Cocky Protector - Kat Mizera Page 0,12

wanted them to potentially find it. Not that I thought they would go looking, but I had all my hopes and dreams and fantasies in there, and now someone had read them. My face flamed at the thought of Ace reading my sexual fantasies. Granted, they were probably pretty tame compared to other women, but they were still mine, and not for anyone else’s eyes.

I got angrier and angrier as I watched him, and I blew out a breath, trying to decide what to do.

What if it wasn’t him?

It was hard to verify whether or not that was Ace, considering the quality of this picture, and that scared me a little more, because then I could be in serious danger. Whoever it was had access to my home. To me. And that was unacceptable.

Not for the first time since my father had passed, I missed him. He would have handled this by now. Just like he’d handled my lying, cheating husband. I felt a stray tear leak from my eye and swiped at it angrily. I was my father’s daughter, and though he was gone, he hadn’t raised me to be a wimp. I’d been meek through my formative years because my mother insisted that was how ladies behaved, but a bad marriage and losing the man I loved and respected more than anyone had changed me, so I couldn’t allow myself to be victimized without disrespecting my father.

And the first thing I was going to do was confront whomever this was. Lt. Colonel Wayne Barrow had raised me and there had to be at least a little of his huge heart and military savviness in me. And even if there wasn’t, I was going to fake it. I didn’t have a choice.

I gave my students mostly busy work the rest of the day. I didn’t like to do that, but with exams coming up, working on a study guide was both functional and something they would have done anyway. It gave me the time I needed to think, wrap my head around everything going on. Part of me was terrified while the rest of me was determined. I could and would get to the bottom of this. I had a plan and I wasn’t stupid. I knew the neighborhood between the school and my apartment like the back of my hand, every alley, shop and streetlamp. I had Mace in my purse and I knew Mr. Koelzig at the chocolate shop always looked for me. If I walked past his shop, he would be watching for me and give me a sample of something.

I couldn’t plan for everything, but by the time I left school I was prepared for what I considered the confrontation of a lifetime. It was possible Ace, or whoever my stalker was, wouldn’t be following me home today, but he’d spent hours at my apartment. Obviously, he wanted something he hadn’t found because from what I could tell, he’d left without taking anything. I couldn’t be sure since the camera was set up in the living room and I couldn’t see what he did in the other rooms, but unless he took something small enough to fit in his pockets, he hadn’t had anything with him when he’d headed toward the door.

So today, and every day until I could confront this guy, I would be prepared.

I kept the Mace in my hand and my hand in the pocket of my coat as I walked toward Mr. Koelzig’s bakery. I kept my pace pretty slow, pausing to look in stores and pretending to window-shop. I stopped to speak to people I recognized, pet a few dogs, and even took the time to buy a loaf of bread because I actually needed it. The whole time I had my eye on a guy in a leather jacket and a baseball cap who was walking on the other side of the street. It could have been anyone, but he wasn’t getting lost in the crowds when I stopped and I felt a slight rush of adrenaline as I realized it was probably him. I didn’t know who him was, but it had to be my stalker.

I walked into Mr. Koelzig’s bakery and smiled at him. “Do you mind if I go out your back door?” I asked when he approached me. “One of my students has a crush on me and keeps trying to give me presents, so I’m trying to avoid him.”

He smiled. “Well, as beautiful as