Opening
These chapters swing from romantic high to heart-stopping danger. A fake proposal, a real kiss, and a brutal “breakup” collapse into a single truth: love demands risk, and sometimes protection looks like betrayal.
What Happens
Chapter 26: A Blank
Hannah Brooks steps into a sterile new apartment and feels the hollowness of “freedom.” She’s fallen for Jack Stapleton and their pretend relationship, and now the exit she once craved feels like exile. Her new security detail is Taylor—assigned, Taylor claims, by Hannah’s own request—salt in the wound. Then a viral video lands: Kennedy Monroe surprises Jack at his Houston home, cooing through a puff-piece interview before proposing on camera. The cliffhanger ends without an answer, but the theme of Appearance vs. Reality kicks in as Hannah dissects Jack’s posture and gaze, convinced there’s zero attraction.
Rewatching, she spots her beaded safety pin hanging from Jack’s necklace—an electric jolt of hope. A knock interrupts: Robby, her ex, tries to win her back, sneers at Taylor outside the door, and accuses Hannah of never letting him in. The barb hits—and clarifies. Robby’s right that she kept him at a distance, but wrong that he ever deserved closeness. Hannah finally understands Love and Vulnerability: with Jack, connection feels real. She thanks Robby for showing her “what love isn’t” and shuts the door for good.
Chapter 27: Delusional Optimism
The day before Thanksgiving, Jack FaceTimes Hannah, buoyant. The Corgi Lady stalker is caught in a sting with Glenn Schultz and the police; her sister is taking her and the corgis back to Florida. With the threat neutralized, Jack invites Hannah to the ranch. She says no—clean break, no mess—even as the Kennedy video churns in her head.
Jack drops the real reason. He tilts the camera to his chest: her beaded safety pin hangs from his necklace. He confesses he hasn’t been hitting golf balls; he’s been combing the riverbank with his dad’s metal detector to find her pin, “because of the look on your face when you realized it was lost.” The gesture reframes Protection and Security: it’s not just his safety she’s guarded; he’s been guarding her heart. Hannah can’t resist. She says yes to Thanksgiving.
Chapter 28: To What We Hold Onto
Hannah arrives at a warm, noisy potluck—and sees Kennedy Monroe seated beside Jack. Gut-punched, she parks herself at the far end, already crafting her exit. During the family tradition of thank-yous, Doc’s moonshine loosens her tongue. She speaks about not running from hard things anymore and choosing what to “hold onto,” threading her grief and growth into a toast that lands squarely in Grief, Family, and Healing. The table applauds; the Stapletons glow.
Later at the bonfire, Kennedy calls Hannah “ordinary” and demands a vote: who should Jack choose? Jack calmly raises his hand for Hannah. Then his parents, Hank Stapleton and Connie Stapleton, join him, followed by the entire protection team. Kennedy leaves at Jack’s request. Alone, Jack admits his “relationship” with Kennedy was a publicity stunt. He teases out the cruel “bad kisser” comment from Robby, then answers with proof: a fierce, grounding kiss that leaves them stumbling toward his room before Doc interrupts. Jack asks Hannah on a real date, calls her the “after” to all his superficial “before”s, and she finally believes him. She says yes.
Chapter 29: A Choice
Back at her half-unpacked apartment, Hannah spirals: nothing to wear, nerves spiraling, doubt everywhere. Taylor knocks—returning borrowed things, offering a quiet, earnest apology. Hannah doesn’t forgive her, but she lets Taylor help with clothes, hair, makeup. It’s a tiny but meaningful truce, the start of repair.
Walking up Jack’s drive, Hannah battles a “catwalk of ex-girlfriends” in her mind and the old injuries from her mother, Robby, and Taylor. She chooses courage. Facing Your Fears is a decision, and she makes it—to hope, to try, to date a movie star even if it feels ridiculous. She presses the doorbell.
Chapter 30: Code Silver
Jack answers—and becomes a stranger. New haircut, contacts, a star’s icy veneer. He sneers at their “date,” asks, “Did you think that was real?” and claims the confession, the bonfire, the kiss were an acting exercise to prove his mother wrong. He slams the door on her foot, leaving it bleeding. Humiliated, Hannah limps away, fury and shame crowding out oxygen.
Then training snaps into place. She replays the scene: his rigid posture, the door opened only a crack, a flash of fear in his eyes. Something is off. She pulls security footage on her iPad and sees the truth: a man inside with a gun to Jack’s head. The cruelty was cover. She dials 911 and Glenn; Glenn orders her to stand down and threatens her London promotion. She hangs up—choosing Jack over everything. She runs inside, tracks them to the roof. The door slams, the gunman startles, turns, and shoots her.
Character Development
Hannah Brooks Hannah stops running. She moves from isolation to hope to a decisive, sacrificial love, proving her instincts and heart can coexist.
- Accepts she kept Robby at arm’s length—and that he never earned closeness
- Sees Jack’s necklace and lets hope back in
- Names what she’ll “hold onto” at Thanksgiving, choosing presence over avoidance
- Accepts Taylor’s help without absolving her, showing guarded generosity
- Trusts her training under pressure, overriding humiliation to save Jack—even at the cost of her career
Jack Stapleton Under the charm sits steadfast care. Jack’s grand gesture and public loyalty reveal grit beneath the movie-star shine.
- Spends mornings metal-detecting to find Hannah’s safety pin, then wears it
- Publicly chooses Hannah over Kennedy and ejects the spectacle
- Reframes their connection as his “after”—a new life beyond superficiality
- Delivers a cruel performance at the door to keep Hannah safe, embodying love as protection
Taylor A quiet step toward redemption.
- Offers an unvarnished apology without excuses
- Supports Hannah’s date prep, signaling willingness to rebuild trust
Themes & Symbols
Appearance vs. Reality Illusion rules these chapters: the Kennedy romance is a PR construct; Jack’s front-door cruelty is a shield; the “resolved” stalker threat masks a worse danger. What the world sees and what is true diverge sharply, and reading the gap becomes the difference between heartbreak and survival.
Love and Vulnerability Hannah’s arc reframes strength as openness. She risks humiliation to show up, names her needs publicly, and breaks protocol to save Jack. The story insists that intimacy requires exposure—and that courage is measured not by stoicism, but by the willingness to be hurt.
Protection and Security Professional duty evolves into personal devotion. Once the official threat clears, the intimate one explodes. Hannah’s skills—observation, pattern recognition, baseline behavior—become the bridge from romance to rescue, turning bodyguarding into love enacted.
Symbol: The Safety Pin The beaded pin carries Hannah’s past pain and resilience; Jack’s relentless search and daily wear transform it into a promise. When he returns it with his brother Drew Stapleton’s necklace, it fuses memory and future—two lives choosing to hold onto each other.
Key Quotes
“Thanks for showing me what love isn’t.” Hannah reframes a breakup as clarity. The line closes the Robby chapter and opens space for real intimacy with Jack.
“Because of the look on your face when you realized it was lost.” Jack’s reason for finding the pin exposes his compass: he reads Hannah’s pain and moves toward it. It’s protection as tenderness.
“Ordinary.” Kennedy’s insult sparks a public test—and a public choosing. Jack’s raised hand redefines “ordinary” as the courage to be real.
“Bad kisser.” What Robby uses to belittle, Jack redeems with action. The kiss becomes evidence: Hannah’s connection with Jack is visceral, mutual, and unperformed.
“Did you think that was real?” The line weaponizes Hannah’s deepest fear—that she misread love. Its coldness is a deliberate mask, one she must pierce with training instead of emotion.
“He shot me.” The cliffhanger snaps the book from romantic fulfillment into high-stakes survival, fusing genres and raising the emotional and physical stakes at once.
Why This Matters and Section Significance
This stretch delivers the romantic payoff and detonates it into a thriller. The long-simmering “will they/won’t they” from Chapter 1-5 resolves with a public choice and a first real kiss—then flips as Hannah’s humiliation becomes a tactical clue. Her pivot from wounded lover to clear-eyed protector validates her competence and completes her transformation: she no longer flees danger; she runs into it for love.
The result is a decisive turning point. Hannah sacrifices her career dream for Jack, proving growth through action. The narrative uses rom-com grammar—the grand gesture, the moonshine toast, the bedroom stumble—then subverts it with a rooftop gun and a bullet, propelling the story into its final act with all stakes—heart and life—at their peak.