Page 58 of Commander

“Yes.”

“I love being here like this. It’s simple and…” I paused. “I’m not sure how to say this. It’s easy. Does that make sense?”

“Yes, it does.” He rested his forehead against mine. “You don’t have to always be on guard with me. You can talk to me.”

Tears burned the backs of my eyes.

“I want to. I’ve never had anyone to truly share things with, but I’m worried that once you know my secrets, you’ll…” I trailed off, turning my head away.

“You can trust me.” He tilted my chin up. “Tara, we all have secrets. Yours can’t be any worse than mine.”

“I’m not squeaky clean like you are. I don’t do the right thing even if it will cost me.”

“You think I don’t know that you’ve circumvented numerous international laws in your pro-bono work? Honestly, I’m impressed no one besides Edgar ever challenged you on it.”

“I’m a liability to you.”

“I’ll worry about that. Your need to protect and fight for the underdog is what has endeared you to so many around the world. Although, I’d appreciate if you would refrain from joining any underground organizations of crazy crusaders until I’m out of office.”

I winced inside. Oh boy. I was up shit creek. The plans to get Ameera back were as crazy and vigilante as they got.

He must have noticed my reaction to his words. “Tara, trust me. I trust you.”

Trusting him was something I never thought I could do. Now I wanted to so desperately confide in him, find comfort in him, to know that he would still be there in the end.

“I’ll try,” I whispered.

“That’s all I can ask. I’ll fight for you, T-Rex.”

My heart skipped a beat. He’d said the one thing that would put a crack in my defenses against him.

“I swear I’m going to kick Tyler’s ass,” I muttered. “Why do you call me that? You don’t even know why he gave me the name.”

“I know. It’s because you are tiny, with little arms, but could bite anyone’s head off if they got in the way of your causes.”

“I’ll show you tiny arms.” My fist flew out to punch his shoulder, but he caught it in the palm of his hand.

“Fast, but not fast enough, young Padawan.”

“Young Padawan, my ass. My days as an apprentice are long behind me. I’m a full-fledged Jedi Master.” I beamed at him.

And here was another thing we had in common. Our mutual, geeky love of all things Star Wars.

“Come on.” He ran a thumb over my knuckle. “Let’s see if you can keep up with this old man. For the next few hours, it’s just you, me, and nature.”

I turned up my nose at the last word of his sentence, which resulted in an eye roll from Ashur.

Ashur stood, scooping me up and then throwing me over his shoulder.

I screamed. “What are you doing? Put me down.”

“To change. We’re going to go for a run, and the hell if I’m going to let anyone see you in a bathrobe, Jedi Master or not.”

“You really are a Neanderthal as Tyler said, Mr. Kumar.”

“Never denied it, Mrs. Kumar.”

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