Page 52 of The Bodyguard

But that would blow everything. No leverage. No evidence chain. And Andi would never forgive him for going rogue. Still, he wasn’t going to tell her yet. Not until he had proof she could see, touch, verify. Not until he could look her in the eye and say, ‘This is the man who opened the door.’And not until he knew what else the bastard had compromised.

He stood slowly and let the information soak in. Paragon’s fingerprints weren’t just on Wexler’s money. Paragon’s fingerprints were all over half the real estate deals corrupting Andi’s district. Their MO was always the same—buy loyalty in chunks, wear down resistance with just enough legal distance to avoid fallout.

And now they’d bought someone inside her team.

He texted Cerberus:

Isolate Lennox’s cloud backups. I want GPS tags, message strings, and voice logs. Discrete surveillance only. Do not tip him.

The reply came back instantly.

Affirmative. Confirming proximity logs—device synced near Donato’s personal schedule twice this week.

Twice, which meant the leak wasn’t a trickle. It was a goddamn pipeline.

Mitch pushed away from the desk and crossed to the window again. The street was still. Just a garbage truck humming down the far side and a cyclist slicing through the quiet with a messenger bag swinging off one shoulder. The night pressed against the glass with a steady kind of threat. Not overt. Just constant.

Behind him, the soft rhythm of footsteps padded across the loft.

Andi. She didn’t speak. Didn’t come close. Just passed through, grabbed a blanket from the arm of the couch, and settled on the far end with a book she didn’t open.

Mitch didn’t turn around. He didn’t trust what might show on his face if he did. She was getting to him. Not just under his skin, but beneath it. Deeper than he should have allowed. Her scent clung to the space now—jasmine, honeysuckle and a faint note of citrus she used in her lotion. It wrapped around his thoughts in ways he couldn’t shut off. Made it hard to breathe clean.

The worst part was, he didn’t want to breathe clean anymore. He wanted the mess. The fight. The fire. He wanted her voice in his ear, her hands on his shoulders, her laugh breaking through the places that hadn’t felt human in years.

But that kind of want got people killed. It blurred edges. Dulled instincts. Made men reckless, and reckless got you ambushed in alleys and flanked by your own goddamn client’s campaign staff.

So he stayed quiet. Pulled away. Let her think it was strategy, not survival. But he felt every inch of her. Every breath she took across the room.

She shifted once. He heard the blanket rustle. “You’re quiet,” she said.

He didn’t respond.

“Mitch.”

He turned just enough to look at her over his shoulder. She had one leg tucked under the other, her head tilted as she studied him like she was trying to figure out which version of him she was getting tonight.

“I’m working,” he said.

“You always say that when you’re trying to disappear.”

“I’m trying to keep you alive.”

Her eyes narrowed slightly. “Is that all you’re doing?”

He didn’t answer because the truth wasn’t safe to say.

Andi held his gaze for another second. Then gave a small nod and looked back down at her book. She still didn’t open it. Just held it in her lap like some kind of shield.

Mitch turned back to the window.

Cerberus sent another ping:

We’ve pulled the background on Lennox. Connected address matches drop point for envelope two.

There it was. The connection. Mitch ran a hand over his jaw, tension grinding deep in his teeth. He needed a play that didn’t blow the lead. Something clean. Surgical. A private meet under pretense. Isolate, interrogate, extract.

He checked his watch. Midnight. Too late to act now. Too early to sleep.

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