Page 63 of The Bodyguard

Mitch didn’t look at her. “Not necessarily; I’m calculating.”

“Is there a difference?”

He took the armchair opposite her, elbows resting on his knees. “One makes you dangerous. The other makes you reckless.”

The words landed hard, but she didn’t flinch. She took a sip, let the heat of the mug center her. “You don’t trust me to make this decision.”

“No,” he said. “I don’t trust you to make it without factoring your safety in last.”

Her chest squeezed. Not from guilt. From recognition. He wasn't wrong.

“I’ve had control over every aspect of this campaign,” she said, slow and even. “Every message. Every donor. Every goddamn comma in a press release. And now…” She trailed off, staring at the surface of her coffee.

“Now, someone’s trying to kill you,” Mitch finished, voice quiet but edged in steel.

She nodded once. “And you think that means I’m no longer qualified to decide how I fight.”

“I think it means I’ve seen what happens when people decide from inside the blast radius.”

They sat with that. She looked at him then, really looked. He’d pulled on a simple black T-shirt, jeans buttoned at the waist, barefoot. Casual. At ease. But only on the surface. Beneath that was the man she’d met in the hallway weeks ago—dangerous, focused, unflinching. Only now, she knew what he tasted like. What he sounded like when he lost control. What it felt like to let him have hers.

The mug warmed her hands, but it didn’t touch the burn under her skin.

“I’ve never submitted to anything in my life,” she said. Mitch didn’t blink. “I’m not weak. I’m not some fragile piece of glass that needs to be put on a top shelf until it’s safe again.”

“I know that.”

“But I’m tired, Mitch.” She swallowed hard. “Tired of running toward everything and pretending like I don’t see what’s coming from behind. Tired of being brave for everyone else and pretending like it’s all strategy and optics.”

He stayed silent. Waiting. Letting her give it to him in her own time.

“I’m choosing this,” she said. “Not because I have to. Not because I’m broken. But because I trust you to take the wheel when I need to sit down for a second. I want to fight. I will. But I want to do it as a team. And you—” she let out a quiet laugh, “—you don’t know how to be anything but the one in front.”

Mitch didn’t speak. He set his mug down, stood, and crossed the room in three strides. He didn’t touch her, not yet. Just looked down, eyes locked on hers like he was seeing something new.

“You think this is easy for me?” he asked.

“No.”

“Every instinct I have is about control. About containment. But with you…” His jaw flexed. “With you, it’s never been about command. It’s about responsibility. You’re not a job anymore, Andi. You’re the line I won’t cross. Even when it kills me.”

Something in her throat burned.

He reached for her then, one hand sliding beneath her hair, curling at the nape of her neck. The other traced her jaw, steady and sure. “You give this to me, you don’t get to take it back the second it’s inconvenient. You hand me your safety, you don’t get to argue in the middle of a firefight.”

“I won’t,” she whispered.

“Say it.”

“I trust you.”

His eyes darkened. “And if I say stay down, you’ll stay down?”

“Yes.”

“If I say run, you run?”

She nodded. “Yes.”

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