Page 19 of The Bodyguard

Boss Man sneered. “That’d be a big, fat negative.”

“If you’d answered your text messages,” Paul added.

Jared’s fist slammed into the heavy wood table and made the quartet jump. The corners of his lips quirked. “Watch yourself, kid.”

Kid.The jab had the intended effect. Paul’s irritation was palpable and probably close to how she felt about hisbabe.

“They have been here?” Sawyer’s anger mirrored Jared’s. A tightening fury shifted over his face.

“Yeah,” Boss Man confirmed.

Her slow brewing rage shifted from the secret visit to the implications. She looked between Sawyer and Jared and asked, “Did they blow my cover?”

Jared nodded curtly.

She turned to Paul and her mother. “You blew my cover!” The ramifications snowballed. “Someone tried to kill me—Sawyer’s life was in danger.” Anger skewed her vision. “Because of you two?”

“Babe—”

“Do not,” she hissed, “ever call me that again.”

Undaunted, Paul reached for her hand. “Angela,” he tried.

She smacked his hand away and swung her attention to Rich and Rob. “Why are you here? What do you two need?”

“Well,” Rich said, confidence shaken, “we thought we had a few weeks to discuss this with you—”

“Spit it out before I do,” Jared warned.

“I’m going to run for president,” her mother offered. “And Paul’s going to run for my Senate seat.”

Angela’s jaw dropped. Her mother never wanted to leave the Senate—and Paul? A senator? “What?”

Her mother was unfazed. “It’s not unheard of for a chief of staff to step into a senator’s—”

“Chief of staff?” Angela jerked to Paul. “Since when?”

He reached for her again. “If you were home—”

“I am trying to stay alive until this stupid trial wraps.”

“About that,” her mother said.

Angela’s heart lurched into her throat. “What?”

“We have a problem with the Pham trial,” her mother said with the quick, sharp rip of an unseen metaphorical Band-Aid. “You may have noticed delays in the news.”

“I try not to watch the news.” The pen in Angela’s hand trembled. She let it drop onto the table. “What kind of problem?”

“Pham wants to cut a deal,” Paul said. “The Feds are considering it.”

Her mind spun. She wanted to testify. She wanted Pham in prison. But the insane part of her cared about the old man who cared—pretendedto care—for her. He listened. He knew her likes. He spent time with her. He kidnapped her and kept her for years but acted more like family than the two people at her side. “The Feds have to talk to me first. They told me that. They would do nothing unless they talked to me first.”

“Well, lucky you, with a mother in high places,” Jared muttered.

Her mother snarled at Jared but then softened for Angela. “Dear, look, there’s more to it. We can turn this into a good situation.”

“Samantha,” Jared warned.

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