Page 6 of The Bodyguard

With a thousand-yard stare, the woman’s eyes remained straight ahead, as though the other people weren’t in the room.

“I’ll get an update on Jared,” Ibrahim volunteered.

Sawyer nodded. “Thanks.” They’d had a major security breach. How the hell had anyone found Angela? They’d gone more than a year since Pham’s network had put a hit out on her. After all this time without so much as a blip, a lone assassin found her in Abu Dhabi.

Sawyer picked up the PSM. The lightweight pistol fit in the palm of his hand. He ejected the mag, pulled back the slide and lifted it from the frame, and removed the recoil spring, rendering the weapon temporarily useless. “Give her some room, Angela.”

Angela ignored him and poised before her attacker like a rattlesnake focused on its prey. “What did I ever do to you?”

“Nothing, Ange. That’s the point.” He put the pistol and its parts on an end table piled with therapy and entertainment magazines. “You’re not a person to these people. You’re a target. A paycheck.”

Angela reared her hand back and slapped the assassin. The impact snapped her head to the side—a red welted handprint arose on her cheek.

Ibrahim jumped for Angela. Sawyer stared. Her crisp blouse was partially untucked from her skirt. Stray hairs had escaped her tight ponytail. Those details wouldn’t have been noticeable if he hadn’t known how exacting Angela was in her appearance and how tightly she tried to control life. “Let her go.”

Ibrahim shot him a look. Sawyer nodded. Angela had lost control. Her nostrils flared. He had no idea what had happenedin her therapy session. But she was face to face with the threat they had been avoiding. It was real. Everything she tried to ignore, to play off and pretend didn’t exist, was very real and deadly.

Ibrahim let Angela go. She balanced in high heels and smoothed a skirt that made her legs go on for days.

The shooter probed the inside of her own cheek with her tongue and slowly faced ahead again, not saying a damn word.

“You want an answer that you’re not going to get,” Ibrahim said quietly.

Sawyer agreed. Ibrahim understood. Mercenary assassins didn’t offer chit-chat. They didn’t have experience with capture and forced conversations with their targets. They wouldn’t provide answers to questions from their near-kills, and even if they did, they wouldn’t be able to explain why they’d taken shots—at least not in a way that would make sense to Angela. Angela Sorenson was a payday.

He walked behind Angela and placed his hands on her shoulders. “Even if she had something to say, it won’t be what you want to hear.” Sawyer pressed his fingers into the straps of her Kevlar vest. “She’s a paid gun. A lone operative. The only thing she’s thinking about is her next move.” He kept his eyes on the shooter’s thousand-yard stare and dropped his voice. “She’s calculating how to get loose. How to eliminate everyone in the room. What to expect when Boss Man shows up. What to do when she’s moved to transport. How to handle lockup. How to escape.”

Angela glanced over her shoulder. From inches away, her eyes searched his. “She tried to kill me.”

For the first time, her voice betrayed fear. Anger curled in his chest. “Not if I’m around. Have you ever noticed what we do at work?” He laughed, but it didn’t lighten the mood.

Angela pulled away and glared as if she’d never considered that Titan dealt with risks of death on a nearly daily basis.

Sawyer let her walk to Ibrahim.

“Come,” Ibrahim urged. “Let’s go. We can talk in my office.”

“I have had enough therapy today.” Angela looked from Ibrahim to the shooter and then to the bullet holes that puckered the walls. Her gaze swept over the upturned furniture and returned to her therapist. “I’m sorry about your office.”

Sawyer snorted. The woman had dodged bullets and retaliated against her attacker, and now she offered an apology for chaos. “This isn’t on you, sweetheart.”

“To the contrary,” she murmured. “I’d say I’m one hundred percent the reason.”

Sawyer glanced at Ibrahim. They could team up and explain the hell out of the circumstances when she didn’t have adrenaline coursing through her blood. Angela was logical. This would make sense. But now was not the time. His only focus was on returning Angela safely to the fortress they called home.

CHAPTER THREE

A full day had slipped by, and Sawyer remained clueless about the previous day’s assault. It didn’t require a genius to figure out the motive for the attempt on Angela’s life. Tran Pham didn’t want her on the witness stand. Looming threats were why Angela had been tucked away in Abu Dhabi. But after years in hiding, how had Angela’s location been compromised? With each passing moment of silence and a lack of answers, Sawyer grew restless.

Jared Westin had promised Sawyer an intelligence briefing that morning. Then nothing happened. His boss had gone dark—not a word from Jared about their missed briefing and not a word to Angela, keeper of the schedule and wrangler of their team. If she didn’t know where Jared was… Sawyer’s stomach churned. Something was wrong.

His heel bounced. Sawyer repositioned on the couch. An undercurrent of tension knotted through his muscles as he scoured the luxurious lobby that covertly housed Titan’s Middle East headquarters. He wished he were near Angela. But she didn’t require a protective detail on their property.

Titan had eyes all over the building. Cameras covered every square inch of public space and the gated private offices with NSA-level security protocols. Half of the hotel staff had backgrounds that should have made Sawyer feel comfortable when Angela was in meetings on her own. Bellhops with black belts, a retired Green Beret for a concierge, and a head chef with a former life as a CIA asset were within fifty meters of his position. They could be called upon if there were a problem anywhere in the hotel.

The farthest elevator door opened. Liam and Hagan walked out and, seeing him posted like a sentry, walked over.

Sawyer strode forward and met them. “Any word on Boss Man?”

---