Page 19 of Big Bodyguard
I turn slowly, my breath catching. The trees loom tall, their shadows swallowing the path back to the cabin. My pulse pounds so hard it drowns out everything else.
“Jack?” I whisper, though I know deep down in my heart that he wouldn’t creep up on me like this.
The next sound is faster, closer. Heavy. Deliberate.
Before I can react, an arm snakes around me from behind, crushing my chest. A gloved hand clamps over my mouth, smothering my scream.
Panic explodes in me like dynamite. My camera slips from my shoulder, hitting the ground with a sickening thud. I thrash, kicking, clawing, but the man holding me is huge, his strength unyielding.
“Got you,” a rough voice growls against my ear. The reek of stale cigarettes and sweat hits my nose, making me gag.
I try to bite, but his grip tightens, his arm squeezing so hard around my ribs I can barely draw breath.
“Shh. Don’t make this harder,” he hisses. “Your bodyguard isn’t here to save you this time, sweetheart.”
The world tilts, fear blinding me. All I can think to do is pray for Jack to find me.
Please, Jack…
Chapter Eight
Jack
The call came in clipped and urgent, the kind of tone I know too well. The senator’s head of security, voice low and grim, telling me there’s been another threat.
I knew the attack at the club wasn’t random, but hearing that there’s been another threat—specifically against Charlie this time, not just against the senator himself…
My jaw clenches so hard it aches.
Not random. Charlie wasn’t in the wrong place at the wrong time. She was the target.
And she’s here. With me. Out in the open.
I look around the perimeter, scanning the tree line, every sense sharpened to a knife’s edge. Ten minutes I’ve been out here. Ten minutes checking fences, shadows, prints in the dirt. Everything looks clean. Quiet. Too fucking quiet.
Still, I don’t like it. Not one bit.
A one-man security detail for the senator’s daughter—yeah, it sounds reckless on paper. But I’m not just anyone. If they want to get to her, they’ll have to go through me. And I’ll put every last one of them in the ground before I let that happen.
She doesn’t know it, but I’d readily die for her.
And that’s the problem.
I rake a hand down my face, a humorless laugh grinding out of me. Christ, when did this happen? When did she stop being an assignment and become…everything?
She’s only been in my life for a couple of days. Barely a week, and that’s including the time I watched her before she left Washington DC. And yet I can’t picture walking away from her when this is all over.
She’s mine now. I’ve claimed her. Or maybe she’s claimed me. Charlotte Freeman has gotten under my skin in a way no one ever has.
The way she responds to my kisses…the way she looks at me and calls me Daddy like a good girl…everything she does leaves an imprint on me.
And last night…fuck. Last night broke me wide open. I tasted her innocence, claimed it, and there’s no going back.
I check my watch again. Ten minutes gone. Feels like an hour. I need to get back inside, need to see her.
My gut is screaming at me now, the instincts that never fail me tightening like a noose.
Move. Get her out. Don’t waste another second.
