All Chapters of The Bodyguards boy : Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

64 Chapters

Sparkles and Smoke

The LGBTQ Gala was everything a PR team could dream of spotlights dancing across city landmarks, rainbow banners unfurling down the steps of the Grand Vespara Hotel, and cameras flashing like falling stars.The ballroom shimmered with crystal chandeliers and prism-colored lights that danced across marble floors. Banners proclaiming “Visibility is Power” hung beside media walls stamped with the Wesley name in sharp gold letters.Cassian Wesley arrived last.He stepped out of the black car like it was a stage curtain peeling back. He wore white velvet an immaculate tux stitched with subtle embroidery across the shoulders. A silver phoenix in flight shimmered faintly beneath the lights, rising out of velvet like a secret reborn.People stared. Cameras clicked. Even the moon seemed to pause.Rowan trailed behind in a charcoal grey suit, the crisp collar open, no tie. He was a shadow dressed in elegance, quiet power beneath polished restraint. If Cassian was fire, Rowan was the steel that

Smoke Without Fire

The penthouse was dim when they returned, the glitter of the gala behind them, but its consequences still simmering in their bones.Cassian stood at the floor-to-ceiling windows, staring at the city like it owed him answers. Rowan paced behind him, his movements tight, controlled. The silence between them was no longer companionable. It was explosive.“I didn’t leak that video,” Cassian said for the third time, his voice taut.“I know,” Rowan replied, but his jaw ticked.“You don’t sound like you know.”Rowan turned sharply. “Because we were going to leak it, Cassian. That was the plan.”“But we didn’t.”“And yet it happened anyway.”Cassian turned to face him. “Are you accusing me?”“I’m saying someone did it. And it sure as hell wasn’t me.”They glared at each other, tension crackling between them like static. Their near-kiss on the rooftop, the loaded silence since, it all hung between them like unsaid truths.Rowan exhaled and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Let’s go over this ag

Ghosts in the wire

Morning light crept into the penthouse through gauzy drapes, casting soft shadows across the floor. But there was no peace in the glow just exhaustion wearing yesterday’s clothes.Cassian hadn’t slept. The message from the unknown number had replayed in his mind all night like a ticking clock.Happy almost birthday, Cassian.He stared at his laptop, bleary-eyed, the blue glow accentuating the lines of worry etched into his face. He refreshed the security logs again.Still three access attempts. Still one unknown ID.Rowan entered the room, unshaven, shirt half-buttoned. “You’re still up?”Cassian didn’t look at him. “Did you know there were remote login attempts on the server?”Rowan’s brows furrowed. “No. You’re sure?”Cassian turned the laptop toward him. “Look. Two are yours. The third is untagged. Not from my system. Not from yours.”Rowan leaned in. “Could be a hacker. Could be someone we missed.”Cassian’s jaw tightened. “Could be someone watching us.”The tension between them h

White Lies

The morning after felt deceptively ordinary.Sunlight spilled over the penthouse’s terrace, glinting off the half-assembled poolside bar. Staff in matching polos moved around briskly, adjusting white parasols, hanging shimmering paper lanterns, and arranging tables draped in ivory linen.Cassian stood barefoot at the edge of the pool, coffee in hand, watching his reflection ripple on the water. The all-white theme was starting to take shape gleaming loungers, frosted glassware, floral arrangements bursting with lilies and orchids. It was beautiful, expensive, and intentionally curated to scream control when inside he felt anything but.“Looks like something out of a magazine,” Taryn said as she appeared at his side, clipboard in one hand, headset around her neck. “You sure you want to go through with this?”Cassian smirked faintly. “Why wouldn’t I?”Taryn gave him a look. “You’ve got a countdown hanging over your head. Throwing a pool party sounds… counterintuitive.”“That’s the poin

Over the edge

The sun was already beginning its slow descent, casting golden fire over the city when Cassian stepped onto the penthouse terrace.Rows of low tables were draped in white linen, champagne buckets sweating against the humid air. The rooftop pool glittered like liquid crystal, its surface reflecting strings of white fairy lights stretched above. Guests mingled in crisp white linen dresses, linen shirts, tailored shorts, wide-brimmed hats. The scent of sea salt from the man-made rooftop breeze mixed with the sweetness of champagne and the faint, clean burn of pool chlorine.Cassian had dressed the part white beach shorts with gold drawstrings, a thin linen shirt unbuttoned to mid-chest, sleeves rolled casually. The light kissed his collarbone, catching on the fine chain resting against his skin. His bare feet padded silently across the deck as he scanned the crowd.He’d told himself this party wasn’t about celebration. It was about distraction. About drowning the past few weeks in music

Ashes on the water

Back in the city, Rowan was halfway to his apartment when his phone rang.Lennox.The words that came through were jagged, frantic:“Cassian’s… car explosion coastal highway the bridge”Rowan didn’t hear the rest. His chest caved in. He turned the car around so hard the tires shrieked, the world narrowing to a single thought that screamed through his skull.If Cassian was gone if those last words between them were the fight they’d never take back Rowan wasn’t sure he’d survive it.He pushed the car past its limits, city lights warping into streaks of color in his peripheral vision. Sirens rose ahead, sharper with every turn. The taste of smoke hit his tongue before he even saw the scene.The bridge loomed broken, burning, alive with chaos.Blue and red strobes painted the smoke. The acrid scent of gasoline and scorched rubber clawed at his throat. Fire crews moved like grim shadows in the glare, their shouted orders cutting through the roar of the river below.Police lines barred the

Beneath the current

Cold.That was the first thing he knew cold that wasn’t just on the surface, but deep, invasive, clawing into the marrow of his bones. The ocean swallowed him whole, pressing in from all sides as if determined to erase him. Cassian kicked instinctively, arms flailing through water that felt heavier than gravity itself. His lungs screamed, desperate for air, but the dark waves pressed down, unrelenting.The last thing he remembered clearly was laughter his own, a brittle thing fed by too much liquor and then headlights, wind, speed. And then betrayal. Hands that touched him too familiarly, shoving him, not holding him. A blur of motion, the car, the bridge. The sharp rush of saltwater closing over his head.Now it was only chaos.Cassian fought upward, but the surface kept slipping farther away. Every movement was sluggish, like swimming through wet cement. His beach shirt twisted around him, tangling against his body like a net. Panic roared in his chest, hotter than the freezing wave

The Ashes They Claimed

Morning broke like shattered glass.The city’s skyline was gray, muted, veiled by smoke that still lingered from the night before. The headlines hit before the sun had fully risen:CASSIAN WESLEY DEAD IN FIERY CRASH.Wesley heir perishes in midnight explosion.Highway inferno claims another life of privilege.Screens blared the story. Phones buzzed with alerts. Paparazzi swarmed outside the Wesley tower, their lenses pointed at every window, every door, hungry for the shot of a grieving mother or an enraged father.Inside, grief clung to the penthouse like smoke.Rowan hadn’t slept. He sat in the corner of Cassian’s living room, the leather couch creaking beneath him whenever he shifted, though he barely moved. His hands still smelled faintly of smoke, though he’d scrubbed them raw. His shirt clung damply to his back, his hair mussed from dragging his hands through it over and over.In his head, he replayed the same loop: Cassian his voice sharp Fall for me? Admit you already have?”An

Echo’s in the dark

The city never really slept, but tonight it felt like it was mourning. Headlines flickered across glowing screens on every corner:CASSIAN WESLEY PRESUMED DEAD IN COASTAL HIGHWAY EXPLOSION.A neat, devastating line for the tabloids to chew on. A scandal ended. A tragedy reborn. But Rowan Maddox couldn’t accept a single word of it. Not when his chest still burned with the memory of Cassian’s voice, not when his instincts screamed louder than every headline combined. Not when his gut told him Cassian Wesley was still alive.He didn’t go home that night. He couldn’t. The thought of stepping into his apartment quiet, dark, filled with nothing but his own reflection was unbearable. Instead, Rowan returned to the Wesley penthouse.The space was heavy with absence. Curtains drawn tight, city lights leaking in like broken glass. The faint smell of Cassian cologne still hung in the air. Champagne had dried sticky on the counter. Cassian’s robe, white and carelessly draped, lay abandoned over t

Stop Digging

The night pressed in around Rowan like a weight. He had been moving through it for hours, the city’s lights slipping past the windshield of his car, unregistered, meaningless. He wasn’t heading anywhere specific, not yet, but if he stayed still, if he sat long enough in the penthouse where Cassian’s scent still lingered, he would go mad. Movement kept him sharp. Movement kept him from drowning in the thought that Cassian might already be gone.Every lead so far was a thread, half-cut, leading into shadows that didn’t want to give answers. He had turned the still photo of the car over in his mind until the pixels burned into him. He had memorized the blood-stained wristband he’d found, even the faint metallic smell of it when he’d pressed it to his nose. Ghosts of evidence. And then there was the corrupted feed from the hotel, a deliberate erasure if ever there was one. Whoever had touched that footage knew what they were doing.Rowan’s gut churned with a certainty he couldn’t shake: C

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