All Chapters of BEAUTY AND THE BODYGUARD: DANGEROUS DESIRE BOOK 2: Chapter 111 - Chapter 120

ZADE'S POVI didn’t say it out loud. But the words were there anyway, sitting in my chest like something I’d swallowed without meaning to.I stood there for a long time, the night air cool against my skin, the sea moving below, the blood on my knuckles slowly drying.Eventually I pushed away from the wall.My knuckles were split across two joints, the skin broken cleanly against the stone. I pressed them against my thigh and felt the sting of it and welcomed the pain because it was simple and honest and so much easier to deal with than the thing currently happening inside my chest.I stood still for a moment.Just breathed.The night air moved around me, warm and thick with the smell of the sea and the wild thyme that grew between the garden stones. Beautiful night. The kind of night that had no business containing what was turning over in my head.I love you, Zade.Three words from a sleeping woman's mouth.Said without armor. Without calculation. The way things came out when the con

ZADE'S POVThrough the hallway, stepping around what was on the floor, Nancy keeping her eyes forward the way I'd told her to. Down the stairs. Through the lower level—kitchen, back corridor, service passage that led toward the rear of the property.She stayed exactly where I needed her to stay. Moved when I moved. Stopped when I stopped, no hesitation, no second-guessing. Every pressure of my hand answered with immediate response.Not passive. Not frozen.She was choosing this actively with every step, which was the bravest thing I had watched anyone do in a very long time.Two more men came through the back door as we reached the kitchen.I moved her behind me in one motion, putting my body between her and the threat, and handled what needed handling.When I turned back she was pale but her jaw was set. Her eyes were clear."Still with me?" I asked, low."Still with you," she said, without a single beat of hesitation.We went through the back door.The night air hit us, warm and sal

NANCY'S POVNot the comfortable cool of the villa's air conditioning or the pleasant chill of the sea at night. This cold was passive. The cold of thick stone walls that never got warm, of a space that the sun never reached, of air that had been sitting in the same place for too long.It settled against my bare arms and legs and feet like a presence.My feet.Bare feet on a stone floor. Cold and slightly gritty under my soles, the individual roughness of old stone that had never been smoothed or finished. I tried to pull my feet back and couldn't. Something was around my ankles. Rope. Thick and coarse and tied with the efficiency of someone who knew what they were doing. Each ankle secured to a separate leg of whatever I was sitting on.A chair. Wood. Old—I could feel where the joints weren't quite tight anymore, a faint give in the structure when I shifted my weight.My wrists were tied behind me. The same thick rope, the same efficient knots. My shoulders ached from the angl

NANCY'S POV"The plan was simple and elegant," he continued as though I hadn't spoken. "Mischka would gain your trust. Keep you isolated. Make you feel safe. And when the time was right, he would bring you to me." Something moved through his eyes. "I grew impatient waiting for him to complete the delivery. So I completed it myself.""You're lying." My voice was steady. I made it steady. "You're trying to make me doubt him.""Of course you would say that." He reached into the inner pocket of his jacket and produced his phone. Unhurried. Completely certain of what came next. "That's the natural response. Doubt the information rather than doubt the person." He turned the phone screen toward me. "Watch this."I didn't want to watch it.I watched it.The video was clear and well-lit. An office somewhere—expensive furniture, large windows, the kind of office that belonged to someone with significant money and the comfort of never having to explain where it came from.Two men seated a

ZADE'S POVI woke up with a splitting headache. It felt like someone had taken a hammer to the back of my skull and was still swinging. As soon as I opened my eyes, the pain in my shoulders hit me like fire. Both of them burned at the same time, a deep tearing ache that went all the way down into my chest and up into my neck. I tried to move my arms but they wouldn't come down. They were stuck above my head, chained tight to something above me. The metal was cold and heavy around my wrists. My feet weren't touching the floor. I was hanging there, my whole body weight pulling on my shoulders, stretching them past what they could take.The place was dim. Just a weak light somewhere behind me that didn't reach far. Stone walls all around, dark and wet-looking. The air smelled damp and old, like earth that had never seen the sun, mixed with old wood and something stale. It was cold too. The kind of cold that sank into your bones and stayed there.My head throbbed worse when I tried to thi