The Bodyguard Who Broke Me
For three years, I slept with my father’s head of security behind everyone’s back.
Last night, with one hand at my throat and the other under my dress, he finally asked for a name, a future, something real.
“After graduation,” I whispered against his mouth. “Let me finish my defense first. Then we’ll tell them.”
“No.”
By then I was shaking beneath him on the leather seat. “Then sooner. On my birthday next Friday. I’ll stop hiding then... Cassian, please—gentler...”
That seemed to satisfy him. His mouth softened against my skin, and his voice dropped low against my ear.
“Good girl. I just want you too much.”
The next afternoon, I met my best friend for tea.
The moment she opened the passenger door, she spotted the torn foil packet caught beside the seat and lifted a brow.
“Bourbon cherry?” she said, already grinning. “That’s our company’s unreleased line. So this is what you’ve been hiding.”
I snatched it up and shoved it into my bag. “It’s not public yet.”
She frowned. “That’s the strange part. We only sent those samples to a handful of VIP clients.” Then she pulled out her phone. “I did a product follow-up with one of them yesterday, and his private account was basically a shrine to his girlfriend.”
She turned the screen toward me.
I only looked once, and my whole body went cold.
The man in the photo had a line of Latin script inked low across his abdomen.
I knew that tattoo.
I had kissed it the night before.
My fingers started shaking as I opened the private account Cassian had never shown me.
April 4. The conservatory. Me and him.
April 7. The upstairs studio. Me and him again.
April 11—last night. A six-second clip in the back of the car.