Page 119 of The Bodyguard's Fall

It was in that moment, with my hand touching his mouth, that I wondered if I overshot my will to resist. We were so close. The day had turned out to be quite terrible, and the thought of going to sleep wrapped in his arms wasn’t the least bit unappealing. Turns out, I didn’t need any willpower. Tate was exhibiting enough for the both of us. Grasping both of my shoulders, he turned me around and marched me toward the bed.

“I’ll do whatever the hell I want. Get back under the covers and face the wall. Do not turn around unless you’re under duress. Got it?”

“What kind of duress?” I asked with big eyes as I settled under the covers.

“OLIVIA.”

A soft laugh huffed out of me. We stared at each other for a long moment, fire between us, but underneath the flames was an ache of wanting and yearning so tender and sweet that I was the first to look away.

Plot Twist: The broody, handsome, irritating, and charming undercover cop who is also posing as a bodyguard can, in fact, do whatever he wants.

At least to me.

Tate: Got anything on the Camry?

Will: Nothing yet. We had a few leads, but they ended up going nowhere. We’ve made it through a third of the list so far.

Will: How are you two holding up?

Tate: I’m crawling out of my skin.

Will: Me too. How’s Liv? You keeping your hands to yourself?

Tate: Trying.

Will: You like her. Don’t you?

Tate: I’m teaching her to box today.

Will: Haven’t you been doing that?

Tate: Not with the gloves. She’s not mad enough. I’m going to try to poke the bear.

Will: How long have you been married now?

Tate: Two weeks.

Will: Yeah. That’s going to go over well.

It was a week before Halloween, and we’d been a married couple for almost two whole weeks. There’d been no sign of Leroy since the shattered window, and we were all on edge waiting to see what might happen next. Strangely for me, having Tate clucking over me like a mother hen had taken the brunt of my worries, as if I’d transferred them to him. The only thing left of me seemed to be a carefree, teasing, flirtatious woman bent on getting under Tate’s skin. I was also sleeping better. Of course, that could be the brooding, stubborn bodyguard lying next to me most nights.

He was back to the old Tate. Bossy and brusque and annoyingly committed to my safety.

Sigh.

For the record, I was extremely grateful for the safety part. I just… Couldn’t we have that and a little harmless flirting to make the whole situation more bearable?

Since we’d been married, we hadn’t had a self-defense lesson. And today, Tate seemed to be making up for lost time.

He had just spent five minutes correcting my fighting stance. Then he pulled out a pair of red boxing gloves from the tractor and dropped them onto the field between us.

“Alright, Rawlins. Up until now, you’ve been practicing your form. And while you’ve gotten better, your punches are still weak. You’re still scared to really hit me, so I’m hoping the gloves will get that out of your head.”

He was going to eat me alive.

I somewhat awkwardly put the gloves on and steeled myself to ignore the bossy attitude and accept the help he was offering. Gratefully. And I’d let him.

To a point.