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“Laina, he straight up lied to you.”
“Excuse me!” I say, recoiling. “My dad doesn’t just go around lying to people.”
“He would to get what he wants. Which in this case, seems to be blind vengeance.”
“Everett! That is a horrible snap judgement!”
“If he cared about anything else, he would have come straight back here, back to you, the minute he walked out of that plane crash.”
“He-”
My retort catches in my throat. What? No. Dad has a perfectly good reason for what he’s doing. It’s stopping a criminal warlord. It’s righting wrongs. It’s a well-thought-out plan, not blind vengeance.
“Laina,” Everett says firmly. “I understand. It’s your dad. You worship your dad-”
Enough with this casting-doubt-shtick. “Hold up, did you marry me in order to help me or not? Why do that and then try to talk me out of this?”
“I had no idea about this secret mission thing,” Everett holds his hand up in the air in innocence. “I thought maybe you would have some new information about the Vidovic Group and I wanted to be aware of any threats that might have been made against you. I did not know that you were determined to put yourself in harm’s way.”
“Isn’t that why you’re here?”
“No, Laina Amelia Caledonia Beretta Milenna, it’s my job to make sure you stay out of harm’s way.”
I don’t so much as bat an eyelash at his attempt to lighten the mood. Everett takes a breath, then switches to a pleading tone. “I have to keep you safe, away from danger.”
The back and forth, the emotions of the day that have been swirling around me rear up. I shake my head to clear my thoughts, but Everett takes it as me saying no.
“People died!” he says, raising his voice just enough to make his point. “My mom, my dad, your mom, they died for this. And when someone comes after us for this dossier, it’s going to be you or me. And I’m not going to let it be you.”
The fight is knocked out of me at the implication of what Everett, my bodyguard, is saying.
“That’s ridiculous,” I whisper, then clear my throat. “You don’t have to die to protect me.”
“But I would. Every single day, I would take a bullet for you, I would do whatever it takes to keep you safe.”
“No job, no career, no salary is worth that,” I reply.
Something snaps in Everett. His self-control runs out. He lunges forward and swoops his hands to either side of my neck.
“You are, Laina,” Everett says, his face close to mine, full of conviction and unfeigned emotion. “You are worth that.”
There’s a flash of honesty that passes between us, a lightning crack, a new awakening. It illuminates something that I’ve never seen before, something I’ve been blind to up until this point. Could it be?
“No,” I whisper in surprise, delight racing through my veins as my heart pounds. Could he-?
Everett drops his hands from my blushing cheeks and turns away before I can get another look at his expression. But I could swear what I saw was real.
I’m not the only one holding back feelings.
As much as I want to dive into that fact and relish it and respond to it, if that’s the case, I understand how carrying out this mission where I’m potentially in danger would be asking a difficult thing of him.
There’s a lot going on between my dad and the news about his dad and this dossier. Allowing feelings to come towards the surface would only complicate things further.
I come around Everett to face him. “I promise to be as safe as I possibly can,” I say solemnly. “I promise not to put myself at unnecessary risk. I promise to listen to and do everything you tell me to do.”
He arches an eyebrow at me. “Everything I tell you to do?”
My face flushes. “You know what I mean. But yes, please, help me do this.”
