FBI Academy 101: if you want to bypass a hard target, you don't challenge their strengths; you exploit their routines.
Mitch was a creature of absolute tactical efficiency. Before I slipped out, I had spent twenty minutes listening to the rhythm of the house. He had taken up a watch position in the living room, situated perfectly to cover the front door and the hallway leading to the master bedroom. But a standard suburban floor plan always has a blind spot.
I had carefully pried open the master bedroom's ensuite window, working the latch inch by inch to prevent the frame from groaning. Thanks to my academy training on physical surveillance, I knew how to distribute my weight to avoid squeaking floorboards and brittle exterior gravel. I had dropped silently into the side yard's mulch, slipped past the neighbor's motion-sensor floodlight by hugging the shadow line of the privacy fence, and vanished into the Miami night.
I snuck back into the house hours later, the quiet layout of the place mocking me. I couldn't even count how many times I've been picked up by random men who bought me drinks. Usually, they'd say something completely disturbing and I'd just up and leave, or they'd say the right thing, and all of a sudden, I was on top of them in the backseat of their car. I knew I had a problem. But I wasn't doing any drugs. I refused to go down that dark road again.
The buzz was heavy, making my head spin a little, but I still knew my limits. I had drank enough to stop overthinking, enough to blur the sharp edges of the nightmare my life had turned into this evening. I was supposed to just sit here in this safehouse, watch movies, online shop with their plastic, and lounge by a pool. It was a life I absolutely dreaded already, and it was only our first night. It felt like I was trapped in a messed-up marriage before the ink was even dry on the paperwork.
I slipped through the laundry room, using one hand to pull my dress off over my head while setting my phone down with the other. I bundled the fabric up and threw it straight into the washing machine. The washer started with a low rumble, and I made my way out into the hallway, unbuckling my bra in the dark.
Suddenly, a shadow shifted in the hallway, and the overhead light flooded the space. Mitch was standing there, his arms crossed over his chest, his posture perfectly rigid.
"Why aren't you sleeping?" he questioned, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. His robotic professional mask slipped just enough for him to awkwardly turn his head away from my bare chest.
"I—"
Before I could invent a lie, he turned back toward me. His hand reached out, his fingers rough and unyielding as he poked at my neck and the skin of my upper chest.
"Hickeys," he growled.
"No, no." I swatted his hand away, a sudden wave of heat rushing to my face.
"The seal on the side fence was broken," Mitch cut in, his voice dropping into a lethal, fiercely protective register. "You stepped on the pine mulch instead of the stone pavers. Your stride length changed when you crossed the neighbor's property line. You used a classic counter-surveillance pivot to check your six. FBI academy habits."
I swallowed hard, my cheeks burning.
"You went to a dive bar three miles from here. You sat in the corner booth, had a few drinks, and left with a stranger," he recited mechanically, his eyes burning with a controlled, furious heat. "I followed you the entire time, Lauren. I watched you get into his backseat. I know exactly what you did in that car."
A massive wave of embarrassment hit me, hot and suffocating, making the alcohol slosh uncomfortably in my stomach. But the shame instantly twisted into raw, defensive anger.
"You followed me?!" I snapped, pushing past him into my bedroom, my heavy, furious footsteps echoing in the quiet house as he shuffled in right after me. "You watched me? Are you fucking serious, Rapp? That is disgusting!"
"It's my job to keep you alive," he snapped back, his voice thick with a dark, commanding intensity that made my breath hitch.
"Answer me," he commanded, raising his voice when I didn't say anything.
I jumped at his tone, a rare flash of raw anger breaking through his assassin exterior. Underneath the fury, I could tell he was pissed at himself, too. He was a professional, but it had taken him time to realize I had even escaped his perimeter. Still, there was a heavy, suffocating tension radiating off him. He had spent the last hour watching me hook up with a stranger in a dark parking lot, and the sexual frustration rolling off him in waves was almost palpable.
I walked straight into my master bathroom to escape him, but he flipped the bathroom light on and planted himself firmly in the doorframe.
"I went out," I muttered, my hands moving to pull my underwear down, letting them fall to my feet as I tried to ignore his presence.
Mitch didn't look down. His eyes stared intently, almost painfully, at the blank wall directly behind me. "I am trying to keep you safe. If Ghost finds you, he won't just take you, Lauren. He will kill you."
He was absolutely furious, his jaw tight as he stared past me. "You want to go out? I'll go out with you. And if your primary concern under this roof is physical validation, you don't need to risk your life with strangers in a parking lot to get it. I am fully capable of handling your needs safely within the perimeter."
I blinked, completely flustered by the blunt, analytical delivery of the offer. My head was spinning. I let out a dry, slightly nervous laugh as I opened the heavy glass door to the shower, leaning over to turn on the warm water. "I can't exactly go have sex with guys while you're around, Rapp. And it's not like I'm gonna fuck you."
An oppressive silence fell over the room, filled only by the sound of the water hitting the shower floor. The glass door began to rapidly fog up, signaling it was warm enough. I stepped inside and closed the door, watching his dark shadow move closer, pressing right up against the frosted glass.
"Talk to me," he said, tapping firmly on the glass.
"Just do your job, I don't want to talk to you," I called out over the spray, rotating under the warm stream to wet my entire body. "Can I just shower in peace?"
"No."
The shower door flew open, a gust of cold bathroom air blowing inside.
"Why are you so mad?" I demanded, turning to face him, completely naked and defensive. I hated that he was standing in the actual shower stall with me now, encroaching on the only private space I had left.
Mitch stood there, his gaze locked strictly on my eyes, maintaining his serious, unyielding vibe even as the spray began to soak him. He grabbed the collar of his shirt and pulled it over his head in one fluid, aggressive motion, tossing it onto the bathroom floor.
"Apparently, I need to keep a closer eye on you," he said, his voice dropping an octave, thick with a dark, commanding authority that made my pulse race. "Because the second I pull back, you're in a stranger's car risking your life, and I won't let something bad happen to you on my watch."
I stared at his broad, soaking wet chest, completely overwhelmed by the sheer intensity of his focus. Trying to mask just how flustered I actually was, I let out a frustrated sigh and tightly crossed my arms. "If you're going to stand in my shower and lecture me, the least you can do is get out of those wet clothes. It's ridiculous."
I expected him to back down, or at least exit the stall. Instead, Mitch kept his stone-cold, serious demeanor perfectly intact. His hands moved down to his waist. Without a single word or a break in eye contact, he unzipped his pants, stripped them off along with his underwear, and tossed the soaked bundle straight out of the shower door.
He sat down heavily on the built-in tile shower bench. Up close, there was absolutely no hiding the fact that he was very obviously, fiercely hard.
My cheeks flared a deep, burning crimson. My mind went completely blank, the sight making my breath catch in my throat. I was entirely exposed, and so was he, but he didn't look away for a single second.
"I'll just watch," he said, his voice dangerously calm, his dark eyes locked onto me.
I broke eye contact instantly, my heart hammering against my ribs as I whirled around to face the shower wall, letting the warm water hit my back. Trying to play it off and ease the suffocating tension, I reached for the soap and muttered, "I bet you will, you perv."
"Do you want me to step out of the shower, Lauren?" Mitch asked. His voice wasn't teasing. It was serious, steady, and entirely professional.
I stayed quiet.
The silence stretched between us, heavy and thick over the sound of the rushing water. I didn't say yes. I didn't tell him to leave. I just stood there under the spray, my back to him, my skin tingling.
Behind me, I heard a low, almost imperceptible shift in his breathing. Mitch didn't ask again. He immediately understood. He knew that I liked the fact that I had an effect on him—and he knew that I liked knowing he had been watching me this entire time.
