“The elevator will take you straight there. He’s inside. Try not to break anything.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
He just laughs to himself and shuts off the engine, seeming content to stay where he is. So, I follow his instructions and go in the elevator, which only goes down a couple of floors.
The doors open into his penthouse, and I find Vanguard in the kitchen, leaning against the counter with a cup of coffee in his hands. He’s wearing a simple black T-shirt and jeans, his feet bare, his hair still damp from a recent shower. He looks incredibly normal.
Just incredible, period.
I swallow hard, feeling all my hair stand on end. I’m not going to survive this man, am I?
“You came,” he says.
“Danny didn’t give me much choice.”
“Danny offered you a ride. You could have said no.”
He’s right. I could have. The fact that I didn’t says everything I’m trying not to say.
“How was the tour?” he asks, setting down his coffee. “Did Julia roll out the red carpet?”
“She showed me some things.” I stay near the door, keeping distance between us, though I know it’s futile in the end. “Some biology labs, monitoring stations, that room that looks like a dentist chair from hell.”
Something flickers across his face. “And?”
“She warned me to keep things professional. Between us. Between you and me.”
“Uh huh.” He doesn’t look amused.
“She said you have a tendency to become fixated. That whatever I think is happening between us isn’t real. That it’s just programming.” I force myself to meet his eyes. “Dopamine responses designed to create a bond.”
Vanguard is very still. “And you believed her?”
“I don’t know what to believe.”
I don’t know whatthisis.
He carefully sets down his coffee. “She told me the same thing. Last night, after the gala. Was sitting here and waiting for me when I got home.” I raise my brows at the idea of her just waltzing in here. “Warned me to stay away from you. Said I was letting my obsessive tendencies get the better of me.”
“Are you?”
“Probably.” He pushes off the counter, slowly moving toward me with predatory grace. “Does that bother you?”
“It probably should…”
“But does it?”
He stops in front of me, close enough that I can smell what soap he used, can see the pulse jumping in his throat, the way his pupils have dilated, the tension coiling in every line of his body.
No, I think.I want nothing more than this man to be obsessed with me.
“Mia.” His voice is rough. “I’ve spent six years doing what Julia tells me. Being who Global Dynamix needs me to be. Performing for cameras and politicians and a public that sees a symbol instead of a man.” He reaches up, his fingers hovering just shy of my face. “But on that rooftop, I finally felt like a man. Just a man. Just Nate Whitaker. I felt something real for the first time since I can remember. And I’m not willing to let that go just because Julia Van Veen is threatened by it.”
“This is a bad idea,” I whisper, feeling the pull toward him like I’m circling a black hole, one that will pull me down and down and never let me go.
“The worst.” His fingers brush my cheek, feather-light, and I shiver, my eyes fluttering closed for a moment. “So tell me to stop.”
I should. I should tell him to stop, walk out that door, go back to the hotel, and figure something out. I should be the professional, cold operative SOE is relying on me to be.
