Bodyguard's Obsession

Chapter 16

Chapter 16

I clung to Mark like he was my teddy bear. I wrapped my arms around his neck and held him close, needing to feel that he is actually here with me and I'm not dreaming all of this. I needed to feel a sense of reality right now.

He rubbed my back soothingly and I felt myself melt into him from the gesture. I slumped against him as he helped me to my feet. My legs wobbled dangerously and before they could give out, he swooped them out from underneath me and held me in a Princess position. I stared at him with wide eyes.

His heat seeped through my clothes and warmed my skin. Tiredness was ebbing its way into my system but I fought back, wanting to stay in the moment for just a little longer. I just wanted to feel him close to me, who knows when I will ever get the chance to be this close to him again. This is the only time I'll be able to feel close to him again.

His heart thrummed gently in his chest, his breathing controlled and steady unlike mine which seemed to have stopped altogether. His ice-cold eyes stare back into my own and I couldn't decide if he was freezing my heart or melting it. Yet, the warmth from his body will always be branded into my memory with the way it seems to enclose around me like a blanket.

As I look into those eyes, those blue arctic eyes, it felt as though time had frozen itself. As though the world had stopped completely and we were the only living things that weren't frozen in this very moment. I couldn't anyone else around. All I could feel and see was him.

It was always him.

He will always be the one. He has always been there. I will always be afraid of being rejected by him, of disappointing him. I'm not afraid of losing others like I am with him. I'm absolutely terrified that one day I will wake up and he's not there anymore. I'm at a loss without this very man beside me.

But... I know that one day he will leave. I know that one day I will never see him again unless I catch glimpses on the news, or even possibly on the street, or escorting his next celebrity around. Truth be told, I don't want him to be with anyone else. I don't want him to be assigned to anybody else. I know it's very selfish and I know that in doing so, it's breaking the rules but damn rules!

Damn everything to Hell! I love him. I'm not ashamed of that. But I can't tell him. He will never feel the same for me and if this is the only way I get to be around him then so be it. I don't care, so long as I'm near him and get to see him every day.

"Am I interrupting something?" A voice suddenly asks from nearby. My cheeks flush with embarrassment as I turn my head away, realising that Noah is still here in the room with us.

"Whatever," Mark grumbles. I feel his body shift beneath me and I feel him carrying me away. "Let's get you cleaned up."

I plant my face in his shoulder, hoping to hide my face forever. I was probably as red as a tomato right now. I heard a door being opened and moments later, my ass came into direct contact with a very cold, very hard surface. I pulled away and saw that he had placed me down on a marble counter in the bathroom.

He uncurled his arms from around my body, then planted his hands at my waist. I looked to the bathroom door, seeing that it was closed and locked. My cheeks flare again as ideas and images begin flying through my head like that letter scene at the Dursley's house in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.

"Layla," my name falls from his lips like a honeyed whisper and my heart stammers in my chest at his voice. "Are you okay?"

Then everything just fell to the ground in nothing but rubble and ash. My shoulders slump as the hope that had begun to build in my chest dissipated and teetered away like smoke. "Yeah." I respond quietly. I couldn't trust my voice any more than that. I couldn't trust myself that if I spoke one more word that I couldn't break down right here in front of him and he doesn't need to see that.