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7

MITCH

T he breach didn’t come from the outside. That was the first thing Mitch confirmed when the Cerberus data sync finished uploading.

He stood at the edge of Andi’s loft, shoulders squared, eyes on the encrypted tablet as the logs scrolled across the screen. Clean entry points. No system flags. Surveillance cameras untouched. Nothing unusual in the access feed except for what wasn’t there.

The cameras had caught no sign of the drop, just a uniformed courier standing outside the building’s front entrance, holding a standard white envelope with a red stripe across the seal.

He swiped to the next screen, pulling up the communications metadata Cerberus had flagged for secondary review. Internal file access from a spoofed credential tied to a junior staffer’s workstation. On paper, it looked like an accident. Until you tracked the timestamps. The logins matched the nights Andi’s schedule had changed at the last minute.

Someone had eyes. And someone was feeding that information to whoever wanted Andi vulnerable.

Mitch shut the tablet with a snap and locked it.

The sun had barely broken the skyline. The city outside the loft glowed gray-blue with dawn. Andi was still asleep—he’d checked ten minutes ago. She curled into her pillow like she hadn’t watched her life splinter piece by piece. And despite everything, he was still watching her chest rise and fall like it was the only rhythm in the room that mattered.

She hadn’t told him she was unraveling—at least not in so many words. She didn’t have to. He’d seen the way she disappeared into that shower last night and how she’d come back out wrapped so tight in that funky chenille robe that she might’ve snapped if he’d touched her wrong.

So he hadn’t touched her. He’d waited, given her a mug with her favorite tea and then given her the one thing she couldn’t ask for—space without distance.

But space had limits. So did patience. And he was fast approaching the end of both.

Mitch reached for his phone and typed a brief message into the secure Cerberus channel.

Client coverage request: Coop McCullough. Four-hour window. 0930 arrival. Full briefing upon handoff.

He watched the message send and immediately followed with a second to Coop’s private number:

Need you to shadow Donato this morning. No deviation. No exceptions. I’ll be back by 1330.

Cerberus would call it a professional rotation. Mitch knew better. He wasn’t stepping away to debrief with command. He needed a different kind of counsel—one he couldn’t get from a field report.

And only one place made sense.

* * *

Club Southside opened at eleven. Not for the public. Not even for vetted members unless they had clearance. But the private lounge? That private lounge remained accessible to Cerberus personnel and any needed servers, cooks, or janitorial staff.

Mitch didn’t walk in like a man asking for permission. He never had.

Dark walls. Polished wood floors. The place was quiet at this time of day—no sound carried through the space like a pulse, steady and familiar. A few early staff passed him by with polite nods. One or two recognized him with more than that—lingering glances, subtle shifts of posture, the smallest curve of lips meant to signal invitation.

He ignored all of it. He wasn’t here to play.

Royce Sanders was already at the corner table when Mitch arrived. Kingston Coltrane joined them less than a minute later, wearing a slate-gray shirt rolled up at the sleeves and the kind of expression that said he’d skipped his morning workout to make the meeting happen.

“I thought hell would freeze before you came back here,” Kingston said, sliding into his seat.

“I’m not here for scene work,” Mitch said. “I’m here for information.”

Royce raised a brow. “From us or about the case?”

“Both.”

A server brought coffee—black, strong, poured without asking. Royce sipped his. Kingston leaned back with a grunt.

“You’re covering Donato?” Royce asked.

“Yes.”

“And you’re already breaking protocol,” Kingston said, glancing at his watch. “She doesn’t leave the loft unescorted.”

“She won’t. I left McCullough on her.”

Royce’s eyes narrowed. “Still not like you.”

Mitch didn’t respond right away. He focused on the coffee, the heat of it centering him, the familiarity of this room settling somewhere under his skin. He hadn’t been here in months. Maybe a year. The last time he’d stepped foot inside one of the clubs, it hadn’t been this one. He’d sent a woman packing with tears in her eyes and bruises blooming on her pride from the London club, Baker Street.

“You thinking about her?” King asked—very little escaped King’s notice.

Mitch gave a clipped nod. A sub attached to the South African diplomatic liaison. Smart, beautiful and it turned out, manipulative as hell. They assigned him to the ambassador’s diplomatic protection detail. The woman wanted more than he could give. She wanted ownership from him, and in the end betrayed them all.

He’d had to neutralize her as a threat, and she was now spending her time in an English prison. She’d thought she could weaponize both her position with the delegation and her submission to Mitch. She’d thought to make him choose between the contract to protect the ambassador and his relationship with her.

He chose the job. Her trial had torched his name with just enough innuendo to make him radioactive for six months. He swore he’d never make the mistake of mixing emotion with control again… until now.

Royce leaned forward. “So, what is it? Donato different?”

Mitch nodded once. “She doesn’t pretend. She doesn’t ask for comfort. She just... handles it. Until she can’t.”

“That’s not weakness,” Kingston said. “That’s exactly the kind of strength that breaks if no one notices soon enough.”

“She’s unraveling,” Mitch said. “But she won’t admit it. Won’t ask for help. And if I push, I lose her.”

“And if you don’t, she dies,” Royce added. “Hell of a place to stand.”

A quiet passed between them.

Kingston was the first to break it. “So, why are you really here?”

Mitch looked at them both, unblinking. “Because I want her. And I don’t know if I can protect her the way she needs if I cross that line.”

Royce barked a short laugh. “You crossed it when you started making her tea.”

Kingston smiled faintly. “Or when you turned down Bridget last time she offered to scene with you.”

A voice purred nearby. “He turned me down twice, actually.”

Mitch didn’t need to turn his head to know who it was. Bridget, one of the bartenders and a former sub he’d played with on and off years ago, leaned against the far pillar like she’d stepped out of a noir film—tight dress, arched brow, and a glass of scotch she wasn’t drinking. Her fundamental problem was she was a better bartender than a submissive.

“Miss me, Mitch?” she asked, running a cleaning rag over the bar top.

He didn’t blink. “No.”

Her smile faltered. “You’re not even curious?”

“Not anymore.”

Kingston glanced up at her. “Club etiquette applies, Bridget. He’s not available.”

“I was just saying hello.”

“Say it and go,” Mitch said, calm and flat.

Bridget lingered a second longer, then turned, heels clicking back behind the bar. Mitch watched her leave, not because he was interested, but because he wanted to be sure she did.

Royce gave him a long look. “You really are all in, huh?”

“I don’t do halfway.”

“That’s why this is going to wreck you if it goes sideways,” said King.

“I know,” Mitch said with a nod. He finished his coffee and stood. “Thanks for the perspective.”

“Anytime,” Kingston said. “But don’t wait too long. You keep pushing her, she’ll either break... or bolt.”

Mitch nodded once, then stepped out of the lounge and into the cooler air of the club’s upper corridor.

His phone buzzed. Not the work line. The encrypted Cerberus alert.

He pulled it from his pocket and read the message.

Donato left the loft. Solo. Tracking her now. Possible unauthorized movement.

His blood went cold.

He keyed in a return ping and accessed the live feed. A camera caught her ducking into one of the L stations near Lakeshore. No security, no escort. Purse slung high. Focused. Intent.

There was a second message attached to the alert:

she received a call from a burner. Claimed to be a whistleblower. Sent location. She didn’t tell anyone.

Mitch was already moving. He didn’t curse. He didn’t yell. He just started planning. Whatever the hell she thought she was walking into, she wouldn’t be walking alone. Not anymore. Not on his watch.

* * *

She hadn’t changed her gait. Hadn’t looked over her shoulder. Hadn’t done a damn thing to show she knew someone was following her. That wasn’t bravery. That was hubris.

Mitch spotted her the second she stepped off the train and headed into the shadowed fringe of Riverline Park, a location buried in a crumbling district just far enough outside of her campaign zones to raise suspicion. Not close enough to downtown for casual foot traffic. Not far enough for a clean line of Cerberus surveillance. A dead zone.

And she’d walked in like it was just another photo op. Alone. Unarmed. Unaware.

He followed her from the opposite platform, slipping into the shadows beyond the fence and dropping low to observe. The park had three entry points. One of them—behind the community rec center—was wide open. Another, near the loading dock of a shuttered grocery store, was partially obscured by a rusted-out van. That’s where her tail had settled. Civilian clothes. Generic posture. The kind of forgettable face that blended in everywhere… and nowhere.

Mitch didn’t break stride. He moved fast, cutting around the fence line, bypassing the edge of the broken playground equipment. Even over gravel, he moved silently, his body moving like the weapon he was trained to be. Mitch reached the van, sidled up alongside it, keeping himself flat against it and waited.

Mitch realized he must have been spotted in the sideview mirror as the guy opened the door and tried to flee. Wrong move. Mitch struck, wrapping one arm around the man’s throat, dragging him into the shadows and closing the door of the van in one clean movement. The man barely had time to gasp before Mitch had him on his knees, wrist bent at an angle designed to discourage resistance.

“Give me a name,” Mitch growled.

The man struggled. Mitch shifted his weight, adding just enough pressure to make a point.

“Not her,” the man hissed. “She’s not the target today.”

“Then who is and why get Andi involved?”

“She’s bait.”

“For who?” Mitch asked adding more pressure.

Mitch’s pulse slowed. Not sped. Slowed. That was the danger point—the clarity before combat. His voice dropped even lower.

“Who’s the target?”

The man didn’t answer.

Mitch drew his knife. It made no sound, but the glint of steel was enough.

“You,” the man choked out. “The people I work for don’t leave loose ends.”

“I may not be loose, but I will be their end. And you have just failed your assignment,” Mitch said, and knocked the man out cold with one swift blow to the temple.

He dragged the unconscious body deeper into the bushes and zip-tied the wrists behind his back. He snapped a photo and uploaded it directly to Cerberus. Let the field team deal with the cleanup. He had bigger priorities.

Like the woman who had just walked straight into a trap.

He spotted her in the open concrete expanse behind the empty park field. She stood at the edge of the old skate ramp, holding her phone up to her ear, pacing. Still looking around like the source might be late.

He’d never been more furious or focused in his life. Mitch strode straight to her laying his hand on her shoulder.

She flinched. “Jesus. Mitch, you scared the hell out of me. How did you…”

“Walk,” he ordered.

Andi hesitated for half a breath. That was all before she turned, heels clicking on the cracked pavement, and started toward the exit. He took her elbow—not gently—and steered her back the way he’d come, cutting across the lot at an angle that shielded them from both visible entrances, but took them past the guy who had tailed her.

They didn’t speak until they reached the car. Only when she was inside, the seatbelt clicked and locked, did she finally break the silence.

“I was being followed?”

“Yes.”

“I take it you handled it?”

He started the engine. “He’ll wake up zip-tied next to a trash can and wondering why the fuck his head hurts so bad and about all the bad life choices that landed him where he is.”

“Mitch…”

“Don’t,” he snapped. “You don’t get to speak first.”

She snapped her mouth shut. He drove in silence for a full minute. Just long enough to take the next turn, hit the bypass, and make sure no one was tailing them. Then he finally looked at her.

“You left the loft without backup. You turned off your tracker. You used an unsecured burner to respond to a message from an unverified source.”

Her chin lifted. “It was a whistleblower. Someone from inside my campaign.”

“You don’t verify intel by walking into a kill box.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” she shot back. “Don’t you think I knew what I was doing?”

“No,” Mitch said, voice sharp. “I don’t think you had the first goddamn clue what you were doing. You thought you could control the danger by getting ahead of it. You thought if you handled it, you’d be safe. You thought if you asked for help, it would make you weak.”

She went quiet again. He kept going. Because the words weren’t just for her.

“They used you as bait, Andi. Not because they want you out of the way today. But because they want you scared. Isolated. Afraid to move without second-guessing yourself. And you walked right into it.”

“I didn’t know,” she whispered.

“If you’re going to do stupid things like this, you should have . Otherwise you leave it to professionals and while we’re on the subject of professionals… do you have any idea what it would have done to Coop if something bad had happened to you?” His knuckles flexed around the steering wheel. “I’ve never been assigned to protect a smarter woman than you. But when it comes to this—when it comes to letting someone protect you—you’re too damn proud to see clearly.”

He stopped at a light and turned to look at her fully.

“You don’t get to do this again,” he said. “Not while I’m your protector. Not while I’m still breathing.”

She didn’t answer right away. When she finally spoke, her voice was softer than before. “You think I’m too proud?”

“I think you’re scared to let go. And I think that scares you more than being shot at.”

Andi laughed once, bitter and breathless. “You’re not wrong.”

“I rarely am.”

She turned her head to look at him. “That’s the problem.”

He didn’t respond.

Not until she said, “You ever make a mistake like that? Put your trust in someone who didn’t earn it?”

And Mitch… saw her. The fear behind the sarcasm. The edge behind the steel. Rick Wexler was her London.

The memory hit him so fast it nearly knocked the air from his lungs. The way the woman had looked that night in Geneva. Kneeling on the hotel carpet, eyes wide and wet, voice begging for things she never wanted. Because she didn’t want submission—she wanted leverage.

She’d told him she loved him. Then leaked half the classified comms schedule to her contact in Johannesburg. Said she only did it because Mitch didn’t ‘love her back.’

He swore that day he’d never confuse submission with trust again—never let sex cloud his operational clarity. He knew Andi was different, but that didn’t change the danger.

His silence must’ve said more than he realized.