Chapter 14
Chapter
Fourteen
MIA
Before Maverick can answer, I grab my laptop, heading silently for the bedroom.
“Is that it?” he asks, raw-voiced, face darkening.
I let the click of the closed door answer for me. An ache tugs at my ribs. Maybe I’m being too hard on him. But I can’t fall back into old patterns. Like waiting for someone to save me. If there’s anything Maverick has taught me, it’s that I ultimately must act alone.
Hours pass in a flash, the only witness shadows creeping long across the floor as I hit the record button again. Try to get it right.
Nothing about this is performance. It’s raw. Authentic. Dangerous. Yet, my body trembles, and a knot tightens in my stomach. Am I walking into another Edwin trap without even knowing it?
As sunset turns the Texas sky wild—a brazen glow in horizontal stripes of blue, gold, and rose—I pad back out into the living room, sitting cross-legged on the couch. Maverick stands by the window, body tense, eyes trained on the edge of the property. Vigilant, steady.
“You want to talk about it?” he asks without moving a muscle.
“On the record or off the record?” Anger surges inside. Am I really ready to make the same mistake all over again with him? The mistake that could cost me any chance at freedom?
He turns, dark eyes washing over me, brows furrowed. “Off-duty and off the record.” He grits out the words, like they cost him something.
I hesitate for a moment, questions flitting through my mind like dandelion fuzz in the wind. But I can tell he’s past reflection, his face sheer determination. Whether or not he wants to, whether it’s right or wrong, I know he’ll help me.
I take a deep breath, lick my lips. His eyes drop to my mouth, and the room sizzles. “I made a video,” I say, trying to keep my voice steady. “An appeal to my fans for help.”
He nods, jaw tense.
“What, no trying to talk me out of it?” I raise an eyebrow.
“I’m here to support you first, Mia. Protect you second and give advice only if you ask for it.”
No one’s ever trusted me so much. My throat tightens, a dangerous sting gathering behind my eyes.
“Okay,” I say, and it feels like two syllables lay me bare before my bodyguard. “Tell me what you think.”
Without hesitation, he crosses the room, carefully taking a seat next to me. Too close to be professional, but still navigating a careful line. I hand him my laptop, and he watches twice, face unreadable, mouth unmoving.
“What do you think?” I ask when I can’t take the suspense anymore.
“Tell me what you want me to comment on.” His voice is warm but guarded.
“If it’s believable. If I make sense. If I should post it.”
His eyes wander to mine, face torn. “I can’t tell you what you should or shouldn’t do. But I can give my opinion on the other two factors, for what it’s worth.”
For what it’s worth. Far more than you may ever realize.
He exhales slowly. “Believable? Yes. Clear and logical? Completely.”
“But?”
“But I can’t shake the feeling Edwin will find a way to use this against you.”
My stomach drops. Not because he’s telling me anything I don’t already know, but because he had the courage to be honest. It could cost him, and he knows it.
“Okay. Then what else do I do?”
The room goes silent. He stares ahead, expression storming. “I faced something similar once. A contract I shouldn’t have been let out of. Only fate stepped in, handling it for me. In your case, though, I don’t feel Edwin will ever voluntarily let go.”
“Agreed.” I want to probe deeper, find out what he means by a contract and fate. But that’s not the conversation we need to have right now.
“You have to find a way to let the public know something is wrong without triggering immediate legal retaliation.”
“Easier said than done,” I huff.
“The risk you’ve awakened a sleeping bear will always be there. But you could minimize it by being more factual, more restrained. By appealing to logic and reason rather than emotion.”
I let the words—and the fact this man is helping me—sink in.
“No accusations yet, just mention of a pattern.”
“Yes,” I whisper, drawing a little closer to him, though I know I shouldn’t. I need to feel Maverick’s presence as much as I perceive it. He doesn’t move away or betray concern, even when our thighs touch on the couch.
“I think you should use your real name, too,” he says, and the weight of what we’re discussing finally sinks in. This could blow up my whole life. End my career. Especially if Edwin has his way … and he always does.
“When I start talking, I trigger the fallout—whether immediate or more measured. I know that much.”
“The woman I’m looking at is strong enough to handle it,” he says calmly.
“You have more faith in me than I do,” I confess with a soft laugh. “I’ve spent most of my life being told what was best for me, which means I’m still learning—slowly—that silence doesn’t equal stability.”
“No, it doesn’t. But words for words’ sake, emotion for drama won’t help you either. You need cold, calculated fact. That’s what Edwin fears most, I’d imagine.”
“So maybe a written statement then. Something that will make my fans notice. That might get advocacy groups involved.”
He nods, face stern without being mean. “Something that makes Edwin’s response look like guilt rather than a curtain he can hide behind.”
More hours pass as I pore over years of journals—documenting abuse, framing timelines, ordering and aligning facts—until the truth is impossible to ignore.
Maverick sets a fresh mug of tea down on the coffee table, eyes dark and warm, as I read back through my statement again, mouth moving wordlessly.
To see my life laid out without emotion, detailed with quiet precision, knowing that what I allude to is only a tiny sliver of what I’ve endured… It’s almost too much. It feels dangerous, far more dangerous than my earlier candid attempts at videos.
I let out a sigh that carries weight, weight I didn’t know I’d been holding this whole time.
“What can I do?” he asks quietly, the friend I need instead of the bodyguard I require.
I stare into my mug for a long moment, measuring the cost of what I’m compelled to ask. This will change everything between us.
I bite my bottom lip until I taste salt and metal, hands fidgeting.
He turns away, strides to the kitchen counter, and returns with a crochet hook and yarn. He sets them on the arm next to me wordlessly.
“Sorry, it’s not alpaca yarn. I’ll do better next time.”
His words are the peace offering I need. The corners of my mouth turn up despite myself, and his face lightens subtly.
“Will you read this for me now? Give me your honest opinion?”
“Of course, Mia. But I’m no lawyer, and I don’t understand the intricacies of all of this. So, take what I have to say with a grain of salt.”
“I know.” I sigh, fingering the soft wool with one hand, letting its feel transport me back to another time and place. “But I still trust you more than anyone on the face of this earth.”
The words make me feel smaller, like I’m back on the soundstage to Good Morning USA, waiting for Edwin to snatch my stuffed animal friends.
“Then, I won’t break that trust again, Mia Lowell. No matter what it costs me.” Something shifts in his face—not softness, not relief.
Resolve. The kind that only comes when a man knows he’s crossed a line he can never uncross.
He says my name as if he’s seeing me for the first time. Truly seeing me, and I can’t doubt his words. They crack open something in my heart that I didn’t even know was there, and my mind wanders to a future I’ll never have. And the man who can’t be anything more than my temporary bodyguard.
Sitting next to me, he reads through it several times without saying a thing. Finally, his eyes meet mine over the laptop screen, all pupil so that they’re two ebony orbs.
“Is there anything that would make it easier for them to say I’m crazy?” I ask.
Maverick pushes the laptop back toward me, drawing closer. He doesn’t stop until I feel the heat of his body on my arm and shoulder, with only a thin sliver of air between us. Safety, ache, and need all at once.
My throat thickens, heart pounding against my ribs. I remember the feel of his arms like steel bands around me. God, I need them again.
He points to a line on the screen. “That adverb. It could be spun, I think.”
I cut it, staring at him.
His face storms, nostrils flaring. Air escapes my lips, his eyes filled with a hungry desire I haven’t seen since his return. “Wait six hours before posting, at a bare minimum.”
“Tomorrow, then. After I sleep on everything.”
Silence stretches long between us; no need to speak. Touching with our eyes. Somehow it feels more intimate than flesh ever could.
“Want to take your tea outside? Sit beneath the stars?” he asks, and it feels like starting over. Something I’d given up hoping would happen between us.
“Only if you hold me,” I whisper.
His mouth twitches. “That what you need?”
“Yes, it’s what I need.” The words make me feel naked in front of him.
“Alright then,” he says, offering his hand.