Her Darkest Protector (eBook)

Layla Ochoa is not supposed to survive the week. A witness to a cartel killing, she is handed to a silent bodyguard in a van and driven into the mountains, where a stranger named only Cole is supposed to keep her alive until the trial. He keeps his distance, he keeps his rules, and he keeps his secrets, until a storm cracks the wall and a flashback shows her the man underneath the iron. What starts as 8 weeks in a cabin becomes a quiet, careful undoing of every wall he has built, and every time she takes a step toward him, the cartel takes a step toward her. He has not let anyone close in 9 years, and she has spent a lifetime learning to survive alone, and neither of them knows how to stop once they start. When the hunter finally arrives, she has to decide whether she is the witness who hides or the woman who fights back. She learns to shoot, she learns to read him, and she learns that the hardest lesson of all is staying. This is a slow-burn bodyguard romance about 2 people who have survived by never needing anyone, and what happens when they run out of reasons to be alone. It is tense, it is tender, and it is honest about the cost of trusting someone with the dark parts of yourself. It is also a story about learning to stay, and about the small, ordinary choices that add up to a life, a basil plant and a lake house at a time. Inside, you'll discover: . The 9 years of distance between Marcus and his own heart . The first night she sews him up and the second he lets her hold him . The threats, the fire, and the ambush on the highway . The trial that tries to take him apart and the testimony that saves him . The gun, the kitchen, and the art of learning to stay . The lake house, the loons, and the life they build in the wreckage . The basil plant on the windowsill and the promise it represents