President's Daughter's Bodyguard-Chapter 95: I Want To Tell You The Truth

Chapter 95: I Want To Tell You The Truth

The news landed like wet stones.

"Pilots cancelled...Airspace got closed. All flights grounded until further notice..." Frank’s face went hard and then hollow, as if someone had taken the color out of him by hand.

"We are stuck...They will not let us leave Asteria. The embassy just messaged. The president cut off our evacuation. He says the tour is a priority."

Theo’s smile came slow, then wider, like a man who had been waiting for this exact noise in the air. It was a smile that didn’t belong to the situation; it looked like a private joke.

He kept pacing in tight circles without purpose, as if it could stitch the world back together.

"Theo, why are you smiling?" she asked in a voice that quivered because the night felt colder now.

Frank moved instinctively between them as if he could shield her by being nearer.

He moved her behind the armchair and took a breath that was too loud for the room. "Let Theo think," he stated.

Although his words were not rude, Danielle was forced to arch her brow.

Theo slowed dowb.

He turned and looked at Danielle with eyes that had been sharpened by a kind of fatigue she had never seen before.

Theo had allowed himself to be cracked open in front of her already, but there were fractures he had not revealed.

He could see that she was waiting for the rest of the confession in the same way people waited for rain after a drought.

"You didn’t want her to find out this way," Frank muttered in a half accusing and half pleading voice.

Not being sure which he was allowed to be.

"No," Theo answered. "I didn’t. But she is unsafe. I will not risk her life because some man wears a suit and calls orders from a mile away."

Frank snorted a short laugh. It sounded unnerved. "Are you going to tell her now?"

Theo stepped closer to Danielle. The heat in his hand when he took hers felt like pulling at a fragile tether.

He had never treated the truth lightly. When he told the truth, it landed like an avalanche. He hated both the telling and the consequences.

Danielle swallowed. Her throat made a small sound. "Tell me what?"

Theo’s jaw moved as if the name he had kept hidden was heavier than anything else he could say. He nodded once, deliberately, as if that counted for courage.

"You deserve to know who I am when your father is the target and men in silver are roaming the dunes. You deserve to know why certain people pretend to be on your side and why the president can order pilots to stand down and feel nothing."

Frank’s eyes narrowed. He wanted to step forward and stop this, but he was also a man used to following orders and this looked like the kind of chaos he would be required to clean up.

Theo inhaled and then let the air fill his chest, slower this time.

"I didn’t tell you before because it would have changed everything...If I had told you when I first walked into your life, you wouldn’t have let me near you. You would have run and I would have failed before anything had a chance to start."

Danielle’s fingers tightened on the couch cushion. "Failed at what," she asked.

"At protecting you," Theo replied simply. It sounded like an apology and an accusation at the same time.

"At keeping you alive while I worked the angles. While I listened to men with too many smiles. While I played the soldier and pretended that was all I was."

Frank rubbed his temple. "Theo, this is not the time for riddles. You will get us all killed playing with secrets."

"No," He closed his eyes for a second. When he opened them again his pupils were steel.

"There are worse things than being killed by a bomb. There are worse things than the world ending while you watch it on a screen. There is waking every day and knowing that you could have stopped it and did not."

Danielle could not read the expression on his face.

"So tell her, then...Tell her outright. She has the right to decide."

Theo nodded. He took a breath so strong that the hairs at the nape of his neck did not move. For a long beat he stared at Danielle like he was memorizing her for a lifetime.

"There are things I have not been honest about," he began. "Names I left out, allegiances I pretended didn’t exist. I have been working on two fronts. One of them you already know and hate. The other you don’t know at all."

"What do you mean by two fronts?"

"I mean this..."Bunny, I own the military of Ithaliana."

"Wha-? The country that wants us all dead? The-?"

"Yes..."

"Why...I mean, how? How? You’re from Germanya, how could you own their military?" Danielle’s eyes turned as big as flashlights.

"When Ethan killed Bae, and my father did nothing to protect her...I had no other choice but to join the enemy’s side. I bought their ruler with my money, and now...I pretty much own them."

"Bu-but, it doesn’t make any sense, Theo?! How did you manage to hide this from my father?"

Danielle looked at Frank who was clearly avoiding thr eye contact.

"I see..."

"I’m sorry."

"But, then, why do you need to kill my father, Theo?" She inhaled more air. "Is it because of yours or Ethan? I’m so confused."

"Bunny, your father needs to go down because of two reasons; one-he’s a bad ruler...and two-if we get rid of him, these countries could sign a peace deal and finally live like normal people."

"Also, Danielle, look at the way he treats you? He cancelled our escape routes. Your father doesn’t care about you!" Frank tried to reason with her.

"Listen here, you lil’ shit! Let me have a conversation with Theo alone!"

Both men were too scared to speak...the calm lady was now turning into a dragon.

But he did listen and left them alone.

"Theo, I will ask you one last time, and if you don’t answer truthfully, we’re done..."

"Okay."

"Are you protecting me because your goal is to kill my father?"