The Assassin’s Billionaire Bodyguard
Chapter 28

"Isabella!" Cam followed her out of the boardroom with Gideon quick on his heels. "Call your sister-in-law off."

She threw her head back and laughed. "Do you think I have such power?"

"She's your sister-in-law, talk to her."

"About what exactly, Torres?"

"It's a misunderstanding."

"Misunderstanding? How is you, deliberately attempting to do a deep dive into the personal lives of eight of my closest friends, a misunderstanding?"

A woman came running from the direction of Cam's office. "Sir, my computer keeps turning on and off and," she let a flustered sigh escape her bright pink cheeks, "and there's an image of the scene from forty-year-old virgin, where Steve Carell screams Kelly Clarkson but instead," she put her hands to her mouth as if trying not to laugh, "your face is superimposed on his body and you're screaming Clara Draxton." Isabella chortled with glee. "Best day ever!" she punched the air with exuberance. "I want it as a screensaver."

"This is not funny Isabella. She's committing a felony."

"Is she? Let's call the FBI and see if they can trace any of the things happening with your system or will they get lead straight to things you don't want them seeing?"

He glowered at her, his eyes furious and his lips were pressed so tightly together his top lip had almost disappeared. She skewed her head and gave a saucy taunt in his direction, "you know, you're pretty when you're angry."

Before he could respond, the sound of Cam's office door at the end of the hall opening and her name being called in surprise, made Isabella turn around. "Mikhail?" She looked to Cam, "the meeting your security told I couldn't interrupt is with Mikhail?" She walked down the hall and stepped into the open arms of the older man and pressed kisses to each of his cheeks.

"My darling Isabella, Raisa is desperate for you to come visit us."

"When you send your nightmare of a son to Siberia, I will come visit and not a minute sooner. I'm ready to hire a hit man."

"I am sorry for his behaviour," Mikhail was genuinely contrite, his piercing blue eyes looking at her with adoration. "You are special to us, and we do not condone what he's been up to."

"He's wearing on my patience."

"I will do my best to fix things."

"Please do," she gave him another hug. "Now if you'll excuse me, I need to get back to the office."

"You are not going anywhere!" Cam gripped her by the arm and hauled her back towards the conference room.

She yanked her arm out of his tight grasp and pointed her finger at him, "don't make me embarrass you in front of your staff, your client or your bodyguard. You touch me again in anger and I'll drop you hard."

They stared at each other furiously before he finally broke eye contact, looked away in frustration pointing to the door. "Please, come back to the boardroom and help me replace a mutually beneficial solution to our current problem." "Is everything okay?" Mikhail called out.

"He pissed Clara off."

"Everything's fine."

They spoke over each other, and Mikhail's white bushy eyebrows rose in his forehead. "If you have pissed Clara Draxton off, everything is not fine. She is ruthless."

"Mikhail," Cam spoke, "I need five minutes with Isabella. Can you please go back to my office? My admin assistant will bring you a hot cup of coffee and I will be right along." He motioned to his admin assistant to escort Mikhail away.

He went to put his hand on Isabella's shoulder, but she slapped him away. He took a breath and motioned again to the door, "after you."

When he closed the door behind him, he pointed at her. "Call her, now."

"You don't have her number?"

"I'd google it, but my f*****g system is crashing all around me!" he yelled at her.

She giggled unafraid of his temper. "Jesus Torres, calm down. You'd think your entire business was at risk or something."

"Isabella," he growled her name in a warning

"My panties are getting wet," she winked as she pulled her phone out and called Clara on speaker. "Hey boss lady. I'm here in the land of chaos and insanity. Cam Torres is very unhappy."

"Clara, fix my systems now."

"No." Clara hung up the phone.

Isabella shrugged, "it seems she doesn't want to deal with domineering dictators at present. Maybe try again later when you're not being such a dick."

"Call her back."

"I really don't want to. This seems more of a Cam Torres problem, not an Isabella Ruiz problem."

"You are enjoying this." He was stunned

"You're just seeing this now? The wet panties comment didn't flag it?"

"She's in my company's private business files."

"You were in her personal files, tit for tat."

He took a deep breath. "What's it going to take?" He waited for Isabella to answer but she simply shook her head at him like she had no idea what he was asking. Suddenly his cell phone started ringing and he fumbled for it and put it on speaker. "Draxton, fix my system, please?" he tried to sound less furious than he was. "Um, no. I think you don't really understand the gravity of the situation."

"He thought you were doing something nefarious Clara. It's why he ran us all." Isabella called out throwing him under the proverbial bus with as much gusto as she could muster. Her cheeks were radiant as she reveled in his misery.

Cam's head snapped up and if Isabella were a weaker woman, she likely would have withered on the spot from the pure cold rage emanating from his face. "I was concerned for Isabella's welfare. The activities of the weekend seemed odd to me. My entire life is dedicated to seeking dangerous situations out."

Clara clicked her tongue. "Cam, if you want to have a relationship with someone as special as my sister-in-law, you need to work on your trust. Isabella, you and Cam should do some trust exercises."

"Yeah," she grinned, "I'll let him close his eyes and fall backwards and I'll try to catch him. If I'm honest though, if we do it now, he's hitting the floor."

"Clara, what do I need to do to fix this?"

"Make my girl feel like your apology is genuine and until she is satisfied and not upset with you any longer, your computer system is my b***h. Cam, what does the file Operation Snakeskin hold? Should I open it?" The sound of her hilariously laughing as she hung up the phone echoed around Cam and Isabella.

"Hm, from the look on your face, it's a file you don't want her to open. You know, if Gideon is the best you have, you may want to upgrade your computer techs."

"I have six, two I've recruited from the US government. They are incredible at what they do."

"And yet, here we are."

"Isabella, I apologize. I do. I sincerely and unequivocally apologize for violating your privacy. I could not for the life of me figure out how the nine of you fit together and so my mind immediately went to the worst possible scenario. I didn't know you had been kidnapped. I didn't know Clara brought you to the women's center. I didn't know you ever went there. It's not in your file you got help there."

"Well, I do attend there. People who are there need help Cam. You put a bunch of people at risk by digging into something you shouldn't. Now my boss is angry because your inability to trust could have put lives in danger."

"She's holding my business for ransom and for what?"

A devious smile played around the corner of Isabella's lips at his words, and she dialed out to Clara. "Hey boss, remember when I told you Cam offered me a million dollars to take Evgeni back and away from his daughter?" Cam's inhaled sharply at her comment, "he just agreed to double the amount as a donation to the women's shelter as an act of apology for being a douchebag."

"Great, I have his number, I'll send him the information for the women's center's banking info. Once the money is deposited, I'll release the system." Clara hung up abruptly.

"You're blackmailing me?"

"Pfft, a million dollars is nothing to someone with your cash. Two million is peanuts to you, Mr. Torres." Isabella's eyes were dancing with glee.

"Fine, I'll do it," he sighed. "Why do I feel I've just been beaten to a pulp, and nobody's even touched me?" he muttered to himself, rubbing his throbbing forehead, as he waited for the information from Clara to come through.

"Oh!" Isabella jumped excitedly at his comment, grabbing his attention. She called Clara back. "Cam also volunteered to be my sparring partner at the self-defence class this weekend. It's my turn to teach. He's going to be my dummy."

"Awesome, I'll bring my grandfather to watch!" Clara was pumped and hung up again.

"I didn't agree. I'm busy Saturday morning."

"Cancel it."

"Isabella you can't just," he watched her typing into her phone, "what are you doing?"

"Texting Clara to say you're not coming on Saturday, and I'm really disappointed about it." Her dark eyelashes batted at him mournfully.

"Now who's being a d**k?" he bit out. "Fine, I'll change my schedule for Saturday."

"Great," she started to walk towards the door and paused to kiss his cheek. "Don't be so sour. All's fair in love and war."

He pulled her back to him, pressing her body tight against his, "where do you think you're going?"

"Back to work."

"Nope," he shook his head, wrapping his arms around her waist, trapping her to him. "I need to make sure you are well and truly satisfied with my apology." Suddenly his eyes were mocking and amused as she struggled against him. "I can't have you going back to Clara saying we didn't kiss and make up."

She stopped struggling and then nodded. "Sure, should we just have s*x on the boardroom table?" At his surprised gasp she laughed. "Kidding Torres, I'm riding a high of victory." She leaned back and draped her hands loosely around his neck, her purse sliding down her arm. "I'm still annoyed with you."

"I know and I am sorry. All of this could have been avoided had I known your past."

"I don't apologize for keeping my past mine. There are very few people who know what happened."

"I am grateful you trust me enough to share." He rested his forehead against hers and closed his eyes. "I feel like I've just run a marathon."

She made a face as her phone started ringing in her purse again. "Damn it Clara, you're interrupting me, this time."

Cam kept her tight to him as she answered the phone.

"Did you leave yet?"

"No, I haven't left yet." She winked at the man holding her tight, "Cam said he wanted to make sure I was satisfied by his apology."

"Are you?"

"So far, so good."

"Well, I'm sending a car for you. Evgeni Andropov was just here. Ben wasn't here so the guy in the lobby just threw him out and said you were out for the rest of the day. He was screaming for you and yelling like an i***t. He said he would just go to your house and see you there."

"Are you kidding me?" She knew Cam could hear every word of the conversation and she wanted to scream as he took the phone from her and put it on speaker.

"Hey Clara. Do you agree with me when I say she shouldn't go home? If he's there, he's going to be a nightmare."

"He is not taking me from my house."

"Clara, I propose Isabella come to my place for the night. It's safer. I have a team there already. I'll get my driver to run her home and get Casper and she can stay at my place until either yours or my team grabs the idiot."

"It's a great idea." Clara's tone was resolute.

Isabella scowled furiously at Cam. "I don't want to go hide at your house. Let him come to my house. I'll show him-

"Isabella," Clara cut in, "Mikhail would be upset if you put a bullet in his son's head."

"I wouldn't be. I'm so far over this psychopathic nightmare."

"I know. For tonight, at the very least, do as Cam says. He's right. Elian is working tonight, and my dad has the kids and I'm here until at least eight or nine to make up for being away the last three days. It's safest you are with security. Go to his house." "This blows."

"What you do when you get there is none of my concern," Clara chuckled

"God Clara!" Isabella's cheeks burned with mortification at her sister-in-law's innuendo.

"I'll call you later. It's an order Isabella. Go to Cam's and lay low until we sort this out."

"Fine but I want it known I'm pissed off."

"Noted," Clara said dryly and then ended the call.

"Hey," Cam tilted her chin and forced her to meet his concerned gaze. "I know you're angry but is spending a night at my house really so horrible?"

"It's not spending a night at your house Cam. It's spending a night hiding from someone I don't want to hide from."

"I just want to pick him up and we will sort this out." He sighed, "I'll cut some meetings short and be home as soon as I can."

"Fine," she toyed with the buttons on his shirt. "I had such good plans. I was going to go home and take a hot bath and cuddle with Casper."

"You can do all those things at my place. I'll have the car take you to your place, collect Casper and then go straight to my place." "Alright," he kissed her lips softly.

The sound of the door being thrown up and Gideon's annoyed curse made them both laugh.

"You're making out when our system is falling apart."

"Clara promised to fix it, if I make things right with Isabella." He hooked his arm around her neck and spun them both to face Gideon, "also the maniacal a*****e is out running the streets. The minute his father was here, he probably shook off his detail. Gideon looked to Isabella and made a face, "I wouldn't wish that i***t on anyone. It'd be a lot easier if you'd go to the house instead of your place."

"She already agreed," Cam motioned for them to leave the boardroom. "Make sure she has security to get her dog and then take her straight to the house."

As they reached the elevators, Mikhail popped his head out of Cam's office. "Um Isabella."

She looked over her shoulder. "Yes?"

"I made a mistake. Evgeni messaged me and I told him I had seen you here and I wanted him to leave you alone. I don't think I should have told him you were here."

"f**k!" Cam punched the elevator call button furiously and motioned to Gideon, "get her out of here now before he does something stupid like shoots her like he threatened last time."

"He threated to shoot me?"

"He said if he can't have you, nobody can, Isabella and suggested a gun would be useful in making you see sense."

"I'm sorry Isabella." Mikhail genuinely was contrite, but she said nothing as she got in the elevator.

Gideon escorted her to a waiting car just in time for a sports car to pull up behind them. Just as Isabella got in the car and it pulled away, Evgeni was slamming his fists on the trunk of the car, screaming her name.

She punched the back of the seat in front of her in frustration. She didn't like not being involved in her safety and running away from her problems felt cowardly and spineless.

The trip to her house took far less time than she had expected, and she went inside and grabbed Casper's go bag of a lead, food, treats and his favorite bow tie. She wanted to stay home but Clara had given her a direct order and not even when they weren't on Bellona time would she ever disobey her Alpha commander. Clara wanted to deal with Evgeni diplomatically and so she would let her, against her better judgement. However, when she got back in the car with her dog and the security agent was griping about how long it had taken her, she found herself deliriously close to boiling over and taking matters into her own hands, regardless of her instructions.