Something cold and heavy settled low in Taer’s stomach when he realized what you were holding. His phone. More specifically, his burner phone. The one he used to contact your father and give him updates on you, the one you were not supposed to know existed. Had you already gone through it? Would you recognize the number he called every Friday while you were at work?

“Baby, it isn’t what it looks like.”

The excuse was weak even to his own ears. God, he was supposed to be better than this. He shouldn’t have kept the phone, or any phone, at his apartment. If he was honest, Taer didn’t think you would have been able to sniff it out. Then again, that was his own fault. He should have guessed you’d be just as cunning as your father was. If this wasn’t such a twisted situation, he might have asked you how you figured him out. How you managed to find a burner phone hidden behind a false wall in the broom closet of all places.

At the moment, though, he only felt sick. He shouldn’t have accepted the job from your father in the first place. Back then, it seemed like easy money. Date you and keep you safe, but never let you know who sent him. There were worse jobs people had been assigned. Whatever drama there was between you and your father, that wasn’t any of his business. It wasn’t hard being your bodyguard, either. You lived a relatively simple existence.If anything, Taer had it easy, but that wasn’t something he’d agree with right now.

He got attached. It was as simple and as stupid as that. All his experience, and yet you still managed to make him soft. Now he had to deal with the reality that no matter how he spun it- he had betrayed you.