Page 140 of The Bodyguard

“I know.”

“You can do this,” he urged.

“I know.” But she still didn’t set foot out of bed. “But I’m not ready.”

“Sweetheart, you’ve been ready for years,” he said quietly. “The sooner you do this, the sooner you’re done with him.”

All of this she knew. Still, she was stuck under the sheets. “I don’t know if I can.”

It wasn’t as if she was going to have a panic attack like she had at the Cabots’ house. But her frozen limbs weren’t moving. She didn’t know how to jumpstart her derrière into action.

“Angela.” Sawyer crawled over her and under the covers, pulling her into his arms. “I am ready to start my life with you. I am ready for everything. All of it. But it all starts with you taking this step and ridding yourself of this baggage. I can’t do that for you. I would in a heartbeat, but it’s not my burden to release.”

An ache throbbed in her throat.

“I’m going to spend my life with you. I’m going to marry you. Have kids with you. Anything that you want, Angela. And all of that starts with testifying.” He tilted her chin up, forcing her gaze to lock onto his. “Give me that, and I will give you the world.”

Once more, tears threatened to fall down her cheeks. They had talked about their future, but when he put it like that, their future made her heart explode. She couldn’t say anything except, “I love you, Sawyer.”

“Love you too.” He pulled her onto his chest and kissed the top of her head. “If I could do this for you, I would.”

She knew that and nodded. And that was all she needed. “All right. Let’s do this.”

Several hours of driving later, the blacked-out SUV rolled into the underground parking lot. Somewhere above them was the federal courthouse, brimming with reporters and Tran Pham.

Angela wore a black pencil skirt and cuffed white blouse. She channeled her inner badass with a stack of gold bracelets like her mother’s and a vivid red lipstick that made her feel like a rock star.

Sawyer sat next to her, silent and holding her hand as the Marshal rolled to a stop. An armed gaggle of marshals waited outside the SUV to escort Angela into the building.

“When you’re ready,” the federal agent in the front passenger seat said.

Her heart galloped twice as fast as it had when they exited Interstate 495 toward the federal courthouse complex. She squeezed Sawyer’s hand even tighter than she had as they slowed in the garage bay.

“Ready?” Sawyer asked.

Angela inhaled slowly through her nose and exhaled through her mouth just as slowly. “Yes.”

Sawyer nodded to the agent in the front seat. The woman got out and opened Angela’s door. Fluorescent lights from the parking lot flooded into the back seat, as did the murmur of voices, greeting her and setting them into action.

Updates were given. Directions commanded. Angela relied on Sawyer to hear everything and ensure she did what was needed. The protective gaggle hustled her into an elevator.

Two minutes later, she sat in a private conference room, a bottle of water at her right hand and Sawyer standing next to her left, waiting for the assistant district attorney prosecuting Pham’s case to make their appearance.

The ADA didn’t have much to say. She looked younger than Angela expected, but she also looked smart, savvy, and hungryfor a conviction. The one-sided conversation ended with an utterance of “We’ll call for you when we’re ready.”

Then Angela was alone with Sawyer and her bottle of water. She looked up at him. “I’m ready for this to be over.”

He nodded, in bodyguard mode, scanning the empty room like a threat hid in the wood paneling. “Same, sweetheart.”

One minute passed. Then five minutes. Finally, fifteen minutes had crawled by. “Maybe we should ask—”

The door swung open. A new face greeted her. “They’re ready for you.”

Angela’s stomach lurched. She reached for Sawyer’s hand. He took it and held it until they reached the door. “You’ve got this,” he whispered.

She did. Forget the number of interrogations over the years and the amount of prep work the federal investigators and district attorneys’ offices had put her through; Angela was beyond ready to leave Pham in her past.

They moved into the courtroom. A jury waited to hear from her. The judge reigned from the dais in the middle of the room. People filled all the other available seats. There were no news cameras, but reporters huddled at the back wall, ready to get their sound bites and run them out of the courthouse to wherever their computers and cell phones waited.

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