by Ava Benton
“You told me you’re not going anywhere with me.” I pulled out my phone and dialed my brother. “Whatever. One less thing to worry about.”
“Come on. I only want to know where we’re going, is all. I think I have a right to know.”
“We’re going someplace safe.” I held up a hand to silence her when Slate answered. “I’ve secured the package.”
“You’re taking her home?”
I glanced at her from the corner of my eye. “Negative.”
His silence spoke volumes. Eventually, he asked, “Why negative?”
“Long story.”
“When it is not?”
“Meet us at the hangar and we’ll talk about it on the plane.”
“You’re bringing her with us?” he shouted.
“Did you know your voice goes up an octave when you’re upset?”
“Fuck off.”
I chuckled. “Like I said, I’ll explain it when I see you.” I didn’t give him the chance to ask any more questions before I hung up.
“We’re going to a plane hangar?” Hope asked the moment I was off the phone.
I counted to five in my head, slowly, to keep from exploding on her.
“That’s what I said.”
“And you’ll keep me safe?”
“I said that, too.” And I wished I hadn’t.
She was already more trouble than she was worth. Bad enough I had to kill a man in cold blood—which I couldn’t pretend didn’t give me a sense of satisfaction—but Mary would have my balls in a sling when she found out I didn’t complete the mission.
Too late to worry about that.
We had a plane to catch.
6
Hope
I couldn’t keep my eyes off him as we made the short flight to a supposedly secret location. Nobody would find us there, or so he said. I would believe it when I saw it. Something about almost being shot to death maybe two hours earlier made me a little skeptical.
Then again, he had saved me.
I looked at him again out of the corner of my eye. He was sitting across from me with his long legs splayed out in front of him.
Meanwhile, his brother—who looked a lot like him—sat facing him. He didn’t look happy.
Neither did the other two members of the team. They were brothers, too, I could tell. I wondered if they were twins.
All four of them had the same tall, thick builds. Muscles for days. It was a little overwhelming, being in the presence of all that sheer masculinity.
I resisted the urge to fan myself whenever I got a little flushed. So they were all Special Ops at one point. I believed it, with builds like theirs. Good to see they hadn’t gotten lazy in the days since their… retirement? Discharge? Roan hadn’t made it clear. A long story, he said. That was it.
I asked myself why I was thinking about meaningless crap just then, when I had so many other things to worry about. Maybe that was why. I was tired of worrying.
I had worried every single moment since I watched Dan’s shooting. Even when I was asleep—not like I had slept much. Every bang, every footstep, had made my heart stop and my eyes fly open. And with the thin walls of the little roach motel I’d been staying in, it was hard not to pick up every little noise.
Good thing I carried everything I needed with me, at all times. Not like there had been a dresser to unpack in or anything. I wrapped my arms around my backpack in a protective grip. It was my entire world, the clothes and toiletries I had managed to pack before running.
I doubted I’d ever go back to the house again. All my clothes and shoes and purses and books were there. I realized it didn’t matter, really. I didn’t care if I never saw any of it again. He had bought it for me, after all.
The thought of my father left a bitter taste in my mouth, just the way it had since that last night.
I felt eyes on me and looked up from the magazine I was flipping through without reading. My cheeks grew warm when I met Roan’s eyes.
“How are you?” he asked.
“Okay. Thanks.” I didn’t know what to say to him.
What did a girl say to the man who saved her life? Especially when there were three other men sitting around, listening in.
“We should land in about twenty minutes. The cabin is a half-hour from the airport.”
“Where is it located?”
His brow creased. “Would you stop with the questions, already?”
“I’m sorry if wanting to know where in the country I happen to be is a problem for you,” I murmured.
I was sure one of the other guys snorted.
Roan’s face hardened even further. “If you needed to know, I would tell you. In fact, let’s get one thing straight right now. You’re on a ‘need to know’ basis with everything from here on out. In other words, unless I think you need to know, you’re shit outta luck.”
My cheeks burned again, but out of rage this time. I threw the magazine to the floor. “I don’t deserve this!”
“You also don’t deserve to know where I’m taking you to protect you!”
“Okay, okay! Christ, we’re in an enclosed space, you two.” Roan’s brother held up his hands. “Can we keep things to a dull roar? Thanks.”
“Sorry,” I murmured.
That didn’t cool me off, however. I was still fuming. It was like talking to my father, trying to get him to open up to me and treat me like a person instead of like something that belonged to him. Just a possession, just something to make him look good—which I almost never did, not to his standards. Graduating from Columbia was just about the only achievement he’d ever been proud of.
Roan turned away to look out the window. I took the chance to smile at his brother. “You’re Slate? Is that right?”
He grinned, which made me wonder how much handsomer his brother would be if he ever lightened up.
“That’s right. You’re as smart as he told us you are.”
My smile cracked. “Oh. He told you about me?”
“What did you think we went to your house to talk to your father for?” Roan muttered, still looking away.
“It’s not my house. It’s my father’s house. Get it straight, please.” I heard him mutter something else under his breath in reply, but I didn’t dare ask him to repeat himself. I had the feeling I didn’t want to know.
Slate stared at Roan, but kept talking to me. “Anyway, I think it’s only fair to point out how out of the ordinary this is for us. We don’t usually make our own decisions over whether or not a client deserves us to work for them. We don’t make judgment calls like that.”
I knew what he was trying to say, and instead of being annoyed by him, I felt sorry for him. He played by the rules. They all did—it was ingrained in them, probably, thanks to their military background. Following orders was what they did. And they were all taking a big chance on me.
I reminded myself that Roan was the one who had convinced them, too. He believed me. What choice did he have after saving me from an assassin?
I shivered when I remembered him throwing himself over me, pressing me between the wall and his unyielding chest. I had felt safe for the first time, even when bullets were flying.
I didn’t have to carry everything on my shoulders. I could let somebody else take care of Dad and whoever he’d hired to kill me.
To kill me. My blood ran cold. I pressed my knees together tight to keep them from shaking. He wanted to kill me.
“I don’t feel well,” I whispered, unbuckling my belt with shaking hands. I made it to the bathroom just in time.
Knowing they were sitting not far from where I was retching into the steel toilet bowl was crushingly embarrassing, but it was better than doing it in the middle of our seats.
Once I finished throwing up my pancakes and coffee, which didn’t taste nearly as good the second time around, I washed my face in the little sink. Then, I studied myself in the mirror.
I looked old. Haunted. There were deep circles under my eyes, eyes which
were lifeless. No light shone from them. My friends would never recognize me. I hardly recognized myself.
What was my life going to turn into? Where could I go? What could I do for a living when I was afraid to use my real name? Who knew if Dad or one of his “friends” would find me? Would I be on the run forever? The thought was enough to make slitting my wrists look like a good idea. I couldn’t live like that forever. I wasn’t even sure I could handle it for another week.
My own father.
He wanted me dead. Roan didn’t have to tell me the gunman was sent by Dad. I could put it together. The man was just a poor, ignorant slob. He wasn’t mobbed up. He didn’t have the edge I imagined even a low-level mafia enforcer would have. He’d done everything but pee his pants.
And he was dead.
I splashed my face again with cold water, icy cold.
The man was dead. Why did I feel sorry for him? He would’ve killed me—he certainly might have if Roan hadn’t been there to protect me. He wouldn’t have felt sorry, I was willing to bet. So why should I?
Roan wasn’t sorry he killed him. He hadn’t even hesitated. In the time it took me to give him the gun and turn away, he’d blown the man’s head off.
“And he did it for me,” I whispered.
I didn’t know how to feel about that. It was horrifying on one hand, enough to make me want to kiss him on the other.
Nobody had ever done anything like that for me before. Deep down inside, I knew he would protect me to the death. Why? No idea. He didn’t know me. He didn’t owe me a thing. But again, I remembered him covering me against the brick wall. I remembered him keeping me from committing murder, which I might have—I was half out of my mind in that moment, terrified and enraged.
He killed a man for me.
“Hey.” There was a knock at the door—gentle, quiet, but firm. “We’re gonna be landing soon. You okay in there?”
“Yes. Thank you.” I had never meant those words more.
I took one more look at myself before opening the door and meeting him eye-to-eye.
They were still icy, like the color of steel, but not as piercing as they were back in the restaurant. There weren’t so many lines around them. He killed a man for me. I couldn’t get it out of my head.
“We should buckle in. You sure you’re ready? We could circle a little if you need more time.”
“No, no. I’m fine. It was just one of those moments when… I don’t know… it all came together and hit me like a ton of bricks. No big deal.” I tried to laugh, but it came out sounding pretty weak.
He looked uncomfortable, and it was clear he wasn’t the kind of guy who talked about his feelings. If anything, knowing I could make him feel something other than irritation was sort of cute.
“Come on,” he said in a gruff voice. “We’d better get ready to land.”
“Whatever you say,” I murmured, still remembering the sound of that final gunshot.
7
Roan
“What do you plan on doing with her?”
I turned away from the window to face my brother and cousins. They wore identical looks of disapproval bordering on anger. Even when they were pissed, they looked alike.
“Listen. I know I’m putting you guys in a shit position—”
“Not just us,” Carter reminded in a low growl. “Mary, too. You think she’s gonna trust us to perform another job after this? What if she tells us we have to find someplace else to live?”
I managed to keep from rolling my eyes. If I did that, he might shift on me—and that would be a real pain in the ass to explain to Hope, who would inevitably wake up from the sound of us trying to kill each other.
“You don’t have to be any part of it, then,” I said. “You can go back. All three of you can. I’m gonna stick around here with her and wait.”
“For what?”
I shrugged. “Until she’s a little better, for one thing. I mean, you saw her. She looks like a fucking zombie.”
“Yeah, I thought she was gonna pass out a couple of times on the plane. She’s pale as a ghost,” Drew said, shaking his head.
“Wouldn’t you be? Hell, you remember those early days as well as I do, when we were sure we were all we had. Nobody but us to lean on, nobody to trust. Sure we would end up with a sniper’s bullet in all our heads.” I glared at each of them in turn, ending up with Slate. “Remember that?”
“Of course,” he said as he shoved his hands in his pockets. “I don’t love the idea of leaving you out here alone. What happens if this guy sends more people after you?”
“How is that possible?” I asked. “He doesn’t know anything about us. He probably doesn’t even know Mary’s name. He doesn’t know where we went, and even if Hope was stupid enough to try to use her phone there’s no service out here.”
“Yeah, and she never did use it before now,” Carter pointed out. “There was no way to use it to find her because she never turned it on.”
“See? We’ll be fine.”
“I still don’t see what you’re waiting for,” Drew said. “I mean, how does this end?”
“It ends when I send for the jet to take us wherever she wants to go.” I pointed upstairs, where Hope was sleeping.
She had fallen asleep in the car and needed help getting into the cabin.
I had finally picked her up and carried her to bed.
“The jet isn’t for your personal use,” Drew murmured with a deep frown.
“Yeah. You don’t make that call. Mary does,” Carter added.
Slate, meanwhile, looked like he wanted to speak up for me, but wasn’t stupid enough to do it.
I couldn’t even blame him.
“When I talk to Mary about this and explain what Hope told me, and what happened today in the alley, she’ll get it.” I was bluffing. I had no idea what Mary would think or what my choices would do to my future as part of the team. I made sure to keep my chin high. No sense in letting them know I was winging the entire thing.
“I think one of us should stay with you,” Slate insisted.
I shook my head. “No way. I won’t pull you any further into this. That’s non-negotiable, so don’t bother arguing.”
They looked at each other.
I could sense the silent conversation they were having—just another one of the perks of being who we were. Just like we could communicate without words when we were hunting together, we could nearly hear each other’s thoughts.
Only they didn’t want me to hear their thoughts.
It was like a wall had gone up between us.
This was the first time I had ever felt like they were blocking me out. Maybe I deserved it for what I was doing.
“Okay. We’ll go on without you. But it’s up to you to tell Mary why we turned back on this mission.”
“And I’ll do it. She knows how to reach me.”
Slate gave me a short nod, then opened his mouth like he wanted to say something.
I shook my head just enough for him to see while the others walked out. There was nothing he needed to say.
He gave me one more regretful look before turning and following our cousins out to the car.
It wasn’t the first time I had to strike out on my own, but I had never felt so alone. I guessed it was because I had gotten used to having them with me. We were a team in every sense. I could anticipate their moves the way they could anticipate mine. We all brought something to the table. I would miss their skills and smarts, even as I assured myself I would be fine without them. And I would.
The cabin wasn’t nearly as big as the one we lived in, which was sort of the point. I hadn’t been there in almost a year. The last job that sent me there was out of Pittsburgh, which was only about forty-five minutes away. The cabin was the closest safe place Mary owned. Just one of many such cabins and out-of-the-way houses she owned around the country and even in a few choice spots around the world.
I still didn’t know half there was to know about her—why did
she do what she did? How did people reach out to her? How had she even found us?
That was a question that used to keep me up at night. I walked through the modest living room with its low ceilings and cheerful hand-woven rugs in shades of red and yellow. They didn’t do much to improve my dark mood. One entire wall was lined with books, but I didn’t have it in me to open one up just then. Not when I had so much on my mind.
I went to the kitchen instead and noted the bare cupboards. We’d have to go out for food. I couldn’t exactly ask Mary to have it sent there the way she sent it to our cabin back home.
Let’s just say I know how it feels when you’re left on your own. That was as much as she would ever tell any of us when we asked why she took us under her wing the way she had. She didn’t have to, for sure. It wasn’t even clear how she knew who we were or why we needed help. But we did need help. It wasn’t every day a guy found himself in a world completely against him.
I went down to the basement, where I knew a call would be coming in from Mary any moment now. As soon as she heard from one of the guys she’d be steaming mad and ready to chew me out.
I booted up the system that would allow us to talk, sort of a half-assed set up based on the one back home, but one less easy to trace.
We weren’t exactly hiding in Montana. We were just in seclusion, outside the rest of civilization for our own good. The small cabin in which I sat was a different story—a secret.
I only had to wait another few minutes before the same pealing bell noise I was used to hearing at home rang through the basement. Never in all my years in Special Ops had I felt the sort of pit in my stomach as I did when I accepted the call.
“I was sure they couldn’t be telling the truth.” There were two spots of color on her face, one on each cheek, deep red. Her jaw was clenched so tight I wondered if she could crack a walnut in her teeth.
“Did they tell you why?”
“Yes, they tried to. Your brother begged me to be understanding. How can I be understanding right now?”
