by AJ Quinn
“You knew,” she whispered. She watched Elle freeze. Saw Jessie’s confusion as she glanced from her face to Ben’s, then back again. And she felt empty. So very empty. “Damn it, Ben. You and Grace both knew this is what we’d find.”
Ben’s shoulders appeared to sag under the weight of her accusation. “Dare, it’s not what you think. Not exactly. Let me explain.”
“No, you don’t get to call me Dare like we’re good friends and think that will somehow make things better.” The words tumbled out harshly and disjointed.
Because she wanted to strike out, she shoved her hands in her pockets, closed her eyes, and shuddered out a breath while Jessie and Elle and the world beyond them ceased to exist. “You’ve been keeping secrets, Ben. Hiding the truth from me. It’s the one thing—the only thing—I ever asked you to promise me. The one thing you said you’d never do.”
Ben reached out for her, taking her arm. “Darien, I’m sorry—”
“No, you don’t get to be sorry either because it doesn’t change anything.” She pulled herself free from his grasp. “At least have the decency to admit you and Grace knew what we were dealing with. Can you do that?”
Ben released a low, frustrated groan. “No one knew for certain. All we had to go on was chatter. Rumors circulating that someone might be trying to resuscitate the Guild for reasons we could only guess at. It was all supposition and guesswork. So we kept it need-to-know while we watched and waited. Until the rumors could be verified.”
“Bullshit.” Darien would be the first to admit she wasn’t one for adhering to rules. But honesty, especially with those she was supposed to be able to count on, people she was close to, had always been held as sacrosanct. Knowing Ben and Grace had withheld information from her shook her. Finding out they’d been less than honest with her hurt.
Do the ends justify the means, she wondered. “This is why you and Grace made sure I was here, under your watchful eye, when the truth came out. Isn’t it?”
Ben flinched. “We didn’t want you getting hurt. Or doing anything—”
The unintended but lethal jab was right on target. She wheeled around as his anger sparked her own. “You wanted to be able to control my reaction, isn’t that what you mean? Well, guess what? I’m not thirteen anymore. And you can’t control me now any better than either you or Grace could control me fifteen years ago.”
“Dare, damn it, listen to me. We can work through this. Grace will fly in and we can all sit down. If we work together, we can figure out who’s behind the resurrected Guild. We can figure out what they’re after and how to stop them.”
Darien shook her head vehemently as something twisted inside her, but she kept her gaze steady on him. “No, I don’t think so. You had your chance to have us work this through together and you blew it. Now it’s my turn.”
She felt Ben give her a slow, measuring study, but his dark eyes revealed nothing of his thoughts as he asked, “What does that mean? What do you think you’re going to do?”
“I’m going to do what I do best,” she answered, suddenly feeling tired to her bones. “I’m going to do what you and Grace and my mother trained me to do.”
Ben blinked. “You’re going to go after the Guild.”
“It’s what I’m good at, isn’t it? And it would no longer surprise me if it’s what you and Grace counted on when you brought me in.”
“That’s not it at all.”
Feeling overwhelmingly weary, Darien shrugged him off. “You know what, Ben? It doesn’t really matter.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means it doesn’t matter what you thought or planned or what Grace thought or planned. It doesn’t even matter why the Guild is back or what they intend to do. What’s important now is getting close enough to shut them down permanently—before any more innocent lives are lost. So I’m going to finish what was started nearly fifteen years ago. Only this time, I won’t stop until I know for certain the job is done.”
“And how in bloody hell do you think you’re going to do that? Can you at least answer me that?”
She might be angry with him, but she was not so far gone that she couldn’t hear the frustration, weariness, and yes, even hurt in Ben’s voice. Darien stopped, considered, then allowed her thoughts to begin racing as she structured a plan on the fly. And even though she hated herself for it and thought she was showing weakness, she eased back into a long-established pattern of talking her thoughts out…with Ben.
“I’m going to go see Yuri.” She turned, sending a whisper of dark hair over her cheek. “If anyone knows anything about the Guild and who’s behind it, it’ll be Yuri. He’ll get me a contact.”
“What makes you think so?”
“They said they’re just beginning. They want to demonstrate their power and warned another attack is imminent. But if they plan to continue with large-scale acts of terrorism, they’re going to need what I can offer. Assault weapons, missiles, weaponized vehicles. Whatever. I don’t care. All I need to do is get close enough to look them in the eyes. And then I’m going to take them apart for good.” The storm had passed and she was calmer. “There won’t be any coming back again after that.”
Ben’s frown deepened as he appeared to weigh her words. Watching him, Darien couldn’t help but wonder if this too was part of some Machiavellian plan he and Grace had concocted. Dangle the Guild in front of her, wind her up, and let her loose to hunt them down. Seek and destroy. Could it be that simple?
Trust no one. Wasn’t that what she’d been taught? She didn’t want to believe it, but present circumstances were forcing her to consider every possibility.
After a lengthy silence, Ben spoke. “Even if we do it your way for now, you’ll need to move slowly. Not do anything rash. Jessie and Elle and I are still here. Grace is a phone call away and will stand ready to provide whatever intel or resources you need. All you need to do is tell me what we can do to help.”
Still hurting, still feeling the sting of betrayal, Darien wanted to say there was nothing anyone could do to help. But years of training stopped her, and the truth was if she wanted to do this, and do it right, she would still need help. She would probably need all of them—Jessie, Elle, Ben, and Grace—before this was all over if she wanted to survive. And she intended to survive.
“Before I meet with Yuri, I’ll need to see Zoey. I need to set the stage. In the meantime, I’ll need one of these ladies ready to go with me. I don’t care which—just help whichever one’s willing to back me up.”
“All right. But it’s late. Why don’t you leave it until morning?”
“I don’t see any point in waiting.” She felt his eyes on her face, knew he disagreed but didn’t know how to stop her. How to change her mind. “Don’t push me on this, Ben. Neither of us will like what happens. I’ll be back when I have things in place.”
Ben bit off an oath. “Damn it, Dare. Please don’t leave like this. Tell me how to make things right.”
“You can’t. And there’s one more thing.”
“What?”
“When this is over, I’m no longer your problem. I’m through. I want out and I don’t give a damn about the consequences.” She sent a slashing, cynical look as she brushed past him and started for the stairs.
“Dare—”
Hurt, unbelievably hurt, and fighting to keep her composure, Darien kept walking. There was nothing left to say, and the sound of retreating footsteps was the only answer she had left in her to give.
Chapter Seven
Darien did not come back to the house that night.
Nor, quite obviously, had she returned by morning. When Jessie walked into the kitchen, there was no delightful aroma of fresh-brewed dark-roast coffee in the air to greet her. There were no bowls of fresh fruit from the market or steaming croissants straight from the bakery down the street.
Admit it, she thought. You’re already spoiled.
But it was more than that and she knew it. In spite of the physical at
traction, Jessie hadn’t wanted to like Darien. She had just wanted to get the job done. But Darien had made working together easier than she’d anticipated—and liking her had happened quite naturally.
Staring at the empty coffeemaker, Jessie realized she was worried about Darien. And that was crazy, because if anyone gave the impression they could look after themselves, it was Darien Troy.
Abandoning any thought of trying to make coffee and unable to face the prospect of drinking something Ben might make, Jessie chose the path of least resistance and walked to the patisserie a couple of blocks away. A good decision. The right decision. The early morning sky was an incredible shade of blue, and the air was already warm, filled with scents and sounds, and the promise of a beautiful day.
She took her time, and more than twenty minutes passed before she returned to the house with three coffees and a box containing pain au chocolat. Maybe not as healthy as something Darien would have put together, but who could deny the pleasure of chocolate for breakfast?
Ben was up, staring morosely at the empty coffeemaker and wearing the remnants of a bad night. His eyes lit up when he saw what she was holding. “You’re a lifesaver,” he said. “I was about to murder another pot of coffee.”
Jessie smiled at him faintly.
“At least it doesn’t look like it’s going to rain.”
The weather—how original. But if Ben preferred to make small talk about coffee and the weather rather than address the elephant in the room—the argument he’d had with Darien the evening before and whatever had driven her from the house—then Jessie would cut him some slack. She would give him time.
She knew instinctively that whatever had gone down between him and Darien had hurt him deeply on a personal level. She shuddered as she recalled the jagged ice in Darien’s tone and felt herself softening.
But her experience and training warned her not to lose too much time. The clock was ticking and they still needed to identify the people behind the organization calling itself the Guild—before they made their next move.
Trust your instincts. She did what she’d been taught to do. She let him make small talk, gave him time as she took a sip of her coffee. It was strong. Very strong. But she figured the jolt of caffeine couldn’t hurt.
“She was going to see Zoey. She’ll have spent the night with her.”
At last. “Who is Zoey?” A lover?
“The best answer I can give you is that Zoey’s an artist Darien took under her wing. A very young artist.”
His emphasis had Jessie trying to read between the lines, along with the expression on Ben’s face, with no success. “How young is young?”
“She’s maybe seventeen…going on forty.” He sent her a wry smile and shrugged. “Dare saved her from an unfortunate incident in an alley in Berlin. Then, for a reason she’s never bothered to explain, she kept the kid with her while she completed the job she was there to do instead of saving her and walking away as she should have done. The funny thing is, for a runaway, the kid didn’t put up even token resistance. They were like kindred spirits recognizing each other. And then Darien compounded the matter by bringing Zoey back to Paris with her.”
“When was this?”
“Maybe four years ago.”
Jessie tried to understand, but it felt as if all she could do was try to keep up. “The child would have been around thirteen. Are you telling me with all the technology available upstairs, no one bothered to or was able to find out where Zoey came from? Who she belonged to? No one tried to get her back to her family?”
“Actually, Dare did her usual thorough job. She found out the kid came from Amsterdam, but she said there was nothing there Zoey needed to go back to. So she assumed responsibility for her. She’s gone so far as to set her up in what was Dare’s pied-à-terre before she bought this place and looks after all her expenses. She also sees to the girl’s education.”
“I don’t get it. Why doesn’t Zoey just live here?” She indicated the expansive house surrounding her with a wave of her hands. “It’s certainly big enough, so it’s not like they’d be tripping over each other.”
“That’s true, and they tried that route in the beginning. They never said why, but my guess is neither Dare nor Zoey is very good at living in close proximity to other people for too long. And rather than risk Zoey heading back to the streets, they worked out a compromise.”
Jessie couldn’t miss the light of amusement in Ben’s dark eyes or the affection evident in his tone. “But you live here. How does that work?”
“Actually, I don’t live here,” Ben responded. “I maintain my primary residence in London, but I also have a home in Tokyo. I’m only here because I got pulled into this job.”
“Because of your history with the Guild.”
Her comment elicited a real laugh from Ben. “You’re really more like your mother than your father, aren’t you.” He made it a statement, not a question. “But to answer your question, yes. I’m involved in this because of history.”
“History that includes both Darien and my mother?”
“Yes, again. Darien, Grace, and I were all originally part of bringing the Guild down fifteen years ago. And I expect we will all somehow be involved in stopping them once again. Preferably before they go too much further.”
Suspicious by nature, Jessie blew out an impatient breath. “For Christ’s sake, Ben. Fifteen years ago, Darien would have been a child.”
“She was thirteen.”
She tried to picture Darien at thirteen. She’d bet she’d been tall for her age. A slim, long-legged, wild child with haunted eyes the color of smoke. She blinked the image away and turned her attention back to the conversation. “You realize what you’re saying makes no sense at all, don’t you? How is it even possible?”
“Actually, it makes perfect sense if you stop to think about it. Revenge is a powerful motivator—even for a girl barely into her teens.”
“It’s still not working for me. What kind of revenge drives a girl to go after terrorists?”
She watched the change as it slid across Ben’s face. “The kind that’s based on avenging her mother’s death.”
Because she knew she was responding emotionally, Jessie fought to cover her own reaction. She closed her eyes for just an instant and pictured her own mother. “I can see how that could be quite motivating. But still, for you and my mother to bring a thirteen-year-old girl along as part of some covert operation to take down a terrorist organization? That’s just crazy.”
“Actually, you’ve got it backward. It wasn’t our takedown. It was Darien’s operation all the way. Grace and I considered ourselves lucky that she allowed us to go along with her.”
“What are you saying?”
“When we became aware Arianna Troy had been killed—when her body was recovered—Grace and I started searching for Darien. But it wasn’t easy. She’d had plenty of training and time to disappear. We found out later that Arianna was set up, but Darien had no way of knowing who was behind it, which meant she wasn’t prepared to trust anyone. By the time we caught up to her, she’d been surviving on her own for quite some time, and by then the damage was done. She had compiled a list of targets—people she felt were responsible for her mother’s death—and she was operating with one simple premise. She wanted revenge, and if someone got in her way, they bled.”
“Then why did she allow you to help?”
“I think because, deep down, she knew both Grace and me. She had known us personally for a number of years through her mother, and in the end her need for help trumped her distrust. Dare had her priorities straight, and she knew it was either accept our help or get killed without being able to exact total retribution.”
Reaching into his pocket, Ben pulled out his wallet and extracted a photograph. “This was taken a few months before Arianna died.”
As Ben’s words faded into silence, Jessie stared at the photograph. Thirteen-year-old Darien had been on the cusp of evolving into somethi
ng spectacular when she’d posed for it. The painfully beautiful face already sculpted into intriguing angles and hollows. The frightening intelligence clearly visible in the smoky gray eyes, along with the ever-present defiant attitude evidenced by the line of her jaw and set of her chin. But without the damage caused by whatever transpired in the months after her mother was killed.
Jessie got the point. “Shit.”
Ben nodded. “I know you have more questions. But unless it interferes with what we need to do to stop the Guild, some of the answers will have to come from Darien. Or from Grace.”
“My mother, because you don’t believe Darien will answer my questions?”
“Actually, I don’t know for certain, but I’ll be curious to find out.”
She hesitated, wanting to ask more questions before accepting they’d come as far as they were going to. For now. “All right, but I’ve got to warn you. I grew up surrounded by secrets and I’ve discovered I have little tolerance for them.”
Ben smiled faintly. “Fair enough.”
“What happens next?”
“Right now, unless you brought club wear with you from Islamabad, my guess is we need to go shopping.”
Jessie couldn’t restrain the shudder that ran through her. Shopping? “What do I need with club wear?”
“Have you forgotten already?” Ben raised a brow, an unholy gleam in his eyes. “Darien will need backup for her visit to Yuri’s tonight, and Yuri owns a club.”
“Are you that certain she’ll be back?”
“Without a doubt. Darien’s a professional. That means she’ll see any job through, but especially one that’s personal. And that means she’ll be going to Yuri’s tonight.”
“And what’s she hoping to achieve by going there?”
“Hopefully, get a foot in the door and a chance to fill the Guild’s shopping cart.”
The tightening in her chest was automatic. “Darien’s going to offer to broker the weapons deal?”
