by Anne Russo
Adam had no choice but to take him at his word. They moved through the alleyway, which led out to a deserted parking lot. A lone car parked behind the dumpsters. A dark colored sedan with tinted windows. The car started up, and the trunk popped open when they approached.
Adam started to turn back, but before Adam could speak, he felt a forearm around his throat, throttling him. Adam fought the attack, pushing back and kicking outward. But the grip on his throat tightened. Adam panicked, convinced he was several painful inches from death. The pressure mounting as black spots crowded his vision, and he braced himself for the end.
“Sorry, doc.”
Adam heard the hitman’s whisper, right before the world disappeared.
Chapter 3
The trip back to the estate was agonizing. Ian had called Mei from the front gate and told her to meet him at the entrance. She was waiting in the foyer, flanked by a handful of bodyguards as he stomped into the mansion. Over his shoulder, he carried an unconscious Adam.
“Your new boyfriend?” Mei quipped as he dumped Adam’s inert body onto the polished marble floors.
“Fuck off,” Ian snarled. Two guards stepped forward to pick up Adam, where he lay.
“Jesus. What? Calm down,” Mei urged, attempting to appear concerned, but her barely suppressed giggles gave her away.
Calm? Good luck with that, Ian thought. He’d had the two hour drive back to the estate to ruminate, and he was nowhere near calm. How in the hell had he stumbled across Rhys’s kid?
Ian had drawn his conclusions about Adam years ago. Hell, he’d even considered seeking him out before deciding against it. Not wanting to know, but the truth had refused to stay hidden. Fate had intervened instead, stepping in and snatching free will out of his hands.
Now, having met Adam, the missing piece of the puzzle was at last formed. And everything made sense. In truth, he’d deciphered the answer all along but had not wanted to face what he’d discovered. Yet, now having stared into Adam’s eyes and seen his stupid, gorgeous face.
Adam wasn’t merely Rhys’s kid. He was Katherine’s too. He was living proof that Katherine’s and Rhys’s loyalty to his father only extended so far. The newly learned and unsavory fact now worming around his skull, refusing to budge.
Ian raced for his room’s safety, needing to put some space between himself and said proof. At least for the time being. He still didn’t understand why he hadn’t rid himself of the headache altogether while he’d had the chance. What had it been about him that had made him hesitant to shoot him at all?
“Hey!” Mei called after him. “What the hell do I tell Katherine?”
Ian turned long enough to answer her. “Tell her that her fucking kid is here,” he growled and kept marching.
He hastened toward the apartment and to the secluded safety of his room. He couldn’t collect his breath, heart racing as he dashed inside, slamming the door shut behind him. Ian threw his head back, struggling in vain to wrap his mind around the truth of what he’d uncovered. Ian’s thoughts tangled, drifting back to his first encounter with Adam in the elevator. The ease of which he’d caught his eye as if drawn to him without sensing why. Ian was horrified by the slow realization that he might’ve killed him, never knowing. That was if the kid’s damned photo hadn’t stayed with him all these years. The image, demanding answers to a thousand questions. Questions that after Rhys’s death, Ian had buried deep and refused to unlock. The discovery of Adam’s existence having coincided with the darkest night of his life. The night he’d lost Rhys forever, the night he’d been powerless to stop—
Ian shook off the flurry of black memories threatening to overwhelm him. He hurried over to the bookshelf in the corner, flying straight to a tattered bible sandwiched between a sea of books. He flipped open the pages until both photos fell out into his hand—time reeling backward as he stared at a young child’s image. Still unable to reconcile the photograph to the man he’d been seconds away from murdering in cold blood.
He was pulling handfuls of books from the shelves, wanting to rip the world apart with his bare hands. Instead, he’d settle for this, for tearing apart every single goddamn page. Every piece of furniture until nothing remained. He tossed a handful of books aside, startled when two photographs fluttered to the floor by his feet. Curious, he bent to retrieve them.
The first, an old snapshot of his parents and himself. His father near identical to him in all but coloring, standing confident and assured. Ian’s mother with her black curls and radiant smile. Her lovely face was beaming with pride as she held baby Ian up to the camera. Their faces were a brutal reminder of the things he’d lost long before tonight. No longer able to endure the image of a family he had never known.
He turned to the next photo instead, a little boy around seven or eight. Smiling into the camera, a bright, adorable child with a toothy grin, too familiar eyes, and tousled sandy blond hair. Ian turned it over, discovering a name written in marker and signed in a childish cursive.
Adam Morrow, 1998.
Why these two photos? Why had Rhys secreted these pictures away for safekeeping? Who the hell was Adam Morrow? Why did his face alone leave Ian sick to his stomach? A dawning sense of recognition that terrified him. Not that it mattered now. Rhys was never coming back. He’d never get the chance to ask him, question, demand to know why this boy reminded him so much—
“Ian?”
Shaken from his reverie by approaching footsteps, Ian snapped the book closed. He turned to acknowledge Kalifa standing in the doorway.
“Katherine asked to see you.”
“Yeah, I bet,” Ian mumbled under his breath.
“The man you brought. Who is he?”
The question stunned him. Kalifa nor Hector ever questioned him, unlike the other three. “He’s a goddamn nightmare is what he is.”
Kalifa raised black brows in alarm or interest, he couldn’t tell.
“Well? What is it?”
“You look worried,” Kalifa announced, answering in her quiet way.
“I’m not worried,” he spat, stomping past her toward the elevators, determined to get to the bottom of things once and for all.
* * * *
Ian stood, observing Katherine from the doorway. A silent and uneasy voyeur watching as she sat by Adam’s bedside, her pale white face detached. Cautious, he stepped into the room, clearing his throat, getting her attention. Katherine’s gaze lifted to meet his, hostile and defiant as she glared at him from the other side of the room.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know what to do with him.”
“Do with him? I’m still wondering how you knew anything about him.”
Ian tried to swallow away the dryness; his words choked. “I heard the name before. From, from Rhys.” It wasn’t a lie, per se, a half-truth, which Ian had mastered over the years.
“I see,” Katherine came around the bed. “So am I to assume he’s here because you’re aware he’s my son?”
The comment took Ian aback, not expecting her to be so direct.
“He resembles me, doesn’t he?” She studied Adam as he lay there unconscious, unaware of the matters of life and death waging as he slept.
“He does. Is he my brother?”
“We both know he isn’t,” Katherine confirmed. “So, Rhys made you aware of him but not who he was to him. Interesting.”
It was one thing for him to connect the dots on an intellectual level. To have Katherine confirm the photo he carried was of the son his father’s wife and best friend bore and gave away in secret. It was too much for his brain to process. Ian couldn’t bear to face her; his mind reeled.
“I didn’t know for sure,” Ian answered, unsure. “He never told me directly.” The need to defend Rhys against her condemnation of him was as strong as ever.
Katherine stepped in closer, crowding his space. “What happened between Rhys and I was a mistake.” She tilted her head to the side. “And one that happened once and only after your father died.”
“You can check his date of birth if you have your suspicions.”
Ian stiffened, her eyes burning with the challenge, but still, he could not face her, the hurt in her eyes.
“Do you hear me? I’ll not stand for having my character questioned. Is that understood?”
Ian nodded, face burning.
“Never once did I betray your father. I loved him. I still love him.”
“I know,” he answered, hoping to appease her. “I’m sorry, Katherine.”
“Therefore, I ask that you keep the knowledge of Adam’s father between us.”
“Pardon? What am I to tell him?” Ian worked up the nerve to ask. “When he wants to know about his father?”
“Tell him nothing. Rhys Meyers died a coward, a drunk. He was a shell of a man when he died, a traitor who gave us up to save himself.” Katherine glanced over at Adam, her expression pensive as she turned back to Ian. “No, you leave his questions to me. You say nothing. To no one.”
Ian simmered, each insult she slung in Rhys’s memory stung, as if Katherine had called him a traitor instead. Katherine carried on, oblivious to his suffering. “Fate is such a funny, fickle thing.
For twenty-five years, I did everything in my power to keep us apart. And yet, here he is.
Thanks to you.”
Ian chanced, glancing over at Adam, a breathing nightmare of his own making. “Does that mean he’s staying?”
“We can’t very well let him leave,” she replied, too calm. “But you knew that, or you’d have left him where you found him. Yes?”
“Yes.”
“Good, so you understand you’ve inherited not only a stepbrother but your newest recruit.”
“Recruit?”
The task, daunting and thrilling in equal measure, an impossible request, but the possibility still intrigued Ian. “I assume I have your permission to treat him as I’d any other recruit? No special treatment?”
“Yes, no special treatment. Now, that’ll be all. I want to be alone with my son.”
It took Ian aback. The casual way she claimed him. For, never once in the years he’d known her had she referred to him as such. Son. Son or not, Ian saw the embodiment of his guilt instead. The guilt he’d carried with him every day of his life.
“Yes, of course,” he replied, swallowing hard.
He turned to leave, glancing once more at Adam’s sleeping form, struck with the unsettling sensation of staring into the past. A past, doomed to repeat, helpless to stop it happening. Ian hurried from the room, the overwhelming sensation of déjà vu washing over him as he fled.
* * * *
Adam struggled to open his eyes, slow to awaken. As if he were clawing his way out of a black hole, blinking into the light. He groaned and fell back onto the pillow behind him, then became aware of the hand pushing back and holding him to the bed.
“Now, now,” a soft feminine voice purred. “Don’t move, darling.”
Adam turned with enormous effort, blurred vision focusing until he made out the figure of a woman. She was around fifty he guessed but could pass for much younger under the right lighting. His first impression was she reminded him of an aging film star, with her fine sophisticated features. Long sculpted nose, and blood red lips. Dark brown hair swept into a sophisticated knot. But, it was her dark green eyes, startling in their familiarity that unnerved him. Despite how immaculate and well-dressed she was, she brought only overwhelming dread.
“Are you awake? Adam, my name is Katherine. Can you hear me?” Her voice was as polished and smooth as the rest of her.
Adam nodded weakly. Katherine let out a fluttery breath in response, stealing her features into something more formidable, her bright lips flattening to a thin, worried line.
“Where am I?” he got out, scratchy, faint.
“You’re home,” Katherine replied as if the answer were the only logical one.
“This isn’t home,” he answered and tried to worm away from her touch, groaning in frustration when he couldn’t.
“It will be,” she answered, soothing.
Her words sent chills racing. Dread washed over Adam in waves. Deeper now, worming its way into his chest and spreading like a disease. When she spoke again, it did little to expel his fears.
“Listen to me carefully, Adam. Can you do that for me?”
“Where is he?” he demanded, ignoring her question.
“You must mean Ian,” Katherine replied, shaking her head. “He’s not your concern right now.”
“My concern? He kidnapped me! Where the hell am I?” He choked on the words, frantic.
“You’re safe. That’s all that matters.”
Those words did little to soothe; he was desperate now, panic overtaking logic and reason. “What are you saying? Why won’t you tell me where I am?” Adam was horrified when Katherine sat beside him on the edge of the bed and took his hand. Too frightened to object, Adam allowed her to hold it.
“Adam, please try to listen. This is important. I never intended for us to meet this way. To be honest, I never meant us to meet at all.” Katherine paused before continuing. “I suppose there’s no delicate way of saying this. I’m your mother. Your real mother.”
“No, you’re not,” Adam tried to deny it but couldn’t. Not when the undeniable truth stared back at him with his own eyes. At last, Adam finally understood where he had come from, who he belonged to, and the knowledge horrified him.
Katherine frowned and squeezed his hand harder than necessary. He winced and tried to pull out of her grasp, but she clung tight. “Faces don’t lie, darling.”
“I don’t belong here,” he protested. “I don’t.”
Katherine smiled that sweet, patient smile again, but her eyes were deadly serious. “I want you to understand that I never wanted to give you up for adoption. But I wanted you to have the life I was unable to provide.”
“Please, I don’t understand what’s going on?” Adam slid his hand away. A gesture he noted from the darkening of her eyes, she didn’t appreciate. “Why am I here?”
“You’re not supposed to be,” she answered, bored like. “But that stepson of mine never could keep himself out of things which don’t concern him.”
“Please, look, I’ll keep my mouth shut. I won’t say a word. I promise—”
“You’re not hearing me,” Katherine cut him off, tone sharp. “You can never go back. Never. We’re all you have left, my dear.”
“We? Is—is my father here, too?” Adam couldn’t help but ask.
The question took Katherine aback, her lips narrowing into a thinner line, eyes glinting.
“Your father was a man of little consequence. A mistake I would ask you not remind me of making. Is that understood?”
Adam swallowed, unnerved by her tone, he nodded.
“Good.” She continued. “The only thing that matters now is you’re here.”
“What—what is here?” Adam demanded, shaken by an avalanche of information.
Katherine softened, leaning forward and retaking his hand. This time he didn’t fight her, devastated. “We handle problems that others cannot. For a price.”
Adam’s mind flipped back to the hospital. Mallory’s room and the discovery of a spreading pool of blood and two dead bodies. The other man’s finger on the trigger, ready to shoot him on the spot. Realization clicked. Beyond frantic now, he tried to sit up, desperate to put as much distance between them as possible.
“I don’t belong here,” Adam protested again, but his pleas fell on deaf ears once more.
Katherine stood up, studying him with a disapproving stare, peering into his eyes as if to lay his every secret bare. Underneath though, Adam spied a faint layer of revulsion, a contempt for him that made his skin crawl. She made his skin crawl. This woman who claimed she was his mother.
“Please let me go. I don’t want to be here—”
“Stop it,” sh
e hissed, stopping his plea. “It’s clear that you need time to process. Now you rest. Someone will be around to take you to your room.”
He turned away from her, face pressed into a pillow, attempting to stifle his sobs. Adam couldn’t make sense of what she was saying, how all the things he had worked his whole life for were gone now. One night, one terrible night, it had all disappeared, ripped straight from his hands. Shaking her head with pity or disgust, he couldn’t tell. She left, shutting the door behind her. He wasn’t the least bit surprised to hear a lock clicking shut behind her.
* * * *
That had been the first lie. There had been no rest. A group of guards led him down one endless long hall after the other. An elevator took him several stories below. Once the door opened, they pushed him through a dim hallway, past a spacious living space, not unlike the types of lavish penthouse apartments he had only seen on TV. Past the living area lay a series of closed doors. They ushered him into the one at the end of the hall, leaving him in the middle of a rather lovely bedroom. Alone.
The room featured a large oak bed piled high with a thick white comforter and matching king size pillows. There was also a matching desk and chair set and several ornate dressers. The only thing that ruined the room’s lovely opulence was its noticeable lack of windows. Overcome, Adam threw himself down on the bed, worn out, his brain a tangled whirlwind.
He stayed that way for three days. By day three, Adam had no desire ever to leave the bed again. Or go on at all. Adam tossed and turned in fits and starts, his blurry eyes drifting over the tasteful furniture. The pristine decor resembled a fancy hotel room, only one with no sunlight and a lock on the door. With the door closed, the world fell silent. There were no outside noises, only his terrible thoughts. His overwhelming sense of dread grew as the days passed.
While he slept, someone came and left him a tray—a bowl of soup and a sandwich, a mug of lukewarm tea. Adam drank only the tea and left the food. When he awoke again, someone had cleared the tray and left a pot of coffee and a pitcher of water in its place. Adam fell back to sleep, and when he woke again, the light was on by the bed. And, sitting there by his bedside, the man who had kidnapped him. Ian. His dark brown eyes gave away nothing as Adam struggled to sit, shocked to discover him beside him, and so close.
