I was more a dog kind of person.
But his lips against mine were different, restrained.
“I need to tell you about Sophia,” he said.
My mouth went dry. The woman he’d loved, the one who’d died. He’d promised to tell me the story someday but had been reserving this unprecedented level of opening up to me for our upcoming trip to Australia. It was less than three weeks away and one of the major reasons I didn’t want to be dragged off to Japan.
Connor had surprised me with the plane tickets a month earlier, showing me how much he’d cared, how much he’d been paying attention. I’d been pining for a visit home ever since I’d landed in LA, and so he’d made it happen. Simple as that.
So why did he need to tell me about Sophia now? In my apartment of all places? And didn’t he want to hear how the client interview had gone first?
“Okay,” I said, sinking to the bed beside him.
Part of me was squirming with curiosity, the other part jittery with nerves, and a third part anxious for Connor whom this was sure to be a painful conversation for. And having to fake break up just after he bared his soul to me was hardly good timing. But I wasn’t about to argue with something he felt he needed.
“I met her through work. She applied for a position with Stiles Security and Investigation.”
That made sense. His whole life was work, so where else would he spend enough time with a woman to fall for her?
“She was a professional bodyguard. Ex-military. Had a sharp mind for strategy, was proficient at close combat, and could outshoot me nine times out of ten. I gave her the job because she was the best applicant by a mile.”
I swallowed a pang of jealousy. Stupid. To be jealous of a dead woman. But she was everything I wasn’t, and she sounded perfect for Connor. While he and I fit together like… well, I wasn’t sure how we fit together exactly, they would’ve worked like a well-oiled machine. And now I was thinking of them moving together with oil in a different way. I was an idiot.
Connor’s face was strained. A tiny ripple on the surface that hinted at turbulence deep below. It was hurting him to tell me this, and my mind was busy conjuring the green monster.
“We understood each other. The job. The demons. The release of someone to share it with. We got engaged. A month later, she was killed. The job we shared—the one that brought us together—killed her.”
My stomach dropped, and the green monster vanished without a trace. “I’m so sorry.”
Connor went on as if I hadn’t spoken. “She was trained to anticipate and defend against physical threats, and she was an expert at it. The Taste Society had a VIP client who needed a traditional bodyguard as well as a Shade, and so I gave her the job. But the assassin found a way around both of them. I believe it must have been Stalenburg.”
Goosebumps pricked along my arms, and my mind dredged up the day I’d first heard the name Stalenburg. The sweat-soaked hitman who’d spoken the three syllables in a reverent whisper. Connor telling me she was regarded responsible for every fatal poisoning of Taste Society clients protected by Shades in Los Angeles over the past fourteen years. That she never made mistakes, that no one had anything on her.
He hadn’t mentioned she’d also killed his fiancée.
“I’m so sorry,” I said again, feeling like a broken record. But no words would fix this, soothe this. Nothing could.
“I’m telling you what happened because I love you, Isobel Avery.”
If I didn’t know better, I’d swear Connor choked up as he said those astonishing words.
“You do?”
He started as if I’d shocked him. “Of course. Isn’t it obvious? I thought you knew.”
“Um—”
“Why else would I work so hard at being a suitable life partner for you? Someone who opens up to you, is less than hopeless at communicating, and—God forbid—tries to make you smile by making stupid jokes?”
“Wow.” I could barely get the word out. My eyes were wet, and my heart was expanding like somebody had hooked it up to a helium pump.
“But I can’t be with you when you recklessly throw yourself into danger without even taking precautions.”
And just like that, my balloon popped. And plummeted to the ground. Where it was torn to shreds by a passing lawn mower.
“What? What are you talking about?”
“I ran into Levi today, and he told me about your plan to confront that human-trafficking doctor. Inadvertently that is, he assumed I already knew.”
Oh no.
Desperation to save the girls had driven me to lengths I’d never thought I’d go to. I would’ve done almost anything to get Doctor Dan to talk, to tell me where they were being held. But it wasn’t the line I’d been prepared to cross that bothered Connor. It was the danger I’d put myself in to cross it.
This was going to be bad.
“It’s one thing for you to be a Shade. I mean, that’s bad enough, but fatalities are very rare and you’re trained for it. But this?” His gray eyes met mine, and they were raw with anger. “This is another thing entirely. Why would you take that risk alone? Why wouldn’t you tell me?”
He wasn’t going to like my answer, but I had to give him the truth. “Because… you would’ve stopped me.”
“You’re damn right I would’ve stopped you. It was an insane risk!”
I opened my mouth to explain, but Connor lifted his hand. “It’s done now, and I didn’t bring it up to argue about it.” There was a long pause. Maybe the longest of my life. “You asked me to communicate with you, to trust you and be vulnerable with you. Well, this is me being vulnerable and communicating. I’m asking you to stop this reckless behavior because I’ve already lost the love of my life once, and I can’t go through that again. Can you promise me that?”
“Yes, of course!” I wanted to shout.
I wanted to cry.
I wanted to fall on my knees and beg his forgiveness.
Yet I sat there frozen instead.
Just yesterday I’d received a postcard from one of the girls I’d saved. How could I promise not to put myself in danger if the cost was other people’s lives? Innocent people’s lives. I might not be overly qualified, but I kept finding myself in positions where I was the only one around to help.
Connor’s mask—the one I’d been so honored he’d let down for me—slammed into place. He carefully slid Meow off his lap and stood. Then he reached into his breast pocket and withdrew an envelope, giving me a déjà vu moment of the first day I’d ever met him. He handed the envelope to me.
I cracked it open. Inside were the plane tickets he’d bought for us to fly to Australia together.
“Maybe Etta would like to go with you,” he said quietly.
Then he walked out of my apartment.
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Poison and Prejudice (An Eat, Pray, Die Humorous Mystery Book 4) Page 25
