29. Eva
EVA
Sleep crusted my eyes as I peeled them open and rested a hand on my husband’s still-expanding chest. He was alive.
Barely.
If we had gotten to him just a few minutes later, who knows what would have happened.
I brushed a strand of overgrown hair back from his forehead. Time had aged my husband. The pressure and stress of his newfound job had worn on him, making him appear older than he was.
I wished so badly that he would have trusted me with the information that had been weighing him down, but I knew deep down, he had kept it from me out of fear.
Even now, he laid knocked out in bed, but the tension in his body never fully relaxed.
Deep bruising under his eyes proved just how stressful this whole mission had been.
He had chosen to do this on his own, but the time for flying solo was over.
The Shadow Government had turned violently on him, putting him in an untenable situation.
But I never would. And neither would anyone at OPS. I was beginning to think there wasn’t a single thing Cash could do to push any of them away.
“How is he?” Knight asked from the doorway.
“Still breathing,” I murmured, grateful that the damage last night hadn’t been worse. Thankfully, FNG had been there to save his life. However, the knock to the head was still a major concern.
“You should get some more sleep.”
Sleep. That was difficult to come by. What little I had gotten last night was constantly interrupted by the overwhelming concern that when I opened my eyes, my husband would no longer be breathing.
“I’ll try.”
“I’m serious, Eva.” He walked further into the room. I could feel the intensity of his gaze on me despite the fact that I was staring at my husband’s striking face. “We have a difficult road ahead. You need rest.”
“Yeah? What about you? How’s the hole in your chest?”
“No longer a hole,” he bit out.
I was pissed about that, too. The fact that Knight and Cash were so reckless, so crazed for the opportunity to end all this, that Knight agreed to let Cash shoot him…That my husband took on the guilt of yet another brother’s possible death…
“What was he thinking?” I whispered, trying to figure out my husband’s twisted mind.
“Which time?” Knight sighed, walking to the other side of the bed. He stared down at his brother, his eyes lit with anger and confusion. I could only imagine what this was like for him.
To find out he had additional family members, and then was taken before he even knew him. The other…was lying in a bed, on the brink of death if we couldn’t figure out how to save him. And his sister…well, at least she was coming around.
“Why did you agree to it?”
I didn’t need to explain my train of thought. It was clear when Knight raised his eyes to meet mine that he knew exactly what I was talking about.
“You could have died. Kate would have been left all alone.”
“It was the price we had to pay.”
“And your life was worth it? How could you do that to Kate?”
A flicker of guilt flashed in his eyes before he quickly wiped away all semblance of remorse. “I did it because my family is everything to me. And if Cash pulling the trigger ended this reign of terror, I would happily sacrifice everything.”
“She never would have recovered if you had died.”
He stared at Cash for a moment, the knowledge of what would have happened swimming in his eyes. “She would have been alive.”
“Tell me…I’ve been alive. Do you really think all this was worth it?”
“We didn’t have a choice,” he answered calmly. “They were coming for us one way or another. This gave him a shot to turn things around.”
“Months,” I murmured, brushing my fingers down Cash’s arm until I linked my fingers with his. “It gave us months, and what happened to his soul in the meantime?”
“I know my brother better than you think. Trust me when I tell you that he would sacrifice anything to keep his family safe.”
I knew that. God, did I know that. My heart ached every day he was gone, knowing he was fighting a battle he very well might not win. And all the time, feeling like he couldn’t talk to me. I played my part, doing my best to be the grieving woman who had been left behind.
It wasn’t difficult. I was grieving. Just not for the reasons others suspected. Now…how could I ever let him leave me again? After all we’d been through, I just couldn’t allow him to sacrifice anything more.
“This has to end, Knight. We’re done.”
“I know.”
“Was it worth it?” I finally tore my eyes from my husband and looked at Knight. “Was abandoning his family to take down the Shadow Government really worth it? Look at where he is now.”
Knight’s eyes flashed with anger as a cold chill took over the room and his temper flared.
“You ask if it was worth it? If he hadn’t left, they would have come after anyone close to Rafe.
He bought us time. Yes, it was fucking worth it.
By joining them, he got to the inner circle.
He figured out major players, which allowed us to gain access to information we didn’t have before.
Fox was able to get account numbers, which Rae is currently using to drain their funds and make it impossible to function.
“Without that information, the Shadow Government would still be running free, making decisions for the rest of the world without us knowing a damn thing. Yeah, I’d say his sacrifice was worth it.”
“But Michael had access all along,” I whispered, knowing this was a point of contention. “If you and Cash plotted this out with Michael, why didn’t he just hand over that information to you? Why make you go through all this?”
His jaw clenched in anger. “That’s something you’ll have to ask Michael.”
The last thing I wanted was to talk to Michael.
He was Cash’s father, and I knew it was a twisted relationship, one that Knight didn’t come close to sharing anymore.
But Cash had sacrificed so much. It didn’t make sense that a father would allow his son to go through all this when he so easily could have ended it all.
“Get some sleep,” Knight said, turning his back as he walked out of the room.
Sighing, I rested my head on the pillow next to Cash, but sleep wouldn’t come. Not when I was finally back by my husband’s side again. Not when he was so close I could touch him.
My only concern was which man would wake up beside me. The protector or the villain?
Featherlight touches slid over my cheek, rousing me from sleep. “Cash,” I murmured, my eyes still heavy as I struggled to wake up.
“Sleep.”
The soft words lulled me back to sleep momentarily, until I realized those words were spoken by none other than my husband. My eyes flew open and I stared in the pale moonlight at my husband, whose eyes were watching me intently.
“You’re awake!”
Still, he said nothing. The cold, hard mask of indifference had returned. My husband wasn’t here right now. No, he was pretending to be the man who had walked out on me, but why?
“How are you feeling?”
“What the hell are you doing here?” he snapped, his anger rising to the surface.
“I’m here because you need me.”
He scoffed, pushing upright in such a painfully slow manner that I nearly helped him.
Nearly .
I knew he wouldn’t appreciate the help right now. Not when he was trying so damn hard to lock away all his emotions.
“Eva, you shouldn’t have come over here. I don’t need you.”
I barked out a laugh at that. “Really? Because when we found you, there wasn’t much left of your life.”
He twisted just enough to look over his shoulder at me, but I could feel the heat from his gaze, the anger simmering under the surface. “Just another thing we need to discuss.”
“My tracking you?” I snapped. “What’s wrong? You don’t like it when the tables are turned? You don’t like knowing that I was watching you all along? That you never really escaped me? Or is it that you didn’t pick up on it after all these years that rankles?”
“I left for a reason,” he snapped, pushing to his feet.
But that ended up being the wrong move. I sprang into action as he swayed, barely staying upright for more than a few seconds. Lowering him back to the bed, he did his level best to appear to be the grouch asshole he wanted me to believe he was.
“You left because you wanted to protect us. So, I let you go. I let you do things your way. But that ends now. You’re now Enemy Number One, and the Shadow Government will stop at nothing until we’re all dead. So, you either let me help, or I’ll tie you to this bed and make the decision for you.”
His anger spiked, but I thought I saw a flicker of amusement in his gaze, though he hid it within seconds. “You’re not part of this. It’s not an option.”
“Really? Because I’m your wife. I’d say that makes me more than part of this. I’d say that gives me rights to something you don’t want to admit. You need me, and even though you try to deny it, you want me here.”
“What I want is for you to shut your damn mouth and go home where you belong,” he snapped.
In one quick move, I pushed him to his back and straddled his hips. “Where I belong is by your side.”
His jaw clenched as his anger spiked, but so did something else. There was no denying how much he missed me, not when his cock was hard as steel and pressing against my core.
I rocked just once, just enough to prove my point. His jaw clenched in anger as his hands locked on either ankle, holding me in place.
“Care to deny it?” I whispered, rocking once more.
A pained groan left his lips, but he refused to react in any other way. Those beautiful, stormy eyes locked on mine, telling me to do it again, but the tension in his body said he wasn’t ready to yield. Not yet.
“There’s something you need to get straight, Cash.” I slid my hand along his broad chest, then back down, grazing my fingers along the waistband of his underwear. “I’m not going anywhere, and you can’t make me.”
His fists tightened on my ankles, and for a moment, I thought he would flip me off him, but instead, he squeezed his eyes closed as his hips jerked involuntarily.
A moan slipped from my lips as his cock pressed at my entrance. God, it had been too long since I’d felt him between my thighs. But even longer since I’d had the intimacy of his arms wrapped around me, holding me as he whispered how much he loved me.
I craved that more than anything.
“Cash,” I moaned, running my fingers along the hem of my shirt. My eyes fluttered as I rocked against his length, drawing my shirt over my head. A sharp gasp left his lips as his grip on me tightened almost painfully.
“You need me,” I whispered, “as much as I need you.” I jerked my hips again. The hard length between my thighs brushed achingly against my clit. Sparks erupted in my belly, drawing ragged breaths from my lungs as I fought to hold onto my control.
My eyes fluttered closed as I rocked back and forth, drawing out every second. I had waited for this moment for so long. Desperation clung to me, clawing at my emotions for the connection I craved.
“Eva,” he gritted out behind clenched teeth. “You need to get off me.”
But his words slid off me despite the hurt in my chest. I couldn’t move if I wanted to, not when I was so close to the connection I would die to feel one last time.
A ragged breath tore from my lips as his cock nudged at my entrance through the thin material of our underwear. God, just removing that barrier would settle him deep inside me, satiating that burning desire for a few minutes.
The first tremble of my orgasm rocked through me. My heart pounded in rhythm to my hips, begging me to chase what I so fiercely desired. Legs shaking, ragged breathing, desperation clawing at me…I cried out as the first tremors rocked my body, making me come apart in a matter of seconds.
“Fuck!” Cash shouted, his fists leaving my ankles in a flash as he gripped my hips and tossed me off him, rolling on top of me between my spread thighs.
“Cash—”
He tore my panties from my body, and then he was there, thrusting inside me to the hilt.
I cried out from the ache that intensified as he seated himself so deeply inside me.
Tears pricked my eyes as my emotions got the better of me, forcing me to face what had been the most agonizing days of my life.
But he didn’t give me time to think about any of that for more than a few seconds as he pulled out and then thrust hard back inside of me. I wrapped my hands around his neck, holding on as he pistoned his hips, driving into me over and over again with wild abandon.
His lips crashed into mine, savagely kissing me and reminding me of what I had been missing for months on end. This kind of passion, it couldn’t be denied, couldn’t be twisted into something ugly.
With every snap of his hips, a little piece of my husband returned. The savage beast inside him died slowly, bringing back the man I cherished so damn much.
Tingles raced up my spine as my core tightened around his thick cock. His large hand slid between us, his fingers brushing deftly against my clit as his eyes pierced mine.
“Come on my cock, Eva. Let me feel you strangle me.”
Tremors racked my body as his filthy words undid me. I came hard, my pussy squeezing his cock so tight that he cried out before smashing his lips to mine, devouring me as he spilled his seed inside me, riding out the waves of pleasure.
His cock thrust in and out, never dying down even after he came hard inside me. I was a boneless mess in a pool of sheets, but as he pressed his lips to mine and his eyes sparkled in the moonlight, he lit that flame inside me once again.
And then he took me again.