Chapter 18
18
FIONA
I gazed at Zeke, feeling the weight of his question. When he’d set out to distract me, I’d never have guessed that we’d end up here. I liked it, though—his willingness to trust me. It made me feel as though I wasn’t alone in the fondness I was developing for him, and while I desperately wanted to know what secrets he was keeping, I also didn’t want him to feel pressured or as if I prioritized my own curiosity over his needs.
“If you want to tell me, I’d be honored to listen,” I said. “Nothing you say now will ever be repeated to anyone else. I promise.”
His eyes softened. “I trust you.” He kissed my forehead and his chest expanded as he inhaled deeply. “You asked once about where I worked before I started King’s Security with Ronan and Kade.”
“I did.”
“I was employed by a government agency right out of college. This particular agency is always on the lookout for young recruits with useful skill sets, and because of my specialization—I won’t bore you with the details—and my position on the college gymnastics team, they offered me a job.”
“You were a college gymnast?” Perhaps that wasn’t the detail I ought to have focused on but it had certainly come out of left field.
He grinned. “What? You can’t picture me on the high bar?”
I shook my head. He was fit, there was no denying that, but I would have picked him as more of a motocross rider than a gymnast. “So, what happened after they hired you?”
He looked up at the ceiling. “They put me through all kinds of training, and then I started assignments. At first, I was primarily in the office, handling logistics and the cyber side of things, but I gradually began to work in the field too. My last mission… it didn’t end well.”
His body was tense, and I smoothed my hand over his chest. He was still looking at the ceiling. Maybe that made it easier for him to speak. I got the feeling he rarely opened up to anyone about anything, let alone this.
“I went undercover in a cyber-terrorist cell with another operative, Ernesto. For the first few weeks, it was fine, but then Ernesto began behaving strangely. I didn’t mention it to our boss. Being undercover can do things to a person, and I thought he was just having a hard time.”
“But?” I asked warily.
He sighed. “Ernesto had turned. He set me up and made it look like I was the one who’d gone rogue.”
I stiffened, my heart going out to him. I understood all too well how that kind of betrayal felt. Especially from someone he’d trusted.
“My own team captured me and brought me in for ‘ questioning.’ Let me tell you, the agency makes police interrogation tactics seem like a chat with friends.”
“But surely you explained?” I asked.
“Ernesto had done an excellent job of making me look guilty. They assumed I was lying, and they didn’t bother doing a polygraph because we’d all been taught how to beat them.”
I raised an eyebrow. That would be a helpful skill. No wonder he lied so easily.
“They asked me for answers, and when I couldn’t give them, they tortured me. They thought if they tried hard enough, they’d break me.” His voice was matter-of-fact, but I flinched.
“They tortured you?” I whispered, my stomach sinking. “Was it bad?”
“Yeah.” He nodded stiffly. “They’re really good at making you want to die without risking it actually happening.”
“I’m so sorry.” The words couldn’t possibly make up for everything he’d been through, but he deserved to hear them. I kissed his chest and held him tight, hoping he’d take comfort from the embrace.
“Thank you.” He kissed the top of my head. “Eventually, the group attacked the water supply system in Washington D.C. The agency headed it off before too much damage could be done, but only because a member of the cell had a crisis of conscience at the last minute.” He was quiet for a moment, then added, “That’s also how they found out that Ernesto had been the turncoat, not me.”
I couldn’t imagine how that must have gone down. “What did they do?”
His mouth twitched. “Stopped torturing me.”
“But they set you free and issued an apology, right?” In these times, people couldn’t get away with doing that kind of crap .
He laughed bitterly. “Hardly. I can’t be certain, but I think they intended to get rid of me.”
My chest seized. “What?”
His fingers tightened reflexively on my shoulder. “By that point, I knew too much, and they couldn’t trust that I’d keep the knowledge to myself. Most agents can retire without fear because the agency is sure of their loyalty, but after what they’d done to me, they knew they’d broken any loyalty I had to them.”
“But they obviously didn’t…get rid of you,” I whispered, tears prickling my eyes at the mere thought. If that had happened, I wouldn’t have met him, and I couldn’t imagine my life without him in it—even when I’d just thought of him as the obnoxious guy at work who flirted too much.
“No, they didn’t.” His voice was strained. “Because I made it clear that I had information that would implicate a few high-ranking officials and could destroy their careers or even get them imprisoned. If anything happened to me, those records would have been sent to the media. So, they let me go, but they didn’t want to. The only thing that keeps them from coming after me is mutually assured destruction.”
My heart ached at the thought that Zeke still might not be safe, even all these years later. He’d done nothing wrong, and yet he paid a price for someone else’s mistake. I could understand now why he held his cards so close to the vest, and used his charisma as a defense mechanism. If I were him, I’m not sure I’d ever trust anyone again.
“It was smart of you to have a contingency plan in place,” I told him.
“It would have been smarter for me to report Ernesto’s behavior and figure out what he was up to sooner,” he said regretfully. “I was lucky I had a fallback plan. I’d done it on the advice of another agent, but I’d thought I was being paranoid. I never believed I’d actually have to use it. I was so fucking naive.”
“I’m sorry.” I wished I could make it better for him. I bit my lip when it quivered, so he wouldn’t notice, and cuddled closer. I couldn’t take away the pain of his past, but I could make sure he didn’t regret sharing this with me. “I guess we both have trust issues, although it’s fair to say yours are more well-deserved than mine.”
He made a sound of disagreement. “It isn’t a competition.”
“I know.”
“But…” he started hesitantly. “I would like to try to work through those trust issues together, if you’re up for that.”
ZEKE
I held my breath while I waited for her reply. I was asking for a lot. My issues ran deep, and I wasn’t an easy person to be close to, but I desperately wanted her to agree. If she did, I’d tell her anything she wanted to know about my past. I’d be an open book for her, and I knew she’d be a vault of secrecy in return. But what if I was too much? Too damaged, or broken. Fiona deserved the best, and quite frankly, that wasn’t me. But I’d damn well burn the world down for her if she asked me to.
She didn’t keep me waiting for long. Her lips curled into a small smile. “I’d like that.”
Relief hummed in my veins. She raised herself up and kissed me. This time, it wasn’t hungry or demanding, but soft and sweet. It felt like a promise.
I gathered her close and sank into the kiss, wishing it could go on forever. Right now, with her lithe body pressed against me, I didn’t feel so alone. I could imagine a reality in which it wasn’t me against the world but us against the world. In the past, I’d had teams of skilled operatives at my back, with millions of dollars of resources behind us, but nothing had ever made me feel as supported as she did.
I could fall in love with this woman. If I wasn’t already.
She drew back, but I chased her lips. There was nothing sexual about it, I just wanted to hold onto the connection between us for as long as I could. She indulged me, and we kissed slowly until the neediness within me eased enough for me to stop without worrying that she might disappear at any moment.
We lay together for a while until the computer pinged and we could see that Bergen was returning to the same residential address he’d previously visited—presumably, his apartment.
“Thank you for sharing with me,” Fiona said after we’d watched the dot for a few minutes. “It means a lot, and I know it can’t have been easy.”
“It was easier than I expected,” I admitted. Revisiting that part of my life was never fun, but telling her hadn’t been as difficult as I’d thought it would be. I’d known, in my heart, that she wouldn’t think less of me for it.
“You must have done some interesting work for them,” she said. “Met some interesting people.”
“Yes,” I replied, wondering where she was going with this.
I turned to face her. Her eyes were wide with interest.
“Did you ever meet any female spies?”
I chuckled. “We didn’t call ourselves spies. We were agents or operatives.”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine. Did you ever meet any female agents or operatives, then? ”
“Plenty.” I grinned at her exasperated expression. “Some worked with me, others worked against me.”
“How awesome were they?” She lowered her voice. “I bet they were sexy.”
My grin widened. I couldn’t tell if she was just fishing for information or if she was trying to work out if I’d ever been involved with a fellow agent, but it was an effective distraction from the grim mood that had fallen, and I was here for it.
“Female operatives come in all shapes and sizes, just like the male ones. Sure, some of them played up their sexuality, but others had impressive intellects, and many looked like everyday people. That’s half the job, you know. To blend in with everyone else.”
She frowned and waved a hand at me. “But you…”
“I got the tattoos and piercings after I left,” I told her. “I knew I was safe, temporarily, but I figured that making myself stand out would be a good way of preventing them from trying to bully me into working for them again. Once they’d decided they couldn’t get rid of me, they were reluctant to let me go. Looking the way I do now renders me far less valuable as an undercover asset.” Besides the whole fact that they’d hardly be able to trust me to go undercover without defecting even if they did pressure me into it. They knew a losing cause when they saw one, but the extra encouragement sure didn’t hurt.
“Do you actually like them?” she asked.
“I do.” I touched the place where the piercing through my eyebrow would usually be. “I’d always wanted a tattoo but hadn’t gotten one because of work.”
“I’m glad.” She kissed me chastely. “I hate the thought of you doing something you didn’t like just to protect yourself.”
I resisted the urge to point out that that had basically been my life for years .
“Besides,” she added, “they’re sexy as hell.”
“Yeah?”
“Definitely.” A wicked smile curved her lips, but then a shadow passed over her eyes and the smile faded.
“What is it?” I asked, hating the bleakness of her expression.
She rubbed her lips together. “What do you think will happen?” she asked, blinking rapidly. “If I go to prison, I mean. Will I be okay? I’m not as strong as I pretend to be.”
Oh, Fi.
I tucked her face against my chest. “We won’t have to find out,” I said. “Because it isn’t going to happen.”
Whatever I had to do to ensure that, I would.
Whatever it took.