Chapter 24 Competing Voices
Competing Voices
The morning came in fragments. Gabriel's voice, low and clinical, documenting observations.
My body, heavy with chemical aftermath, caught between competing instructions.
Nathan's careful training whispered caution, escape, survival.
Gabriel's deeper conditioning demanded surrender, submission, home.
I couldn't move without betraying one of them.
"Fascinating." Gabriel sat beside the bed, tablet in hand, studying me like a particularly interesting specimen. "Your cortisol levels are spiking in waves. Classic response to conflicting behavioral imperatives. How does it feel, having two masters in your head?"
"Fuck you." But the words came out slurred, weak. Whatever he'd given me last night—beyond his hands, his mouth, his systematic dismantling—still clouded my system.
"Such language." He set the tablet aside, fingers finding my wrist. Checking pulse, always checking, always monitoring. "Nathan really did corrupt your vocabulary. You used to be so much more... articulate."
"Nathan didn't corrupt anything."
"Didn't he?" Gabriel's thumb pressed against the pulse point, feeling how it jumped. "Tell me, what do you actually know about him? Beyond what he told you, what he showed you. What do you know about Nathan Cross?"
The questions hit like cold water. What did I know? Ex-FBI. Contractor. Saved me from myself kept me safe, taught me to be human again. But under those facts lay questions I'd never asked. How he'd found me. Why he'd risked helping me. Where his resources came from.
"You're trying to confuse me."
"I'm trying to educate you." He released my wrist, moving to pour water from a pitcher on the nightstand. Same bitter taste as last night—medications I couldn't identify. "Drink. You're dehydrated, and we have difficult conversations ahead."
"I'm not drinking anything else you give me."
"Yes, you are." Matter-of-fact, like stating weather conditions. "Because beneath all that borrowed defiance, you're still my good girl who follows instructions."
I wanted to throw the glass at his head. Instead, I found myself taking small sips, body obeying even as mind rebelled. The conditioning ran too deep, associations between his voice and compliance carved into my bones.
"Good." He took the empty glass, setting it aside. "Now. Let's discuss your savior, shall we? Nathan Cross. Age thirty-four. Former FBI, yes, but discharged under... interesting circumstances. Would you like to know why?"
"Stop."
"Excessive force. Pattern of escalation. Particularly skilled at breaking assets during interrogation." Gabriel's voice stayed conversational, but his eyes watched my every reaction. "The government found his methods distasteful. The private sector, however, found them quite valuable."
My stomach clenched. Nathan, gentle Nathan who held me through nightmares and never pushed too hard, breaking people? The image wouldn't reconcile. I was always the one to torture when we hunted, not him.
"You're lying."
"Am I?" He produced a tablet, swiping through files. "Here's his discharge paperwork. Redacted, of course, but the patterns are clear. And here—private contracts. Security work, they called it. But look at the clients."
Names scrolled past. Some I recognized from news headlines—trafficking busts, criminal enterprises, the kind of people who traded in human misery. My hands shook.
"Falsified. You could make those say anything."
"True." He set the tablet down. "So let's discuss things harder to falsify. How did Nathan know exactly where to find you? You completely disappear after the handler he sold you to died. How did he know your name? Stuff from your past? The bar you worked at?"
Questions I'd asked myself in quiet moments. Questions I'd buried under gratitude and growing feeling and the simple relief of being saved.
"He had intelligence. Connections."
"Yes. He did." Gabriel leaned forward, intent now. "Do you know where those connections came from? Who his intelligence network actually served?"
"Stop." But the word came out pleading rather than commanding.
"He never told you about the family business, did he?
The Mire empire. Oldest trafficking network in the western hemisphere.
Our father built it, refined it, turned moving human assets into an art form.
" His voice dropped lower. "Nathan inherited the crown.
I tried to leave, to build something different.
They put me at the Institute as punishment. Until you."
The words hit like physical blows. Trafficking.
Human assets. The clinical terms for horrors I couldn't process.
But pieces were clicking—Nathan's resources, his knowledge of facilities, the way he'd understood exactly how to handle a traumatized asset.
How he always knew what to anticipate despite me never seeing him do the research and leg work I was.
"No." Denial, desperate and thin. "He saved me. He helped me."
"He retrieved you." Correction gentle but implacable.
"Standard protocol for high-value assets who slip containment.
Establish trust, create dependency, ensure voluntary compliance for transport.
Much easier than force. He's never had an asset kill a buyer, handler, and whoever the other blow-job was. Until you."
"That's not—he wouldn't—"
"Wouldn't he?" Gabriel touched my face, turning me to meet his eyes.
"Tell me, Bunny. In all your time together, did he ever suggest a plan beyond kill me and start a life together?
Take out all the bad guys you could. Destroy the rings, and then find the head of the snake, and then have a happy little life. "
The question shattered something. Because he was right. Nathan's plan had always been reactive—run, hide, survive another day. Never building toward freedom. Never finding a way to truly disappear. Just... managing. Containing.
"You're his brother." The words escaped without thought, pulled from some deep recognition. The way they moved alike. The way their hands knew exactly where to touch. Family business.
Gabriel went very still.
"Clever girl." Soft, almost proud. "Though that particular truth won't help you much. We chose very different paths, Nathan and I. He embraced the legacy. I tried to build something cleaner. The Institute was meant to be different—willing assets, trained for purpose rather than broken for sale."
"But I wasn't willing."
"No." Simple admission. "You were my exception.
My fascination. The asset who could have been so much more than commodity.
" His hand curved around my throat, possessive but not threatening.
"I spent three years watching you, trying to help anyway I could.
I wanted to turn you into something even more extraordinary than you already were.
He spent three months preparing you for auction. "
"You're lying." But my voice cracked, certainty crumbling.
"The buyer's already been selected. Highest bidder for an asset with your particular psychological profile.
Someone who appreciates conditioning as art form.
" His thumb stroked along my pulse. "Nathan was just ensuring you arrived in optimal condition.
Trauma bonded but not broken. Attached but not destroyed.
Premium product commands premium prices. "
I was going to be sick. Could feel bile rising as his words painted horror over every gentle moment, every careful touch. Nathan holding me through nightmares—managing assets. Nathan teaching me to trust again—ensuring compliance. Nathan making me feel human—preparing product for market.
"How much?" The question tore from somewhere primal. "What am I worth?"
"Eight figures, minimum. More with your unique training.
The things I taught you to crave, to need—there's a very specific clientele for that level of conditioning.
" He leaned closer, breath warm against my ear.
"Did you think Nathan's attraction was genuine?
You're brilliant, yes, but you're also a perfectly crafted instrument of surrender.
Of course he responded. He's still human, even if his humanity serves terrible ends. "
My mind was fracturing, splitting between truths that couldn't coexist. Nathan who saved me. Nathan who was preparing me for sale. Gabriel who broke me. Gabriel who was trying to keep me from worse breaking.
"If you're brothers, you're the same."
"Biology doesn't determine destiny." His hands moved to my shoulders, holding me steady as I shook. "I chose research over retrieval. Building rather than breaking. Until you made me want things I'd trained myself not to need."
"Don't." But I was crying now, everything I'd built with Nathan crumbling into ash. "Don't pretend you care. You're both monsters using different methods."
"Yes." Simple agreement. "But I'm the monster who wants to keep you. He's the one with a buyer waiting."
The truth of it hit like a physical blow. Whatever Gabriel's methods, however twisted his version of care, he'd never tried to sell me. Had fought to keep me when the Institute wanted disposal. Had built me up even as he broke me down.
"I need to think."
"No, you need to accept." His hands tightened slightly. "The chemical fog is clearing. Memory blocks degrading. Soon you'll remember everything—your time at the Institute, your real training, the gaps Nathan filled with false narrative. And when you do—"
The door exploded inward.
Nathan stood in the wreckage, violence written in every line of his body. Not the careful soldier I knew—something rawer, more dangerous. Blood on his knuckles suggested the security outside hadn't stopped him easily.
"Let her go."
"Brother." Gabriel didn't move, didn't even tense. "Dramatic entrance. Very on-brand."
"I am not your brother, and I said let her go."
"She's not yours to retrieve anymore." Gabriel's voice stayed conversational even as the room crackled with threat. "Game's over. She knows what you are. What you intended."
Nathan's eyes found mine, and something cracked in his expression. "Bunny—"
The sound that tore from my throat wasn't human. Conditioning collided with three months of careful trust, and what emerged was pure animal instinct. I moved without thought, launching myself not away but toward—
Toward Gabriel. Putting my body between them, feral protection for the monster who'd made me over the one who'd tried to steal me. My hands were claws, voice breaking on sounds that might have been screams or sobs or Daddy repeated like a broken prayer.
"Don't touch him don't hurt him don't don't don't—"
"Bunny, please." Nathan's voice broke, hands raising in surrender even as I tried to savage him. "It's me. It's okay. I'm not going to hurt anyone."
But I was beyond words, beyond reason. My nails found skin, drawing blood as I fought to protect Gabriel from this threat. This liar who'd worn kindness like a mask while preparing me for market.
"My Daddy," I sobbed, grinding against Nathan in confused aggression, body trying to hurt and claim and protect all at once. "Mine. Don't take him. Please. Please don't take him away again."
Nathan went perfectly still, letting me attack without defending. Tears streamed down his face as I clawed and sobbed and broke apart completely.
"I'm sorry." Whispered, wrecked. "God, Bunny, I'm so sorry. This isn't—I didn't—"
"Fascinating response." Gabriel's clinical voice cut through my frenzy. "Complete psychological fracture resulting in protective imprinting. The conditioning holds even against recent attachment. Really quite remarkable."
"Shut up." Nathan's voice was raw. "Just shut up and help her you fucking ass."
"I am helping her." Gabriel's hands found my shoulders, gentle but firm, pulling me back against his chest. "Shh, sweetheart. You're safe. Daddy's here. No one's taking me anywhere."
The words worked like a key in a lock. My body went limp, fight draining out as quickly as it had emerged. I curled into Gabriel's hold, shaking and sobbing while Nathan watched with devastated eyes.
"You broke her." Accusation and anguish mixed in Nathan's voice.
"I revealed her." Gabriel stroked my hair, soothing sounds that meant safety in my fractured mind. "The breaking was already there, papered over with chemicals and false narrative. All I did was strip away the lies."
"Those weren't lies. What we had—"
"Was retrieval protocol executed with unusual emotional investment." Gabriel's voice stayed calm even as I shook apart in his arms. "Don't mistake your own compromise for genuine connection. You knew what this was from the beginning."
Nathan made a sound like breaking. Stepped forward, then back when I whimpered and pressed closer to Gabriel.