Page 13 of How Much For a Life of Lies?

Kill me now.

SIX

Kai

Six months I’d been part of our team of two. Six months of Zach getting stressed about me going off-book, and me trying hard to stay within the lines.

I’d almost made him proud on a couple of occasions, although there’d been no repeat of us against a wall, which was unfortunate since he was a sexy-ass mother, and my craving for another taste had become more.

And this more was something I couldn’t get a handle on. Like… I’d stare at him when he was focusing on other things, or I’d imagine the steps I could take to grab his hand and drag him into another room and kiss him. My X-rated shower fantasies all starred the former SEAL, when he was all torn up and exhausted post-action, and in every single one it was him on his knees for me.

Like that would happen. He gave off so much top energy it was insane.

Take his refusal to let me drive any car we were in—controlling asshole. He said my driving was erratic but, sue me, I loved going fast, and hell, some of those signs were advisory, right?

Not according to Mr. I-stick-to-the-rules Reynolds who repeated often that me driving him anywhere would only occur if he was bleeding out, dying, had multiple broken bones, and was unconscious of any horrors I could inflict on him.

Rude.

Whatever, six months in, we’d become a team. Not well-oiled by any stretch of the imagination, but closing down the Santoro network had been a feather in our sort-of-team cap. We were efficient, timely, got things done, and had slipped into our roles easily. Sometimes I wanted to shove him down the stairs. Sometimes he threatened to shoot me.

But in most things I kept my distance—we didn’t talk about our pasts, we did our jobs, and we went home to our Sanctuary-funded apartments on different floors of the Chicago HQ.

Surely there was no way in hell he could know me enough to see the flicker of unease I had over the case files I was staring at. This was the second case we’d worked together for Sanctuary and not the worst one on paper, but seeing surveillance photos knocked me back a step.

Zach, juggling coffees and pastries, closed the door on the small office we’d been given to brainstorm this next mission, but I couldn’t tear my gaze from the intel. The weight of my past bore down on me as I stared at the photos spread out before me.

A man—Jeremy Clarke—prepper.

Or rather, Jeremy Clarke—monster. He used his prepping cover to hide what he did to kids in his remote compound.

On paper, he was a wild-eyed assault-weapon-handling moron. The cops didn’t have the resources to go in. The feds wanted him, but with his security less a group of good old prepper boys and more black-clad ninjas with Kalashnikovs, he was dangerous. Hence reaching out to the brand new Shadow Team, which was still me, Zach, and this guy called Simon, who ran Chicago’s Sanctuary HQ.

The intel I was reading was Simon’s work, neat and organized by date, and this new target’s story was right there in black and white. One side was the tale of a prepper with solar power, self-sufficiency, and vast fields of harmless vegetables, the other side was intel on the cavernous room below his brick-built square home where he held runaways, kids, women, men… so many photos, and links to videos that were horrors hitting way too close to home. The feds didn’t want a Waco situation—there were civilians inside—hence our involvement.

Surgical arrest, no kills.

But, god, I wanted to kill Jeremy Clarke, as if doing so might erase some of my own less than stellar childhood memories. The darkness, the paranoia, the guns—it was the same as the place I’d grown up in, and seeing these photos and understanding Clarke’s case pulled out memories of what I’d left behind. Memories, long-buried, surged to the surface, threatening to drown me in a tidal wave of fear and rage, and I cursed.

“What’s wrong?” Zach asked, as the easy manner with which he’d been studying the intel slipped away.

“He’s just…” I waved at the photo.

Zach narrowed his eyes at me. “What?”

“Evil,” I muttered, and after a frown in my direction, Zach returned to the intel.

I didn’t know Jeremy Clarke, but I was related to someone like him, and the thought of shutting his enterprise down excited and sickened me in equal amounts. I should tell Zach why I had such a visceral reaction. We might mess with each other, but he wasn’t a bad guy at heart, even if he was a controlling asshole. He’d listen to the sad, sorry tale of my broken childhood, and tell me he understood. But then he might suggest we hand this case off to someone else.

Fuck that, we were working this damn case, because if I could get one more person like this off the table, then it was a good thing because he was just like dear old Dad—a man I hadn’t had cause to think about in years. A wave of revulsion washed over me, suffocating as recalling those less-than-stellar years sent a shiver down my spine and stirred up emotions I’d long tried to bury deep. I refused to let the ghosts of my past hold sway over me when I was anywhere near Zach.

Or anyone. I’m strong, resilient, a bad-ass helo pilot, and I will not allow myself to be defined by the scars of my upbringing.

And repeat.

“Are you even looking at this intel?” Zach shoved my arm.

I shoved him back, and he rolled his eyes.

---