Page 135 of Don't Hate Me

His nostrils flared, and he jerked back like he had been punched in the face. He pushed my face to the side with a noise of disgust.

“God, I hate your generation,” he huffed. “All suicidal idiots from the moment you’re born.”

“Or maybe it’s just that your bastard son made my life so fucking horrible that I have nothing to live for anymore,” I spat.

“Not true,” Ryan said from behind me. “Your girlfriend is currently getting decommissioned by her handler for failure to complete her job. What if we can put a stop to it?”

The world froze around me. An elephant felt like it was sitting on my chest.Decommissioned.I swallowed thickly.

“What does that mean?” I asked, my voice just above a whisper.

“It means they’re going to put a bullet in between her eyes and dissolve her body in acid,” the senator said with an amused grin. “You know how it is in her world. The less evidence, the better.”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” I said, locking my gaze with him. I willed him to look into my eyes. To see a truth that wasn’t there.

“No?” he asked, cocking his head to the side in an exaggerated act of disbelief. “I could have sworn I’d seen footage of the two of you fuckingmultipletimes. On top of that, both of you were obviously fleeing—”

“You disgusting son of a bitch—”

“Ah, ah,” he said with a laugh. “Let’s play nice, huh?”

I gritted my teeth to stop the curses from falling from my mouth.

“How do I know you’re telling the truth?” I asked after a while.

“Better than the alternative, isn’t it?” he said and motioned for Ryan to leave. “I’ll give you an hour to decide. Let’s hope she’s not dead by then.”

Quinn

Searing pain ripped through my body as the bullet embedded itself into my shoulder.

I bit back my scream as I fell to my knees in front of Rolf.

“How thefuckdid you think this was okay?” Rolf spat at me.

Panic was clear as day in his wide eyes. The heaviness of the men’s stares in the back of the room weighed on me.

Was he doing this to humiliate me before he killed me?

I wouldn’t put it past him, but what I didn’t know was who thehellthose people were.

At first I thought they were some of ours, but the twisting of Rolf’s face as they forced me into the warehouse had me thinking otherwise.

“You’re seriously asking me that? You think I’d just sit here and be your puppet for as long as I lived?” I forced out through gritted teeth.

Blake and I were fucked. Plain and simple.

The worst possible outcome had manifested itself. It’s like the universe didn’t want either of us to leave our old lives behind. Like the universe had been conspiring against us, making it so neither of us would get the freedom we so craved.

I knew the risks from the start, but I had believed too much in myself. Believed that the people we were fighting against were too stupid.

“I gave you everything,” he spat. “I gave you alife.I gave you thefreedomto do whatever the fuck you wanted. The only thing you had to do was keep doing jobs for me!”

“The only thing I had to do?” I scoffed at his audacity. “You were going to have me decommissioned…aregoing to have me decommissioned.” I gave him a pointed look.

“You know I never wanted to do this,” he said, his eyes shifting to the floor.

“You seemed pretty damn sure thatthis iswhat you wanted to do when you were on the phone with me,” I reminded.

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