by Joan Swan
“Why? Mateo does speak fluent Greek.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know, but it doesn’t matter. It’s not my decision to make.”
Luke’s fingers stilled in Mateo’s hair, then moved to Keira’s cheek. Trying to get her attention. “Keira.” His tone said everything she didn’t want to hear, a combination of you-can’t-avoid-this and you-need-to-do-the-right-thing. “There is clearly something between you two. Beyond a child’s need for comfort.”
Yes, she knew. She’d known the first moment she’d seen his photograph. Only, she still didn’t know what that something encompassed. And the longer she had Mateo, the murkier the source of their connection became. “We’re connected by the powers. I’m protecting him. Caring for him. It’s just natural.”
“It’s natural for a child to cling to someone who cares for him, but you clearly love him, too.”
She pushed up on her elbow. Mateo’s head was cradled on Luke’s shoulder, and Luke’s fingers ran over the boy’s hair, cheek, arm, then back to his hair. Lord, he was a sweet man. But he was also stubborn. And right now that stubbornness was making the walls close in on her.
“Yes, I love him, like I love Kat.”
“You have to recognize that you love him differently. Even I can see that.”
Her answers were never good enough. “What is this about?”
“It doesn’t really matter where he’s from. Those implants in his head, that mark on his skin, his powers, change everything. If he is from Greece, you can’t just dump him back there with cutting-edge technology in his head and military-grade psychological powers. If anyone ever caught wind of that, what happened to him here would be a spa date compared to what they’d do to him in Greece.
“If he is from here and we can’t reconnect him with his parents, which doesn’t seem likely given the results of Mitch’s research on reported missing children, he’ll end up in foster care. That alone is absurd—you letting him end up in foster care. Plus, you know DARPA won’t let him stay there. They’ll snatch him and send him who knows where to do who knows what.”
Her chest grew tighter with every word. “I can’t believe you’re dumping all this on me. Now. After the day we’ve had.”
He slipped warm fingers beneath her hair to squeeze her neck. “I want you to think ahead. You like to have plans, right? Plan A, plan B, et cetera.”
She could see where this was going. “You’re boxing me in, Luke.”
“I’m giving you options.”
“Do any of those options include just being me? Who I am right now? Or do they all require me to change into a person more suitable to who you want me to be? Specifically, a mother.”
“It’s not about a label. I love who you are right now. I love who you are but won’t allow yourself to be. I see a boy you love, who also loves you and needs a home. And I’d love to be part of making that family.”
Her heart rattled in its cage. She wanted to let it free, but the fear of what would happen to it if she did was overwhelming. What lurked outside those bars?
If she let her heart out . . . If she let it live . . . People could hurt her.
And there were a lot of people out there who wanted to do just that.
When she didn’t respond, Luke shook his head with an expression of disbelief. “You can’t use the genetic excuse here, Keira. Who would be better suited to raise him than people who understand his powers?”
The word excuse hit her wrong. His impatient, demanding attitude hit her wrong.
She sat up, angled toward him. “Have you ever considered that you’re seeing what you want to see? That I’m not fighting against the inevitable, but that you’re fighting for the impossible?”
“Your fear is talking, Keira, not your heart.”
She pushed off the sofa and stood, so filled with competing emotions she was shaking. “Don’t judge me.”
“Keira.” His voice turned stern. “Open your damn eyes. You are the strongest, warmest, most capable woman I’ve ever known. There is no one more suited to be this boy’s mother than you. More than that, you want to. You just won’t let yourself. And you don’t have to do it alone. I care about him, too. But you won’t let me in, either. Not really. You always hold something back. You always have a safety net. An out.”
Keira’s fight died. Pain and confusion melded into a rock wedged beneath her ribs. Those were terrible, cold, mean things to say. Yet, they were true. Which added more shadows to her cloaked psyche.
In direct contrast, Luke’s light eyes were filled with confidence, his expression drenched with hope. He struggled toward his goal of family like a moth seeking light. And no matter how much he and Keira wanted each other, maybe even still loved each other, it wouldn’t be enough to overcome that primal instinct that drove him, the same one Keira longed for yet pushed away at the same time.
She couldn’t do this anymore. Not tonight. Not with him. She needed some time and space to clear her head and calm the fears heating her temper.
“It’s good you care about him, Luke.” The relative safety of the guest room beckoned. She took in the sight of the two of them together and yearned for a different past, a different future, and an end to all this pain inside. “That will make it easier for you to decide whether or not you want to adopt him.”
This time when Cash returned to his room, he didn’t have the energy to throw furniture. He didn’t have the energy to do anything but sink his head into the pure down pillow they provided as if it would somehow make up for holding him prisoner.
“Hey, O’Shay. How’d it go?” Q’s raspy voice drifted through the vent at the foot of Cash’s bed and clawed its way into his brain, drawing him from the edge of sleep.
They often talked like this until they drifted off—at least on the nights Q was there and not MIA on one of their testing frenzies where they took him off-site for days or even weeks at a time.
“I tried it your way,” Cash slurred without opening his eyes. “But I won’t know if it worked for twenty-four to forty-eight hours.”
“What are you going to do if it works?”
Cash’s eyes opened. He stared blankly at the dark ceiling turning gray with the morning light filtering through the glass block that was his only window. The first thought that came to mind was, that’s a stupid question. Only after a millisecond, it wasn’t so stupid.
After he’d found out what these animals had done to Q, Cash had realized the chances they would release him as promised were nearly nonexistent. But there was always hope. There had to be, or he’d have killed himself years ago. He’d never been this close to a solution, and the possibility these fucks might not release him now was beyond his pain threshold.
The cell door clanked. Fear flashed through Cash’s chest. If they heard him talking to Q they could move his friend to another cell, and Cash had come to rely on Q’s presence for his sanity.
He sat up in bed, still dressed after he’d simply fallen there when he’d walked in. His face still cut, stained with dried blood, and his room still trashed from his earlier tirade.
The steel door swung open, the lights flipped on, and a woman walked in. Cash’s eyes took a moment to adjust. When he recognized her, everything inside him shut down.
Dargan strolled in, her icy blue eyes taking in the havoc Cash had wreaked. In her tailored taupe suit, with bleached-blond hair straight to her shoulders, every speck of makeup perfect, she was ludicrously out of place.
“I like what you’ve done with the place, Cash.” Her voice was as smooth and cool and hard as glass. “But you don’t look so good.” She cast a glance at the guard they called Domino because of his mixed African American–Caucasian ancestry. “Send a medic when we’re done here.”
Domino gave a quick nod.
“Something big must have brought you, Jocelyn.” Cash stood, put his hands on his hips, gaze searching the room for a weapon should he need one. He edged toward the metal chair lying on its side near the wall it had bounced o
ff earlier. “You’re either here to release me or kill me.”
“You’re so melodramatic, Cash. I really would love to release you. Had your experiment tonight panned out, I would be asking Domino to escort you to a car waiting to take you to a brand-new life.”
“Then why are you here? Annual visit? At . . .” He glanced at his watch. “Five-fucking-o’clock in the morning?”
She smiled, but there was no warmth in it. He doubted there was an ounce of warmth in her entire body. “Duty never sleeps, right, soldier?”
“The patriotic crap stopped working when you killed my wife and stole my son.”
Her brows lifted, head tilted with a minuscule shrug. “We did warn you, Cash. A number of times.”
Fury gushed in his veins. He lunged for her, his head filled with a vision of squeezing her neck until that pale skin turned alabaster, those blue eyes stared wide with vacancy. He made it as far as her blazer. Fisted his hands at her collar. Two guards came from behind her, jerked on his arms, and hauled him backward, slamming him against the cement wall.
The satisfaction in her gaze stirred his rage, but whatever he’d pulled off her neck, the metal now tangled in his fingers, distracted him. With his hands tight by his sides, he wound the chain into his palm and closed his fingers, then jerked out of the guard’s grips.
“Mateo is already dead, isn’t he?” Cash breathed hard, searching, maybe hoping, for a reason to quit. “He died with his mother, didn’t he?”
“No,” she said, completely unflustered. “No, he didn’t. In fact, that’s why I came tonight. When I heard how close you were, that your earlier attempt failed, I wanted to give you that extra incentive to keep going. The sooner you finish, the sooner you get to be with them.”
“Them? Who’s them?”
She pulled something from her pocket and approached. A photograph. Cash’s chest tightened, but he kept himself from reaching for it. He couldn’t let her see his desperation.
“In fact, not only do I have a current photo of your now five-year-old son for you, but of him with your sister.”
Cash’s jaw went slack before he found control. No one had ever mentioned his sister. He had assumed they didn’t know about her. Assumed she’d been adopted early on in foster care and changed her name.
She’d been such a cute kid, with those big blue eyes, those freckles, the deep sweetness and endless loyalty to those she loved despite their mother’s attempts to quash her. He was sure there had been childless couples fighting over her. He was also sure he used that rationalization to ease the guilt he often suffered over running after the fire, over not letting her know he was alive.
So much guilt where Keira was concerned. And now, that much more if these fucks had drawn her into this.
He considered denying Keira’s existence, but remembered who he was dealing with. The darkest agency of the government with the deepest power. So he said nothing.
“Amazing, isn’t it?” Jocelyn held up the photo. “How paths diverge, then cross at another place, another time?”
The restraint he had to employ to keep from ripping that photo from her hand made him shake. “What do you want?”
“I want what I’ve always wanted—safety for our troops, security for America. And I’m here to remind you that your work not only contributes to the greater good of our country, but to show you the rewards waiting for you personally.”
She held the photo out to him. Cash didn’t drop his gaze from hers, but he couldn’t keep from reaching for the photo. Because if they did know about Keira, if she and Mateo were both still alive and Dargan had a photo of them together, they were probably held captive somewhere. Which meant Cash could no longer think about dealing with the next step when his experiment succeeded. He would need a plan. Now.
He snapped the photo away from her, held it in his free hand, keeping his other clenched tight around the chain and what felt like a substantial charm, and brought the image close for scrutiny. One part of his heart hoped it was a fake. The other prayed it was real.
He inspected the faces—the boy first. His son. Mateo Ryan O’Shay. Yes. He would know those big brown eyes anywhere, no matter how many years later. They were his mother’s eyes. Zoya’s eyes. Oh, God, how he missed that woman. Missed the child they’d created.
He closed his throat around a sob. Blinked back tears burning his eyes and turned his gaze to the woman. Keira. Yes. He might not have seen her since she was five years old, but the woman in this photo was definitely Keira. He recognized the defiance in her bright blue eyes, the same look she’d often given their mother, which had always earned her a good smack across the face. Sometimes worse if their mother had been drinking.
His eyes flicked between them. Did Keira know Mateo was her nephew? Did she know her brother was alive? Or did she still think he was dead?
“Where are they?” Cash’s voice came out as a venomous rasp. “Where are you holding them? How do I even know they’re still alive?”
Jocelyn smiled that thin, frigid smile and shook her head in that dainty way that made Cash want to strangle her. “Of course they’re alive. We know how intelligent you are. We aren’t going to try and trick you. And whether we have them in custody or not doesn’t matter. We can reach anyone, anywhere, anytime we want. You know that.
“The only way to get your life back, Cash, get their lives back, is to finish what you came here to do so we can part on good terms. You’re so close. It would be a shame to give up now.” She gestured to the photo. “He’s only five. And Keira, almost thirty. Lots of life left to live. With you or without you.”
Jocelyn sauntered toward the door. “Good luck with your work tomorrow.”
Her guards followed, both casting a guilty look his way before closing and locking the steel door.
Cash turned his back on the entrance and uncurled his fingers. A bead chain lay in his palm, the kind he’d worn for years with his military dog tag hanging on the end. But attached to this chain lay a key. Little smaller than average, thin, multiple notches all along the length, narrow top. Not a house key. Not a car key. Maybe a safe. Whatever it was, Dargan would notice it was gone soon. And she’d know where it had been lost.
His attention turned back to the photo. Cash was entrenched in memories of Zoya and Mateo by the time Q spoke again. “Is it him?”
“Yes. It’s him.”
“Hey, man, you never told me you had a sister.”
“That’s a really long story.”
“Can I see your picture? Can I see your family?”
Cash continued to study their faces. He’d never get enough.
“I’ll give it back,” Q said. “I just want to see that little guy, put a face to the name and the stories.”
Cash’s fingers tightened on the photo. He didn’t want to give it up, but he trusted Q. He leaned down and slid it through the vents, holding tight until Q’s fingers secured the other side. “Be careful. It’s all I’ve got.”
As he let go and the picture dropped out of sight, Cash’s chest knotted in a moment of panic. Then double knotted as Q didn’t immediately say anything.
“Q? You have it?”
“Yeah, yeah,” he murmured. “They’re . . . They’re beautiful. Does your son look like you?”
Cash’s mouth turned up in an ironic half smile, realizing he and Q had never actually seen each other. “No, he looks like his mother. But my sister and I look a lot alike.”
“Can’t look that much alike,” he quipped. “She’s pretty. So you’ve got black hair and blue eyes?”
“Yeah.”
“She’s younger than you?”
“By ten years.”
“Married? Kids? Where does she live?”
Cash closed his eyes, guilt coating his guts. He often missed Keira, but had spent years justifying his lack of effort to reconnect with her. Early on he’d told himself any connection to him could hurt her chances of getting a good family. Then, he’d justified not seeking her out because su
rely she wouldn’t want an ex-con for a brother. And finally, the army had given him the perfect excuse, instructing everyone involved in highly classified projects that the less contact with family the better.
“Cash?” Q said. “How come you never talk about your sister?”
“I don’t . . . know her. I mean, now—I don’t know her now. We were separated when she was five and I was fifteen.”
“Separated?”
“I’m tired, Q. Give me the picture back so I can get some sleep.”
“You’ve piqued my interest, buddy. And I can sense you need to talk about it.”
“You sense shit.” Cash slammed a hand against the wall. “Give me the picture.”
“Tell me what happened with your sister, and I’ll give it back.”
“You son of a—”
“Time’s wasting. Thought you were tired.”
Cash clamped his mouth shut and heaved a long breath. “Our house burned down when we were young. My mother went to prison for murder, my sister went to foster care. I ducked out because I didn’t want to end up in foster care, too. Got in some trouble with drugs, went to prison for a few years. Got out, joined the army, went into classified work. There was never a good time to reconnect.”
Q remained quiet a moment. “You said your mom was dead.”
“She is. Died in prison.”
“Who did she murder?”
Cash leaned his head left and right until his cervical vertebra popped. “Me.”
Another long silence.
“Can I get the picture back, now?”
“Hold on. You skipped out? You faked your death in the house fire and let your mom go to prison for murder?”
Cash didn’t have one iota of guilt. “If she hadn’t gone to prison, she’d have gotten custody of Keira again. If that had happened, I guarantee my sister wouldn’t be alive today.”
“And Keira? She thinks you’re dead?”
“As far as I know. It wasn’t until I met and married Zoya and we had Mateo that I realized I needed to find Keira. Then Zoya was killed, Mateo taken, and I ended up in this hellhole. Hence, my lack of success in contacting her again.” He slammed the wall. “Picture, please. Now.”