Loving My SECRET (Corrigan & Co. Book 10)

by Crystal Perkins

  I’m not enough, and now I know that I never will be. It’s time to do the only thing I can—take on the mission that will end my life. I’d never kill myself, but nothing’s stopping me from taking the one assignment that I should never even get close to. I was asked for help, but even the person asking knew I couldn’t personally help without putting myself at risk. Which is why it’s perfect for me now.

  I email her, and then put everything in place. I’ll have one hour to get out of town before everyone realizes what I’ve done. I’m going to miss my friends, but I can’t stay here any longer. I can’t be here, watching Matt parade his women in front of me again. I let him fool me twice, and I have no one to blame but myself.

  I put that smile back on as I seal my office and tell Alex I have an unexpected appointment. She doesn’t question the sunglasses on my face, even though I can tell she wants to. I make it out of the building and into my car without any problems, and then drive to the private airfield. It’s time for the end to begin, once and for all.

  * * *

  Matt

  I’m on my third glass of Scotch when the alarm on my desk goes off. It’s a distress signal from the Society, and I’m running for the door before it ends its chime. I make it into the Foundation offices, and find chaos. I follow Alex into the conference room, only to notice that Reina isn’t there. My grandmother is in her place at the head of the table, and my stomach drops.

  “Where is Reina?”

  “She’s gone. That’s what the alarm is for.”

  No. Oh God no. No. “How can she be gone? She’s in charge.”

  “She deactivated herself. She had it on a delayed timer, so it didn’t take effect until she was already too far away for anybody to go after her,” Ainsley says.

  “You have to know where she was when it deactivated.”

  “Yes. She was in the air. My team is trying to find the plane, and they’re also trying to recover what they can from what’s left of her hard drive and email.”

  “She destroyed her computer?”

  “She destroyed her whole office. She broke everything that wasn’t bolted to the floor,” Faith tells me.

  “We’ve got something,” Ainsley says before I can ask any more questions. She’s looking down at her tablet, and all of a sudden there’s an email up on the screen.

  It seems straightforward. A nun is asking for help because her convent is being threatened by a trafficker. Audrey stands up so fast that her chair topples over, which tells me there’s more to it.

  “No. Jane…no. She didn’t. Why did she go? Oh my God.”

  “I don’t know, Audrey.”

  “What is it? What’s wrong with Reina going on a mission? I know she’s out of practice, but she’s still tough.”

  My grandmother practically collapses into her chair before answering. “What’s wrong is that the man who’s terrorizing the convent is the man we saved Reina from twelve years ago.”

  “Saved her? What the hell are you talking about?”

  It’s Audrey who answers. “I had just been recruited into what would become the Society when I met a woman on the bus. She was crying, and something drew me to her. I took her to a diner, and after getting her some food, she told me about her daughter. A beautiful girl who was taken by the Coyote who helped the family cross the border. They had paid him, but once he saw Reina, he wanted a different kind of payment.”

  “Son of a bitch.”

  “Yes he was. And is. Reina was the first official Society mission, and we got her out. She would never tell us if he raped her—.”

  “He didn’t,” I blurt out. “I was her first.”

  “I guess I needed to know that, but then again, I really didn’t.”

  “Sorry, Gram.”

  “As I was saying, we got her out, but without killing him.”

  “That’s my fault. I couldn’t do it. I should’ve done it,” Audrey says, looking like she’s going to break down.

  “It was everyone’s first mission. You got Reina out, and that is what’s important,” my grandma tells her.

  “You know he was obsessed with her. If he sees her, he’ll do whatever he can to have her again.”

  “Why would she do it, though? She had to know it was a suicide mission,” Jade says.

  “I don’t know. It had to be bad, whatever it was. Her office, deactivating herself. I never thought she would leave. Something had to have happened.”

  “It did,” I say, and feel all of their eyes on me. “I gave her our divorce papers today. I sent her over the edge, and now you need to tell me what we’re going to do to get her back.”

  Chapter 2

  Reina,

  I know I’m the biggest asshole on the planet right now, but I just couldn’t help it. I bought you a yellow diamond because I know you hate the color yellow. I also bought you a yellow diamond necklace and tiara to wear on our wedding day. It’s fucked up, and I saw the hurt you tried to hide when I gave you the ring tonight. You put on a happy face as everyone told you how gorgeous the ring is, but I know you hate it. I spent almost a million dollars on that ring, knowing full well you’d hate it, but not being able to stop myself. This wedding is fake—it’s what we agreed to—and I have to show you that. I can’t let you know how much I wish it was real, or give you false hope for a future together. As much as I love you, and long to have you as my wife for real, I know that will never happen. And so I bought you a ring I knew you’d hate, praying that it will make you hate ME, and stop looking at me like there’s a chance for us, when I know there isn’t. Please know I’m sorry for adding one more thing to the list of asshole moves I’ve done to push you away. I had no choice.

  Yours always,

  Matt

  * * *

  A few months ago…

  Matt walks me into Tiffany’s, telling me he has a surprise for me. We’ve been having a rough time after everything that happened with Darcy and the mentors. I know he wants to apologize, and I guess he thinks jewelry will help.

  As soon as we step inside, a man walks over and leads us to a private office. Once we’re seated, he pulls a tray of jewelry from his desk. The smile on his face is genuine, as the one on my face freezes.

  Every piece of jewelry he’s showing me features yellow diamonds. Some are just the one stone, and some are clusters around other white or colored stones. My motherfucking bastard of a husband has a smile on his face, too.

  “Which one do you want, Rei? You can have anything, you can have them all if you’d like.”

  I draw upon the strength I’ve had to tap into more and more over the last few months, and refuse to cry. I know Matt and I were only together for two weeks all those years ago, but he teased me so much about hating the color yellow, that he has to remember. How can he not remember that I wouldn’t even sit on a yellow chair in the food court at the mall?

  They’re both waiting for me to say something, and the smile has slipped a little from the other man’s face. I have to speak up, but what the hell am I supposed to say? I can’t go home with anything on that tray. I just can’t.

  “Everything is beautiful, but I don’t need any more jewelry, Matt.”

  “I know you don’t need it, but I want you to have something you love.”

  I close my eyes as I feel them get wet, and will the damn tears back in. He knows. I can see it in his eyes. Matt knows I hate everything on that tray, which means he knows I hate my ring, too. I knew he’d try and push me away this year, but I didn’t know just how much he despised me until right now. I won’t play along, though. I’m done being his victim—at least for right now. We still have a few more months of “marriage” left, and God only knows what he’ll try to torture me with next.

  I smile sweetly at the man behind the desk, and remembering his accent, speak to him in his native Farsi. “Can you please show me some items that have no yellow in them. I hate the color yellow.”

  His mouth opens in surprise as he blatantly looks at my ring. “You
hate yellow?”

  “Yes. My husband must have forgotten.”

  “Is there a problem?” Matt asks in English, looking between the two of us.

  “I was just telling this nice man how you must have forgotten that I hate the color yellow.”

  “I-I’m sorry, Rei,” he replies, looking like a deer in the headlights.

  Oh, I bet he is. He didn’t think I’d speak up. Why should he? I gushed over the ring on my finger, and wore the fucking matching tiara and necklace he sent me on our “wedding” day. I probably should’ve just kept the smile on my face, and grabbed the most expensive item on the tray. I couldn’t do it, though. I can’t keep pretending that everything’s okay.

  I lean over to whisper in Matt’s ear. “This is not okay. Nothing over the past few months has been okay, but this? You pretending to do something nice when you know you’re hurting me instead? It has to stop. If you hate me so much, then sleep in one of the guest rooms, or even in another apartment. I cannot keep doing this with you. I just can’t.”

  “I was playing a joke on my wife,” Matt says suddenly, in his most charming voice. “Can you please show her modern looking pieces with sapphires in them?”

  “Yes, of course, Mr. Corrigan.”

  We sit in silence until the man comes back with a try of things I honestly love. I don’t need any of it, but if Matt wants to play, we’ll play. I pick up a heavy necklace that has strands of diamonds above and below a giant sapphire.

  “I’d like this,” I say, and then pick up a thick bangle covered in diamonds and sapphires as well. “And this bracelet.”

  The man looks at Matt, and he nods. “I already stated that she can have anything she chooses. Is there anything else you want?”

  Yes, I want something else. I want a husband who respects me and doesn’t think that diamonds and sapphires can make up for standing against me. I want a husband who loves me. Those things aren’t on the table, so I just shake my head. “No.”

  Matt hands over his credit card, which is approved in seconds. When you’re as rich as him, your credit card company doesn’t question you spending over a million dollars in a jewelry store. I know it won’t even make a dent in his bank account, and he knows I’ll never wear the jewelry he just bought. The man boxes the pieces up, and hands me the blue bag.

  “Thank you,” I say in Farsi.

  “I really am sorry, Reina.”

  I don’t answer him. I can’t. I excuse myself and walk calmly out of the office, and then the store itself. There are no footsteps behind me as I go. No real apologies, or even the pretense of love. If I didn’t already know how little I mean to Matthew Corrigan, I certainly do now. He’ll never love me, and I’ll never survive once this is over.

  * * *

  Reina

  “I need to get to the convent,” I tell the man who’s seated across from me in the village cantina. I tried to get in on my own, but the place is literally surrounded by men with automatic weapons.

  “No,” he says. The word is the same in English and Spanish, but I refuse to take it for an answer in either language.

  “You would stop me from taking my spiritual path?”

  “It is a death sentence. I should not tell you this, but those women in there are all going to die.”

  “Die?” I ask, pretending to be surprised.

  “Yes. No one will breach the walls because it is a sacred place, but the man who controls this village has vowed to take anyone who steps outside. He is a very bad man, and I-I should not even be talking to you right now.”

  I know just how bad of a man he is, and I also know he’s doing this to get to me. I got away from him once, and he wants me back. I have no doubt that he knows I run the Corrigan & Co. Foundation, and is also aware that I’ve seen to it that C&C funds are sent to the convent monthly. I was once headed there, and he’s planned an unwanted homecoming for me. I’m not the scared teenage girl I was over eleven years ago when he took me, and I’m not afraid to die now as long as I take him down with me.

  “Good thing I want to go in, and not out.”

  “It is suicide for you. No one will come to help. We aren’t newsworthy.”

  “I am well aware of the situation.”

  “I would need much money to make this happen.”

  He looks over me as he says it. I have on a plain blue dress, with sandals and no jewelry. He thinks I can offer him nothing, but he is wrong. I take my engagement ring from my pocket, and toss it on the table.

  “It’s worth over a million American dollars.”

  “I cannot take stolen property. What would I do with it.”

  “It’s not stolen. The ring belongs to me.”

  “You are married?”

  “I was. Now I wish to become a nun. Do we have a deal?”

  “You don’t want to keep the ring? For sentimental reasons? I believe they would let you keep at least the one thing.”

  “That ring means nothing more to me than a way to get inside the convent. Again, do we have a deal?”

  He looks down at the ring, and smiles before picking it up. “Yes. We have a deal.”

  * * *

  Matt

  “What’s the plan?” I ask, walking into Ainsley’s underground command center.

  Instead of a verbal answer, I’m faced with nine pairs of eyes cutting into me like silent lasers. Seriously, if looks could kill, I’d be dead. And if it wasn’t for my Gram and the guys getting in front of me a few hours ago, there would be several bullet holes and knife wounds marking my body right now. They would all be well deserved, but that’s beside the point. All of us need to work together right now.

  We need to get Reina back, and then I need to finally admit that I want her. Really, and truly want her, and not the bullshit crap I’ve put us both through for over a decade. It’s time I manned up and told her everything. Every. Damn. Thing. It’s going to hurt like a bitch, but she deserves to know it all. Once she does, I can only hope she’ll give me a chance—a real chance—to show her that I mean it this time.

  “We have a plan, but it doesn’t include you,” Audrey says, rubbing her stomach. She’s starting to show, and it would be adorable if she wasn’t holding back from punching me right now.

  “She’s my wife,” I remind everyone through clenched teeth.

  “You signed the fucking divorce papers, asshat. Now why don’t you go off and get one of your women to suck you off or something. We have work to do,” Stella tells me.

  I know I deserve it. God knows I deserve it. Hell, everyone in this room knows I deserve the disgust and anger that’s being leveled at me. None of that matters right now.

  “I am going after Reina. With or without you. I would prefer to work with you, but I’ll go alone if I have to.”

  “It’s a little late to be falling on your sword, Matt,” Isa says. As shy as she normally is, in this situation she’s taking me on. I’m proud of her for it, but again, I have one priority right now, and she isn’t in this room. Which is why we need to be working together.

  “I love you all. Every single one of you are like sisters to me, and I would fall on a sword, grenade, or whatever the fuck I needed to, if it came to that. But as much as I love you, I love Reina more. I know what I did was stupid, okay? I knew it when I was signing those damn papers. I was scared, or at least I thought I was. I realize now that I never really knew what fear was until I was in that room with all of you, hearing that I might never see her again. If she dies without knowing that I truly love her…I can’t…we have to get her back. Please work with me on this.”

  “And then what?” Jade asks. “What happens once we bring her home?”

  “Then I prove to her that I love her, and want to be a real husband to her. I burned the divorce papers.”

  “How long until you get skittish and run again?” Faith asks me.

  “Never. I swear to you—all of you—that I am never leaving Reina again. I want her in my life. I need her. I’m done letting my fuc
ked-up issues keep us apart.”

  “You’re saying all the right words, Matt, but how do we know they’re true? How do we know that once she’s back you won’t jump back into every pussy that comes your way?” Ellie asks. Damn she’s tough. I knew that already, but damn.

  “You’re going to have to trust me. And just so you all know, I didn’t sleep with as many women as you think I did. I just made it seem that way.”

  “I trust you with my life, Matt. But I don’t know if any of us can trust you with Reina’s heart again,” Tegan tells me.

  “You can all trust me. I promise.”

  “Trusting you hasn’t worked out so well for me in the past. I thought we were friends, and then you chose to go against me,” Darcy reminds me.

  “I chose my Gram, Darcy. Her, Jessica, and Miles will always come first. That’s just the way it is.”

  “You’ve already proven that they come before Reina, but that’s between you and her. We need you on this mission, because all of the intel and recon my team has gathered tells me this is going to be bad. We’ll all be lucky to get out of there alive. With Audrey staying back, you’re an extra body. So yes, you can help us. What happens after that is up to Reina, but I don’t think you can expect it to be easy. Everyone gather round, and let’s do this,” Ainsley says.

  I nod a thanks to her, but she just flips me off. I wouldn’t expect anything different, and I know she’s right. Getting Reina back is going to be the easy part of this scenario. Convincing her to trust me, and give me another chance is going to be what’s hard. I’m not looking for easy, though. I’ll jump through every hoop she gives me, and do whatever she needs. I’ve failed us both more times than I can count, but failure’s not an option this time. I have to win—for both of us.

  Chapter 3

  Reina,

  I can’t stop thinking about you. I always think of you, but tonight you’re on constant replay in my head. No amount of alcohol, or women grinding on me in the club, could take the memories from my mind. The memories of when you gave yourself to me for the first time. I hadn’t killed an innocent man yet, but I still wasn’t worthy of the gift you gave me. I wasn’t worthy of you then, and I’ll never be now. I just need you to know how much it meant to me. I hate that I hurt you, even for a few seconds, and I’m still fucking humbled by you, even after all these years. I know I’m a mess, and I shouldn’t come to you when I’m at my lowest point, but I can’t help it. There’s nothing in this world like being buried inside of you, Reina. It’s the only time the demons in my head are quiet. It all started with that first night, and no matter that I’ve had other women and you’ve been with other men, our bodies know they belong together. Sometimes I’m tempted to believe that, too. I know I’ll never belong to someone else. It just won’t happen, even if I can’t allow myself to admit it—to myself, or to you--I’ll always only belong to you. Despite the way I act, or the things I say, you own me. My conscience won’t let me give myself to you, but no matter what, I’m yours. One day maybe I’ll be brave enough to show you that. Maybe.