“So was I,” Alex said.
“I was older as well,” said Kingsley. “I was nine when I was brought to the home.”
“So you guys were brought together in a care home and trained?” I looked around each of them, and Kingsley nodded.
“Exactly. And then when we were old enough, we started to be assigned missions. You being the latest.”
“Me? I was a mission?”
“Yes, because you revealed what your father had said to you in your final moments.”
A pang of regret swelled inside my chest like a balloon. If only I’d not spoken to the reporter, none of this would be happening now. But then the balloon popped. If I hadn’t spoken to the press, I wouldn’t know who my father’s killer had been. I would be continuing to daydream my way through my life, with no focus. And as mixed as my feelings were toward the men I sat in the room with now, I also didn’t want to go back to a life where they weren’t in it.
“What about the memory stick?” I said eventually. “Were any of you given that mission when my father died?” Isaac was talking about preventing corruption before it happened, but then why had my father still had to take the flash drive? Shouldn’t one of the team stepped in?
Isaac shook his head. “It was before our time. We were still in training, barely more than kids ourselves. Someone should have been there to help your father, but it wasn’t picked up on soon enough. I’m sorry for that.”
My face pinched as I tried to process all of this information. “It wasn’t your fault. Like you said, you were barely more than kids yourselves.” At only a couple of years older than me, Clay would only have been sixteen, Alex and Lorcan would have just turned eighteen. Kingsley and Isaac might have been a little older, but not old enough to deal with whatever corruption was going on in the FBI.
“Even so, someone should have stopped it before it got so out of hand. Your father should never have needed to take the memory stick.”
“So he did the right thing?” A tight, painful pinching closed my throat. My instincts had always told me my father had been a good man, and he wouldn’t have taken something confidential if he hadn’t absolutely had to, but when the press picked up on it, and everyone was talking about how he had betrayed his country by doing so, it was hard not to hear those things. Even Agent Fucking Hollan’s absence after the funeral had made me wonder if everyone else was right and my father had done a bad thing. People said he’d stolen the information in return for money, and the people who had shot him must have been involved in the deal. The deal had simply gone bad, and my father had paid for his part in it. I’d never wanted to listen to those things, but it was hard not to after awhile. Having his innocence laid out in front of me now felt like a baptism. I could think of my dad in a good light again, without the fear that he’d never been the man I’d loved my whole life.
“So he took the memory stick to try to keep it out of the hands of the wrong people?”
Isaac nodded. “That’s about the sum of it.”
I needed to know what was on that stick.
I’d seen these men as the enemies, but now how I felt toward them had changed. I’d been so wrapped up in myself, and my father’s death, I hadn’t given any thought to the guys and what they might have been through during their lives. They were all orphans, having lost their parents at a young age. I wondered if the place where they’d been brought to train as young children had anything akin to a parental figure, or if it had been hard and cold. Had they had a mother-figure to sing them to sleep at night, or place a cool towel against their foreheads when they were sick? Or had they only had each other?
My heart broke at the thought of any of them as young children, having lost both parents and picked out by whomever it was they worked for to train as this special taskforce. Isaac was the prickliest out of them all, but I tried to imagine how it had been for him, moving to a strange country, only to lose both of his parents and end up in a foster home with no friends or family to speak of. No wonder he was a cold fish.
I was about to talk myself into trying to be nicer to him, when I reminded myself that they had kidnapped me and locked me in a cellar for several days. I had every right to still be pissed at him, or any of them, for that matter.
Isaac lifted his eyebrows. “Any more questions, Darcy, or can we get started now?”
“We can get started.”
Familiar nerves fluttered in my stomach, and I swallowed hard, trying to push them back down. Revisiting my father’s death was traumatic, and it wasn’t something I wanted to do. Maybe that was what all the questions had been about—my attempt at delaying the inevitable. But if I was going to remember the number, I had to keep going. It would have been what my father wanted.
“Remember that it’s the words your father says to you which you need to focus on,” Kingsley said. “Try not to be distracted by everything else.”
“By the man who murdered him, you mean?”
“Yeah, and try not to panic again. You’re just an observer. It’s not really happening.”
We went through the same routine, me sitting with my eyes closed, breathing how he instructed, and picturing a movie theatre screen in front of me. Even before I’d seen anything, my heartrate increased. It wasn’t a fun thing, to witness your father’s death over and over, but I knew I needed to get those numbers.
The screen flickered. There I was, standing with my back facing outward, shouting at my poor dad. He had his back to the window, his face pinched with his own frustration at his teenage daughter. I couldn’t help my attention being drawn back toward the black glass, watching for the flash of movement. Hollan must have shot my dad, and then slipped in through the kitchen door, which was how I’d seen his reflection in the glass. Had he searched the house for the flash drive while I’d been on the floor with my dad bleeding out, screaming for help? He must have heard me. If he’d listened harder, he’d have been the one who’d heard that code instead of me. Things would have been so different if he had. Hollan would have gotten hold of the drive and been able to access whatever was on it. Whatever my dad had been trying to hide from Hollan and his team would have landed directly in their hands.
In the landscape of my memory, I heard gunshots, and my dad fell forward.
Suddenly, I was back in the memory again. One moment, I’d been in the chair, watching, the next I sat on the floor of the living room with my father in my arms. Blood seeped through to my skin and clothing, but I bit down on the horror and panic surging up inside me and threatening to take control. The words that had filled my mind on that day tried to crowd my thoughts—don’t die, don’t die, don’t die—but I forced them away. I needed to focus on my dad and what he was saying to me. I couldn’t think about the man I knew was rummaging through our house to find the item he’d killed my father for.
Instead, I looked down into my dad’s face. The man who had raised me. Tears poured down my cheeks, and somehow I knew I was crying in the real world as well. I placed my palm against his cheek, wanting so desperately to make things better and knowing it was impossible. I wanted to look into his blue eyes, eyes so like mine, and try to give him some comfort, but it didn’t matter what I did now, the outcome would always be the same. This was the father of my memories. It wasn’t really him, but that didn’t make things any easier.
I moved my gaze down to his mouth, trying hard to ignore the sticky hot blood seeping against my skin. Concentrate, concentrate, concentrate. Everything around me threatened to draw my attention away. Knowing Hollan was somewhere in the house with us made me want to hunt him down and make him pay, but I had to stay focused. I had to remember. The numbers were already in my head somewhere, I just needed to open up the pathway that would take them from my stored long term memory to my active memory.
Staring down into my father’s face, I watch his lips move. A bubble of blood swelled like oil between them, and I flinched as it burst, spattering specks of red across his chin. I held back a sob. I wanted to look a
way, but I couldn’t. This was too important. I blinked back my tears, needing to see, and watch as his lips formed the words. As my father spoke the final words I’d ever hear him say, the numbers appeared before me in boxes. Each digit took its own position in the space around me.
I had the code.
Chapter Twenty-one
With a gasp, my eyes shot open and I found myself back in the living room, sitting cross-legged on the plush cream rug. My face was damp, the taste of salt clinging to my lips as though I’d spent time caught in ocean spray. My heart thundered in my chest, and I fought to slow its pace.
Kingsley leaned forward, frowning at me in concern. I wanted him to move back. He inhabited the space where my synesthesia allowed me to see the code my father had given me, the numbers hanging in the air in front of me. But the guys still didn’t know about that.
At least now I could visualize the numbers, I knew I’d never forget them. Kingsley had been right when he said my mind had absorbed the information on a subconscious level and stored it away in my long term memory. I had accessed the code now, and I wasn’t going to let it go anywhere.
The men all stared at me.
“Well?” Isaac was the first to speak. “What do you remember?”
I shook my head. “I’m sorry. It was all too much again. It was just the blood and him dying. I couldn’t concentrate on anything else.”
Isaac slammed his fist down on the armrest of the chair and jumped to his feet. “Bloody hell!”
“I’m sorry.” I allowed my face to crumple, my lower lip quivering as I remembered the emotions I’d experienced in recalling my father’s murder. “Maybe I’m just tired. I’ve been through a lot, and today has been crazy. It’s been an overload of information.”
Kingsley looked at me in sympathy then turned to Isaac. “She’s right. We can’t ask the brain to pull up buried memories when it’s already exhausted.”
A twinge of guilt plucked at my gut for lying to them.
A part of me wanted to tell them the number, if only to offload, to put its burden and the weight it carried onto their shoulders. But the code was my only leverage. If I gave them the number, what reason would they have to keep me around? I needed to get to Hollan, and right now these men were the only connection I had to him.
Now I had the number, I needed time to think. The excuse of needing some rest would buy me that time, and I’d figure out what to do afterward.
“Maybe if we got the memory stick first, it would be easier for me to remember,” I suggested cautiously. I didn’t want to make them suspicious of me. “Give me something to focus on. You said all sorts of things can trigger a memory—smells, sounds, tastes—so why not actually being able to hold the one thing that makes this all so important?”
“Did you ever see it yourself?” Kingsley asked.
I shook my head. “No. Why?”
“If it’s not in your memory already, linked to your memory of your father that night, then it won’t do anything to help.”
“But I’ve made that connection now,” I pressed. “I’m sure it will help to get the drive first.”
“It’s not that simple.” Isaac paced across the room with his hands shoved in the pockets of his suit pants, his head down. “Getting it back will literally be a military operation.”
“You know where it is, then?”
“Hollan will know.”
“So you know where he is?” I prompted, trying to squeeze them for every detail.
“We know how to find him.”
Damn, he was being vague. Not that I thought I’d be able to take on Hollan by myself, but right now if I could get hold of a gun and that son of a bitch was standing right in front of me, I wouldn’t hesitate in making him pay for what he did.
The thing worrying me the most was if I gave them the code, they would leave me behind, or worse. My use would have been served.
“That’s enough for now.” Alex got to his feet. “It’s probably time we all got some rest.”
I didn’t like the idea of wasting time sleeping, but though I’d been pretending to be too tired to remember, exhaustion suddenly weighed down on my limbs, and I found myself hiding a yawn behind my hand. The thought of Alex’s big bed, with the soft white sheets and the heavy feather duvet made me long to crawl beneath the covers and snuggle my face into the pillow. I’d been sleeping on the floor for the past few nights, which perhaps was a little stupid on my part, but it had felt like the right thing to do at the time.
Alex stopped in front of me and offered me his hand. I smiled up at him gratefully and took it, his palm soft and warm, and he pulled me to my feet.
“’Night,” the others called to me, and I raised a hand to wave them goodbye.
I caught Isaac’s eye and a chill went through me. He didn’t smile or say goodnight. I wanted to think he was just being his usual asshole self, but there was part of me—the guilty part, perhaps—that wondered if he knew I’d lied.
We reached the stairs and Alex paused. “I’ll bring you up some of the clothes from the cellar so you can find something to sleep in, or change into in the morning. You’re welcome to borrow one of my t-shirts, or anything else you want. Help yourself to whatever is in the drawers.”
I gave him a grateful smile. “Thanks, Alex.”
He left me to go back down to the cellar. I didn’t plan on ever stepping foot in that place again.
I trotted back up the stairs and went into the bedroom. The bed was as big and fluffy as I’d remembered, and I smoothed my hand across the top of the soft sheets, before heading into the bathroom.
Damn. I didn’t have a toothbrush.
A gentle knock came at the bedroom door, and I poked my head out of the bathroom to see Alex ducking through.
“You don’t have to knock on your own bedroom door,” I told him as he entered, his arms bundled with things.
“You might have been getting changed.”
I hadn’t had the chance to figure out what I was wearing to bed yet, but the thought of one of his big t-shirts did sound comfortable.
He dumped the pile of clothes down on the bed, and I noticed a couple of pairs of panties and a bra dangling out of the pile. The sight of them embarrassed me, and they weren’t even mine, not really. I wondered which of the guys had gone out of their way to purchase women’s clothes and underwear, or if it was possible one or more of them had a girlfriend or even wife hidden away somewhere.
“Thanks,” I told him, picking up each item and stashing it away on the occasional chair in the corner. “I really appreciate it.” My toothbrush fell out of the bundle, and I bent to pick it up. “And extra thanks for this!”
“I thought you’d need it after that curry.”
I laughed. “Are you trying to tell me something?”
Alex went to the dresser and slid open a drawer. He rummaged around and picked out a t-shirt and threw it to me. At about six feet two, Alex was tall and lean, and the t-shirt would hang somewhere mid-thigh on me.
“Thanks. I’ll go and change.” Without thinking, I brought the material up to my nose and inhaled. It smelled distinctively of Alex, the cotton worn and soft as butter.
I glanced up to catch him watching me, and I snatched the t-shirt away from my face.
Alex’s blue eyes lit with pleasure though he controlled his mouth enough not to show it.
“I’ll leave you to it,” he said.
My teeth snagged my lower lip. “I feel bad you sleeping down in the cellar.”
He shrugged. “Well, you shouldn’t. We made you sleep down there for three nights.”
He had a point.
“Even so,” I said. “It seems stupid when this bed is plenty big enough for both of us. You just stick to your side, and I’ll stick to mine.”
“You have a side now?” he asked, his tone flirtatious.
“Yes! The one closest to the window. And don’t try anything. I’ve got a mean right foot.”
He chuckled. “I’m a gent
leman.”
Only when you want to be, I thought but didn’t say. My memories of Alex grabbing my legs in the back seat of Hollan’s car remained fresh in my mind. He hadn’t been such a gentleman then. Of course, he’d been trying to save my life. I just hadn’t known it at the time. I tried not to look too deeply into the reason why thinking of Alex as rough and ready gave me a thrill.
“Okay,” he agreed. “As long as you’re sure.”
“Yeah, I’m sure.”
I took the t-shirt and toothbrush back into the bathroom to get ready. When I emerged five minutes later, my legs were bare. Tugging at the hem of Alex’s t-shirt, I tried to cover a little more of my thighs.
Hopping beneath the sheets, using them to cover the rest of my body, I snuggled down, facing away from the side Alex would be occupying, toward the window. It was pitch black outside now, only the light from the moon and the stars blinking. We were in the middle of nowhere with no manmade light to ruin the night sky.
I heard the rustle of fabric as he got undressed, and I wondered exactly how much he was planning on wearing to bed ... not that I had any intention of finding out. Alex’s weight depressed the mattress on the other side of the bed as he climbed in as well.
There was a little jolt of movement, followed by a click of a light switch, then the room fell into darkness.
I expected to lie awake for ages waiting to sleep, but all my claims of being tired must have been true, because the moment my eyes slipped shut, I was sound asleep.
FEATHER LIGHT TOUCHES drifted down the side of my body to caress my naked thigh. My body woke, though my mind still floated, caught in that wasteland between wake and sleep. Teeth grazed my neck, and I let out a moan, wriggling down in the softness of the warm bed. The light touches became more insistent, and I twisted to meet them to find a strong, hard thigh wedged up between my legs. A hot mouth closed over mine, a tongue tracing my lips. I ground down against the thigh between my legs, my pussy already wet and swollen in response. A hand found my breast beneath the oversized t-shirt I wore, and clever fingers pinched my nipple, rolling and teasing me to a sensitive peak.
Hacking Darkness: A Reverse Harem Romance (Dark Codes Book 1) Page 15