Chapter Fifteen

 

Robert could still remember how utterly helpless he’d felt when he’d realized he couldn’t get to her. Ariel had been on the other side of that bulletproof glass and the doors had been locked. He’d stood beside Owen as both of their women had been placed in danger, and it had been the single worst moment of his life.

He couldn’t imagine what Owen was going through, how he’d felt as he’d run like a madman after a vehicle he could never catch. How he’d run until he couldn’t anymore. Tucker had found him lying in the grass having chased that van until he’d thrown up and passed out.

“We should move and now,” Ezra said. “I want us on a plane back to London as soon as possible.”

They were sitting around the conference table but there were way too many seats empty. The ones that were filled contained shocked and numb people. People who wouldn’t forget what had happened that day.

It was early evening and the morning felt like it had happened years ago. They’d been forced to regroup, assess, clean up. Plan.

“I know you do, Ezra, but we’ve got to get a pilot to you first. Owen can’t fly at this point.” Damon was on the left side of the split screen. “I can’t trust hiring someone local.”

“I can get Si there but it’s going to be eighteen hours or so. I’m sorry. It’s the best I can do.” Big Tag’s face took up the right side of the screen. He looked haggard, and early morning light streamed in behind him. It looked like he was still at the office in his house. “I’ll have you out of there and another team in place sometime tomorrow afternoon.”

Tucker’s eyes came up, staring at him from across the table. That stare told Robert everything he needed to know.

Tucker wouldn’t be leaving Germany. Not until the job was done. The mission parameters had changed, but they still would finish. And they would never leave a man behind. Or a woman.

He understood what Big Tag was trying to do. He thought they were far too close to this problem, but he was wrong.

This was his problem, their problem. The Lost Boys would handle it.

They were coming out of retirement. While they’d been cleaning up and dealing with the bodies, he’d also made a couple of calls. He’d put the plans in motion. In the end it was a fairly simple job.

“Then I think we should move safe houses.” Ezra had been perfectly calm through the last several hours. He’d stood in the yard and looked down at Emily Seeger’s body and merely nodded to his ex-wife as though giving her some silent permission. He hadn’t even seen the moment Solo had dragged the body away and started her incredibly thorough cleanup procedures.

“I don’t think there’s a need for that,” Big Tag replied. “Look, I know you’re nervous, Ezra, but if you haven’t gotten a visit from the police so far, you’re not going to. Moving the team at this point could cause more trouble than staying in place. The club isn’t open again until next Thursday and I’ve already talked to Peter’s wife. Can you give me an update? Have we recovered the van and Peter’s body without incident?”

No incident besides Peter’s murder.

They continued on, but Robert couldn’t get his mind off what had happened this morning and how it had changed everything. Ezra had immediately started tracing Dante’s subcutaneous tracker. He’d taken the only other vehicle at the club, a motorcycle. Solo had hopped on the back, wrapping her arms around her ex-husband, and they’d gone after the van.

The wait had taken forever.

It had been even worse when they’d returned with Solo on the motorcycle and Ezra driving the van.

“I found the van left outside the city in the parking lot of a secluded park. Dante had cut the tracker out of his arm. I found the body of Peter Bergman slumped over the front seat where it was obvious he’d been shot in the head by whoever was sitting in the backseat.” Ezra’s words came out in a dull monotone. “There was no evidence of Dr. Walsh or Dante. I have to assume Dante had one of Levi’s men meet them there and they fled.”

“I’ve got someone working on the CCTV cameras around the area.” Damon leaned forward. “How is Owen?”

“Owen is sedated.” He’d been forced to do it because Owen had lost his shit. “He’ll hate me for it later, but I couldn’t let him go running through the streets of Munich with a gun looking for Dante when we have no idea where he is.”

“You made the right call, Rob.” Ariel spoke for the first time in an hour. She’d said very little since she’d been forced to kill Emily Seeger. She’d been an automaton, going through the motions, doing her part in cleaning up the mess that had been made, but it was obvious she was still in shock. “Owen wasn’t capable of making proper decisions. He was too… God, I don’t even know what to call it.”

Grief. Fear. Guilt. The horrifying helplessness that came from knowing someone he loved was in danger and he couldn’t do anything about it.

Big Tag’s hand ran over his head. “I’ll be on that plane. Charlie’s packing me up right now. I promise, I’m going to fix this. Well, what I can fix. I can’t bring Peter back. God, I’m sorry. I made this call. I knew we had a traitor and I let you work with him.”

“And I agreed with you,” Damon replied. “I thought it was worth the risk to figure out who the traitor was. I didn’t realize there were two of them, nor that Emily Seeger would show up and flip the balance we had.”

“If it means anything at all to you, I would have made the same call.” Solo was sitting across from her ex. She’d been serious and professional, her normally cheery disposition dimmed in light of the tragedy of the morning, “Dante had done nothing at all violent before this.”

“Speak for yourself,” Tucker said. “He was pretty fucking violent to me when he was working for McDonald. And Jax and Sasha. Fuck, you can’t ask Sasha.”

Sasha’s body was wrapped up and stored in the big freezer unit alongside Peter’s for now. They would find a way to carry Sasha back to London and Peter would be given to his people here so he could be buried in his beloved homeland. They would not do the same for Emily Seeger. Solo had promised she could handle that particular job.

“I know,” Damon said, his tone solemn. “If we’d had any idea that Dante was capable of this level of harm, we would never have left him in. We didn’t know who the traitor was. We had suspicions, but we couldn’t know for sure.”

“We thought this particular op would be an excellent way to figure it out since this was supposed to be nothing more than a fact-finding mission.” Big Tag sounded weary. “It wasn’t supposed to end in a bunch of bodies. And Robert, you have to understand that we had no idea Seeger was anything but a nurse who’d worked briefly with McDonald. I’ve got everyone I can trying to run down your family.”

He shook his head. “Don’t. We have no idea if she was lying or telling the truth. I tend to think she was lying. We can worry about my past later. We need to find Rebecca. She’s the only thing that matters now.”

Because Owen wouldn’t be able to handle it if they lost her. Rebecca had come into this life because she loved Owen. Rebecca had given up a remarkable lifestyle, put her meteoric career on hold to help them.

Owen would burn down the world if he lost her.

The way he would if he’d lost Ariel.

He stared at her across the table. She wouldn’t look him in the eyes.

“Have we had any contact with Dante?” Damon asked. “He obviously took Rebecca with him.”

Or they would have found her body.

“It’s a good plan. She’s an excellent way to gain access to Levi Green,” Ezra pointed out. “That’s our working theory at this point. It would have been easier to kill her and leave her behind the way he did Peter, but she has value to Levi.”

“I’ve got some people looking in to where Levi is,” Solo promised. “I’ve also written a report that will bring down the wrath of God on him if I can ever get that fucker in the right position. If I can prove he kidnapped an American citizen, I can burn him. If I burn him, well, I can really actually burn him. I’ve got plans.”

“I need you to find a way to talk to him,” Big Tag said. “He’ll meet with you, Solo.”

Levi Green had an unhealthy fascination with the gorgeous operative. He likely would use the opportunity to meet with her, but Robert doubted he would handily bring Rebecca with him so they could nab her.

“No.” Ezra shook his head. “I’m not sending my…I’m not sending Solo in to deal with Levi. He’s proven he’ll do anything. Why should we give him another captive to hold over our heads? He could be anywhere. I think we should go back to London and start searching from there. We’ll get in contact with Green and we’ll negotiate. We do have something he might want more than Rebecca.”

“Beck, you are not trading yourself for her,” Solo hissed. “You are not going to be a martyr.”

Ezra gave her a smile that could only be described as predatory. “I promise I’ll take him with me.”

“I think you’re right and everyone should come back to base,” Damon pronounced. “Ian is sending a team in and they’ll start an investigation. They’ll be on the ground sometime tomorrow. You’ll come back to The Garden. I know he won’t want to come…”

“I’ll make sure Owen gets where he needs to be,” Robert promised. Where he needed to be might be up for debate, but he wasn’t having one now.

“Thank you. I know this is hard on you, but I truly believe this is the best way to protect you all.” Big Tag sat back. “I’m going to take care of this personally, Robert.”

“I know you will, sir.” Sometimes it was good to be thought of as the reasonable one. They bought every single thing he was saying. They had no idea what he’d really been doing during the cleanup. No idea he’d already planned a mission.

A mission he might not return from.

“I disagree about Owen,” Ariel said. “He needs to stay here. I’ll talk to him, but if you try to drag him back to The Garden, I think he’ll find a way to leave again. I understand that you’re trying to protect him, but would you honestly sit in an office while your wives were being held by an enemy?”

“No, of course not.” Big Tag seemed to think for a moment. “All right. He can stay, but he can’t be in charge of this op.”

Ariel nodded. “I’ll make sure he understands. You might send Kai Ferguson, if you can.”

“I was actually going to ask you to remain there. You know what’s gone on and you can help with Owen,” Damon replied.

Ariel’s head came up. “No. I think I should come in. Honestly, Damon, you should fire me.”

“I’m not going to fire you.” Damon took a long breath. “But I do understand why you’re upset. Perhaps it’s best if Ian sends in another psychologist. Come home, Ariel.”

She thought she should be fired? Why the hell would anyone fire her? He held the question, though, because it seemed like something they should talk about in private. And he was definitely going to be private with her. He had things to tell her, things she needed to hear.

Before he blew their world up.

“I will certainly come back to London,” she agreed. “But we’re going to have to talk. And I think it’s time to tell Tucker and Robert the full truth. I won’t hide it anymore.” Her eyes flashed, the first fire he’d seen in hours, and she turned to them. “I didn’t work for Scotland Yard. That was my cover. I was recruited into MI6 during my last year at Oxford. I thought I would be an analyst. It turned out I had innate skills I was unaware of, and MI6 trained me and sculpted me.”

“They turned you into an assassin,” Tucker said.

“Hey, that’s a rough word to use.” Solo crossed her legs and sat back. “She’s not some instrument of evil. She was doing necessary work.”

Tucker held his hands up. “Hey, not using the ‘e’ word here. I’m not judging her. I wish she’d been around earlier so she could have assassinated Dante. It would have solved a lot of our problems. And we knew about Ari’s past. Levi made sure we did. He sent Rob that report on you and Sasha made sure we read it.”

“He thought Levi could get the warrants off you and him and Jax.” Robert felt the need to defend Sasha since he couldn’t defend himself. “I know what he did was wrong. He was passing along information to Green, but he was desperate. He’d started to have memories of a child.”

“What?” Ariel turned shocked eyes his way. “He never mentioned that to me.”

“He was closed off. He didn’t trust anyone.” He wanted to reach out to her, but he stayed in his seat. “He only recently told me about it. He thinks he might have a daughter. I promised him I would try to find her.”

He had no idea how he would do it, but he would.

“I’ll let Adam know,” Ian said, his voice hoarse with emotion. He knew what it meant to have children.

Could he and Ariel have had a family? Would she have wanted a couple of kids? She would have been a wonderful mother.

His mother would love Ariel. His horny-ass brother better keep his hands off Ariel. Tim would think she was gorgeous.

He shook it off. He couldn’t get sick now. Hopefully, there would be time later to find out if Emily had been lying and his family was out there somewhere.

Ariel stood up, her eyes bright. “I’m going to go pack and make sure everything is cleaned up. I want to be ready to go.”

She strode out and Solo started to get up to follow her.

Robert held out a hand. “Let her be for now.”

Solo’s brows rose. “Are you going to take care of her?”

“Yes.” He would have one last night with her because after what he was planning on doing, she might never be able to trust him again. “I’ll take care of her, but she needs to cry and she doesn’t like to do that around other people. Besides, we need to talk about what the Agency is planning to do with us. I suspect since Ariel has been meeting with you that we’re more entangled than I’ve been led to believe.”

“We’ve been working with friendly parts of the Agency and some of Damon’s old contacts at MI6,” Tag acknowledged. “I decided it was the best way to keep them off our backs. It was originally why we allowed Ezra in to interview you. We kept up the contact even after Ezra got burned. We’ve shared information about our progress.”

“And our files?” He understood the razor-thin line Big Tag had been walking.

Tag looked at him straight through the monitor, his eyes gleaming with will. “No. I would never share those with anyone without your permission. I swear it.”

The words settled something deep inside. There were reasons to work with intelligence agents, and Tag and Damon would know who to trust. “And why wouldn’t you tell us?” The answer was self-evident. He’d lived through this morning. “Because we had a leak. Of course.”

“No one wanted to deceive you, and certainly Ariel didn’t,” Tag went on. “But you run that group, and you don’t always see the worst in people. You’re not the same as the rest of us. We were operatives. We were trained to keep secrets, to always suspect. You were a soldier. I knew that before anyone confirmed it. You take care of your men and you do whatever you can to make sure they get what they need.”

“You thought I would tell the rest of the men.” It was a possibility. “You’re not my commanding officer, Ian. I can’t tell you what I would have done. Knowing what I know now, I hope I would have made the right call, but I can’t say it for sure. I would have trusted them and I would have been wrong.”

“Then don’t blame Ariel,” Solo said, her eyes somber. “She wasn’t allowed to tell you, and Big Tag pretty much is her CO.”

“I told you, I’ll take care of her.” He would take care of them all. “Now we should go and pack, though I was hoping to talk to Jax.”

A little lie, but a necessary one. He might be a soldier, but he’d been around the operatives long enough to have picked up a few tricks.

Damon’s gaze was grim through the screen. “Jax was very upset when I told him about what happened. I’m afraid he and River took a sabbatical. They’re at a friend’s country house. The service isn’t great there. I’ll send a note that you’re wanting to talk.”

“Or I’ll go out and see him myself when I get there. Give him some space, too,” Robert said.

“You seem very calm.” Big Tag’s eyes had narrowed, and even with thousands of miles between them, he could feel that man’s suspicions.

He had to allay them and quickly. Ezra wasn’t as centered as he normally was because Solo was here. Ariel was lost in her own guilt and grief. It gave him cover. He couldn’t have Big Tag start looking at him hard. He couldn’t have anyone know he’d gone into Peter’s office and taken all the information the man had found out about Kronberg’s safes. “I have to be. Look, I was holding Sasha’s hand when he died, and I’m the one who held Owen down and stuck a needle in his arm. It’s been one of the roughest days of my life, and if I don’t hold it together I’ll fall apart utterly.”

Tag nodded. “Yeah, I do get that. I’m in the same position. I…well, let’s say I feel responsible for everything. Peter Bergman was a good man. He was an excellent intelligence officer who served his country well and was a friend to ours. All he wanted to do was retire and study history and now…well, sometimes it doesn’t pay to do a favor for me.”

He understood the way Tag felt. Peter had been his friend, a nice guy, and now he was dead when he should have had a long, happy retirement. He should have been playing in his club and enjoying life.

Sasha should have had a chance to redeem himself, although in Rob’s mind he’d done that when he’d saved Owen’s life. Sasha should have had his brothers beside him as he tried to figure out if he had a daughter out there in the world. He should have stayed in therapy and found himself again, but he wouldn’t get the chance.

Rebecca should be cuddled up with Owen. She shouldn’t be…he didn’t even know where she was.

“I’ll be there as soon as I can. Let me know if Dante or Green make contact,” Tag said. “And Rob, Tucker, I’m sorry about Sasha. Please tell Owen that we won’t stop until we get Rebecca back.” Tag reached out and the screen went dark.

Damon nodded. “And I’ll be waiting here for you. We’ll put every resource we have on solving this problem. See you soon.”

Ezra stood. “Rob, I assume you’re going to go talk to Ariel. Tucker, can you sit with Owen until he wakes up and explain what’s going on? Big Tag will be here soon and all he has to do is stay calm.”

Tucker nodded. “Of course.”

This was where none of them was thinking. He and Tucker would never leave Owen here alone. They were all considering Owen one of theirs since he’d originally been a McKay-Taggart member, but the minute Owen had taken that damn needle of McDonald’s, he’d become a Lost Boy.

And they did not leave each other behind.

“Beck, I need to talk to you,” Solo said. “I’ve got to call in and I need to go over what you want my bosses to know and what you don’t.”

Ezra looked surprised.

Solo rolled her eyes. “I told you I’m always on your side. We’ll talk and then I have a body to dispose of. I’m going to make sure no one ever finds that bitch.”

“I’ll help you,” Ezra promised.

They walked out, talking quietly.

And he was left alone with Tucker. “When will Owen be awake?”

“In an hour or two.” Tucker looked to the door. “Are we on? What did that fucker say?”

He’d gotten the text from Dante right before the conference call with Big Tag and Damon. “Dawn tomorrow by the Chinese Tower in the Englischer Garten. I’ve figured out where that is. It’s not far from here.”

“But we won’t get there, will we? That’s all one big lie. He’ll be there at Kronberg,” Tucker said. “He’ll show up with Levi Green and try to take it all.”

“And we’ll be ready.” They had to be.

“We’ll be outgunned.”

“Our other option is to turn it all over to Ezra,” Robert offered, though it wasn’t an option for him. “That means the Agency gets involved. No matter what Solo says, if the Agency is involved there’s a chance she gets overruled and the Agency takes whatever we find. They could let Rebecca rot in order to get that data and beat whatever faction Levi’s working for. There’s a war going on in the CIA and we can’t let Rebecca be a casualty.”

It was what he’d realized after he’d come down from his fear. They couldn’t leave this to anyone else. They couldn’t let Tag and Damon take the responsibility. This was up to him and his men.

That was when he’d started planning.

“I’ll sit with Owen.” Tucker stood, looking perfectly resolved. “I’ll explain it all to him when he wakes up. He’ll be ready to go. I’ll make sure of it. And the rest?”

“I’ve got it. I promise. I won’t let you down again.”

Tucker stood in front of him, putting a hand on his shoulder. “You’ve never once let me down. From the time I met you, I knew I could trust you. I knew… I don’t know why, but I knew you. Let’s get this done and get Rebecca back.”

“They might never trust us again,” Robert warned. “We might get that data and really have to turn it over to get her back. We might not be welcome at The Garden again.”

Tucker grinned. “Then we’ll figure it out. We’ll go to Bliss and hide out. They’ll take us in. Jax is family. I’ll find some weird dude who hunts sasquatches for a living, become best friends, and we’ll find a wife to share. Hopefully not a sasquatch wife. But it won’t come to that because I think Big Tag will yell and scream and threaten to do things to our entrails, and then he’ll understand. Because he’s family, too, and that’s what family does. But if it goes bad, we’re with you, Rob. Now go and spend some time with Ari. Make sure she comes with us if everything goes to hell.”

Tucker walked out. Robert looked toward Ariel’s bedroom door. She wouldn’t be going with them.

But he would have one last night with her.

 

* * * *

 

Ariel stared at herself in the mirror through the mist that filled the bathroom. She recognized the face, but there was something older about the look in her eyes. Not even a hot shower seemed to have washed her clean. How could she go back to The Garden and take her place there again? After everything that had happened, how could she pretend she knew what she was doing?

She should never have left MI6. She was good at shooting people from a distance and getting away with it. Not so great at her actual job.

She would go home, make her report to Damon, and then…

Deep down she knew she needed time. She should take a couple of weeks and let it settle, but what she wanted to do was run. It wasn’t even running. It was punishment.

There was a knock on the door and she sighed. Kim. Or Robert. She rather hoped it was Kim because she wasn’t sure what she could say to Rob now. There was a part of her that hoped he was so angry he couldn’t deal with her. She slipped into her robe and went to answer the door because if it was Kim, she wouldn’t simply walk away if no one answered. Kim would break the door down and get the answers she wanted.

I’m fine. Still in shock but fine.

That was what she would say. She would nod and listen to everything Kim told her and ease her friend’s mind. When she was alone again she could go back over all the ways she’d fucked up and cost several people their lives today.

Tomorrow she would get on the plane beside Robert and try to explain to him how sorry she was.

She opened the door and he was standing there, leaning on the doorjamb, his kit in his hand.

Her heart threatened to stop. He was safety and comfort wrapped in a gorgeous masculine package, but she didn’t deserve him. After what she’d allowed to happen, she didn’t deserve any of this.

“Rob, I…”

He brushed past her, walking into her room. “Take off that robe and find your position.”

The impulse to obey him was almost overwhelming. She could throw off her robe, kneel before him, and let him take control. Nothing else would matter but pleasing him and finding her own release. She could forget about the fact that Sasha was dead and Peter was gone. She wouldn’t have to think about what Rebecca was possibly going through or how tormented Owen was.

But those things weren’t going away.

“I think we should talk.” She needed to clear the air with him. No matter how she felt about herself, no matter what guilt weighed her down, she wasn’t about to allow him to use her for some kind of revenge fuck.

He dropped his kit on her bed and strode back to her. He very gently eased her hand off the door and shut them inside. “And I think you will say all the wrong things.”

“Yes, I seem to do that quite a lot lately.” She stared up at him. His shoulders were stiff but there wasn’t a hint of anger in his eyes. “I need to apologize.”

He moved in close, bringing his face to loom over hers. “For following orders?”

“For lying. I lied to you.”

“And still I love you.”

Oh, this was worse. Tears pulsed behind her eyes, making the world blurry. She shook her head, unable to form words.

“That’s better,” he said, his hand brushing the line of her jaw. “Don’t say anything. Just cry for me. You need to let all this poison out of your system. You did not cause what happened today.”

“I was Dante’s therapist all this time.”

“And you knew something was wrong with him,” Robert said quietly.

“You’re not listening to me.”

“No, you’re not listening to me. And I don’t think we can move forward with this conversation unless you do as I asked you to.” He leaned over and kissed the bridge of her nose. “Do you really want to leave it like this? Us? Do you want to end this horrible day with me in another room thinking about you and you in here alone?”

No. She didn’t. “Rob, I killed your wife today.”

His lips curved in the most decadent and malicious smirk. “Yes, and I haven’t thanked you for that.” He sobered and dropped his forehead to hers, his eyes closing. “Damn it, Ari. I was so fucking scared that she was going to kill you. I wouldn’t have been…I never want to go through that again. I know you think I’m angry, but I could kiss every single person who taught you, every mentor you had who turned you into a badass assassin because what happened today turns out differently if they hadn’t.”

“I am everything that report says.” She wasn’t sure what Robert had read, but the truth was bad enough.

“You’re everything and more. And still I love you.” He stepped back. “Should I stay or leave you to yourself tonight?”

The Dom was in the house. It was there in the polite tone of voice he used, the one that let her know she was in charge of making the decision, but that would change if she said yes. If she asked him to stay, he would take control. He would take command of her body, and he wouldn’t stop until they both had what they needed.

She knew she shouldn’t, but he’d said the words she’d wanted to hear forever. I love you.

She moved to the center of the room. Maybe they did need this. She let the robe drop and she was naked in front of him. Ariel took a deep breath and fell to her knees, the carpet softening the blow. She’d taken a lot from him today. She’d taken the chance to get to know anything about his past. In her logical mind she understood that it had been her or Emily. Taking out a dangerous threat was something she’d done a hundred times before, but this threat had been important to Robert. This threat had held the keys to his past, and Ariel had taken it all away from him.

A big hand palmed her head. “I’m so glad you made the right choice.”

“You might not after I tell you what I’m going to do.” She had to be honest with him about everything now.

“You’re going to quit,” he said simply. “You have got it in your head that you fucked up, that you missed something and that’s why Sasha’s dead. I’ve spent all day thinking about this. Why should you have known him better than me?”

“I was his therapist.” She’d been hired to help the men McDonald had tortured. She’d also been expected to identify whether or not one of them could be a threat.

“And Dante was an accomplished liar. He was excellent at his job. Tucker and Jax and Sasha lived with him for years and they never suspected.”

“Well, if they had suspected, McDonald simply erased their minds. You can’t compare the two,” she pointed out.

His eyes narrowed. “I think you should get on your hands and knees. You’re not listening to me.”

“You think you can spank your will into me?”

“I think I can spank you until you finally cry and then maybe we’ll get through this. Tell me you don’t need it. If you don’t, I’ll be more than happy to spend the night holding you and kissing you and loving you.”

But he was right. She needed something more. She leaned forward, getting on her hands and knees. She locked her elbows and braced herself, the muscles of her legs tight and tense. That would make the spanking hurt more, get her more quickly to the place she needed to be.

Robert hunkered down next to her, eyes running over her face. “Ari, you need to let go.”

“I am.” She shook her head. That was wrong. “I mean I will be, once you start spanking me.”

Robert rose and walked to the bed, sitting on the side. “Come here.”

It wasn’t the voice of her Dom, but of her lover, and she shook her head. “Please, I want the spanking.”

She wanted to feel his hand smacking her. It might be the only connection she could handle right now. Her emotions were dangerously close to overload. It was precisely why she’d isolated herself these last few hours. She knew damn well Ezra and Solo were taking on the bulk of the burden of cleaning up her mess, but she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t lose it if she had to look at the faces of the others.

“You’ll get your spanking when I’m ready to give it to you.” The words were hard with command, and she sucked in a breath.

She pushed to her feet and walked over to the bed, keenly aware of being naked. She had no problem with nudity, but this wasn’t merely about her lack of clothing. She felt emotionally naked too. After the day she’d had, she had no more masks to put on. Sorrow and guilt hung on her and they gave her no cover.

“I missed you today.”

She shook her head. “I don’t think I can do this right now.”

He didn’t move, merely sat watching her. “I thought you wanted to talk.”

“We need to.” She couldn’t take her eyes off his, felt caught by them. “We need to talk about what happened today.”

He reached out and his hand ran from her shoulder down to her wrist. He ran it down slowly, as though relearning the texture of her skin. It struck her that though it had been little more than a full twenty-four hours since they’d last made love, it felt like forever. It felt like there was a chasm between them and he was trying to breach it.

When he reached her wrist, he slid his hand around it, manacling her. “I think you want to talk and you want me to listen. I don’t think you want to hear what I have to say.”

“I don’t think you’ve had enough time to process what happened.” It had gone so fast. He couldn’t possibly have thought it all through, have considered the ramifications of what had taken place.

“I’m perfectly fine with what happened between you and the woman who handed me and my whole team over to McDonald for experimentation,” he said evenly.

“This is what I mean.” She started to pull her wrist away, but he held her tight.

“I understand fully what you mean. Let me summarize all of this for you. You think it’s your fault Sasha is dead because you magically should have seen Dante’s betrayal. You are a psychic and you simply ignored that particular superpower of yours. You were reckless and that’s why Dante was able to take Rebecca. And then when the woman my former self foolishly married threatened to murder you, you shot her first. You didn’t let her kill you so maybe we could find her later on and I could reconcile with her because I don’t understand my own feelings. Or you think she might have given me information on the family she claims I have. That’s why you should have allowed her to kill you.”

He didn’t understand. “You’re simplifying things.”

“No, you’re simplifying them.” He tugged on her wrist and drew her between his legs. She could feel the fabric of the black pants he wore against her thighs. He released her wrist and his hands found her hips, sliding down her torso and lighting up her skin. “It’s a complex problem and you’re ignoring the fact that you are human and you can’t know everything. I don’t care if you spent a million hours in therapy with that man, you couldn’t have known his true motivations.”

He was starting to get to her. “I did know something was wrong with Dante. I still told Big Tag and Damon to go through with this mission.”

“Because it seemed like an excellent way to figure out who was betraying us,” he pointed out. “I agree. It went to hell. That’s what happens sometimes. We’re dealing with it the best way we can. This was not your fault.”

She went still, not quite able to reply in any way she knew would satisfy him.

Robert sighed and wrapped his arms around her, dragging her close to him. His cheek rubbed against her chest as though he found deep satisfaction from being close to her. “Like I said before, I’ve missed you. I’m going to spank you now.”

As miserable as she felt, those words sent a thrill through her, and her nipples hardened.

“This isn’t punishment.” Robert released her and looked at her with the calm, controlled intensity that let her know he was totally in Dom mode. “What I’m going to do is about giving us both what we need. You need release, and I need to take care of you. I need my hands on you.”

She had to make a decision. She could stay here mired in her misery or she could accept what he was offering. It might not change the outcome of the day, but it would help her find some peace. “Yes, Sir.”

He made a sexy noise low in his throat and slid his hands up her torso until his thumbs nudged the underside of her breasts. “I’m going to take you over my knee for this spanking. And it’s not going to be playful. This is going to hurt because you need a bite of pain.”

“Yes, Sir.” This time the words were a sigh of relief. She was aroused—she always would be around Robert—but she was also relieved. As long as he was in control, she might be able to let go of her guilt for a few moments. She could stop going over and over what happened. She could simply let go and be with him.

Robert shifted back a few inches on the mattress. He was so tall that even seated on the mattress he had both feet on the floor.

He patted his knee. “Over my lap for your spanking.”

She laid herself over his thigh, her knees, shoulders and head resting on the bed. She turned her face toward the edge of the mattress, looking out.

“No, turn your head the other way. I want to see your face while I spank you.”

Arousal pulsed through her as she obeyed.

Robert took her arms, pulling them to the small of her back, crossing one wrist over the other and then manacling them there with one of his big hands. His other hand held onto the outside of her thigh as he shifted.

One of his legs was under her hips, the other under her ribs. He raised the leg under her hips, propping his heel against the bedframe. That lifted her ass, making it a nice target for him to spank.

Ariel squirmed in anticipation. She wanted him to get on with it. But the devious man wasn’t done tormenting her. Her sight was limited with her cheek pressed to the mattress, but she could see him in her peripheral vision. The arm holding her wrists at the small of her back was thick with muscle, and the hard line of his jaw was dark with sexy scruff.

His other hand smoothed over her upraised ass, and she saw the corner of his mouth quirk up in a smile. “You’re beautiful. I know I keep telling you that, but I need you to understand I think you’re beautiful inside and out. The reports that fucker Green sent didn’t change my opinion of you, and now that I’ve had time to think about it, I understand why the bosses wanted you to keep your past from me.”

“You do?”

“Yes,” he said gravely. “They did it because your past doesn’t matter. You were beautiful then and you’re beautiful now. You were mine then. You just didn’t know it yet.”

The first smack caught her by surprise. His hand struck the center of her ass, fingers smacking one cheek, palm landing on the other. A startled yelp escaped her, and a moment later she felt the heat spreading through her.

“Do you want me to count?” Ariel asked.

He caressed her ass. “No, because I’m going to spank you for as long as I want. I’m going to spank you until you can let go. I’ll do it until you understand you weren’t responsible for what happened today.”

His palm smacked against her ass for a second time, followed quickly by a third. She had no leverage, no way to control the spanking. All she could do was lie over Robert’s lap and accept what he was giving her.

Smack, smack.

The blows were harder now, making her flesh quiver, and heat was spreading through her. He kept going, steady and relentless, yet never striking the same spot twice in a row. His hand spanked her from the top of her thighs to the top of her ass.

Her chest worked, dragging oxygen into her lungs. The pain was now omnipresent, fading to a dull ache between blows but never entirely disappearing.

He smacked her left cheek, right on the sensitive sit spot. It was a harsh blow, and he held his hand there, trapping the heat against her skin. Ariel cried out as pain burned through her. The cold guilt that had gripped her all day was burned away by the heat.

She’d distanced. She’d put things in intellectual terms and come to a conclusion without ever considering the human emotions that had gone into every decision that had been made.

She’d pushed Robert away because she’d been afraid.

She hadn’t been willing to listen to his feelings because she’d feared loving him would mean losing him.

She’d wanted to believe none of the men she’d spent so much time with could possibly betray them. She’d wanted each of those men to find happiness, and that wasn’t going to happen.

It wasn’t her fault. That was what each smack of his hand stated plainly.

Another hard spank, another wave of heat sweeping through her. Ariel cried out, her feet beating against the bed. Robert held her down, his mastery of her body complete. She couldn’t get away—not that she wanted to—but she couldn’t. She had no choice but to feel. To accept.

And to let go of all the things she couldn’t have changed.

The first sob escaped when he once more smacked her burning ass. He paused, and she knew he was looking at her.

Ariel drew in a shuttering breath. “Please.”

Please don’t stop. Please don’t leave me. She needed him so much.

Robert raised his hand and spanked her again. Ariel thrashed in his hold, her feet drumming the bed as he spanked her with rapid hard smacks that peppered her cheeks.

The damn inside her broke and the sobs took over. She barely noticed when the spanking stopped and his hand was skimming over her sensitive flesh. He’d spanked her long and hard, and that meant that while the stinging pain had faded, the deep, aching heat remained.

Ariel knew she wasn’t crying prettily. The sobs came from her soul.

She couldn’t have stopped Dante. She wasn’t a superhero. The problems of the world didn’t fall on her shoulders. She wasn’t responsible for what Robert’s wife had done. He wouldn’t have wanted her to change a thing about how she’d handled that moment in the yard. Robert wanted her alive more than he wanted to know about his past.

She’d tried her hardest, and with every good intention, and she’d still failed. It was the way of the world sometimes, but she only lost if she didn’t get back up and try again.

She wanted so much to try again with this man.

She cried until there were no more tears, only dry, gasping breaths.

The world spun as Robert lifted her, turning to lay her on her side in the center of the bed. He lay on his side facing her. Ariel blinked tears from her eyes and looked at him. Her ass ached, her blood strumming through her system.

“Do you forgive me?” She needed to hear it though she knew what he was going to say.

He brushed back her hair, a look of infinite tenderness lighting his eyes. “There’s nothing to forgive. Not when it comes to your past. Now we should talk about the fact that you pushed me away the first time our going got tough.”

“We found out you were married.” She felt the need to argue her point. “It wasn’t some minor argument.”

“No, there was no argument at all. There was you shutting me out. There was you making decisions for me.” He put a finger on her lips when she was about to reply. “No. You did those things. You decided I needed time. I knew what I wanted all along. I could have gotten every single memory back and they wouldn’t erase the ones I’ve made with you. I told you nothing would change, and it hasn’t. I love you. I will always love you. I want you to remember that.”

He seemed almost grave as he rolled her onto her back, spreading her legs. Ariel hissed as her backside came into contact with the bed. She was so focused on the quick shock of pain—a sensation that made her pussy pulse and her nipples tight—that she didn’t notice him buckling the cuff around her right wrist until the deed was done. Warmth encased her wrist and she realized these cuffs were padded with some supersoft material.

When had he pulled out cuffs? He must have done it while she was on her hands and knees waiting for him.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

Robert arched a brow. “You want to try that again?” That was his Dom voice.

“No, Sir.”

He brought her left arm up and out, sliding the cuff around her wrist and buckling it in place. She heard a little click and glanced up. There was a small lock on the cuffs.

“You don’t think the lock is a bit of overkill?” The cuffs would strap her in. She wouldn’t be able to get out.

He tied red nylon rope to the D-ring on the left cuff, then fed it around the back of the headboard and tied it to the other cuff, which also had a small padlock on it. Robert stepped back after pressing the lock in place, staring down at her.

“I like the way the locks look. Spread your legs,” he commanded.

Ariel felt lighter after her emotional release, but the heat was still present. She tipped her head back on the pillow, exposing the line of her throat, and arched her chest, offering her breasts to him.

“You’re so fucking beautiful,” he whispered.

He made her feel beautiful. And worthy.

Robert pulled his T-shirt off, tossing it to the side, baring that glorious chest. He put one knee on the bed, grabbed her right ankle and lifted it. He kissed her instep, her ankle, then propped her heel on his shoulder.

She moved her toes across to his sternum then slid her foot down the midline of his body, watching his muscles twitch and relax as she caressed him. She didn’t stop when she hit his belt but kept going, thrilled at the noise he made when her toes found his cock.

He was hard, hot even through the barrier of his slacks.

“I’m going to make you understand that there’s nothing you can do that will make me stop loving you. There’s nothing the world can do that will stop me,” Robert said. “If you quit and move away from The Garden, you better be prepared for me to follow you.”

He grabbed her ankle, lifted it away from his crotch. He nipped at her toes, then lay her leg on the bed before quickly shucking the rest of his clothes. She bent her knees, heels on the bed, and spread her legs, creating a place for him.

Robert didn’t hesitate. He climbed onto the bed, between her legs. She was so ready, so in need of his big hard body covering hers.

“Please,” she said. It was only a single word, but he knew what she needed.

Or maybe he needed the same thing. Needed to feel connected to her. Needed to remember what it felt like when they became one.

He eased on top of her, his chest pressing against her breasts, his hips in the cradle of her thighs. His cock settled against her pussy, and when he flexed his hips the hard, veined underside slid along the valley of her labia, caressing her clit.

She wrapped her fingers around the ropes and arched up, trying to wiggle into place so she could allow his cock to sink inside her. Robert bent his head and nipped her right where her shoulder met her neck, a small punishment for trying to take control.

Then his tongue swept up her neck to her ear. He sucked her earlobe as he lifted his hips, his cock sliding into place. Ariel strained against her bonds, hugging his hips with her knees.

Robert was so deep inside her that for a moment she forgot everything but him. For a moment there was only Robert.

“Ari.” He breathed her name, the word hot against her neck.

He started to thrust, and she could do nothing but feel—feel his cock inside her, his chest rubbing her nipples. His breath on her face and neck, and the heat from where he’d spanked her.

“I want you to come for me. Together. I want it to be together,” he whispered.

He adjusted the angle of his hips, so that each time he thrust in his lower abdomen rubbed against the top of her pussy. Close. She was so close to where she needed to be.

The next time he thrust his pelvis bumped her clit. She wrapped her legs around his hips, heels digging into the flexed muscles of his ass. “Do that again.”

“That sounded like an order.”

“It was. Do that again.”

He chuckled and thrust in. Ariel’s whole body tensed.

“I’m close. Robert, I—”

“I love you,” Robert said. “I love you, Ariel.”

That was all she needed. The orgasm overtook her, pulling her up and over a soft, rolling wave. She clung to him with her legs as Robert thrust once, again, and then she felt him shudder as he found his own release.

Ariel sighed in pleasure as his weight bore her into the mattress. She wanted to wrap her arms around him, but she was stuck in his cuffs. She kissed his temple, where his silky hair was damp with sweat. A moment later he rolled off of her but didn’t go far. He lay beside her, his head pillowed on her breast, one big thigh across hers. The other hand came up, casually yet possessively cupping her other breast.

She closed her eyes. The moment couldn’t last. Soon enough reality would crash down around them, but they had this moment, and she would accept the peace he’d given her, accept it for the gift it was.

“So can we agree to put the idea of you quitting everything you know and love on hold?” Robert asked. He stretched like the big gorgeous predator he was. “I seem to remember this very smart lady telling me I shouldn’t make big life decisions when I was emotional.”

“And yet you tried to.”

He shook his head. “Nope. Being with you was a decision I made a long time ago. I was sticking to my decision. I recall offering to go anywhere with you. Deep down I knew something was wrong with Emily. She’s the reason I have those dreams. I think I’m remembering the night she had McDonald’s men come pick me up.”

Now she really wanted her arms around him. “Let me out of the cuffs. We should talk about this.” And make love again. They could do that all night. She would make love to him over and over until he could sleep. “I know how hard tomorrow is going to be for you.”

Because it would be difficult to leave the problem in Big Tag’s hands. It would be hard for him to leave Owen behind.

He wouldn’t leave Owen behind. God. How could she have thought for a second he would leave Owen behind?

She pulled at the cuffs. There had been no real reason to put her in them. And he’d put padlocks on them so she couldn’t use her teeth to work the straps and potentially get out. Those little locks would ensure no matter how flexible she was, she couldn’t get out.

“You have no idea. Tomorrow isn’t the problem. Tonight is going to be hell on me.” He kissed her cheek and rolled off the bed, walking toward the bathroom.

“Robert!” She shouted his name. Kim and Ezra were gone, dealing with the Emily situation. “Let me out.”

He couldn’t be doing what she thought he was doing. He couldn’t have made love to her and then restrained her so she couldn’t stop him from doing something phenomenally stupid like going after Dante and Levi on his own.

Except he wouldn’t be on his own. He would have Tucker and Owen.

They could all die together.

“But you look so pretty the way you are.” Robert’s voice floated out from the bathroom.

She managed to move enough that she could see he’d gathered up his clothes. He wasn’t washing up and getting ready for round two. He was getting ready to leave. “Please don’t do this. Please. Wait for Ezra to get back. We can talk about this.”

She was starting to panic.

“There’s nothing to talk about.” He stood in the doorway of the bathroom, and now she saw what she should have seen before. He was dressed in black from head to toe. He had on a T-shirt and tactical pants, his boots on his feet. This was the way he dressed when he thought things could go wrong.

“You can’t go after him by yourself.” She pulled at those stupid cuffs but the headboard held firm.

He crossed the space between them and covered her with a blanket. His eyes were gentle as he stared down at her. “You know Owen would do it if we were talking about you. He would never let me go in alone. He would move heaven and earth to help me get you back.”

“I promise you we won’t leave Rebecca behind.” He couldn’t walk out of here.

He leaned over and kissed her forehead. “I hope you can forgive me. We have to do this tonight. We don’t have another choice.”

“Yes, you do. You can wait. Levi won’t kill Rebecca.” She kicked at the blanket, trying to move herself up.

Robert merely readjusted the blanket. He slid his hands between the cuffs and her wrists as though checking to make sure he didn’t have them too tight. “I can’t wait. We have to deal with this tonight. Are you thirsty? I can try to get a straw and some water, but I don’t want you to knock it over and be cold. Is the temperature okay?”

“No. It’s not. And yes, I’m thirsty and hungry and I need to use the bathroom.” If she could get out of the cuffs, she might have a chance to put him on his ass and stop this whole thing from happening.

“I love you.” He kissed her again. “I’ll be back if I can. If I don’t come back, know I don’t regret a thing. Not even what happened to me with McDonald. I wouldn’t change it because it made me the kind of man you might be able to love.”

“Rob, don’t do this.”

“Could you say it? Just once?”

She shook her head. “No. No. If you want to hear me say it, you get these cuffs off me.”

She wasn’t going to give him permission to walk into a trap. Tears had started to roll down her cheeks.

“Then I’ll have to love enough for both of us. I’m leaving the keys to your cuffs on the kitchen table. Good-bye, baby. I hope I see you soon. I love you. Never forget.”

He stood and walked out the door.

And she was left alone.