Authors: Sara Arden
B
YRON
DREAMED
OF
Austin
Foxworth again. For the first time, he wasn't on fire. They weren't in the middle of the jungle, and there was no cacophony of screaming playing like some sick movie score in the background.
“You're not supposed to be here,” Foxworth said.
“Me? You're the one who's dead. I'm here to save the princess.”
“You already saved the princess. Now save yourself.”
Byron shook his head. Every nerve ending in his body hurt, even places he was sure didn't have nerve endings. Like his eyelashes. He opened his eyes slowly.
There wasn't a single part of his body that didn't hurt.
His chest felt as though there were a hundred-pound brick on it, and there was a bunch of crap in the room making an ungodly racket. Apparently, he was hooked up to all of it. The more the dark sleep world faded, the louder it got.
A memory of what had happened flooded back. He probably would've died if she hadn't forced him into the backseat.
It would have been a good death, one he would've been content to have. Only there wouldn't have been anyone to keep her safe. He struggled to turn his head and take in his surroundings. He was in the army hospital; at least she'd followed his instructions and fled to the base.
It was his fault they'd been in that situation anyway. If he'd been thinking, he wouldn't have taken her there. He wondered how the shooter knew where to find them. He'd been careful watching for a tail.
Damara was curled up in a chair in the corner, her feet tucked under her. Her face was drawn and pale, dark circles under her eyes.
I love you.
Christ, having that in his head was almost worse. He knew he didn't deserve it. He didn't know what to do with it anyway. It was like a bubble she'd handed him and expected him not to break.
Her eyes fluttered open, and he saw all his failures reflected back at him in her pain.
She flung herself on the bed and buried her face in his shoulder. “You're alive.”
“Unless you kill me,” he mumbled. He wasn't ready to face what her words meant.
“I could kill you. If you'd died, I couldn't live with myself.”
He managed to raise his arm and stroke her back. “That's a bit of a contradiction there, don't you think, Princess?”
“You promised me in Barcelona it would all be okay. I told you in the car and I'm going to tell you again, this is not okay. This is the farthest from okay that it could ever be.”
“I told you I'm not so good at keeping my promises.”
“I swear, I'm going to punch you in your bullet holes.”
He laughed, and it hurt like a bastard.
“I couldn't stand it if you died for me. Because of me.”
This was leading down that road he didn't want to follow. “If I'm okay with it, you should be. You're not the one who has to do the dying.”
She shuddered against him, and he realized that she was crying. “Hey, don't cry.” God, his mouth was dry. His lips felt stiff, as if they were ready to crack. “I didn't die. I'mâ” he took stock of himself “âmostly fine.”
The wounds in his chest smarted, it hurt to laugh, it hurt to breathe and it hurt to have Damara half on top of him. Even with holes in his body, she still made him harder than steel.
“I'm going home, Byron.”
“What? I don't think I heard you correctly.” She couldn't go home, not yet. Not until he'd killed Abele.
“I'm going home.”
“Because of me?”
Dear God, don't let her say it's because of me.
“Because of me.” She splayed her small palm on his cheek. “Because I can't do this. I can't let anyone else get hurt because of me.”
“What about all the people who will be hurt when you go home and there's no one to show the world what your brother is doing? What then?” The monitors started beeping furiously, an audible censure against raising his blood pressure.
“I'll have to find another way. Look at the grouping of the shots. He wasn't even trying to shoot me, Byron. It was you.”
“Yeah, well, he's a piss-poor shot. I'm not dead.”
“Iâ No.” She shook her head. “No.”
“What did you think would happen, Damara?” he said quietly. “This is what men like us do.”
“You're nothing like Grisha, Vladimir and certainly not my brother.”
“I'm just the other side of the coin, Princess.”
“You don't know your own worth.”
He inhaled and exhaled slowly. “That's you. Do you really think that Renner is going to let you leave just because you want to? Because things got a little dicey and you can't hack it?”
“Yes. He doesn't own me.”
“Now you're being naive. All the resources and man-hours he invested in you and this operation? No, Princess. It doesn't work that way. You set a chain of events in motion and for good or ill, you have to see them through.”
“You're telling me I can't go home?” Her voice was almost childlike.
“I'm saying you can't go home without me.” A calmness had settled over him. She'd said she loved him. It had taken root inside of her, and he had to prune it to the quick.
She sat up and leaned away from him. “And you won't take me unless you're going to kill my brother.”
“However you measure it, Princess, someone's thread is getting cut. That's just how this has to end. I made you a promise on the condition that he didn't try to hurt you. So, I'll take you home, but I'm going to kill him. Then you'll be safe.”
“I'll never forgive you,” she whispered.
“I know.” He did know it. Byron was under no illusion that he'd take her back to Castallegna and, once her people were free, she'd forgive him because she realized it had to be done. Damara wasn't an end-justifies-the-means kind of person. Lucky for her, Byron was.
“And you don't care, do you?” Her voice dripped with the acid of the sudden knowledge that she wasn't going to change his mind.
He cared, but he couldn't tell her that. Not now, not like this. “No, I don't. Your safety is paramount here. After he's dead, you will be safe.”
“What about the
Bratva?
” She was trying to appeal to his logic, to get him to find another course of action.
“They'll see their destiny lies elsewhere. They don't want the world's attention on their operations. Frankly, I'm surprised Vladimir hasn't met with an unfortunate accident. It was on his watch that all of this made international news. He can't keep his house in line. I don't have to kill him. His own people will do that.”
“Please don't do this.” Her eyes sparkled with tears.
“I think you should go.”
She shook her head. “I didn't leave you at the park, and I'm not leaving you here.”
“You're not going to change my mind.” He thought that she understood that.
She nodded slowly. “Yes, I will. Because you're a good man, with a good heart. But I don't have to talk about it anymore right now.”
I love you.
In all truth, she might have saved her brother's life yet again if she hadn't told Byron that she loved him. It was a two-birds-with-one-stone scenario. It would be the worst thing he could do and the best. She'd be safe, and she wouldn't be in love with him anymore.
The thought of it tightened around his heart like a noose. He couldn't let himself think about what that meant. Byron knew he was doing the right thing because it felt awful and wonderful at the same time.
The door creaked open and Damara whipped out a 9 mm and pointed it at the door.
“It's just me.” Renner held up his hands. “Don't shoot.”
“I'm not taking any chances.”
“Where'd you get that thing, anyway?” Renner closed the door behind him.
“I'm not telling. But it's mine.” She practically dared Renner to take it away from her. Byron's money was on the princess for that round.
He laughed. “Fair enough.”
“Don't laugh. It's not funny. He could have died,” Damara growled, fierce.
“Yes, he could have. So could you. As soon as Byron can stand, we need to have the ceremony.”
“I'm not doing this,” Damara said.
“Pardon me, what?” Renner was like a king cobra who'd just turned all his attention on a baby rabbit.
But Damara wasn't intimidated. “I said I'm not doing this. I won't risk him.”
Renner's eyes narrowed, and Byron could see the ruthlessness that he'd had to cultivate to be successful at his position.
“She'll do it,” Byron interrupted. “We were in the middle of discussing how this is going to go down when you came in.”
“I was in the middle of telling you it wasn't.”
“And we were discussing how you wanted to go home. I'll take you home for our honeymoon,” Byron said.
“Please don't make me do this.”
“This is what you signed up for. I thought you assured me that you'd do whatever it took to save Castallegna?” Renner's voice was gentle, but the meaning of his words was sharp.
Byron struggled to sit up. “Dan. I've got this, okay?”
“No, your princess and I need to be very clear with each other.”
Byron leaned over so that he was between Renner and Damara. “No, you and I need to be very clear with each other. I said it's handled. My job is to protect the princess, and I'll do it, even from you.”
“What about yourself?” Renner asked him. “Did you tell her the details about Uganda yet?”
“That's just cruel,” Damara answered for him. “He doesn't have to tell me. I don't care.”
“You should. I think you two have forgotten what this is. It's not real. Get your heads in the game or this whole thing is going to fall apart.” Renner slammed the door on his way out.
“Damara, did you not hear anything I had to say about this? This isn't Castallegna, and Renner might as well be a king with all the power he has at his disposal. He usually uses his powers for good, but he is not the kind of man you want to cross.”
“Did you mean what you said? That you'd protect me from him?”
He closed his eyes for a minute. He was afraid of what she was going to ask him. “Of course I will,” Byron said on a heavy exhale.
“Then don't ask me to risk you. If you're gone, then what will I have? Who will keep me safe?”
“You'll keep yourself safe because you're strong, confident and capable. You don't need me, Damara.”
“Maybe I don't need you, but I want you.”
“I haven't changed my mind about killing your brother.”
“You will.”
He knew he had to tell her about Uganda. She had to know. Renner had used it against him like a weapon. If he thought that would keep Byron from doing this one good thing, he was sadly mistaken.
“If you still want to hear it, I'll tell you about Uganda.” His voice was harsher, lower than he meant. He tried to speak clearly, to own his crimes, but his vocal cords didn't want to obey him. Neither did his memory.
Byron shied away from remembrance like he would a hungry lion. He didn't want to think about it. He couldn't, but he had to. Just like he was asking Damara to face some ugly truths, he had to face his own.
She leaned over and carefully placed the gun in the drawer of the nightstand and turned her attention back to Byron. Gone was the fierce warrior angel and in her place was the soft, kind woman who'd held him to her breast when he'd been coming apart at the seams.
Damara nodded slowly. “Tell me.”
“It was summer,” he began, remembering the smells, the heat, the constant sting of bugs on the back of his neck, his arms. “We, my team and I, we were on a mission to roust some guerillas that had been attacking villages. We found them. Or they found us, rather. They attacked the camp and fled, leading us deep into the jungle. I gave the order to pursue.”
He inhaled a shaky breath, feeling as if someone had dropped a piano on his chest. It was more than just the gunshot wounds. It was the weight of his crime, the wages of his sin. His throat constricted. “And it was a trap. An ambush I should have seen coming a mile away, but I didn't because I was so keen on completing the mission. We'd been in the area for weeks, getting nowhere. I thought if we could just...”
“It's not your fault. Your men chose to follow you.”
“They trusted me, and I broke that trust. You know how you don't want anyone to get hurt because of you? My whole team died. Slaughtered. Tortured. By the time I saw what was happening and called a retreat, it was too late. I'm the only one who survived.”
“What were you supposed to do? Follow them to die?”
“If I had any honor, it's what I would have done.”
“And then who would have told Belinda Foxworth that her husband wasn't coming home?”
He cut a sharp glance at her. “Like that's a good thing?” Byron tried to keep a snarl out of his voice.
“It is when that's all there is. Now she knows to bury him. She's not waiting, in vain, sitting by a window watching the road and feeling her heart leap up in her chest every time she sees a strange car or the telephone rings. Each time, it would choke her with hope and despair. Those things can't coexist. Eventually one or the other wins, and either way there's no healing. No grief. So now she can honor the man he was, she can love him, she can miss him, but she can live, too. There's no shame in surviving.”
“It was cowardly.”
“Death isn't always an honor. Sometimes, most of the time, it's the easy way out.”
Byron had held on to his pain, his guilt, it had been like a life raft buoying him up in a black, oily sea. Without it, he was drowning.
“I dream about them. I hear them screaming in my head on an endless loop.”