He blocked the blow with one arm, hard enough to make her leg go numb, never letting go of her other foot, not even loosening his hold, as if her attack had been so inconsequential he almost hadn’t noticed it.
“It was Sean, wasn’t it?”
“Go to hell.”
“You don’t understand,” Jack repeated. “Whitney didn’t do this.”
Mari pressed her lips tightly together, studying their faces. Ken hadn’t moved a muscle, his hand still around her toes. She could feel the warmth of his palm, was all too aware of him as a man—not a captor—not an enemy.
“Fill me in.”
“The old man managed to leave his legacy with one of us,” Ken said, his tone matter-of-fact.
But he was shaken. He covered it well, so well she doubted Jack could see past his mask—that false emotionless mask Ken showed to the world. But when he touched her, when they were skin to skin, she saw more, felt more, knew more than he ever intended—and he was definitely shaken.
“I was the lucky one our father handed down his legacy to, and Whitney knew all along. I thought I had buried it deep where no one would ever know, but he’s psychic and he read me like an open book, and all this time he’s been waiting his chance.”
Jack cleared his throat. “You think he wants to see your reaction to her when he’s paired her with other men?”
“He thinks I’ll kill them—or her.”
Mari’s stomach did a somersault. There was quiet truth in Ken’s voice. She moistened her suddenly dry lips. “Someone really needs to fill me in here, because, quite frankly, I don’t like the sound of that. Whitney has a way of manipulating people into doing exactly what he wants them to do and I’m not exactly his favorite person.”
“Ken.” Jack ignored her. “He isn’t reading you. He has no idea of your character. You think the old man is lurking around inside of you. Hell, I thought the same thing, but it isn’t true. We were investigated. Whitney has a high security clearance and he read everything in our files.”
“What is everything?” Mari asked, trying desperately to ignore the way Ken’s individual fingertips were bringing points of fire to her ankle.
“Jack, it has nothing to do with that. He probably did read the files, but he knows. He set this up because he wants to see how I’ll react and how Mari will react, and now that you have Briony to protect, he wants to see how you’ll react.” Ken’s fingers dug into Mari’s ankle, and he suddenly turned his glacier-cold gaze on her. “My father was an insanely jealous man. He brutally murdered our mother and tried to kill both of us. Whitney knows it and he set this up. You. Me. Jack. Briony. It’s all one big game to him.”
“Well he’s playing a deadly game then,” Jack said. “Because no one controls us, Ken. We do what we’ve always done; we make our own rules and we stick together.”
“What about her?” Ken’s reply was so low Mari barely caught the words.
Jack sighed. “You know it’s impossible to leave her behind, so we’re going to have to work through it. It wasn’t that easy for me with Briony, but we managed.”
“I’m not you, Jack. I’m telling you, I’m like he was.”
“No, you’re not.” Mari was firm, startling both men into noticing her. “If Whitney saw that information in a file somewhere, yes, he’d use it against you. He’s very good at twisting people into knots, exploring their weaknesses, but if he has psychic abilities and he touched you, he didn’t read that in you.”
“How do you know that?” Ken’s fingers continued that gentle brushing along her toes, his grip as strong as ever, but the touch had lost its warning and had become an involuntary caress.
“Because I touched you.”
Ken blinked. It was his only movement. There was no change of expression on his face, but she knew he’d reacted.
Jack edged closer. “You have that kind of ability? To read people when you touch them?”
“She doesn’t,” Ken denied. “She’s lying to try to ease my mind.”
“You wish. I don’t even like you. Why would I want to ease your mind? The worse you feel, the happier I am.” His eyes had gone to cold steel, but she held his gaze and shrugged with feigned casualness. “I couldn’t care less whether you believe me or not.”
“Do you?” Jack asked.
Mari studied their faces. There were definite chinks in their armor, whether they wanted to admit it or not. “Not strong, but strong enough to know Ken isn’t a flat-out murderer, especially not of women. He would carry out an order, but he wouldn’t just go around killing someone for no real reason.”
“Good to know.” Ken let go of her foot and took away the warmth. “If you’re so good at all of this, why don’t you tell me who this man is and we can let it go?”
She frowned. “You know it was Sean.”