Never Gonna Happen - Cynthia Eden Page 0,25
I should have left with Winston—”
“I’ve been working for the government since I was barely eighteen years old. It was either work for them or get my ass tossed in a cell. I’m not a big fan of prison jumpsuits and being locked behind bars, so I played ball with them. Put my shady talents to good use, so to speak.”
Her heart raced in her chest.
“I was a hacker as a kid. It was the only way I could…” His gaze jerked away as Sebastian seemed to try and collect his thoughts. “I could do anything with a computer. Much like your brother.” Now his stare slowly swept back to her. “I recruited him. I’m sorry about that. Didn’t even know what it would do to us both…”
She shook her head.
His fingers slid along her inner wrist. “It’s true, all right? The government recruits all the time from college campuses. Young, smart, eager…shit, it’s like a perfect checklist for them. I knew what they were looking for—and I found the ideal recruit in Antony. I brought him in. He and I worked cases together. When we studied abroad our junior year, hell, that was just a cover, it was—”
“Stop.”
He stopped talking. His fingers didn’t stop caressing her wrist. Soft. Careful.
Her breath hitched. “You own a gaming business with my brother. You have Shark Gaming and Design. You…you’re gonna take a bite—”
“Out of the industry,” he finished their motto softly. “The business is real. Everything we’ve created there is real. All our designs are legit. But Shark is also a cover. It allows us to travel around the world anytime we want under the ruse of marketing or development, when the truth is that we’re sometimes going in for some up-close and personal intel collection for Uncle Sam.”
She couldn’t believe this. Expected it to be a joke. “The government has people.” That was a thing, right? A whole cyber tech team someplace? “Why would they need you two? Why—”
“We are the people they have. Part of their team. And they need us because sometimes, you can’t do the job remotely. Sometimes, you need boots on the ground, you need a body in the fucking room, and you need someone on site with the knowledge to get the job done in twenty seconds flat.”
Her heartbeat echoed in her ears.
“That someone is me.” A roll of his shoulder. “And sometimes, it’s your brother.”
He was still holding her hand. Her skin felt warm where he touched her. Every other part of her body? Ice cold. “Tell me that you’re lying.”
His gaze glittered.
“Tell me that you’re messing with me. Tell me that this is some horrible prank and you don’t mean—”
“I mean every word that I’ve said.” Sebastian swallowed. “You weren’t supposed to know. Not ever. And you can’t tell anyone else, Alyssa. Not even your parents. Swear to me that you won’t tell.”
Her lips parted, but she didn’t promise. Instead, she shook her head. “If Antony’s cover is blown, I don’t have to tell anyone. People already know!” People who’d come after her?
“I don’t know how big this situation is yet. I called Antony’s handler—our handler—and he’s working on things.”
Her brother had a handler?
“If we can eliminate the threat, then Antony may be able to continue the work he’s—”
“I need a drink.”
Sebastian blinked.
She pulled her hand from his. Stepped back from the island as she put some much needed space between them. “You’re a spy.”
“Yes.”
“My brother is a spy.”
“Yes.”
“I’m just supposed to take your word for it?”
His head cocked. “Yes?” This time, he made the answer seem like a question.
Alyssa crossed her arms over her chest. “You’re a playboy.”
“That’s hurtful.”
“You are in the news constantly.”
“I do tend to get my share of headlines,” Sebastian modestly confessed.
“That’s not low key.”
“Hardly.” His right hand flattened on the granite top.
“Spies are low key. They don’t try to get their faces flashed everywhere—”
“They do if that’s their cover. If you’re pretending that all you are is some bastard with too much money who likes to party and play hard. If that’s what you want the world to see so that your enemies will never know the real man, then that’s exactly what a good spy would do.”
The real man. Oh, God. If he was serious…if everything he was telling her was the truth, if her brother was a spy…
I don’t know Antony at all.
And…
I don’t know Sebastian at all.
“Don’t,” he rasped.
Her breath caught as she stared into his suddenly glittering—and angry—gaze.
“Don’t look at me like I’m a stranger.”
But…