as they twined together and Tehya watched the tears begin to fall again.
Tears she couldn’t seem to shed. A raging pain she couldn’t free.
And the fear that nothing would ever make sense again.
* * *
Jordan left the warehouse behind the federal operatives who were pulling a screeching Stephen Taite from the melee that had erupted inside.
He’d had men outside the warehouse before Jordan had called for the advance. Nearly a dozen hard-core mercenary soldiers had been taken down within minutes by Killian Reece and his team.
After the years of manipulating everyone around him in order to see to their safety and their happiness, Jordan had finally been on the receiving end of it.
One of Killian’s operatives had leaked the fact that Tehya wasn’t dead to a known Sorrel associate. An associate suspected of being linked to a shadowy figure rumored to call himself The Marquis, a name French authorities had found in a single file belonging to Sorrel. The single reference had hinted at Sorrel’s fear that the Marquis would find Francine or Tehya before he did.
That someone else, according to the file, was determined to find Francine and Tehya. Just as Joseph Fitzhugh had been determined to keep him from gaining the “key” Francine Taite held.
The information Killian’s team had been working on since the death of Killian’s wife stretched back more than a decade. Killian had refused to let the investigation go, and Jordan hadn’t known about it.
Until the other man had walked into the Senator’s house just minutes after they’d realized Tehya had been taken.
“Jordan, wait up.” Killian turned Stephen Taite over to one of the authorities before moving quickly to his side.
“We don’t have anything to say, Killian,” he snapped. “Get the fuck out of my face.”
Killian’s expression registered surprise, but only for a second. His gaze darkened and then his lips quirked with somber knowledge. “I knew you loved her. I told you that when I came to base last year, didn’t I?”
Jordan jerked back. There was a part of his mind that watched, completely unsurprised as he grabbed Killian by the front of his mission shirt and slammed him against the metal shipping crate.
“You told me she would fucking kill me,” he snarled. “You didn’t trust her, Killian. You didn’t give her a safe haven. You fucking turned your back!”
Killian’s eyes widened for a second before he sighed wearily. “She always had safe harbor,” he finally said softly. “I always knew where she was, and my men were always watching her.” For a second, agony flashed in his eyes. “I lost the woman that owned my soul, Jordan. You’re the only fucking friend I ever had; did you think I would let this world take what means the most to you?”
He’d known Killian for far too many years. He’d known the other man’s demons, he’d known his rage, and when he was telling the truth.
He was telling the truth.
Jordan released him slowly.
“I had to let her think I hated her,” Killian sighed, still facing him. “I had to let you think it. If even once, she’d turned those haunted eyes on me in friendship, I’d have never been able to do what I knew Elite Command was going to have me do.”
“You could have told me,” Jordan raged.
Killian shook his head. “If anyone came to me and told me they were going to use Catherine in that way, I would have killed them before I allowed it. You would have never let it happen.”
No, he wouldn’t have.
Jordan was smart enough to admit that to himself. He would have run with her. He would have hidden with her. He would have never allowed her past to touch her in this way if he had been forewarned.
“I could kill you for not coming to me, Killian,” he rasped as he pushed closer, feeling that need for violence ripping through him. “And I wouldn’t feel any guilt. I wouldn’t feel a moment’s fucking regret. Do you know that?”
“Jordan…” Killian spoke softly, warningly.
“My fucking woman,” he snarled, the fury snapping through his mind. “She was mine and you knew she was mine.”
Killian’s brow arched, some gleam of unholy amusement in them searing the fury only growing inside Jordan now.
“You weren’t claiming her,” Killian reminded him. “You let her go. Maybe, if she was your woman, you should have given a man a clue so he’d know how to proceed.”
“I told you and every other man that came around her to stay the fuck away. I warned, I threatened,