Scarlett. Or Hannah. Or Katya. Her. She’d been The Organization’s slave, too. Just like him. Like all of them.
Without batting an eye at the smashed glass, Numair tossed back another shot as if he needed it. Then he continued. “She was one of hundreds of girls who’d been imprisoned in an all-female installation equivalent to our Black Castle. And like us, the girls were categorized according to their abilities and talents, but also according to their looks. All girls were trained as we were, but the beautiful ones had extra training in seduction and manipulation. They were used as sexual bait for the world’s movers and shakers, or anyone The Organization wanted breached, entrapped or untraceably terminated. According to my source, she was the best. But her trail ended five years ago, when she clearly faked her death.”
Raiden struggled not to howl in agony. The details Numair had just related so clinically painted a gruesome picture of the life of the girl in the photo. A girl who knew she was lost and no one would ever come to her rescue. Who knew she’d be a hostage forever, living a life of danger and degradation, an instrument in the service of whoever paid her masters for her skills, to be used and abused as they willed. A woman who knew that escape was impossible, and the only way out was death.
He’d started this quest for the truth, hoping to find out she’d been forced to betray him. Now he wished she hadn’t been. Being right meant she’d suffered unimaginably, must be scarred for life. Now he would have given anything for her to be just a woman who’d entered the wrong path, then decided to change, to make good.
But she wasn’t. She’d been enslaved. And he couldn’t bear thinking she’d suffered what he had. And far, far worse.
“I now believe you were right,” Numair said. “She won’t expose you or any of us. Not when it means ultimately exposing herself, too. We’re all in the same boat, so to speak.”
He wanted to roar to Numair that he was still wrong, that this wasn’t why his and their secrets were safe with Scarlett. But his vocal cords felt fused over molten agony.
“Bottom line is, you can go ahead and indulge your desire for her. As long as you don’t jeopardize your relevant plans.” Numair stopped, as if debating whether to tell him more or not. Then he exhaled. “There something else you need to know.”
In minutes, Numair stopped talking, and suddenly Raiden could no longer bear hearing another word.
He heaved up to his feet before the roaring inside him escaped his lips.
At the suite’s door, Numair’s warning hit him between the shoulder blades.
“Don’t tell her anything.”
* * *
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Scarlett had known something was wrong the moment she’d entered the penthouse to find Raiden facing the door as if he’d been waiting for her for hours. His hands and face were clenched as he asked that question.
In a heartbeat, she knew what this blazing darkness cloaking him was all about.
He knew the truth. Her truth.
She didn’t have to ask how, didn’t need to. He just did.
She felt exposed, her every sordid secret on display before the one person with whom she’d wanted to retain a measure of mystery and allure. She knew there was no point in prevaricating.
So she shrugged. “What was the point?”
“What...?” He seemed so stunned by her answer he found nothing to say. Then he blurted out, “You don’t consider being the victim of the same organization that’d kidnapped and enslaved me relevant?”
“Not really.” She sat down before she collapsed. “Not now that we both got out.”
Urgent strides brought him standing above her, and then he descended on the couch beside her, taking both her hands in his. “I need you to tell me everything. I know only who you were, how you ended up in The Organization’s hands, how they trained and used you, like they did me. Now I need to know the specifics of your mission targeting me.”
She’d always wished she could erase those specifics from her memory and psyche as she’d erased her former identity. Or thought she had. She hadn’t. Raiden had found everything out.
But to avoid telling him the full truth would only prolong the torture. She should get it over with. What they had would soon be over. His wedding was in sixteen days.
She left her hands in his, not because his touch and urgency didn’t burn her, but because she couldn’t pull away.
Barely holding herself together, she started to explain.
“Medvedev worked on occasion on our side of the operation. He was my handler’s lover. She was the one who recommended me to him when he described the skillset he required to set you up. I realized later this was his personal vengeance on you, and if he was right, he wanted it to be his triumph, and his secret shame if he was wrong. He told my handler no specifics. Though he must have told her something lucrative enough to get her to make The Organization believe I was on a mission for them. She gave me all the time I needed to take care of you. Medvedev told her not to worry about watching me, since he’d do it, and he would deliver me back to her at the completion of my task.”
She paused to adjust her breathing, which had started to hitch under his laserlike eyes.
“It was a very difficult task, he told me, since your records were somehow expunged from The Organization’s system. There were no photos, no fingerprints, no voice recognition, no retinal scans and no DNA to match. Even your implanted tracking devices were deactivated. I assume that was your doing.” Raiden nodded, then gestured his impatience. She continued, almost choking on every word. “His only evidence was that you resembled his escapee, and he had a feeling about you. But he couldn’t build a case on mere resemblance and his feelings. He needed evidence. Evidence I had to provide.”