Total pages in book: 158
Estimated words: 149641 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 748(@200wpm)___ 599(@250wpm)___ 499(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 149641 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 748(@200wpm)___ 599(@250wpm)___ 499(@300wpm)
An hour later, Ben wasn’t sure how they’d stayed apart. He felt magnetized around her.
“I don’t remember what happened,” she said, and there was the slightest flush to her cheeks. Like she was embarrassed. Or telling a bit of an untruth. “I woke up in the hospital. I’m still not entirely sure what that man put my body through.”
She was talking about what Manny had done to her mere weeks before. He could still remember seeing her on that fucking medical bed, an IV in her arm and attached to various wires that would give Manny data about her pain. “It was an experimental drug. I think a bit of it survived.” He wasn’t doing this to her. “Maggie, I know some of it survived the fire. That room he held you in wasn’t completely destroyed.”
She seemed to take that news in stride. “So CSIS has it.”
“I’ll do what I can to get you information about it,” he promised.
Her head shook. “Don’t get in trouble. I’ll let my handler know. He’s still got some ties in your world. Ben, if this is going to work, we have to understand that there’s a wall when it comes to our jobs.”
“You don’t want to work with me?” He didn’t like the idea of a wall between them. He wanted nothing between them. Despite the fact that he knew she was being practical, he didn’t want to acknowledge that their agencies, while somewhat friendly, had issues with each other. Relations with the States had frayed years before and were still touchy.
Her hand came out and moved over his. “Of course, I do, and I will whenever possible. But we have to deal with the fact that it might be hard for us to be together. What are you thinking? I’ll be honest, I started off with the deep belief that we would have a couple of filthy, glorious one-night stands and then I would be able to move on. I don’t think I can move on from you.”
He got such a sense of peace when she touched him and spoke sweet words. He felt her caring. Or she was an excellent actress and she was still playing him and he was the dumbest asshole in the history of time because hadn’t he been through this before?
Her hand moved on his forearm, the motion soothing, like he was a predator and she was going to stroke him down from his emotional turn.
“You’re thinking about him,” she said quietly.
“He nearly killed you.” He had some things to admit to her. “I tried to get your medical records.”
“Tristan would have gone in and erased them.” She sat back with a glass of Pinot Noir in her hands. She looked comfortable in the space, like she’d been here many times, and she probably had since the staff had put them in a private dining room. It was one more mystery to solve when it came to the most mysterious woman he’d ever met. “I’m fine. It was terrible and I have some new scars, but I’m okay. I’m cleared for field work and everything.”
“Baby, you need to understand that he knows how I feel about you. I have no idea how.” He was getting paranoid about it, looking for cameras or people hanging around to listen in. It felt like Manny was everywhere.
“He’s very likely excellent at reading your signs and signals.” Maggie offered another possibility. “He finds me interesting, and he likes to take apart the things that interest him. Literally.”
She needed to understand. Manny wouldn’t stop. It was one of the reasons this was a bad idea in the beginning, but she was on his radar now. It was better that they were together. Better that he could protect her.
Except he wouldn’t be with her most of the time.
He was going to have to tell his shitty tale. He was almost certain she knew a little of it. “When we were in Australia and Manny came to Dare’s hotel suite, he told Tasha and your handler about a woman named Deanna.”
She nodded, and there was suddenly a sheen of tears in her eyes. Sometimes she was so emotional. Others almost completely shut down. It was probably about work. There was the professional Maggie and the real one. This one. If she sometimes seemed like she was two different people it was because she had to be. “Yes, Tasha gave us all a report. She was your fiancée, and she had an affair with Huisman.”
“I think she was young, and he was richer than me. He could offer her more. She tried to tell me it was all a mistake, but I think she just figured out what being with Manny was really like.” He took a long breath. He didn’t like to think about what Deanna might have gone through. Time had lent him some perspective. “Manny hates women.”