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I could see hi hi all of his options He kneas asking hi a verified security threat under his protected roof He understood I was asking hiainst He grasped that I was desperate enough to plead with him to offer shelter to a woman that had not only offered his sister up as a sacrificial la beaten within an inch of his life I was asking him for so much more than he had ever askedbrilliant, he knew that if he agreed it would e down the line Get-out-of-jail-free huge

I lived my life between very clear black and white lines but lately all the edges had blurred into soanyood and bad I illing to die for those convictions, but I also wanted the good guys to win occasionally Lately, it seeuys’ rules It er but I didn’t have a choice and I could see Race knew that as well

“Give e sos and find you a spot”

I sighed and letat my boots and the ood of the dock between them

“Do I even want to ask how you’re going to arrange a vacancy on such short notice?”

He chuckled and it made the hairs on my arms raise up I re cars with Bax He wasn’t lost anymore, and the man he had become was not one to be underestimated

“Probably not, but you’ll both be safe within those walls and I’ll even let you borrow Booker He can keep an eye on your little rat when you’re off trying to save the world”

I snapped lare at him, but he had already turned away and was headed back toward the fancy-looking condominium complex

“I would think you would be a littlewhatever they have to in order to survive, Hartman”

I saw his shoulders shrug and he didn’t turn around as he hollered at oes unpunished, Titus She says she’s here to help you now, but she told Dovie the sauy that iswith my life and with et to him, then I want her as close as possible”

I didn’t have any way to contradict hirunted at his back as he walked away

Chapter 5

Reeve

A FEW DAYS HIDING out in Bax’s tiny apartment made me feel like I was back in WITSEC I hadn’t seen anyone besides the pizza delivery guy And I hadn’t heard from Titus except for the day after he ditched me here when he showed up with a handful of clothes he told o cell phone that he shoved in runt He told ency and then disappeared without another word It was obvious everything about having to deal withon him, but I didn’t have a solution to that probleainst the door after he stor thick in his wake

Every night since I had taunted hi some of that rock-hard veneer he had in place slip, I felt like I was drowning in hi new, but now that I kne that I had actual experience hat it was like to be wanted by him, to be the sole focus of that inferno of hot desire, I couldn’t get around it It chased me into sleep It haunted me when I ake I tasted him I felt him, and when I breathed in and out I could shen ain

I should be focused on Conner I needed to keep a in a crazy irl just because she looked like me, for God’s sake, and he hadn’t done it cleanly or mercifully She had suffered; Titus was brutally honest when I asked about the body that had pulled hiotten out of control at the -ti coht up with me

There was a time before Titus when I would have just run I was quick on my feet and kne to make ends meet when I had to There were plenty of no-naet lost and never be found again But now that the surly detective was right in front ofquality and was honestly willing to help him, I couldn’t do that

No It was tis in the only way I kneas a trap few men could resist, one Conner had already fallen into, and once he ca to ain A shoas on the horizon In the real world good didn’t triumph over evil because evil didn’t play fair Thatevil down, and I was just bad enough to get the job done I wanted Titus to keep me alive, not so I could testify but so that I could put a bullet in Conner before he put a bullet into sacrifice ood and the only part of it thatto the handsoht I was shady and devious; once this ca more than a soulless killer

When soone down on the day Titus said he was co to be hi to ever just open a door without seeing as on the other side When I checked the peephole it wasn’t bright blue eyes looking back at reen pair set in a face made to make women stupid with lust It was al because before I reached for the security chain on the door, the golden god s a dierous in a totally different way froether made an unstoppable team