From Sanctum with Love (Masters and Mercenaries #10)(45)

“What do you think of Case Taggart?”

Kori turned to the woman who had asked the question. Mia was sitting on the couch, her legs curled under her and a glass of wine in her hand. Sarah sat next to her, a frown still on her face. She hadn’t wanted to leave the club, but there had been the small problem of Kori’s tires getting slashed. She’d explained to Sarah that she couldn’t drive home without tires and getting someone out to fix it would have to wait until the next day. That was what she got for parking outside of Sanctum. She’d forgotten her keycard to get into the parking lot, but there was a nice gate between the parking lot of the building Kai owned and Sanctum that only required a code, so she’d parked by her building and walked over.

And some * had taken a knife to her tires. All four had been slashed. She’d had to run back into Sanctum, trying to hide from Kai the whole time, and then convince Sarah to give her a ride home.

If anyone knew she’d gone out by herself, there would have been hell to pay. She’d snuck around the bouncer because she hadn’t wanted to wait for an escort out. Kai could have found her and then she would have been forced to talk about her feelings.

Apparently Mia was having feelings for a guy, too, though she seemed inclined to talk about them.

“He’s a nice man.” Kori answered Mia, who had come along for the ride. Her training Dom had gotten stuck at work and she’d gone home with Kori and Sarah. It looked like they would have a guest on the couch tonight. “He’s been through a lot.”

“I know he recently lost his brother.” Mia took a long drink of the rich ruby liquid. “He seems to hate me. I don’t get it. I’m nice to him and everything.”

She hadn’t seen them interact, but she knew Case. Big Tag had called her and a couple of the long-term subs in for a crash course in BDSM with Case. She wasn’t sure why Case Taggart had suddenly needed Master rights at Sanctum, but she’d been game. Anything to help a friend. “I think he’s hurting. Theo wasn’t only his brother. He was Case’s twin. They shared everything. When they graduated from high school, they went straight in the Navy together. They got separated in the beginning but were in the same SEAL training class before the CIA yanked them both and they somehow ended up here.”

She didn’t know the whole story. One day McKay-Taggart had way more employees than it had the day before.

Mia put down her glass. “That’s fascinating. So the Taggart brothers went straight from SEAL training into Agency work? And they talk about it? Shouldn’t that be classified?”

Shit. Was she not supposed to know that stuff? She’d gone to dinner one night with a bunch of the McKay-Taggart crowd and they talked pretty openly. Then of course they probably didn’t think she would mention it to people outside the circle. Maybe they thought she was like Kai and what they said was covered under confidentiality. Charlotte might shoot her. “No, they don’t talk about it and you shouldn’t either. I shouldn’t have mentioned it.”

“Why?” Sarah asked. “He’s not a spy now. I personally think way too many things are classified.”

“I don’t think he was ever a spy.” Now that she thought about it, if Charlotte Taggart didn’t want someone to know something, she wouldn’t talk about it. “I think he was always a soldier.”

Mia looked thoughtful for a moment. “And his brother died on a mission? I thought McKay-Taggart worked for businesses. I guess I thought that was things like finding corporate spies. Not many of those in the islands I would think.”

“They work everywhere from what I can tell.” It wasn’t surprising that Mia was interested in Case. He was an amazingly attractive man. Like all the Taggarts, Case was a Viking god. “They do lots of kinds of work. I haven’t heard the story about how Theo died. I only know a job went very wrong.”

“No one wants to talk about it.” Sarah set her glass down. “It hurts too much.”

“I find it interesting that he died on the same island as Senator Hank McDonald. Did y’all see the news on his death? He died on the exact same island and around the same time. I always wondered about the story of his death,” Mia said.

“Are you talking about the dude from Houston? Didn’t he have a heart attack?” Sarah poured herself another glass of wine.

Mia was often interested in politics, but Kori couldn’t help her here. “I have no idea. Once we all realized Theo was gone, I don’t think any of us thought much past him, and Big Tag doesn’t talk about work outside the office. If that’s true then I suspect something was happening and the team was likely working to protect the senator. They do a lot of security details. We’ll never know. That side of the Sanctum world keeps its secrets.”

She couldn’t help but think about Erin. Erin had been there when Theo had died. Kori knew that much. Had she held him as he died? Felt him take his last breath?

She’d run away from Kai today, and now that felt like a cowardly thing to do. Kai was her friend, her best friend really. Erin had lost the man she loved, had a hard road ahead of her, and Kori was sneaking out so she didn’t have to have a difficult conversation with the number one man in her life.

Mia’s eyes narrowed. “But don’t you think…”

Her question was interrupted by a knock on the door.