Her Name Is Knight(Nena Knight #1)(85)

“Never.”

“Never?” Her eyes are round as the saucers we use for tea. “You’ll never have sex?”

We have had this conversation as well. My sister believes I have had enough recovery time and should enter the world of the sexually active. “I have unwillingly had enough sex to last a lifetime. And I find it quite distasteful.”

“What about when you find love? I mean romantic love, not family kind of love.”

I sigh again. Elin will never understand how dead I feel inside when it comes to sex, my repulsion when men touch me in that way or any way. I cannot imagine ever wanting someone to touch me like that again. She won’t know the ruin I feel, the lack of desire. I have never known romance. Sex was used as a weapon against me. I want no more part of it. Even though she will never understand, I tell her how I feel. Then I open my eyes and look at her.

It is undeniable, the despair I see in Elin’s eyes as she gazes at me. I wish she would not. There is nothing to despair. It is what it is. Exhausted, all I want to do is sleep, but Elin has more talk in her.

“Nena,” she breathes, “when you came to us, you were this scrawny little thing. And in this short amount of time, you have become the most amazingly strong and bravest person I’ve ever met.”

I can no longer meet her gaze. If I do, I will break right in front of her. With great effort, I say, “Kindly thank Ben and decline the date with his friend for me.”

Elin huffs, annoyed with me, but only for a little while. I am not worried it will last. “Also, if you’re going to be on Dispatch, you’ve got to sound more human, more your age,” she says.

“Do I not sound human?” Her words are nonsensical. If I am human, how do I not sound so?

Elin touches her forehead as if dealing with a difficult child. “You sound robotic, Nena. You speak very properly, and I know you know multiple languages, and that’s wicked, but you sound stilted. You’re too tight, need to loosen up.” She begins convulsing, jiggling her body in an alarming manner. “See, like this. Loosen up. And you need to use slang and contractions and idioms. Shit like that, or you’ll stick out like a sore thumb, and your mark will make you.”

“My thumb is actually the one part of my body that’s not sore.”

“And maybe throw in some cursing too. Say bloody hell, or call someone a tool-ass wanker or fucking cesspot.”

I frown. “Is cesspot a word?” I am pretty sure she is saying it wrong.

Elin throws her hands up as she shrugs. “Who knows? But it sounds good when you’re in the moment.”

I nod, giving up on any comfortable position in my mummy wrap. “Okay.” Elin makes a good point, and if I am going to be an invaluable member of Dispatch, like I plan to be, I had better get to work on becoming less . . . robotic.





63


AFTER


It took Nena a couple of days of soul-searching to decide to tell Elin who Oliver’s father was and that he might not be as innocent a bystander as Elin believed him to be. There was no more dancing around the fact that Paul had to go. His attempt on her father and his threats against the rest of the family were bad enough. It was the cigar that solidified her decision—Paul’s cigar, its scent easily recalled from their encounter the evening of the supper party. Nena could no longer remain silent.

She’d asked Elin to meet at one of their favorite Mediterranean restaurants. Sitting across from her in her sharp business suit, Elin still looked fresh faced and beautiful despite having just arrived from closing on a new business venture in New York, a meeting she’d had to chair on their father’s behalf.

“You’re lucky Oliver had to cancel our plans for tonight . . . and that I love sister time and all,” Elin said, gesturing to the server for another glass of white wine.

Nena watched her sister finish the first glass, wondering if there was any way she could be wrong. No, she decided. She wasn’t.

“Yeah.” Nena hesitated. “About Oliver.”

Elin set her glass on the table, accepting a second glass and thanking the server with a quick smile. She took a sip and furrowed her eyebrows at the expression on Nena’s face. “Jesus, Nena, why so grim? You and the kid’s dad have a row?”

“No.” Nena stalled, knowing this would be the moment that could divide her and Elin for the first time. “Cort gave me a cigar that was left at his house.”

Elin snickered. “That shifty little bird. Is she smoking them or using the wrap for weed?”

“It’s not Georgia’s,” Nena said. “It’s Paul’s cigar.”

Elin snorted. “You must be totally knackered, sis. Where the hell did Paul come from? Last I checked, intel only had Dennis Smith and Kamil Sanders coming up, not big bad Paul.”

Nena forged ahead. “Because I remember its smell from when he smoked it the night of the dinner party.”

Elin’s initial reaction was to lean away, as if whatever amount of crazy Nena had was contagious. “Come again?”

Nena lowered her voice. “Lucien Douglas is Paul Frempong.”

She said it as if he were the boogeyman, and indeed he was. She watched as Elin, initially shocked, narrowed her eyes, which were filling with doubt that had never been there before.

“You’ve gone mad,” Elin told her. “Perhaps Dispatch has taken its toll on you. You can’t go throwing accusations like that around. Lucien is a Council member.”