Destiny Mine (Tormentor Mine #3)(48)

Well, a price aside from the end of my business and the risk I took by approaching Esguerra. Those costs I knew and was prepared to pay. But this? Out of everyone on my list, Henderson is the one most directly responsible for the tragedy that befell my wife and son. He’s the one who gave the orders that resulted in the village massacre.

If anyone deserves to pay for Tamila and Pasha’s deaths, it’s Henderson.

He can’t be allowed to go back to living his normal, happy life after what he’s done.

“I can’t take that deal.” My voice is harsh and guttural. “You know I can’t.”

For the first time, some semblance of human emotion warms the blue ice of Esguerra’s gaze. “I know,” he says quietly. “I figured as much. But they won’t budge on it, Peter. I tried.”

I pivot on my heel and stride toward the limo, the rage and grief I thought I’d buried bubbling up like magma in my throat. I breathe in, trying to calm myself, but instead of tropical vegetation, I smell death and ashes, charred flesh and stale blood. I taste metal on my tongue and see a pile of corpses, of body parts two meters high.

And that little hand, curled around a toy car.

I barely remember the first few days after the massacre. I know I got away from the task force soldiers who dragged me out of the village, but I don’t recall how or when—or if I hurt anyone as I escaped. I assume I did, because my own people started hunting me soon after, even before I killed my superiors for ending the investigation within weeks.

Vengeance was all that kept me going in those days—and in the months and years that followed. I promised my dead son and wife that their killers would pay with their lives, and I kept that promise.

I got them all except Henderson.

“You could just take her again,” Esguerra says, catching up to me, and I glance at him, unsurprised that he now knows about Sara. Kent must’ve told him about her—that or he heard about the kidnapping from his CIA sources. And once he knew that, it was a simple matter of putting two and two together.

Despite that, my first instinct is to threaten him and all he holds dear if he so much as breathes her way. But if he knows Sara is my weakness, then he must know what I’d do if someone came after her.

It’s the same thing he’d do if someone went after Nora.

What he’s about to do to Novak, in fact.

“She has a life there,” I reply instead. “Parents, career, friends.”

He shrugs. “She’d adjust. Nora did.”

I get in the back of the limo and he joins me there, taking a seat across from me.

“Sara is not Nora,” I say as the limo starts moving. “Her roots go too deep. She won’t be happy like this.” I don’t know if I’m trying to convince Esguerra or myself—or that dark, callous part of me that has been wanting this for months.

That has been telling me to forget this mad plan and take back what belongs to me.

“And you will be?” Esguerra tilts his head, regarding me with peculiar curiosity. “You think you’ll enjoy that half-life? Thrive in the cage of all those rules and laws?”

I shrug. “Maybe.” It’s not a concern of mine, but if it ever becomes a problem, I’ll deal with it then.

One thing at a time.

“So what then?” Esguerra asks when I remain silent. “Are you going to let her go for good? Or take the deal?”

“I’m not letting her go.” The words are instinctive, automatic. Life without Sara—that’s not even a possibility in my mind. The past eight months have been hell, almost as bad in their own way as the dark weeks after my family’s deaths.

I’d sooner die than let my ptichka go for good.

She’s mine, and she’s staying mine.

A mocking smile curves Esguerra’s mouth. “Well, then,” he says softly. “Seems like you don’t have much of a choice.”

It chokes me to admit it, but he’s right.

I either take Sara, or I accept the deal. Her happiness or my vengeance.

I can’t have both.





Part IV





40





Sara



I first sense that something is off when I drive home alone after my evening shift at the clinic.

No government-issue car follows me home, and no one surreptitiously watches me as I park my car in front of my apartment building and walk in.

Telling myself I’m being crazy—that I’m just tired and not properly registering things—I shower and fall into bed. There’s no point in worrying about this. Even if I’m not having some weird reverse paranoia, maybe the Feds had to take the night off—babysit their kids or something. It hasn’t happened since my return, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible.

FBI agents are human too.

Still, I toss and turn, unable to fall asleep despite my total exhaustion. I try to think back to whether I felt watched at all today, but I can’t recall. Either my invisible stalkers have become even better at their job, or I’ve gotten so used to their presence I no longer notice it.

The last time I truly experienced that itchy feeling was when I got Peter’s note a couple of months back.

Could it be?

Am I no longer being watched at all?