Darkest Before Dawn
Page 33

Hancock swore viciously and guilt, not an emotion he was well acquainted with at all, gripped his chest like a vise.
“Let me get you in the other vehicle. We can’t afford to stop. But I’ll take a look and see what’s going on. If it’s serious, we’ll have to risk taking you to the hospital.”
Fear immediately filled her eyes even as she shook her head.
“I’m alive. I’m not dying. I just hurt. And I’ve dealt with pain for over a week. I’ll deal with it now,” she said quietly.
Once again a surge of pride overtook him. She simply didn’t know the meaning of the word quit. If only he weren’t destined to betray her. To sacrifice her for the greater good. The world needed people like her, and it fucking sucked that the good ones were usually the sacrificial lambs.
“Let me help you. We don’t know what’s going on and I don’t want you making it worse,” he said in a low voice.
She nodded her agreement.
Hancock leaned in and slid one arm beneath her knees and the other between her back and the seat, gently lifting, watching for any sign of pain or discomfort in her eyes. He should have known he wouldn’t find any no matter how much pain she was in. She had too much pride and determination to give in and appear weak in front of him and his men.
He retreated from the interior and turned Honor’s face into his neck to protect her eyes from the scorching, blowing sand.
“Open the back,” Hancock said as he strode toward the waiting vehicle. “Honor and I will ride in back for a few miles. I need a flat surface so I can see about her injury.”
“Injury?” Conrad demanded. “What injury?”
“I don’t know yet,” Hancock said calmly.
Conrad let loose with a string of obscenities and continued to mutter and curse under his breath as he opened the vehicle and hastily arranged a comfortable place for Honor to lie. Then he stood back as Hancock positioned her carefully on the blankets Conrad had spread out. But Conrad didn’t budge. In fact he pressed in close, touching elbows with Hancock, a grim expression on his face.
Hancock didn’t reprimand his man. Beneath the fury, Hancock could see . . . worry. And guilt. Conrad assumed she’d taken a bullet meant for him, and it would eat him alive. Hancock and his men, every single last one of them, were protectors. Yes, they didn’t always protect the good and innocent. Sometimes it took becoming the very thing they hunted so relentlessly in order to take out evil in the world. So that the innocent would prevail.
Only this innocent he couldn’t save. Her fate had already been decided and written. Unchangeable. It would have been far more merciful for her if she had died in the clinic bombing. Because the short future she faced wouldn’t go by quickly. It wouldn’t be merciful. In fact, it would tear her down to her soul, and in the end, that would fade too, leaving only a hollow shell of the fierce woman she used to be. She would welcome death. Pray for it. And it would only make her captors all the more determined to prolong her hour-to-hour agony.
And he was responsible. He would have done that to her. Make it possible for her to be treated with less regard than an animal. And for what? The greater good? It was the philosophy Titan had always held as their creed, even when Rio led Titan. The man who’d taught Hancock everything he knew.
Hancock had always believed in that motto. He understood it. He lived it, breathed it, risked his life to uphold it. But for the first time, the idea of Honor’s sacrifice being responsible for Maksimov, Bristow and ANE going down and saving hundreds of thousands of innocent people in the process made him . . . sick. It disgusted him.
Maybe it was time to hang it up. Disappear somewhere and start a new life where he would be known to no one and not relentlessly hunted. Somewhere he could be alone, never having to deal with the oblivious people he’d lost his soul for in order for them to continue their ignorant, happy existence.
But no. He had family. By love, not blood. They were the only people in the world he felt . . . anything . . . for. Affection. Love. Unwavering loyalty. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for any of them.
He couldn’t simply walk out of their lives and never return. They deserved better of him after all they’d done for him. They’d saved him. They’d given him purpose and a place in the world, even if it was a place so steeped in shadows and sins that he doubted he’d ever see the light again.
He’d long ago made peace with the fact that he wasn’t a good man. He’d never be a good man. But for his family, he could and would be that man even if it was all a lie. Big Eddie, his foster father. And his brothers—Raid, a policeman, and Ryker, a former military man who went into personal security after his discharge. He’d heard from Eden that KGI was considering taking Ryker on. But he’d last spoken to her months before and only then to let her know he’d be out of touch for an indefinite period of time.
Eden. His baby sister who meant the world to him. She was everything good. Everything he wasn’t. He wasn’t a man who scared easily, or at all for that matter. He was calm in the face of adversity, his mind always calculating like a computer his options and possibilities. And he kept all his missions impersonal. Never forming any attachment or bond with anyone.
But nearly losing Eden—losing her for several hours when she endured horrific torture—had unhinged him. He’d been terrified. Out of control. Shaking. Emotional. All the things he considered weaknesses in his work.
Even as he considered that if he had no family he’d never face those very uncomfortable emotions and reactions, he knew that he loved the Sinclairs when he loved no one else. They were his only anchor in the dark world he was being absorbed into more and more with every passing day.
Shaking himself back to the task at hand, he glanced up at Honor to see if she was still conscious. She was, but her eyes were glazed with pain, though not a single sound passed her tightly closed lips. No betraying quiver in her body. The only evidence of her strain was her tightly curled fists on either side of her.
“I’ll be careful,” he said in an attempt to reassure her.
And then he didn’t understand why he felt the need to say anything at all. If she hadn’t put herself in the line of fire, she wouldn’t be hurt and bleeding. He ought to still be pissed, but lying to himself did no good. He hadn’t been pissed because she hadn’t followed orders. He’d been pissed because when he’d witnessed what she did, his heart had plummeted into his stomach and unholy . . . fear . . . assailed him that she would be killed. And it had nothing to do with the fact that if she died his mission would be FUBAR.
Shut it off. All of it. His stupid thoughts and feelings. He began to roll the heavy material of her burka up her legs. When he got to her thighs he gave silent thanks that she’d worn athletic shorts and a sports bra underneath. The last thing he needed was to start fantasizing about what had to be a gorgeous naked body. He had enough issues to deal with without adding completely inappropriate lustful thoughts. He already had too many recently discovered weaknesses, and he had no wish to add to that list. Hell, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt lust or experienced sexual urges. His missions were his mistress, the only thing he gave unwavering fidelity to. Getting off was something he had neither the time nor the desire for when so many lives depended on him.