Darkest Before Dawn
Page 86

“Which he did,” Honor pointed out. “I’d call that a waste of a good night’s sleep.”
Conrad shook his head. “You don’t understand. He couldn’t tell you the plan. God, he wanted to. He hated the idea of deceiving you when you’d given him your trust. When he’d vowed not to betray your trust. But too much was riding on you not knowing. You had to have no knowledge or it could compromise the entire mission and it could get us all killed. And Hancock made it clear that you were the sole priority. That even if it meant letting Maksimov get away, you were to be protected at all costs.”
Honor sent him a puzzled look because she didn’t understand any of it.
“We planned an ambush. The original plan, you see, was to turn you over to Maksimov as a way of gaining access to him. To finally be part of his inner circle after years of working through middlemen like Bristow. He would turn you over to ANE while we worked to systematically dismantle his entire operation from the inside. Every player, every source of crime. We wanted his entire network destroyed, and then we were going to take him out. And that was going to take time. A lot of time. You would have been dead by ANE’s hands before we completed our destruction of Maksimov’s entire organization.
“But Hancock decided against that. Bristow set up the exchange and Maksimov dictated the terms, but we planned an ambush. We were only going to get close enough to take Maksimov out and then get you the hell out of there no matter what it took. He didn’t care that the connections would still be there, that someone else would simply pick up the reins of Maksimov’s empire. He only wanted him taken out and you safe and then he was going to walk away. With you. And let someone else take on the task of taking down Maksimov’s vast empire.”
“Then how . . . ?”
Her brow furrowed, not understanding any of it. She’d awakened in a cage, Maksimov taunting her. He’d tortured her for days. And then she’d awakened on a plane with Hancock, who was taking her to ANE.
“Maksimov obviously had more than one mole planted in Bristow’s organization. We took out the one we were able to ferret out. And he would have reported Hancock losing his shit and killing Bristow when he tried to rape you. So he ambushed us instead of the other way around. We lost Mojo,” Conrad said painfully. “Viper and Cope were both badly injured and Hancock was shot twice. He nearly died and even then, Maksimov had to pry you from his grasp. Hancock called in every favor ever owed to him from an organization where much bad blood exists. We aren’t direct enemies, but neither are we allies. Hancock didn’t care. He had no pride when it came to you. He begged them to help him find and save you. He tortured himself endlessly, knowing you were in Maksimov’s hands, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. He blamed himself. He believes he betrayed you. That he failed you. Every single thing you believe of him, he believes it too. But he didn’t betray you, Honor. The mission was FUBAR. We lost much and yet he wouldn’t stand down when he desperately needed to be in a damn hospital.”
Honor shook her head in bewilderment. “I don’t understand.” It seemed it was all she was capable of saying. It was too much to take in, to have what she’d believed and grieved over for months change in seconds.
“He loves you, Honor,” Conrad said gently. “Hancock hasn’t ever loved anyone in his life except his foster family. He’s never been loved by anyone except his foster family. He’s never felt he deserved to be loved. He believes himself to be a monster. He believes himself to be worse than Maksimov. He’s dying with every passing day. He’s grieving, tormenting himself, loving you and yet knowing he’s not worthy of you, that he doesn’t deserve you. He let you down. He betrayed you. He allowed Maksimov to hurt you and he will never forgive himself for that.”
“Why are you telling me all this?” she whispered.
“Because I believe you’re hurting just as much as he is. I believe you love him as much as he loves you. I believe you’re both dying and that you’ve given up. And I know you’re the only one who can save him. I couldn’t allow you to believe what he wouldn’t even defend himself against, because he believes it all. That he betrayed you. Let you down. Hurt you. Manipulated you. Lied to you. But Honor, you didn’t see him when he told us the mission had changed. You didn’t see the determination in his eyes when he told us that you were the sole priority, that your safety took precedence above all else. He didn’t give one fuck about the mission or whether he was successful in taking Maksimov down. He tried to do the honorable thing and spare you but still take out a serious threat to thousands of innocent lives. And he lost everything as a result.”
Tears spilled down Honor’s cheeks and she hugged herself, rocking back and forth in the swing.
“Why didn’t he explain? On the plane. After he’d freed me from Maksimov. Why did he let me believe he was delivering me to ANE? Why didn’t he at least try?”
“Because you believed it. You weren’t there, Honor. You were a million miles away and you wouldn’t have heard a word he had to say. And it’s hard to defend or explain when you feel that you are guilty of every single sin you accused him of. He didn’t defend himself because he knew he was guilty of the crimes committed against you. And he loves you as much as he hates himself.”
“Where is he?” she demanded.
Conrad closed his eyes. “I don’t know. He disappeared after Maksimov and ANE were taken down. Titan is no more. We all walked away. We’re done. He’s a lone wolf, Honor. He’s gone off somewhere to die a slow, painful death because he can’t live with what he did to you. But I know this much. He loves you with every breath in his body. I’ve worked with him, followed him, been loyal to him for over a decade. And before you, every single characteristic attributed to him was true. He was more machine than man. No emotion. He had his own code and he lived by it. The greater good. And sometimes that means sacrificing innocents. He hated it, but knew it was a necessary evil.
“But you changed everything. You changed him. Suddenly he wanted to be the man you saw when you looked at him. He wanted to be better. For you. You showed him how to love. How to feel. How to be human. And he’ll never love again. He’ll love you forever just as he’ll hate himself for eternity for what he did to you.”
“Then how can I find him?” she asked in frustration. “Damn it, Conrad, you can’t come here and tell me all this and then walk away without giving me something. I won’t let him do this to himself. I won’t. I love him. Do you have any idea how much it hurt when I believed that he’d used me, that he’d betrayed me and allowed Maksimov to torture me?”
Conrad’s eyes were haunted. “I failed you too, Honor. Not just Hancock. We all failed you.”
“Bullshit,” she said angrily.
Sorrow swamped her eyes. “I’m so sorry about Mojo. He was a good man. He didn’t deserve to die because of me. Because Hancock changed the mission. Are Viper and Cope okay now?” she asked anxiously.
Conrad smiled gently, reaching for her hand to give it a light squeeze. “Always worried for others. You are a remarkable woman, Honor. My life is better for having known you. And if you can save Hancock, you will have my eternal gratitude. Yes, Mojo was a good man, but he died peacefully. He was given redemption, something none of us ever dreamed we would be given. And Viper and Cope are fine. I don’t know where Hancock is, I swear it. But I can point you in the direction of people who might know or at the very least can help you find him.”