Watching through the rear-view mirror, his big smirk. “I just want to be with you, and I want us to play more,” he said. “I’m not asking for the world, just a little part of the world, and with you in it, like all the time.”
“So, you are asking for the entire world,” I laughed. “You want me to retire?”
“Is that even an option?”
I shrugged. I didn’t know many people who had retired, in fact I didn’t know many people who had actually give up their entire lives, rescinded that, and then managed to live a normal life afterwards. “No,” I said. “I’ve probably got enough money to not work for a while.”
He giggled. “So much money.”
“Has Mercy mentioned all the costs that come with our life?”
“No,” he said, shaking his head.
“A lifetime of protection, you’ll have to pay for a new identity, a team of people scrubbing your information off the internet, and then, on top of all that, the agency will take out a huge chunk of the money for making sure it’s all done,” I told him. “Sanctum is great, it’s one of the best, there’s other places, Zodiak are high profile internationally, some people say they’re part of some shadow government, but in this business, it’s bestnot to believe rumors unless they’re coming right from your intel person. Mine is Jinksy, I’ll believe anything that guy says.”
He nodded and sighed. “I don’t even remember who I spoke to when I finished my first job,” he said. “They were—oh, no, I do. It was Finley.”
“Yeah, you weren’t part of Sanctum then.” My knuckles turning white from squeezing at the steering wheel. It all happened really kicked off them, cemented himself inside the agency. He’d taken a life. I should’ve been there. “With all the work you put in, you might’ve been able to find me.”
Rolling to another stop, he placed his hand on my arm. “And what would you have done?”
“More like, what would you have done,” I said, knowing how he’d thrown himself at me when he saw me—and rode my dick so hard I didn’t know if it was a sex nightmare or a dream. I couldn’t contain the smirk. “I like to think we would’ve found each other again in life.”
“You know, you could’ve come back for me,” he said. “At any time. You could’ve asked someone to find me. And they would’ve come and got me. Right?”
I shook my head. It wasn’t as easy as he was putting it. “If it was, I would’ve, I went through so many scenarios,” I told him. “Every single one of them meant you became a weakness in me. I fucking weakness.”
He squeezed my arm. “I’m not a weakness anymore.”
“But at what cost?” I made us both fall into a quietness again. The cost was massive, the cost had been turning Artemis into a killer, forcing him into training, and forcing me into channeling my pain and anger, it forced a lot of things—and through all that pressure, our bodies seemed to come together like magnets at a great force.
21. ARTEMIS
We got back to Sanctum, and after going through security check points, we were separated. I got into the elevator first with Finley and his chipper voice, telling me how much of an impact the article was having online. And at the bottom—or top, I didn’t know anything the moment I was in that elevator, Mercy was waiting for me.
“What do you think will happen to Margaret?” I asked Finley, getting one final question in.
He shrugged. “People think she’ll open up a charity, claim not to know, and get away with it,” he said. “Other people think she’ll do a Martha Stewart and be in one of those minimal security things—or house arrest.”
“I’ll take it from here,” Mercy said, all dressed up in a hot pink power suit. She was always so outwardly colorful, it was disarming, even though I knew she had the power to snap her fingers and—have someone kill me. “You need debriefing,” she said.
“Do you need me?” Finley asked.
Mercy waved him away with a word, and I followed her to an office—not the same one I’d been in before but a room with a long table and several swivel chairs. It was warm from the air conditioning unit pumping in air.
“Take a seat,” she said, leading me to the table head. She offered it up to me, and I should’ve offered it back to her, but I also didn’t want to be rude. “So, you’ve done a delivery job, protection detail, and an off-the-books hit,” she said, recalling the first job she had me doing—unofficially.
“Yeah,” I said, softer. “Do you think I’ve done a good job?”
She nodded. “I do, you’ve got a different approach to many other people,” she said. “But it’s no secret Donovandoesn’t want you here, working this job. He wants you at home, probably raising children on a parcel of land nobody even knows exist.” She spoke with such a straight face that I could only smile back at her.
“I can’t have—” I laughed. “It doesn’t work like that.”
Unamused, she rolled her eyes and I sank in the office chair, feeling like I was two-feet tall. “I know how human reproduction works,” she said. “This isn’t about that. I need you to decide what you want.”
“You’re giving me an out?” I asked.
She shrugged. “I’m giving you an option,” she said. “You can keep working here, make good money, but maybe not out killing people. You can work here and carry out hits, making millions. Or you can leave with the money you’ve made, and see how life treats you.”
