I cross my arms and lean against the wall, keeping distance between us. “You could make this easier on yourself.”
“I could but I won’t.”
“Why?” I practically growl, the frustration rising. “What’s the point? Your cover’s blown. Your team knows you’re compromised. Whatever mission you were running is over. So why not justtell me?”
She tilts her head, studying me like I’m a puzzle she’s trying to solve. “Would you? In my position? Would you betray everyone you’ve ever worked with because some man you fucked asked nicely?”
Some man you fucked.
Whoa.
Those words hit like a knife between the ribs.
“That’s all I was to you?” I say, trying to keep my voice as calm as possible. “Just some man you fucked?”
She stares at me for a moment, so many things swimming in her eyes like fish in a dark pond.
“No,” she says quietly. “That’s not all you were.”
“Thenwhat?—”
“It doesn’t matter.” She looks away. “None of it matters now.”
I want to grab her, shake her, force her to look at me and tell me the truth—about her mission, about her feelings, about any of it. But I know it won’t work. She’s been trained to resist interrogation. It makes me wonder how many times she’s been in this situation, if her captors were worse than me, if they hurt her and…
I stop myself from thinking that. Now is not the time to make this more complicated than it already is.
Regardless, she won’t break from pressure.
So I’ll have to try something else.
“Eat,” I say again, pushing off the wall. “I’ll be back in an hour.”
“For what?”
I pause at the door. “To try again, little killer.”
The second interrogation goes worse than the first.
I ask questions. She gives me nothing. Not a word, not a flash, not a single goddamn tell that I can use.
It’s infuriating beyond words
It’s also, in some sick way, impressive.
“You’re good at this,” I say, pacing in front of her while she sits on the bed, spine straight, expression blank. “The silent treatment. The resistance. They trained you well.”
Nothing.
“What do they do at spy school, anyway? That’s where you went, right? The Rookery? Like James Bond? They teach you how to withstand torture? How to keep your mouth shut no matter what?” I pause. “I have to say, we aren’t so different in that regard. In SERE school, the Green Berets are taught to resist, too. So, I know exactly what I have to do to break you.”
Still nothing.
“Or maybe it’s simpler than that.” I stop in front of her, close enough that she has to tilt her head back to meet my eyes. “Maybe you just don’t care enough to break. Maybe I never meant anything to you at all, so there’s nothing I can threaten that would?—”
“Stop.”
The word is barely a whisper, but it cuts through my monologue like a blade.
