I don’t like the memory.
“And some of them, the most valuable, are kept,” he finishes.“Those ones...Those ones are in the most danger.”
“Why?”Brooks breathes.“Why keep them if they’re so valuable.”
When he meets my eyes, his are flat and disgusted.“Blackmail.That’s why he has Corinne.”
Now I drop to my knees too, the mention of my sister taking all my strength.“You know where she is?”
He nods.“I was with her all week, trying to protect her.Up until this afternoon.Men came and took her from me, and I fought, but I was too weak to stop them.She’s the most high-profile girl they have, I think.Dom’s going t try to use her to force your father to back him in the coming war.He’s trying to take over the whole operation, but he needs help.He thinks your father...If he has Corinne, he thinks your father will have to support him.”
Oh my God.
“Do you know who he’s working for?”Brooks asks sharply.“The Russians.Do you know who they are.”
Beau looks at her once, his gaze tired, and I think we have to get him to a hospital soon.He’s losing too much blood, and I’m still not sure I want Brooks stitching him up.When I reach for him, though, he jerks away.
“Not yet,” he says, like he’s able to read my mind.“I have things I have to tell you.Because I know everything.”
Epilogue
BROOKS
Two Days Later
“How’s your brother?”I ask quietly, my eyes on the paper in front of me.
“Better, but not well,” she says.She flashes me a quick grin.“Why, are you trying to put him to work, too?”
I smile back, but shake my head.We’re going through everything we have, looking for any sign of Corinne, while Kate and Camille question the girls they’ve rescued, looking for anything that can help.None of the girls have seen Corinne, who seems to have been kept separate, and we haven’t found any yet who’ve even heard Aislyn’s name.
I’m starting to think that girl is some kind of ghost.But if anyone can find her, it’s Brooks.The girl is on a mission, now, and with the extra information, she’s flying through ideas, building theories left and right and eliminating them almost as quickly as she has them.
Simon and Jacky Duhon are in the other room, talking quietly with Hunter, who’s doing something on one of the computers.Luke is in there as well, though I don’t know what he’s doing, and I have the passing thought that we’re the most ragtag army anyone ever put together.A bunch of misfits trying to save the world.
Though if I’m going to save the world with anyone, I would rather this ragtag group than the most professional men on the planet.Because I’ve been to war with these people, and I know I can trust them.
I know they’ll have my back when all the chips are down.
“I need the Rossis,” Brooks says suddenly, her eyes on a map in front of her.
The statement is so bizarre that it takes me a full minute to catch up.
“The family I had to go to New York to save?”I finally ask.“You came all the way here to ask me for help for them, and yet now that you’re back in New Orleans, you think you need them again?”
“Yes,” she confirms.“I need Sloane.And Penny and Michael.Joseph.”
“Even when you have me?”
The question is soft, almost quiet, but full of meaning.
Full of weight.
She looks up, her eyes big.“What?”
“You have me.You have everything.Every single part of me, it’s yours.I’ve spent the last five years missing you so badly that it’s been a constant ache, and the last week remembering how you feel under my fingers.I want you back, Brooks.I want it so badly I can hardly think straight.I sure as hell can’t fight the Russians with this hanging over my head, and I don’t want to fight them with anyone else.Say you’ll be mine.Say you’ll stay.For real, this time.”
She bites her lip and considers it for a moment.“But getting married will give my father exactly what he wants.”
