"Don't say that." I looked up at him through my lashes, the picture of devotion. "You saved me. You gave me a life when I had nothing. I'd be dead without you."
"Bunny—"
"I mean it." I rose to my knees, taking his face in my hands. "Before you found me, I was disappearing. I couldn't remember who I was. I couldn't function. You gave me purpose. Direction. Love." The words were poison wrapped in honey, and I delivered them with thesincerity of someone who'd been trained to lie. "Everything I am is because of you."
His eyes glistened. "I love you so much."
"I know." I kissed him, soft and deep. "Let me show you how much I love you."
The sex that followed was the gentlest we'd ever had. I moved above him with a tenderness that felt almost foreign, my hands tracing his face, my lips never leaving his skin. I whispered endearments against his mouth—I love you, I need you, I'm yours—and I watched him believe every word.
When he entered me, it was with a reverence that would have moved me if I'd still been capable of being moved. His hands cradled my hips. His eyes never left my face. He looked at me like I was salvation, like I was the answer to every question he'd ever asked.
"You're so beautiful," he breathed. "My perfect girl."
Gabriel's phrase,I thought, and the irony was a blade between my ribs.You're both the same. You both want the same thing.
But I didn't say that. I said, "I'm yours. Always yours."
The orgasm, when it came, was technically flawless—the right sounds, the right spasms, the right expression of bliss. I'd learned to fake it so well that even I almost believed it. Nathan certainly did. He followed moments later, my name on his lips like a prayer.
Afterward, I curled against his chest and listened to his heartbeat slow. His hand stroked my hair with absent tenderness, the way it had a hundred times before.
"You make me feel safe," I whispered. "You're the only person who's ever made me feel safe."
"That's all I've ever wanted." He pressed a kiss to my forehead. "To keep you safe."
I closed my eyes and let him hold me, and I felt nothing at all. The performance was complete. The lie was perfect. And tomorrow, I would walk out of this apartment and begin the real work of dismantling everything he'd built.
In the morning, I packed a small bag—tactical gear, a week's worth of clothes, the USB drive with his decrypted files. Nathan watched from the doorway, his expression a mixture of pride and concern.
"You have the emergency contact numbers?"
"Programmed into my phone."
"The safe house address?"
"Memorized."
"And if anything goes wrong—"
"I'll be fine." I zipped the bag and turned to face him. "You trained me well. Trust your training."
He pulled me into his arms, and I let him. His embrace was warm and solid and real, and for a moment—just a moment—I felt something that might have been grief. Grief for the man I'd thought he was. Grief forthe life I'd thought we were building. Grief for the version of myself that had believed in him.
"I'll see you in a week," I said.
"I'll be counting the hours."
One last kiss. One last smile. And then I was walking out the door, my bag on my shoulder and my heart a cold, hard stone in my chest.
The elevator doors closed. The building lobby passed in a blur. Outside, the morning sun was bright and indifferent, and I turned my face toward it and let myself feel, for the first time in months, the sharp clarity of purpose.
The apartment was a cage. Nathan was a handler. And I was done being handled.
The real hunt had begun.
I drove for three hours before I reached the dead zone.
