Darkest Before Dawn

She arched one eyebrow. “Why are you here, Conrad?”

“I came for many reasons,” he said. “I came to thank you for saving my life. I came to apologize for failing you. But the most important reason I came is to tell you that Hancock did not betray you, Honor.”

She stiffened, her gaze becoming hard and impenetrable. “I have no desire to talk about Hancock. If that’s all you’ve come to talk about, you can leave now.”

Conrad’s expression became as hard and as determined as hers. He leaned forward, his features savage.

“I will not leave until I say what I have to say. What you do with what I have to tell you is solely up to you, but I will tell you what really happened.”

Honor closed her eyes as grief consumed her all over again. In the weeks since she’d discovered she was pregnant with Hancock’s child, she’d worked so hard to put Hancock and his betrayal behind her. To look forward, not back. To concentrate on the tiny, innocent life inside her that she’d protect with her dying breath.

“Say what you have to say, then,” she said hoarsely. “Then get out.”

“You know he changed the plan. That we stayed up all night planning an alternative. And then he drugged you and he hated it. He loathed himself for what he knew he must do. For two reasons: One, Maksimov ordered you drugged and we were forced to carry out the charade. And two, if you were conscious, there was no way Maksimov would see what we needed him to see. You’re too honest, Honor. There is no way when Maksimov looked at you he would’ve seen the terrified, beaten down, and broken captive that he’d expected. He’d’ve seen the courageous, defiant woman who’d spit in his eye before ever allowing him to intimidate her.”

“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.”