Alpha One (Shadow Agents #1)(34)
Author: Cynthia Eden

“Where?”

“Cemetery. They dumped his body on the senator’s grave.”

Hell, that was a pretty clear message.

“He was carved up. Someone sure took their time with him.”

Because Guerrero had wanted McLintock to talk, and Logan was betting that the guy had talked plenty, before his attackers killed him.

Guerrero and his men liked to get up close and personal with their targets. From the cases that he’d worked before, Logan knew that Guerrero’s weapon of choice was a knife. He liked the intimacy of the blade. The control it gave him as he slowly tortured his prey.

That was why the cemetery bombing had never fit for him. Not up close and personal enough. The guy enjoyed watching the pain on his victims’ faces.

“I’m going with the ME now,” Jasper said, and there was the rumble of another voice in the background, “but I’ll meet you at the press conference.”

The press conference. Right. They still had their show to do. Logan ended the call. His eyes never left Juliana’s. “You heard.” She’d been too close to miss Jasper’s words.

A faint nod. Her pupils had widened with worry.

“And you still want to go out there?” He pushed her because his instincts were to grab her and run. To hide her. To keep her safe and protected. Not to put her on display for the killer. “You still want to challenge Guerrero?”

“He killed Ben….”

“No, he tortured Ben, probably for hours, then he killed him.” Brutal, but that was what they were dealing with, and they all had to face that truth. “You’re going to bait Ben’s killer on television. Taunt him. You ready for that?”

Maybe he expected her to back down. Maybe he wanted her to. Because then it would be fine when he kidnapped her and they vanished.

“How many others has he killed?”

He didn’t even know. No one was sure. Hundreds. With the weapons that Guerrero had sold? Thousands.

“That’s what I thought,” Juliana said. Her chin lifted a little. Her shoulders seemed to straighten beneath the silk robe. “I’m ready for this. I’ll do what I have to do, and we’ll stop him.”

And he knew there would be no running away. It was Juliana’s choice, and he’d never take her choice away. He’d stand by her. Keep her safe. No other option.

He stared at her and realized…he’d hoped that she would want to run, but deep down, he’d actually expected her to do exactly what she was doing. Because he knew Juliana—the woman had a fierce core of steel.

She turned away from him, and he knew…things were only going to get more dangerous for them.

So he’d damn well stay by her side.

But she’d only taken a few steps when she stopped and pulled in a sharp breath, as if she were bracing herself. Then Juliana turned back to face him, her pretty face set with lines of determination. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

He raised a brow. Waited.

Her tongue swiped over her lower lip. “It was my fault.”

Logan had no idea what she was talking about. “Juliana?”

“All of those men who died at your cabin, everything that happened there…it was all because of me.”

He stepped toward her. “No, baby, it’s not you. It’s Guerrero. He’s crazy. He’ll torture, kill—do anything that he has to do in order to get what he wants.”

Logan tried to take her into his arms, but she moved back.

“There was… I didn’t tell you everything.” She wrapped her arms around her stomach and rocked back on her heels. Pain glinted in her dark stare. “When I was in Mexico, when I was with John—”

Not John. Guerrero.

“We talked for so long. About everything. Nothing. Things that I didn’t think mattered to anyone but…me.”

A knot formed in his gut. “What did you tell him?” They’d gone over this before, on the plane ride back from Mexico, but they’d just focused on any revelations she might have made about her father. And now that he thought about it, Juliana had never quite met his gaze during that interrogation. She’d kept glancing away, shifting nervously. All the telltale signs of deception had been there, but he’d just thought—

Not her.

Juliana wouldn’t lie. He was the one who lied. She’d just been nervous, in shock from everything that happened.

“I never realized what I said would matter.” She was meeting his stare now. With guilt and stoic determination battling the pain in her gaze. “I should have told you sooner.”

“Told me what?”

“Guerrero knows about you. About us.” She looked down. “I told you…he wasn’t asking about my father’s work. He was just asking about me, my life.”

And she’d mentioned him? “Why?”

After a moment, her gaze came back to him. “I thought that I was going to die. I didn’t expect a rescue.”

As if he’d ever leave her to that hell. He’d been ready to bring that whole place down, brick by brick, in order to get her out.

“John…asked me if I’d ever been in love.” Her laugh was brittle. “That’s one of the things you think about before death, right? Did you love? Are you dying without that regret?”

That knot was getting bigger every moment. “You told him that you loved me.”

“I even gave him your name,” Juliana admitted in a sad rush. “With his connections, it would have been so easy for him to do a check on you and to—”

“Find the cabin under my name.” Hell. The pieces fit. And that sure explained how Guerrero’s men had tracked her so quickly.

“When you got me out, I didn’t think what I’d said mattered.” Sadness trembled in her tone. “I mean, I’d told him how you felt so I never expected—”

Logan caught her hands, pulling them away from her body. The tumble of her words froze and she stared up at him with parted lips. “How did I feel?” It scraped him raw on the inside to think that she’d been talking with Guerrero, laying her beautiful soul bare.

Juliana swallowed. “I told him that you didn’t love me back.”

His focus centered only on her. On the rasp of her breathing. The scent of vanilla. The ghost of pain in her eyes.

“So I thought he’d know there was nothing between us. I never thought he’d go into your life or that he’d—”

Logan put his mouth on hers. His tongue slipped past her lips. The kiss was probably too hard, too rough, but so was he right then.