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“The last time I was with her was when I extracted her the night of the gala from Carson’s clutches. She found out that I’d met with her dad, that I’d been working with him behind her back. She didn’t exactly take well to that.”
“So she was upset with you? Who cares? It’s just a spat, just an obstacle, it won’t take away from how she feels about us.”
“It was about her dad, Killian. The man she’d pulled out all the stops to find, who she’d immersed herself in the dark for.” He gestured at Aaron. “Who she underwent his grueling and brutal training for.” He eased himself back into the chair, a pained groan escaping him as his body shook from the strain. “It’s also possible that she’s… damaged.”
“Damaged?”
“She was bound and locked in a room with Carson Monroe,” Jonah interjected.
“Fuck,” I rasped. “Ash, did he… he—”
“He touched her.”
My gut twisted. “How? I mean, how bad… what did he—”
“Stop,” Jonah barked when he saw Asher bring his hand to his face, likely making the connection to what he’d endured at that bastard’s hands too.
I drew in a breath, forcing myself to hold back. “Then we’ll take care of her.”
“We will,” Jonah said. “Asher just wanted you to be prepared. He’s being transparent.”
I scoffed. “A little too late.”
With an aggressive move, he got in my space. “Before you come at him—or try to because, believe me, I’ll fucking be there to stop you—you need to know that Revenant set him up.”
I frowned.
“Jonah, don’t,” Ash said.
He looked over his shoulder at him. “No, I’m going to. You’ve been carrying everything on your own for too long. It’s fucking well hurting you. No more!” Turning back to me, he said, “You want to know what happened that night Asher met with that fucker? Here it is.”
“All it's done is allow me to move you into a difficult and no-win position with the woman you love. A position that will ensure, no matter which direction things go in, she’ll see you as betraying her trust, keeping secrets again, her own father from her, in fact.”
“Why?”
“I told you, kid, you can’t have my daughter.”
“You come for her and I’ll stop you.”
I blinked at his account of what had gone down.
That attitude fit exactly with the way I’d come to know her bastard of a father.
I looked out at Ash. “That’s why you really partnered with her on all the takedowns? Your skills are a deterrent, even to the likes of him. You were defending her from being taken.”
“I was.”
“And he paid for it by Revenant setting him up to be taken and fucking well tortured,” Jonah gritted out. “So stand the fuck down. You hear me, Kill?”
“Yeah,” I said, stepping back and shoving my hand through my hair. “I hear you.”
“Shit,” Aaron spoke. “Let’s take it down.” He looked to Ash. “I figured you intended to partner those two on this Coulson mission, yeah?”
Ash sighed heavily. “Initially.”
“All this shit, that’s now a no-go,” Aaron said.
“I need you to go.”
