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“My quarters now,” he said, jerking his chin.
~o0o~
“Where are we headed?” she asked the moment Alexei had closed the door on his high-tech study. Her body was still singing from being manhandled by Alexei on the mat, but her brain was functioning clearly enough to know that she had to keep her wits about her.
“You’re in no position to question me. Shut your mouth,” he added coldly, “and listen for once. You did a good thing last night. And you put up a reasonable show on the mat this morning. You could be of use to us when we reach the island.”
“Are you offering me a job?”
“I thought you already had one,” Alexei commented with a lift of his brow. “Only a few unique and special individuals work with us.”
“And I don’t qualify?” Amber’s hackles rose. “How can you say that when you don’t know anything about me?”
Folding his arms, Alexei stared down at her. “You think I don’t know about you? You think that’s not what I do? How do you think I’ve stayed alive so long? I know everything about you, even down to the fact that you took the job at Hard News, and turned down an offer to join one of the UK’s elite undercover squads because you could see a time coming when you might want to settle down to civilian life.”
“But I never planned to work for you.”
“Not until you were sent here,” he reminded her.
Which was true. Working for Alexei would be full of risk, and not just because of the dangerous missions he undertook. Her heart was at risk too. Unfortunately, the more coolly he behaved toward her, the more of a challenge she found him. Currently, he was right up there in the space marked “Stay away from this man. If you can.”
“I do need to deliver my story,” she admitted, “But I can tailor it to suit whatever story you want to put out.”
With that statement, she had just declared her loyalty, Amber realized. She felt good about it too. Part of her had wondered if Alexei was just another member of the privileged one percent of society, who lived their lives in an ivory tower, but he had proved to be so much more than that. He used his wealth to help others rather than himself, and because of it, he appealed to her on so much more than just a sexual level.
She’d freely admit that she’d fallen for the world he inhabited. She’d always thought of herself as a woman of action but had somehow had got stuck in a low-level reporting job. What could be better than working to change the world for good, as Alexei did, and with a powerful team around her? It would be a culmination of her life’s training and dreams.
“If you do come to work for me, I’ll need to know more about you so I can protect those you care about,” Alexei explained. “The first place any gang will strike to try to get at you is at those you love.”
“I thought you knew everything about me?”
“I need to hear your version of events to be sure nothing was left out of the reports I’ve received.”
Amber only wished she could read the reports he’d received and know where he’d got them from, and who had compiled them, but like all the other secrets she suspected Alexei held close to his chest, she guessed she’d never know. “Where would you like me to start?”
“Childhood,” he instructed.
“Father in the military.” The rush of pain she always felt when she thought about her father silenced her for a few moments. His memory was like a clear bell chiming through all the fug in between. “He was killed on the battlefield, trying to save his comrades.” Pressing her lips together, she lifted her chin. “My mother married again.” This all came out clipped. She didn’t want to relive that part of her past at all—not the mocking she’d suffered at the hands of her stepfather, or his verbal abuse of her father, or the way he’d hit her mother, and worse, when he’d had too much to drink.
“Your stepfather abused you?” Alexei guessed.
“Are you asking me or telling me?” She fixed Alexei with an unblinking stare.
He shrugged. “As I said, I’d like to hear your version of events.”
“I spent a lot of time hiding,” she admitted. “When I was older and the army recruitment team moved into the nearest town, it seemed like the right time to follow my dad into the military. I guess you pulled my record, so I won’t elaborate beyond saying that I loved my time in the forces. Further training in Special Ops was mentioned, and I seized the opportunity. Joining the forces was like joining another family for me.”
“And your stepfather?” Alexei prompted.
“He was forces too, and had never got over the fact th
at he’d failed advanced training, while I got through. It pissed him off. I pissed him off. He liked to test me when I was home on leave, until one day his test became…shall we say, a little more intimate?”
“Did you survive it?”
“Clearly, I did.” Amber’s face froze as she remembered. “He got no further than a quick grope. He wouldn’t have got that far if I’d expected him to do something like that while my mother was in the room. I suppose now that was just further proof of his contempt for both of us.”
“You had a lucky escape.”
