Page 58 of Dead Drift

“Protection is good, but not when it shuts you down.” He knew that only too well.

She shook her head, a sarcastic huff expelling from her freshly kissed lips. “So I’m just supposed to put my heart right back out there for you to crush all over again?”

“No.” He stepped toward her and tipped her chin up, forcing her to look him in the eye. “I will never hurt you again.”

“How can I ever trust you?”

“Only time will prove you can.”

“What if I’m not willing to put my life on hold for you again? For however many years you will disappear next time?”

“As soon as this case is over and Ebeid is stopped, I’m out.”

Her eyes widened. “Seriously?”

“Seriously. I’m leaving the Agency.”

“Why?”

He linked his fingers with hers, intertwining them. “Do you really have to ask?”

“Don’t do it for me.”

“I want everything I do from now on to be for you.”

She shook her head, backing away, shutting down. “You said that before.”

“I know, and in my own messed-up, complicated way, I convinced myself my leaving was for you—to protect you—but I see now it was my selfish, immature way to have an adventure.”

“There’s that word again.”

He frowned. “What word?”

She glared at him. “Adventure.”

Why on earth did the word adventure bother her so much?

Suddenly, the office door swung open. “We’ve got a problem,” Declan said.

“What is it?” Kate asked.

Declan rested his weight against the doorframe. “Guards went to move our detainee from his holding cell to the interrogation room and discovered he’d hung himself in his cell.”

Luke’s jaw tensed. “How?”

“Best we can tell, he waited until the guard standing watch got called away for a moment. He apparently had a length of paracord sewn into his waistband. Pulled it out and hung himself.”

“Ebeid has them trained disturbingly well,” Luke said. “They are so terrified he’ll kill them if they talk—or do far worse before he kills them—that they’d rather take their own lives than face him.”

“Or they truly believe they are serving a greater purpose and cause by taking their own lives rather than risking compromising the mission,” Tanner said, entering behind Declan.

Kate shook her head. “I can’t get over how ruthless Ebeid is. It’s like he’s got mind control over these men.”

24

Griffin studied his beautiful wife, deep in slumber. She’d fallen asleep before they’d even reached cruising altitude. Though he wasn’t surprised after the night they’d had, followed by another intensive and draining day.

Once drink service began, he took the cup of coffee from the flight attendant and settled in to work during their flight to Wilmington, North Carolina.