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God. “I meant with everything else.”
Asher scooted up the bed to lean against the wall. His fly was still undone. Harry deliberately didn’t look at it. “We wait.”
“For what?”
Asher shrugged. “For information on where we go next.”
“From your friend with the mysterious accent. Who calls you his darling.”
Asher grinned. “Youarejealous.”
Yes, you are. Admit it. As much as you loathe this man, you like him too.
Harry ignored the voice in his head that mocked him. “I am not.”
Asher chuckled. “But I think you are.”
Harry growled at him, and for a long, drawn out few minutes, neither of them spoke. Until it got the best of Harry. “How do you know him? What’s his name? I don’t even know what to call him. I can’t keep calling him Four.”
“You can. He would be so amused.”
“His name.”
“His name is not your concern,” Asher said coolly.
Harry growled at him again.
“You shouldn’t snarl at me like that,” he replied with a smirk. “It turns me on.”
Harry sighed and rolled his eyes, all out of patience. “I need some answers, Asher. So you either start talking or I’m gone. And no bullshit. I want the truth.”
Asher stared at him, like he was trying to decide if this was Harry’s tipping point. But he stared too long, he stayed silent too long. Harry stood and snatched up his backpack.
“Sit down,” Asher said. “Give me a minute. It’s not easy for me to talk of this. I’ve never spoken of this. To anyone.”
Now it was Harry who had to size up Asher’s sincerity.
He was nervous, pained even. He frowned, his eyebrows furrowing. “I’ve known him a long time,” Asher said. “Ten years. He’s been the most constant thing in my life. The only constant person in my life. Ever. I have no one. No family, no country to call home. I have... only him.”
Harry sat back down.
“He was a target,” Asher said. “An assignment. He was on the run from his own country. He had accessed information he wasn’t supposed to have seen, and they put a price on his head.”
“Sounds familiar.”
Asher nodded, though his smile wasn’t a happy one. “I found him and I watched him, and I put together a plan.” He sighed. “See, I was young, and I had nothing. No one. All the jobs I got came throughbadpeople. The wrong people. Unsanctioned, mercenary. They didn’t just kill people. They trafficked whatever they could: money, drugs, weapons. People.” He had a distant look in his eyes, as if his memories had taken him somewhere dark. He shook his head and met Harry’s gaze. “I can kill bad people. I have no problem with that. It’s what we do, and I’m very good at it. But I can’t be part of the shipment of women.” He looked down at his lap and whispered, “And children.”
Harry could tell that whatever Asher had seen, been witness to, been part of, was not good.
“So you put together a plan,” Harry murmured, trying to move Asher out of the places his memories had taken him. “Made a deal with him that was beneficial to you both.”
Asher nodded. “Yes. He’s very good at what he does. There is nothing he can’t do with a computer. He’s a genius. Literally. At mathematics, codes, numbers. He has a brain like a machine. His government had him accessing information on other countries, allies, enemies; security, financial, nuclear, you name it. He found operations he was not supposed to find, and someone decided he’d seen too much.”
“And you were supposed to kill him.”
“It was an easy job. He was out of the country, which was rare. His people had lined it up that way, so they could use his death on foreign soil for trade leverage.”
“Nice.”
