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“B—but you hated me? At the castle. You spoke…”
I heard him swallow even above my own ragged breath. “I spoke harshly because…”
His softness then made me look up and our eyes met. His eyes were shining with affection and yes, something like love.
“I’m surprised I’m alive, as it happens,” he said, worrying his top lip.
I inhaled shakily and closed my eyes, hardly able to believe this was happening.
“Caelan will break you, someday,” I whispered, afraid my husband might still hear, even from wherever he’d gone.
Eric sniggered and cupped a hand around his mouth. “Oh, he already did that a long time ago. I just never let him know I’d got past my delusions to see what he really is, beneath.”
“Beneath?”
Eric smirked. “He thinks I did what I did in Ukraine to bring him back into the game. I didn’t.”
“What did you do in Ukraine?” I asked, even though I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.
He met my eye without shame and didn’t take too long to think about what it was he wanted to say. “It’s a war zone, Flora. The people are scared. There’s no black and white. Normal rules do not apply.” I could buy that, at least. “So, there was a Russian asset I’d evacuated from a bombing. Yes, the team got killed in that bombing, but I had no hand in that, I swear. I nearly got killed myself but it was pure luck I’d been on watch that night and was stationed just outside the blast radius alongside the asset we’d stashed in a bunker.” Eric’s conviction seemed real. “We unfortunately got picked up by a bunch of Ukraine militia and things got complicated, hence them calling in Caelan to negotiate the situation. However, if they’d just left me to it, I was on the verge of convincing the Ukraine’s to let us go free so I could take the asset to the proper authorities… when Caelan turned up and ruined everything.”
I narrowed my eyes. “In that swaggering way of his?”
“Yup. But I was playing a long game. I had plans.”
“Plans?” I raised my brows.
He nodded and told me defiantly, “I’d convinced the Russian double agent whom I’d rescued that I was bent. I’d given him a bank account to wire money to in exchange for intel from me. I was going to send him back to his handlers with false information which would ultimately destroy the reputation of one of Russia’s top military advisors. Because every single man we take out is one less enemy, one more chink in their armour.”
I wanted to believe him so badly. After all, wasn’t this what SAS men did? Inveigle, unbind enemy lines piece by piece, shatter loyalties, play mind games… then smash. It seemed plausible.
“I could’ve and maybe should’ve fought Caelan when he arrived in Ukraine, maybe explained myself more, been forceful instead of a pussy. But he was set on his own plan of attack. Isn’t that Caelan all over?” He shrugged and I knew what he was saying. “And maybe I wanted to get rid of him long enough to have a good crack at you, see if you’re both really as happy as he always makes out. Well, I got my answer, didn’t I?”
My jaw nearly fell open and I had to clench my teeth to keep from gawping. The insinuation was staggering: that Eric had used Caelan’s absence as an opportunity to get closer to me. That it wasn’t really Caelan who he was obsessed with anymore, but me.
“There’s something wrong with him,” Eric continued, “something that leaves him without reason. I’ve never known him be so impulsive and erratic before. God knows what he had to do in order to get himself back home. I wouldn’t like to think! He’s lucky to have escaped alive.” My face fell and he saw. “Me? I’m a single man. But a married man with a kid can’t go round doing that anymore, right?”
I felt sick and my palms became sweaty. “I don’t know what he was thinking.” My thoughts turned dark. “But sometimes, I do wonder, if there are things he purposely avoids. Like real life. He’d rather go to Ukraine than go to the supermarket with me.”
A filthy smile painted his face; I’d given him the opportunity to seize upon my doubts. “Last year, I wanted to murder Sherry, to despatch her, eradicate the threat to you entirely. He wouldn’t have it, wouldn’t let me take her out. Mistake number one in my book.” The seriousness of his stare, his tone, told me he was telling the truth. “I knew when I heard on the grapevine Blake Rathbone was rumoured not dead, he’d have heard that, too. And I knew with that rumour Sherry would be on the warpath. But again, my warnings… my plan to have her done away with inside fell on deaf ears.”
Violent rage hit me square between the eyes and I wanted to murder something, someone. Smash. Break. Destroy.
Lies, such terrible lies. So many.
“When it comes to that woman, he’s blind, Flora. I never imagined in a million years he could possibly have an Achilles heel, but she’s it. She’s why reason goes out of his head. The thought of her out there still. Doing what she does. I mean, is that what he wants? Me to kill her without him knowing, so he can just wash his hands and be absolved. I don’t know…”
I rubbed the tears from my eyes, my hands trembling as I pushed the hair back from my face, the reality of it all setting in. I thought it was more than likely that Caelan had known before heading to Ukraine that everyone but Eric was dead. If he’d have told me that before he left for the war zone, I’d have told him to stay home and not bother.
But he wouldn’t have wanted to hear that; because, deep down, he’d been desperate to leave us for the heady heights of all-out warfare once more.
He’d also gone knowing Sherry’s goons might eventually catch up to me, but perhaps he’d somehow known Eric would be here to fill the void. It didn’t matter which way I looked at it, the fact of the matter was, Sherry was the biggest threat to our happiness and he’d been offered the chance to eradicate her but hadn’t.
“Tell me what you’ve just said is true. Swear on my life. On Logan’s. Swear it!”
Eric moved across the bed and sat before me, and I only saw love and desire in that beautiful face of his. He put his hand over mine, a sad smile tugging at those perfect pink lips of his.
“I swear it, Flora. On my life.”
