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I struggled against my restraints and rattled them hard, screaming out in rage. But no one else came. Eventually, I got tired, and I laid back and stared at the ceiling tiles. It was my own fault that I was stuck working for the agency. I’d gotten myself into this mess. And over a stupid boy, no less.
In my defense, I was much younger, and didn’t fully understand the weight of what I had been doing at the time. I’d always been good with computers, and my mind was basically built to be a hacker. I’d always been a bit more introverted, and tended to stay home, which lent itself to my growing skill set. Over the years, I got better and better hacking into whatever I wanted, and I got confident, cocky. And it had cost me.
It had started when I was younger, and I’d credit myself more tokens for whatever computer game I was currently playing. Then it had escalated in my early teenage years to updating grades. When word had caught on at school that I had a special skill set, that’s when I’d been paid to start hacking into things for other people. Then, as I got older, the jobs got sketchier, and I got more and more numb to the reality of what I was doing. The lines between right and wrong became extremely fuzzy.
Next thing you know, I was hacking into air traffic control like it was no big deal and changing my ex-boyfriends flight. I was seventeen at the time, and I’d been heartbroken when I found out he’d cheated on me. Everyone knew about it before I did, and it was humiliating. And when I’d heard he was taking his new girl on the family vacation that I was supposed to be joining him on, I snapped. If I couldn’t be with him, and go on that trip as his girlfriend, no one was going on that trip.
I’d rerouted his family’s plane from Cancun to a small town outside of Mexico City. My goal was to just fuck up their vacation and mess with him. At seventeen I probably shouldn’t have been able to do what I did, but because no one really knew what I was doing, not even my dad, there had been no one to guide me back onto the straight and narrow until it was far too late. I’d completely missed out on the wrist slap and gone straight to the prison sentence.
What I didwasa big deal. I knew that. But it was made evenworseby the fact that there was a prominent government official onboard the plane, and I’d unknowingly delivered that plane into cartel territory. And because I’d been much younger, I’d gotten into the air traffic control system just fine, but I hadn’t mastered the art of covering my tracks quite as well, and I got caught.
My dad’s best friend, Mason Reynolds, was an ex-Navy SEAL and now worked in cyber security for the CIA. My dad had pleaded with Mason to pull some strings and try to help me out. Mason insisted he couldn’t do anything to help, but my dad and I both knew he was behind the call I got, offering me a deal.
That’s when Viktor had contacted me. He’d promised me a full-time, well-paying job, and that the terrorism charges would be dropped, so long as I continued working for his division, a black op cyber security team that was under a branch of the CIA. The division executed and protected classified intel and missions that most people couldn’t stomach knowing about. It was off book and integral to the agency. It was a lifeline, but if I grabbed on, it would require devoting my entire life to the job. Otherwise, I’d be right back where I started.
With this job you were either in, or you were out. Complete and total devotion or bust.
As I stared at the ceiling, I felt enraged. One poor decision and here I was trapped for life. Maybe going to prison was the better option. Whether I was working for Viktor, and the agency, or I was locked up on terrorism charges, I was trapped either way. I was in a prison of my situation, and there was nothing I could do about it. I hated how helpless it made me feel.
I laid there not knowing what time it was, or how many minutes or hours had passed. I felt utterly alone. My dad didn’t know what Ireallydid. Even though I knew Mason worked in Cyber Security, I doubted Mason knew whatIreally did. Even if he did know, I couldn’t risk talking to him about it, not that we saw each other regularly these days.
My job was highly classified, and I was strictly forbidden from discussing it with anyone. I was utterly isolated and alone in it. Tonight was proof of that. Maybe I needed to do what Viktor said, just put my head down and do the work. Maybe it wasn’t all that bad. Maybe it was my own fault for pushing the limits.
I tried to push the bubbling desire for more down and out of my mind. I looked at the bruises down my arms, and the blood smeared down my tank top and shuddered. The memory of what had happened earlier in the night slowly pushed past the pounding fog in my head.
What was worse, getting attacked in my own home, or getting attacked in prison, if I kept this behavior up. I wasn’t really sure.
I mulled over the situation. Who had come to attack me? And how had I ended up here at the agency facility? Had they gotten my message and found me just in time? Why didn’t I think to ask Viktor about my attacker? See if he knew anything. I huffed, that was probably my only chance to get any information out of him about the events of tonight. After this, it would be a death sentence if I brought it up with him.
The events were fuzzy, and it didn’t add up. There was something I just couldn’t put my finger on, something almost familiar, maybe even hesitation from my attacker. I couldn’t be sure, but something about the whole situation didn’t sit right with me.
I had stabbed my attacker, and when I’d tried to escape, he’d shot at me, but he didn’t shoot me. He had held me at knifepoint, but hadn’t– and then I remembered my hair.
With my hands strapped down, I couldn’t reach up and feel the damage, but I cried. Of all the things, it was silly, really. Hair grew back, and thank God it wasn’t a finger like he’d threatened. But it was violating all the same to have your hair cut off like that. My hair was a bit of a security blanket for me, and my cheeks felt acidic as the tears streamed over them. And maybe I was crying about my hair, and maybe I was using it as an excuse to release the emotion of what I’d just been through; thinking I was about to be murdered in my own kitchen.
I jolted as the door to my cell suddenly clicked open and in strode a tall, muscular man, with warm tanned skin, and muscles that strained deliciously against the edges of his T-shirt. I sucked in a sharp breath as his warm brown eyes caught mine, and I felt a flush of heat splash up my chest and cheeks, and I squeezed my thighs together as that flush trickled into my core with nervous longing.
“I heard you weren't doing so hot.” His deep voice washed over me, making my insides swirl.
“Mason.” I whispered, looking around. “What are you doinghere?” I was completely caught off guard and baffled as to why he would be allowed in here.
“How you holding up?” His gaze swept over me as he approached the table I was strapped to. I flinched at being unable to move, while my dream man hovered so closely over me.
He unclasped the straps around my wrists, and then I tried to steady my breath as his hand momentarily touched the skin on my waist as he unclasped the restraint across the middle of me. I pushed myself up to my elbows and watched as he moved down to my feet, and his thumb grazed the soft inside of my ankle as he undid the strap. I felt my center tighten with slick heat in response.
“I’m fine.” I managed to squeak out.
“You don’t look fine.”
“I’m fine.” I ground out. I said it to convince myself just as much as Mason. I couldn’t afford to crumble, not when the stakes were this high. I had to keep my head on straight and keep moving forward. My life depended on it.
He stood at the foot of the table, leaning on the edge, causing the corded muscle in his forearms to fan. I sat propped up on my elbows, finding myself momentarily distracted by the salt and pepper strands streaking their way through his perfect dark head of hair. He was so fucking handsome, and he took my breath away, I’d imagined what it would be like to be with him more times than I could count. Imagined those muscular arms pressing me up against the wall while he thrust into me. I shuddered at the thought and swallowed hard.
Mason was my dad’s friend, and he’d known me since I was younger, more awkward, and immature, and I was sure that was all I measured up to now. Especially being strapped to this table like a toddler having a tantrum.
Mason was so out of my league, and I tried not to think about how much that hurt. I’d never wanted anyone more.
My hand, now free, shot up to my hair, and I felt the blunt short ends that fell around my shoulders.
