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She shifted onto her side and stuffed a pillow under her head to support it. “I had to stay away,” she said, trying to explain why she hadn’t returned to her allies this week.
“You didn’t. Who told you to—”
“I’m of no use to you anymore, no use to the Kindred.” Her love for Brodie hadn’t been in question, but her place in his ranks was because she felt like a fraud. She’d done her piece and didn’t see how she could be of use to such a clan anymore. “Yes, you’re right. I probably am grieving Grant, and there’s some part of me that wonders why you’re not more affected by it. We didn’t get to say goodbye to him or to Art. There was no ceremony, you took him away, and put him straight into the ground.” She kept on going before he could respond to what he’d consider an insult. “But I’ve been worried about my place in the Kindred. I don’t have special skills like the rest of you do. Sutcliffe’s gone. Grant’s gone. Game Time is under our control, and now you’re bringing people in to take CI out from under me too.”
He was on his back with his hands resting on his abs. He just laid there scowling at the ceiling, and she hoped that he wasn’t going to ignore her insecurities.
“Do you want CI?” he asked, turning his head and loosening his expression. “If you want it, it’s yours. It didn’t occur to me that you might want to take over running things. You’d have to stay at the manor and if the Kindred are working overseas we’d be apart—”
“This isn’t about CI,” she said, covering the back of one of his hands with her palm. Physical contact anchored them both, the feel of his skin grounded her, and she regretted putting a wedge between them this week.
Brodie needed a reason, he needed to understand and with her offering no answers, he was forced to speculate. “It’s about us? Do you think I’m replacing you?”
If only it were that easy. “No,” she said, rubbing his hand. “This is about me figuring out who I am in this setup. Before we lost Grant, I could gather intel for the Kindred, I always had a purpose. I’m just feeling a bit useless and that’s not your fault. I just have to figure out how to adapt.”
Obviously, he still wasn’t satisfied. It was tough for her to explain what she didn’t fully understand herself. “Did you think I wanted you out of the way at CI?” he asked. “Or are you determined to be there because it makes you feel closer to Grant?”
She’d often stopped and stared at the CI walls wondering why she was there. Sad as it was, she knew the reason. “It’s comforting.”
“Comforting?”
Taking a deep breath, she explained what she knew. “When I feel lost or confused, I can lose myself in work. Having strict policies and procedures gives me structure that saves me from having to make decisions on my own when my head is screwed up like it is now.”
Brodie wasn’t panicked. He never panicked. Reassuring her was something he was getting better at and that he made the effort meant something to her. His patience endured longer with her than anyone else. “There will always be a place for you in the Kindred,” he said.
Except what he didn’t know was that her insecurities lay there and they seeped back in as sought reassurance. “As more than just your whore?” she murmured, arching a brow. She didn’t mind that role, but it wouldn’t help on missions. It wasn’t his view that she questioned, it was her own. If she was useless to the group in any practical capacity then all she could be was Brodie’s mate. Leaving him wasn’t even close to an option, but she wasn’t sure if she could adapt to being homemaker rather than active participant in the Kindred. “I appreciate that you want me around and I promise I’m not even thinking about leaving you. I just have to figure things out.”
“Meesh will need your support for the transition to new management. You’re still vital to CI.”
Something she liked to be. He turned his hand to curl his fingers in hers and took her knuckles to his lips. Brodie didn’t have the same affinity for the McCormack family firm that she did. In fact, she’d guess he was a bit affronted that she got her solace there rather than with the Kindred. For her, it wasn’t about choosing sides. Kindred missions meant patience, long periods of waiting, especially in the case of Leatt when they had no solid leads thus no solid plans.
CI was a distraction. It wasn’t one that would last. She’d do what was needed to ensure the place didn’t go to ruin, but she couldn’t see herself buddying up to Brodie’s ex, Cuckoo and working under her in the same way Zara had worked under Grant.
One point needed to be asserted without equivocation though. “You should always consult me before calling an ex, just for future reference,” she said.
He put up no argument and picked up her hand to kiss each of her fingertips. “Noted and understood. Now, are you gonna tell me how you know about Mischa?”
Zara told the truth. “Art told me that you worked with her father,” she said. Amusement contorted his lips causing her to peer closer and scoot toward him some more. “You didn’t?”
Kissing her fingers, he was calm as he admitted, “I didn’t work for him, I worked him over.”
With a shallow shake of her head, she frowned. “I don’t—”
“I killed him.”
Inhaling through her nose, she wilted some. She should be used to those abrupt words by now, but they still blindsided her every time. “Why?”
“Meesh paid me to,” he said, letting go of her hand to shift onto his side. “She’d spent months sleeping her way around the criminal element in Italy’s major cities looking for a hitman.”
Zara couldn’t see what the trouble would be for her. Mischa was dynamic and cosmopolitan according to what Art had said, even those who weren’t killers by trade would probably offer to do the job if it got her between their sheets. “She’s beautiful, isn’t she? I would think men would be falling over themselves for her.”
“She didn’t want men. She wanted the best.”
“Which is you.”
“Right,” he said, lifting a strand of hair from her cheek to tuck it into place with her other locks. “My name came up again and again when she made it clear what she wanted, no mess, no repercussions. But getting a referral is tough, even those who know me are scared to piss me off by connecting me with a client… Especially one that could be volatile.”
“But she found you eventually?”
