Chapter 21

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

February 4 th

1:00 A.M.

Safe .

Safe .

Safe .

Cassie's mind kept repeating the word over and over again in an attempt to make it feel like a reality.

But the reality was she didn't feel safe.

She felt violated, she felt afraid, she felt … broken.

Not like herself.

Not like the old version that had spent the last twenty-three years focused only on what her parents instilled in her that her role was. Not like the newer version of herself either. The one that Luis had brought out in her. One that finally understood it was neither selfish nor frivolous to do things she enjoyed, that made her happy.

She felt like … nothing.

Just nothing.

Like all she wanted was to curl up into a ball, make herself as small as possible, and then just cease to exist.

"I'm here, princess, I'm not going anywhere," Luis whispered. His lips touched the top of her head, and his arms held her tighter against his chest. He'd been murmuring soft words of reassurance ever since he walked into the room and found her, but the words weren't helping.

Nothing was helping.

Nothing would ever help because what had happened had happened.

There was no taking it back, no pretending it hadn't, no erasing it from her mind, no forgetting. It had happened and it was going to stay with her forever. How was she supposed to go on now?

How was she supposed to live her life, be normal, be anything other than a traumatized mess?

"Princess, I'm going to carry you out of here now, okay? I'm going to take you through the boat and onto a zodiac we have waiting. We're going to take you back to shore and to the hospital. I'm not going anywhere, I'm going to be right by your side the whole time. You're not ever going to be alone again," Luis vowed.

Part of her wanted to protest leaving this room. The others were out there she knew that. Knew it because one of them had passed in a blanket for Luis to wrap around her since her clothes were a useless mess. She didn't want them to see her, didn't want them to know what had happened, didn't want anyone to ever see her again.

The other part wanted to get the hell out of this room where she had been tortured and humiliated.

But leaving the room didn't mean leaving the memories behind. Whether she was in there or out of there those memories were a part of her now. There was no way to go back. The only option was forward. Only going forward terrified her because she couldn't see a clear path. It was like being back on that paralyzing drug, she could see and hear, but everything was blurry, and she didn't know how to make her body move in any one direction.

For now, she didn't have to move. Luis had her tucked against his chest, and when he opened the door and strolled out into the hall, his hold on her tightened.

Tightened until she almost felt like she was being crushed.

It didn't hurt though. The opposite in fact. His hold did what his words couldn't. They actually made her feel a little safer because he was still there. He'd seen her chained to the bed, the vibrator going inside her, heard her begging and pleading, seen her at her absolute worst, and yet he hadn't left.

He was there.

Holding her.

Soothing her the only way he knew how.

A tiny flicker of hope lit inside her chest.

It was small, barely noticeable, but she felt it.

You're not alone.

I'm here.

I'm not going anywhere.

You'll never be alone again.

Desperately, she clung to those words. They felt like they couldn't penetrate at the moment, felt distant and not part of her. But they were there, circling around her, just waiting for an opportunity to slip inside her mind.

For now, just feeling Luis' tight grip on her was doing more than anything else could, and it stilled the panic, terror, and humiliation enough for other thoughts to start trickling in.

There was something important she needed to tell Luis and the others.

Something more important than her own feelings.

Lifting her head off Luis' shoulder she looked up at him, at his strong jaw, at the pain in his eyes. There was determination there, too, and dedication, and something that looked fairly close to love, or at least the beginnings of it.

"The mole is a woman," she told him. Her voice was weak, and her throat felt raw. Hours of screaming as orgasm after orgasm assailed her body with little break in between them, left her hoarse and so very tired. All she wanted to do was slip away into blessed sleep for a few hours and forget what had happened.

But she couldn't do that.

People were counting on her.

Lives depended on her.

She had to do this.

There would be time to be weak later, to cry over what had happened, to get angry that someone she knew had betrayed her, to curl up and wish that she could just disappear.

That time wasn't now.

Now she had to be strong. She had to find strength from somewhere and she already knew where to find it. Could feel it flowing out of the man looking down at her so tenderly that tears blurred her vision.

"Do you know who?" a voice asked from behind her, and she shifted her gaze so she could see Rocco standing there.

"Leave her be," Luis growled. "She needs rest right now not an interrogation."

Actually, what she needed was not to feel helpless.

Those hours of being trapped in her own body, then being cuffed to the bed while pumped high on the arousal drug and being made to orgasm on repeat had left her feeling powerless. The threats Raul had made when the second dose of the drug was administered weighed heavily on her mind, and she knew that if Luis and the others hadn't turned up when they did, every man on the boat would be lining up to rape her right this second.

Thankfully, the drug was mostly out of her system, and other than a distant hum of arousal and a faint flush, her head was clear enough to think. To process. To know what she had to do.

"It's okay, Luis, I can do this. I have to do this," she corrected. The only way to undo the powerlessness she'd felt was to take back that control.

"You need rest, princess," he said as he looked down at her.

"I need this more."

Despite the indecision in his eyes, he pressed a kiss to her forehead and then nodded. "Do you know the mole's name?"

"No, but Raul said she when he was talking about her."

"Raul was here?" Rocco asked.

"Yeah. You didn't get him?" she asked. The weapons dealer had been there when the second dose of arousal drug was given to her, and she knew he planned on sitting back and watching as his men raped her. If he hadn't been there when Luis and the others arrived, it was because he had been tipped off that they were coming.

"No, princess, he must have left before we got here. But we will get him," Luis vowed with such determination that despite all the evidence to the contrary and the number of times the man had already slipped through their fingers she actually believed him.

"I know where the final bomb is, the one that was going to kill a whole bunch of people if we didn't give up the formula," Cassie told the others. She had no idea if there had been a bomb at the hospital, if it had gone off, if people had died, if she'd been right about her guess or not, and while she did want to find out the answers to all those questions it would have to wait.

This was more important.

Determination was starting to flow through her system now. It was in her nature to need to figure out a problem, find answers, and then solutions. This was what she knew how to do, and she needed to cling to it right now for her own sanity.

"Tell us where, Cass, and we'll make sure that it's disarmed before anyone gets hurt," Rocco said, his voice soft but not condescending.

"You can't," she said, meeting his gaze squarely. While she absolutely appreciated that all these guys wanted to take care of her and fix this problem, unfortunately, this was one thing only she could fix.

"What do you mean we can't?" Luis asked.

"Because the bomb is set up a certain way. A new technology that Raul must have bought from somewhere. I don't know how it works yet, but I'm sure I could figure it out if I studied it, figure out a workaround."

"What are you saying, princess?"

Turning her gaze back to Luis, she took hold of every ounce of strength she knew he was trying to send her way. "Because the bomb is set to only disarm with my fingerprints."

February 4 th

2:22 A.M.

There was not a single thing about this that he liked.

Protective instincts on overdrive, all Luis wanted to do was wrap his girl up in a million silky soft blankets and tuck her away someplace where she would be safe. Preferably a hospital with his entire team standing guard at the door so he knew for certain there was not a single chance in hell that anybody could get to Cassie. If she wouldn't agree to the hospital, he'd take her to his place, cocoon her away in his bedroom, and keep her tucked up in his arms where he knew she was safe.

But this …

This was the opposite of safe.

This was taking her right to the epicenter of danger.

Luis didn't like one little bit that the mole had set this up specifically to target Cassie. Of course, there was the likelihood that the mole had known who would be at the lab that night they set off the first bomb, but there was a chance it hadn't been targeted specifically at any one of the four women on Athena Team.

There was no way this could be taken the same way.

It would have taken a lot of work to source Cassie's fingerprints from her Prey file, and then set them up so they were the only way to disarm the bomb. The mole wanted to drag Cassie into this more than she already had been.

On top of everything his girl had just been through, the last thing she needed was the added weight of taking responsibility for the bomb that was set to go off. She already blamed herself for the whole mess involving the drug and her team, and if hundreds or even thousands of people were killed because she wasn't there to disarm the bomb, it would crush her.

"It's okay, Luis," her soft voice spoke and one of her hands peeked out of the blanket she was wrapped up in to stroke along his jaw.

How was she the one comforting him right now?

It should be the other way around.

She'd just been through hell, and there had been no time for her to rest and recoup some strength, no check-up with a doctor, no chance to even begin processing her ordeal. As soon as she announced the bomb and her fingerprints they'd hopped onto the zodiac, come back to shore, found clothes for Cassie, then hopped right in a car to drive out to the cruise terminal.

Apparently, that was where the mole had chosen to plant their final bomb. He was sure it meant something that everything seemed to keep circling back around to boats and the water, but right now, he didn't care what it meant.

Didn't care about the mole's identity.

Didn't care that with this bomb located that still left one out there somewhere.

All he cared about was protecting the woman who meant more to him than he'd ever realized he was capable of feeling.

It wasn't as though he thought there was something wrong with him that prevented him from loving another person, Luis knew that wasn't true. Both he and Miguel had been lucky to break away from the life that would have claimed them if they hadn't gone into foster care when they did. All these years the only thing preventing him from falling in love was himself.

Or maybe it was fate.

Because he couldn't imagine falling for anyone other than this sweet woman looking up at him with huge doe eyes filled with pain, and fear, and confusion, but also with more love than he felt he was worth.

"How are you so amazing?" he whispered, pulling her as close as he could with them both wearing their seatbelts.

"Not amazing, Luis. I was so scared. I'm still so scared. I screamed and begged and pleaded. I would have cracked. When Raul came back to have the next dose of his arousal drug administered and let his men start raping me, I would have told him the formula."

There was so much self-recrimination in Cassie's voice that he had no choice but to mentally skip over the sickening revelation she'd given him and focus only on her here and now. "Princess, no one would have blamed you if you told, not under that kind of torture."

"Scarlett and Lucy didn't tell, they were strong."

"They would have, princess, you know that. Sooner or later, if they hadn't been rescued, they would have cracked. That's just called being a human. That you're here now when you have every right to put yourself and your needs first, that's what makes you strong, that's what makes you special. That's what makes you amazing." Cradling her cheek in one hand, he feathered the lightest of kisses to her lips, not knowing what kind of touch she was and was not comfortable with right now.

"I'm not doing this because I'm amazing, Luis," she told him, not mentioning the kiss so he assumed he hadn't pushed his luck too far. "I'm doing it because if I don't, innocent people will suffer."

Her screwed-up logic made him smile despite everything else going on. "Hate to break it to you, princess, but you're not living up to your IQ right now."

Brow creasing, she looked up at him. "What do you mean?"

"That is why you're amazing. Because after everything that you've been through, you're still able to put other people first. Thank you."

"For what?"

"For seeing past my bad attitude, for giving me a chance with you even though I didn't make the best of first impressions. Thank you for forgiving me."

"I'll agree your attitude wasn't the best at first, but it certainly wasn't anything that was unforgivable."

"Not for the attitude, princess. For failing you." If he wasn't absolutely positive that his girl needed him right now and that it would make him the world's most selfish jerk to disappear on her, then he would have considered bailing.

After failing Miguel, he'd vowed never to take on the responsibility of another person. Working as a SEAL with his team was different, they were in it together, he had other people at his back, responsibility wasn't resting entirely on his shoulders.

If it wasn't for Cassie, he never would have broken his vow.

She was irresistible and he'd felt drawn to her, but now he'd failed her, too.

Broken the promises he'd made.

Lived out his worst nightmare all over again.

"You didn't fail me," Cassie assured him in her sweet, trusting way.

"Yeah, princess, I did. I let you slip away from me when I knew you weren't safe. I didn't watch over you like I should have, and because of that, you were taken."

"I was taken because I left your side even knowing I was in danger, because I spotted Violet and …" her voice trailed off and fresh tears glistened in her eyes.

"I'm sorry you had to see that, Cass."

"I'm sorry you lost her. I know she meant something to you at one time."

There she went again being all selfless. Taking care of this one he would have his work cut out for him. Any time he tried, she was going to turn it all around and be the one trying to look out for him. "Violet didn't deserve the death she got even though she wasn't a good person. But there's only one person I can't live without, princess."

"Me?" she asked it like it was an actual question.

"If you have to ask then I obviously haven't done a good enough job of showing you." Dipping his head, he let his mouth hover above hers, giving her the option of pulling away if this was too much for her right now. When she didn't move, just stared up at him with those big eyes of hers, eyes that hid nothing, that were a window to her soul, that he could get lost staring into, he allowed his lips to brush across hers.

So sweet.

So pure.

So innocent.

So his.

He could spend the rest of his life just kissing this woman and never once get tired of it. This was what he'd been missing all those years, this connection, something that transcended understanding, that made him feel lost and grounded all at the same time.

Someone cleared their throat, and both he and Cassie pulled away, turning to the front seat of the SUV where both Rocco and Phantom were twisted in their seats looking at them with amused smiles.

"Hate to break things up with you two adorable lovebirds, but we're here," Rocco announced.

Through the windscreen, he could see the cruise ship they believed was the one the mole had planted her bomb on. It was due to set sail later this morning after being in port for the last week. The captain and crew had been alerted to the possible bomb, and they had already begun to offload.

They had no idea how the mole had managed to sneak explosives on board the ship, but then again, the mole had proven time and time again that they were capable of the near impossible.

The cruise ship was a creative choice, and one that would make a massive impact on world news, not just an inventive choice but a smart one, too, when you wanted to make a statement.

But right now, his priority was only the woman at his side.

"You can pull out of this if you want," he told Cassie, capturing her chin between his thumb and forefinger and tilting her face so she met his gaze.

"No. I can't. No matter the risks, I have to do this. I couldn't live with myself if people died because of me, and I'm the only one who can turn this bomb off. If I want even a chance at building the life I want, I need to do this to take my power back. Besides, I can do anything as long as I have you by my side."

Touching a kiss to her lips, Luis released his hold on her chin and instead framed her face with his hands. "You have me by your side, Cassie. Always. I will follow you anywhere you go, no matter what."

With that, they both climbed out of the car, and hand in hand approached what could very well be their deaths.