19. Chapter Nineteen Abby

Chapter Nineteen: Abby

N athan was afraid.

I hadn't ever seen him afraid, but he was afraid then; rushing me out, making excuses about early appointments. Soon, we were in his car speeding back toward his apartment. The night had thrown its thick blanket over San Francisco, but the tension inside the car felt heavier than any darkness outside. I watched him from my peripheral view, the lines of his usually unreadable face furrowed in a rare display of distress. His hands gripped the steering wheel with an intensity that matched the chaos of the evening.

I hated it, the silence between us. It was like a wall I couldn't climb or break down, no matter how much I wanted to reach him. I supposed I deserved it, but right then, I was watching the shadows swallow him whole.

And all I could feel was dread.

I leaned my head back against the seatrest, closing my eyes as I tried to fight back a headache. It had gotten worse and worse during the fight and now my head was pounding, my ears ringing.

"Your boss was right. Matthews was dirty," Nathan said abruptly.

My head snapped toward him. "What?" The single word came out more as a gasp than a question.

Nathan didn't look at me, his eyes focused on the road ahead, but I could see the muscles in his jaw working, a sure sign that he was grinding his teeth.

"Matthews. He was dirty. Taking bribes, dealing on the side. Working for the Serpents."

A heavy pause hung between us, filled with the weight of what he'd just revealed. Part of me wanted to demand details, to dig into the how and why of it all, but another part—the part that was slowly but surely falling for this complicated, dangerous man—wanted to comfort him, to brush away the troubles lining his handsome face.

"Okay," I finally said, my voice steadier than I felt. "Okay. We can deal with that. Does Kenny know about what happened to him?"

Nathan's gaze stayed locked on the darkened street ahead, headlights from passing cars briefly illuminating his profile, casting shadows across the stark lines of his jaw. "My father," he corrected me with a tightness in his tone, "believes Tyler's just missing. He doesn't know he's dead."

"Doesn't know or doesn't want to know?" The question slipped out before I could stop it, and I winced inwardly at my own boldness.

Nathan's laugh was humorless, a short, sharp exhale through his nose. "With Kenny, it's hard to tell what he wants to believe."

"And how do you know this?"

"Ba said they lost a valuable asset in the FBI. Dirty agents don't come often, so after that, it was a simple process of elimination."

I mulled that over, biting the inside of my cheek as I considered the implications. There was every chance Tyler had told his father about me, although I guessed I would already be dead if he had. Maybe that was why he'd come straight to Nathan's house–to get rid of me without drawing attention to himself for fucking up so very badly.

Fuck, I had to tell him about Diane now. There had to be a way we could make this work for us.

"The call I got earlier," I began, watching as his jaw clenched ever so slightly, "it was from Diane Hayes at the FBI."

He shot me a look, sharp and penetrating, before turning his attention back to the road. "You took a call from the feds while you were at my parents' house?"

"Well, Nathan, I am an FBI agent. That's not something I can just turn off because of where I am or who I'm with," I reminded him, my tone even. "And if I don't answer my phone, people come looking for me…and then they end up in the composter."

"What did she want?"

"To meet," I said. "She said we needed to have an in-person meeting."

"Great," he said, his voice growling with annoyance. "Another fucking thing to worry about. You have to go."

"I know, but maybe this could be good for us."

He looked at me, his brows knitted. "What?"

I shifted in my seat, clutching the leather strap of my bag like a lifeline as I mustered up the courage for what I was about to propose. "There might be a way to get more information on the fires...maybe even figure out who's responsible."

"Go on," he said, his voice low.

"By feeding the FBI details, we can help them help us—help you —in rooting out the rat in your operation."

"So you'd go there and double cross Agent Hayes?"

"Not exactly," I said. "I'd just do my job. Get the info we need. Keep my head down so nothing comes down on either one of us."

He considered this for a long quiet second.

"Abby," Nathan's voice cut through the tense silence, "you'd better not fuck me over with this."

The threat in his tone sent a shiver down my spine—not of fear, but of anticipation. "I won't, Nathan. I promise." I reached out, my fingers brushing against his arm in a gesture meant to comfort, to connect.

But he recoiled, jerking his hand away as if my touch burned him. His black eyes were hard as obsidian, unreadable and cold. "Don't make promises you can't keep."

The sting of rejection pulsed through me, but I swallowed it down. I cleared my throat, looking ahead, at traffic.

"Is Justin okay?" I asked, hoping for some normalcy in our conversation.

"What kind of question is that? Obviously not," he shot back, his voice sharp. "Justin just put himself right in Ba's crosshairs."

"What do you mean?" I pressed further, needing to understand the gravity of what was unfolding within the Zhou family. I got it; some of it, anyway, but I needed to hear it from Nathan.

"Ba might preach about family being everything, how we protect our own at all costs," Nathan began, his tone laced with something dark and bitter, "but let me tell you, Abby, he's never been shy about hurting us when it serves his purpose."

I remained silent, digesting his words.

The shadow that loomed over Nathan was starting to take shape in my mind, and his name was Kenny Zhou.

As we approached his apartment, the atmosphere inside the car thickened. I turned to Nathan and asked gently, "Do you want to talk about it?"

He didn't respond immediately, parking the car with a precise maneuver that seemed second nature to him as he slid into the garage beside the Mercedes. After a moment that felt like an eternity, Nathan finally turned to face me. His brown eyes drilled into mine.

"Listen to me," he said, his voice low and steady, "all you need to know is that Kenny Zhou is an exceptionally dangerous man."

I opened my mouth to ask for more details, but he kept going.

"I'm serious, Abby," he said. "He's not to be trusted—under any circumstances. Not with Justin, not with Derek, and certainly not with you."

"But…but why?" I asked, partially because I needed to know as an FBI agent, but also because I did want him to unburden himself. "You said he would do anything for the family. Tell me about him, Nathan."

Nathan's lips parted as if he would spill all the horrors of his world to me, but then he seemed to think better of it. "You don't want to know," he finally murmured, his voice almost lost to the hum of the idling engine. "You don't want to know the things my father does to women."

"Maybe I need to know," I countered, my voice steady despite the tremor I felt within. "Maybe I can handle more than you think."

But he just shook his head again, a grim set to his jaw. "Some things," he said, "are better left in the dark."

A cold understanding began to form in my mind, but I pushed against it. "I'm not afraid of the dark, Nathan."

He looked at me, quiet, unwavering. "Yes," he said. "Well, maybe you should be."