“You’re taking away my options.”
“Because I gave them all to you last time and you fucking didn’t choose me. You chose everyone but me. I’ll fix this. I’ll save you. Choose me, Charlie. Choose us. Trust me. Give me the option of being your hero.”
She had, she suddenly realized. She’d chosen Chelsea over him. She’d chosen herself over him. At the time, she hadn’t seen it that way. It had seemed like a clear path, and she hadn’t considered once turning to him and telling him the truth. How would a man like Ian handle that? He would shut down. Ian needed to be needed and she’d trusted his worst enemy over him.
He was asking for another chance. Or was he just trying to get her to comply?
How could she know?
“Ian, just untie me and let me go to Chelsea.” She had questions for her sister. If Chelsea was blackmailing politicians, they were in more trouble than she’d imagined.
His face tightened. “I can’t. I can’t trust you not to run.”
Frustration welled. “You’ve made sure I don’t have anywhere to run to, Ian. I have nothing to fall back on if Adam has taken those hard drives and you’re going to give them my money.”
She would be all alone in the world again. She would have to start over and hope she lasted long enough to make it. Her whole soul cried because he was the one who had put her here. Her love. Half her soul had banished her to death and pain.
He hauled her up, lifting her into his strong arms. “I’m giving them whatever it takes to keep you out of jail. If you give them the ten million in your accounts, and you stay out of trouble, they’ll leave you be. I worked on this deal. I had to promise some very important people a couple of favors. My favors can mean dangerous things. Don’t fucking tell me I’m trying to hurt you, Charlie.”
Ten million? She stilled in his arms. He knew exactly how much she had. Chelsea had told her Adam had found their bank accounts. She had almost twenty-five million in their accounts. It came from the money she’d stolen from Nelson and her uncle and the money they had made from brokering information. Tears pricked her eyes again, but for a different reason this time. Ian was trying to tell her something, but he couldn’t just say it outright. Was he really trying? Was he really saving her? “You gave them the whole ten million? Ian, that’s everything I have.”
They could be listening. She had to be careful. Hope fluttered in her chest, a babe she’d thought was stillborn but who had just taken its first breath.
He laid her down on the massive bed, fastening her wrists to the hook at the headboard. “I did. All of it, Charlie.” He winked her way.
He’d left her a security blanket. She could find new info. She could build their business again, but the money was paramount if she needed to run.
He stared down at her. “Trust me.”
She closed her eyes. She loved this man and he’d hurt her. She’d hurt him. She’d cost him damn near everything, and she was threatening it again. Her uncle could take out his whole crew. So far they had handled the trouble, but they could lose one of their own.
Trust. She almost didn’t understand the word.
Ian needed it. He needed her to trust him. It was like a code written into his DNA. He was the type of man who would love one woman and then be done. She was his. She was the one who could complete him but her history had fucked them both over.
She had a choice. Him or Chelsea. She’d chosen Chelsea the first time. Her sister had been so young and in need, but they were stronger now and Chelsea was almost off the radar. No one believed she had done anything wrong. Chelsea could walk away.
“So you’ve cleaned up my problems?”
His hand came out, smoothing back her hair. “Yes, thank god your sister has stayed out of trouble.”
She mouthed her next question. Why?
He leaned over, his mouth right over her ear. “I told you. I tried. I tried to rid myself of this need, but I can’t. I need you. I can’t get you out of my fucking head. I haven’t been able to for five fucking years.”
“After today, I should walk away. It would be better for everyone in your life if I disappeared.” She owed him the truth. After everything she’d done to him and his friends, she couldn’t lie.
“I can’t.” He stood over her, his body hard and ready. “I can’t let you go. You asked me a question. I didn’t answer.”
She asked him if what they’d had those years before was real. “Was it real? It felt real. It was real for me. I married you.”
His shoulders slumped. He leaned against the wall, his eyes never leaving her. “I married you. I loved you, Charlie. With everything I had, I loved you, but you didn’t reciprocate.”
How could he think that? “Ian, I’ve spent five years trying to work my way back to you. How can you think I didn’t love you?”
“You didn’t need five years. You needed to trust me. You needed to trust me more than Eli Nelson. You didn’t.”
That was the wall between them, the chasm. She hadn’t trusted him enough to tell him what was happening. She hadn’t loved him enough to give him the truth.
“What would you have done, Ian?” She stared up at him. Sometimes he seemed so remote, aloof, but it was all an act. It could be hard to see past that gorgeous face and perfect body, but deep down he was just a man and she’d hurt him. “What would you have done if I had come to you? I was afraid you would kick me to the curb and then I wouldn’t be able to save Chelsea. There was a tiny piece of me that was afraid you knew everything and you were playing me.”
“I would have killed Eli Nelson. I would have gotten your sister.”
She shook her head. He saw everything in black and white. “My dad had her. He wasn’t going to let her go.”
“I told you I would have gotten your sister. If anyone got in my way, I would have taken them out, and I very likely would have enjoyed killing your father.”
“You were on an op.”
He sighed, looking past tired. “You were more important than any op. I would have turned over the op to someone else. You were my wife. I made vows to you that I never made to another woman. I won’t ever make to another woman. I would have walked away from the Agency and taken care of your problems and then I would have brought you back to the States and bought a fucking house with soapstone and shit and I would have gotten you pregnant and we would have a couple of kids by now, and then I wouldn’t feel this hole inside me every single fucking day of my life. I would be some dumbass dad who takes his kid to soccer practice and bitches about the coach. I would be a husband who just likes to spend time with his wife at boring barbecues and family dinners.”