Master No Read Free Page A

but survive this. His body shook as he tried to get up. Nope. Still wasn’t working. He was a little afraid he was going into shock.
    Couldn’t wait. Had to move. There was at least one gun on the desk. He’d watched the last guy drop it there, as though teasing Ten with it. Just out of reach, too far away. No salvation for you, asshole.
    He caught sight of Dawn, her eyes staring up. Not a hint of light behind them.
    God, he was going to throw up.
    The door opened and Ten groaned.
    Too weak. Too fucking weak and he hadn’t even gotten a weapon. He looked around. The concrete was stained with his blood, but there was absolutely nothing he could use to end his own misery. He had no way to eliminate the possibility that Dawn had been right and he would break. He couldn’t break. If he did one decent thing in his miserable, pathetic life it would be to go out of it without giving up his operatives, his country.
    He’d failed even at that.
    “Thought I’d find you here,” a familiar voice said. “Damn, I kind of hoped you’d both been taken. Guess the princess was a double.”
    With shaking hands, Ten forced himself up. His arms felt like noodles, but the fact that he was no longer alone gave him a weird strength. Ian Taggart was standing in the torture chamber, a P90 across his chest and blood on the T-shirt he was wearing. He was massive and solid, and none of that muscle would protect him.
    “We have to go…” No. That was wrong. It was all fucking wrong and he had to do the honorable thing. “You have to go. Leave me a gun and get the fuck out of here, Tag. There are at least four men in this place and they don’t play. I can’t walk. You have to leave me.”
    Tag snorted, a thoroughly arrogant sound. “There were seven and now there are none. Nasty bastards. They were supposed to be all about religion and shit, but they had a ton of cheap-ass Scotch up there. I guess now they know about the evils of alcohol. You look like shit, Ten.”
    They were dead? Tag had killed them all? “I could kiss you, you know.”
    “That’s what all the girls say,” Tag replied. He sighed. “This is probably going to hurt, buddy, but we should really leave before reinforcements get here.”
    Tag leaned over and he was so fucking right. It hurt like hell to have a six and a half foot monster of a man throw him over his shoulder. Ten damn near blacked out. He forced himself to stay conscious. “How did you find me?”
    “Didn’t. Found her. I put a tracker on that bag you bought her. She was suspicious.”
    “Do I want to know what she did to make you suspicious?”
    “You do not, brother. But let’s talk about paying me back. How about an assignment that doesn’t involve the shit end of the planet?”
    So she’d probably come on to Tag, likely offered herself to him at some point. While he’d been planning a future, she’d been trying to fuck his friends. Still, the sight of her dead body sent him reeling. He had to force himself not to scream out. He hadn’t loved her, but she’d represented a future—something he would never have.
    “I promise.” He forced the words out of his mouth as Tag walked through the house toward the door. “The next time something in Europe comes up, you’re my man.”
    “Cool,” Tag said. “Tell you what, how about you send me to Paris at some point and we’ll call it even. I’ve heard good things about this club there.”
    Tag and his clubs. Tag still had some expectation of finding a woman. Oh, he wouldn’t call her a wife. He would call her a sub, but it was all the same really. Tag thought there was a woman out there who could handle his darkness, who could bring him into the light.
    Ten had finally let go of that daydream. It had never been for him and he would remember that fact from now on. All it got him was death and betrayal. Love was for the Jamies and Phoebes of the world.
    As Tag carried him out into the light of day, he finally let go and unconsciousness