Slow Agony (29 page)

Each of us had one. They were all controlled by one timed detonation, which Silas was in charge of. He’d rigged it up. I didn’t understand how. But we had to place the bombs, so that was why we’d split up.

AXU was underground in much the same way that the main Op Wraith headquarters had been. Dropping these bombs into the vents would get them in place. Once we’d done that, Silas would make a call and everything would go boom.

It would be over soon.

I pushed several buttons on the bomb, activating it the way Griffin had shown me. Then I dropped it into the vent.

I winced when I heard it hit, but it didn’t explode, so that was good.

Quickly, I got to my feet. I needed to meet everyone else at the agreed-upon spot, out of the blast radius.

But I didn’t make it.

I was hurrying away when I felt a sharp point of pain in my shoulder. I gasped as everything started to go black. What had I been hit with?

“It was only a tranquilizer,” said a soothing voice.

I opened my eyes to find myself gazing at the face of Jolene French. She was smiling.

“Don’t worry, Leigh, you’re fine,” said French.

I sat up, panicked. I expected to find myself bound and imprisoned, but instead, I was lying on a couch underneath a blanket. I was inside a room with Monet prints on the walls and a desk in the corner. It looked like an office. That’s where I must be. French’s office.

She held up both her hands. “Now, now. It’s okay. We wouldn’t have used the tranq, but we didn’t think you’d come with us willingly.”

“Am I inside AXU?” I said.

“Yes,” she said, “but you’re hardly a prisoner. Think of yourself more as a guest.”

When was the bomb going to go off? Was I going to get blown up? I needed to get out of here. “If I’m not a prisoner, then I can leave.”

“Wait a moment, Leigh,” said French. “We’ve barely had a chance to talk here. Can you tell me why you were wandering around in the woods by yourself?”

Why had she seen me and not the others? Probably because I was spectacularly bad at moving quietly through the woods. Damn it.

“Were you trying to get away from Griffin?”
“What?” I said. “No. Don’t be ridiculous.” Okay, so sure I was feeling a little bit weird about what Griffin and I had done to Marcel. But that didn’t mean that any part of me wanted away from him. I couldn’t have been moving noisily through the woods on purpose. Could I?

“It’s okay if you were,” she said. She settled down on a chair across from the couch where I sat. “You forget that I know Griffin very well. I know all his secrets. I know exactly what he’s capable of.”

She wasn’t blocking my path to the door. I got up and started for it.

“If you’ve seen his violent side, and it’s frightened you, then there’s no reason to be ashamed of that.”

His violent side? That was a little creepy. It was like she was reading my mind. I hesitated. I turned to face her. “If he has a violent side, it’s your fault. You’re the one who turned him into a killer.”

“Now, Leigh, that’s simply not true,” said French. “There were early candidates for Op Wraith who didn’t make the cut. We gave them the serum, we tried to train them, but they simply weren’t ruthless enough. By the time Griffin was recruited, we knew what we were looking for. We picked Griffin because it was obvious he had potential.”

I folded my arms over my chest. “You’re lying.”

“Did you watch him kill Marcel?”

I turned back to the door. “I’m leaving.” I put my hand on the knob.

“Really?” she said. “You
helped
him. How interesting.”

How could she tell that? I turned back around.

“Oh, Leigh,” she said, her face concerned. “How confused you must be.”

I swallowed. “I’m not going to listen to you.”

“You liked it,” she said, as if she could read it on my face or something. “Didn’t you?”

“No,” I said. How could she know?

She gestured to the couch. “Sit down.”

I shook my head. “I’m getting out of here.”

“You must have considered the fact that you’d never have ended up in that position if you hadn’t met Griffin, haven’t you?”

Of course I hadn’t. But she was right, wasn’t she? Griffin had gotten me into this. But I needed him. He protected me. “If I hadn’t met Griffin, then Op Wraith would have killed me.”

“I thought we’d already set that nasty misunderstanding to bed,” she said. “Your father had intervened on your behalf. All we wanted was to bring you in.”

“And turn me into an assassin,” I said.

“And help you to be useful,” she countered. “If you weren’t cut out to be an assassin, we would have given you a job more suited to your talents.” She gestured to the couch again. “Would it really hurt anything to sit down?”

What she was saying wasn’t true. My father had admitted to me that the only reason they were going to keep me alive was because they wanted me to kill for them. She was making that up. I was sure of it.

I looked at the door.

But it was that if I’d never met Griffin, I’d never have carved my name into a man’s chest.

I looked at the couch.

I sat down.

“I’m certain that facing Griffin’s true nature has deeply unsettled you,” she said.

“It’s not his true nature,” I said. “He isn’t like that.” He wasn’t. Griffin was good and sweet and caring. So, maybe sometimes he got violent. But that was only sometimes.

“Isn’t he?” she said. “You can’t tell me you’ve never seen signs of it before. You two have been together off and on for over a year, haven’t you?”

Did she know
everything
about me?

“He has a tendency to be jealous, doesn’t he?”

I swallowed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m talking about the fact that you’re entangled with a man who’s somehow gotten you to a place where you could help him kill someone. And I don’t simply mean simply killing that person, of course. I can only imagine what Griffin did to Marcel, but I have a fairly good idea of what would have been involved, knowing what I know of Griffin. Did he remove certain body parts?”

I flinched, thinking about the way Marcel screamed. “He deserved it.”

“No doubt,” said French. “Marcel was a bit unhinged, wasn’t he?”

“And it’s your fault he came after us.” I had to remember that. French was the enemy. I couldn’t trust her.

“Not you, Leigh. It was never about you. It was always about Griffin. And I think if you’re honest with yourself, you’ll realize that being with Griffin has ruined your life.”

“No,” I said. “That’s not true.” I thought of scrubbing blood off my body. Wolfman’s blood. Marcel’s blood. There had been so much of it.

“Griffin is a very dangerous man,” she said. “And I had to send Marcel after him, because I had to fight fire with fire. I’m sure you understand.”

“You’re lying,” I said. “You have a personal vendetta against Griffin. You’d do anything to hurt him.”

“I want to help Griffin,” she said. “I’m a psychologist, Leigh. It’s what I do.”

No. She didn’t want to help him. I had to stop
listening
to her. “You admitted you wanted revenge,” I said. “I heard you talk to him on the computer.”

“I let him think that,” she said. “I was hoping to draw him out. I’ve been working with him for many years. As long as I’m there, I can keep him on a leash. But without me, Leigh, he becomes more and more unstable. Haven’t you noticed it yourself? Haven’t you seen that he has become more violent and more erratic?”

Was he more violent? I thought of him in the morning light, bathed in Marcel’s blood, sneering down at a man who begged for the mercy of death. I shook my head, trying to shake the thought loose. “If he is, it’s because of what you’ve done to him.”

“It’s because he’s not getting his proper treatment.” She leaned forward, lowering her voice. “Is he becoming sexually violent yet, Leigh? Has he ever hurt you?”

I thought of the way Griffin had shoved me into the trunk of the tree, his hands urgent. I thought of the way he’d taken me in the hallway in the dorm.

“That’s really the first stage, you know.” French’s voice was soft. “He’ll only get worse. You know what he’s capable of. You’ve seen it. He’s even managed to seduce you into participating. You need to help me bring him in. It’s the only way we can help him.”

I glared at her. “This isn’t going to work on me, French. I’m not one of your patients. I won’t help you get to Griffin. I won’t let you hurt him.” I shot out of the couch and hurtled across the room to the door.

But the knob wouldn’t turn. The door was locked. “I thought I wasn’t a prisoner.”

“Of course you aren’t,” she said.

“Then unlock the door.”

“Let’s finish our conversation, shall we?” Her voice was so gentle.

I turned to face her. “I won’t listen to you. Griffin isn’t dangerous. You aren’t trying to help him.”

“You poor, confused girl,” said French. “He’s probably told you I’m a monstrous psychopath.”

I swallowed. He
had
said that.

“He’s the monster, Leigh. Let me help you, and let me stop him from confusing you any further. You shouldn’t be with him.”

Could there be any truth to what she was saying? Would I be better if I were away from Griffin?

Suddenly, something came back to me from the morning when I’d rescued Naomi. She’d been sitting on my couch, talking about Griffin.
How can you not think you’re lucky to be free of that man?

I shivered.

But it wasn’t true. It wasn’t only Griffin doing these things. It was me, too. I’d gone into it all willingly enough. There was blood all over my hands too. I couldn’t blame Griffin. He’d been abused and hurt and forced to kill. I’d decided to do it all on my own. If there was a monster here, it was me.

And French? I’d seen the way she’d treated Griffin when we’d been in Op Wraith before. She’d been horrible and manipulative. She was using her abilities on me now, and she was good. She was the one who was confusing me.

I clenched my teeth, narrowed my eyes.

And then I lunged for her, knocking her off her chair onto the ground.

I dug my nails into the flesh of her face.

She shrieked. “Thorn! Get in here and control your daughter!”

I heard the door open, but I didn’t let go of French.

Someone grabbed me under my armpits and hauled me backwards.

French detangled herself from me. She stood up, wiping blood from her face. “You’re a vicious one, aren’t you? I do think you’d make a first-rate assassin.”

I struggled against the person holding me.

“Now, sweetheart, if you don’t calm down, I’m going to give you something to calm you down.” It was my father’s voice. He was the one holding me.

I wasn’t sure what my father had injected into my arm, but it had made everything feel very unreal, like I was dreaming. I felt loose and free, no tension anywhere. French had insisted I be handcuffed. I’d let my father do it.

I didn’t feel like I had the energy to resist.

“Listen, sweetheart,” my father was saying, “I’ve been trying to get you away from that horrible Griffin character for over a year now. You have no idea how hard French and I had to work to get Marcel and his men out of jail and working for us.”

“I don’t want away from Griffin,” I said. “I love Griffin.”

“You only think you do,” said my father. “He’s twisted your mind, filled it with all kinds of horrible lies.”

“No, he hasn’t,” I said. “I think you did that, actually. You worked for this terrible company, and made all your money from killing people. You lied to me about all of it. And then you sent Marcel after me. And Marcel killed my friend and made me have a miscarriage and—”

“A
what
?” My father stood up, his nostrils flaring. “You will not be having the children of a miscreant and criminal, Leigh. You are my daughter, and Griffin isn’t good enough for you. He’s a horrible man. If Marcel stopped that from happening, then I’m glad.”

If I hadn’t been so doped up, that might have made me angry, but I didn’t feel I could rouse the effort.

French rolled her eyes. She was pacing on the other side of the room. “Please, Thorn, can you stop apologizing to her so that we can get on with having her contact Griffin?”

“I’m not apologizing, I’m explaining,” my father said. “I don’t have any regrets, and you know that, Jolene.”

“How do we get in touch with him?” she asked me.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I was supposed to meet them, but that was a long time ago. I’m surprised that this place hasn’t blown up yet.” This stuff was loosening my tongue, too, wasn’t it? I shouldn’t have said that.

“Blown up?” said French.

“What are you talking about?” said my father.

“Bombs,” I said. “I’m talking about bombs.” Man. Why couldn’t I shut myself up?

French’s eyebrows drew together. My father turned to her in alarm.

And several gunshots punched through the door, right near the knob.

The door swung open, and Griffin stalked into the room, gun first. “There you are, doll. I’ve been looking all over.”

“Griffin.” I tried to muster excitement, but this drug seemed to make it hard to do much of anything except talk.

French stalked over to her desk.

“Don’t move,” Griffin growled at her.

She glared at him and deliberately picked up the phone.

Griffin pulled the trigger.

The bullet caught her on the arm. Blood spattered. She screamed, dropping the phone and crumpling, grasping at her arm.

“There’s no one to call, anyway,” said Griffin. “Sloane took out your guards already.”

My father swallowed. “That’s right, they’re working with the twins. Jolene, there could be bombs here. Silas is very handy with explosives.”

“That’s right, he is,” said Griffin. He turned to me. “You told them about the bombs.”

“They drugged me,” I said. “I can’t seem to shut up.”

Griffin rolled his eyes. He pumped two bullets into my father’s chest.

He gasped once and then fell to the ground, lifeless.

I flinched. He’d just... done that. Like it was nothing. Had I been blind to how violent Griffin was?