Chapter Ten
Casey
Ethan has me cuddled up with him in his big bed. I’m safe. It’s going to take a hell of a lot to get me out of here too. I don’t ever want to leave Ethan’s side again. I’m going to be stuck to him like glue if I have anything to say about it.
“I’m so sorry,” I mumble. “This is all my fault.”
“That wasn’t your fault,” Ethan says. “He had a lot of demons. A lot. And they were chasing him hard. I’ve gotten reports from several agencies about what he was up to overseas. None of them were good. I didn’t think he’d do… that though. I owe you an apology, Casey. I didn’t keep you safe. He’s going to be an in-patient for a very long time, I can promise you that.”
There is a lot of blame to go around. We all deserve it. Ethan played stupid fucking games with the phone, Jack was wildly unhinged, and I have been ignoring everything I’ve been told since this started. If any one of us had made better decisions, all of this could have been avoided.
“Is it true, about Jack’s ex trying to kill him?”
“Yes,” Ethan says. “It was three years ago. She got him good too. Took three surgeries to save his life.”
“And what happened to her?”
“She didn’t survive.”
“So he did kill her.”
“Self-defense. The DA didn’t even file charges.”
“Because billionaire.”
“Because defensive wounds all over him,” Ethan says. “Because spy.”
I nod. Ethan and Jack live in a world where it is very hard to tell why someone wants you. I guess I make that simple for Ethan. I didn’t want him. So he took me anyway. In some perverse way, he didn’t have to worry about whether I was trying to get with him for his money or his power, because I was too busy telling him to fuck himself while he fucked me.
“Jack told me Vipyr operates for the government,” I say, curiosity getting the better of me there too.
“It’s true,” Ethan says. “Our tech is invasive, but when you have seven billion people on Earth, and it takes less than twenty of them to kill tens of thousands, you deploy technology in a way that might not be ethical, but does the job.”
“Why didn’t you just tell me that in the first place? I wouldn’t have… I would have…” I stammer.
“I wasn’t authorized to tell you any more than you already knew. Doing so would have put you in even more danger than you were already in. There are a lot of people who don’t like what we do. If it came out you knew even part of it, you could have been taken by people a lot worse than Jack.”
“Worse?”
“Terrorists,” he says. “If they could break the net, or get a back door to it, that would undermine it completely. That’s why I wanted you to work for us. You would have fallen under Vipyr team security. But you refused, so…”
“So you fucked me in the ass.”
Ethan smirks in spite of the heavy misery that hangs over both of us. “I took you,” he says. “Because you made me wild. You refused to be bought. You…” He draws in a breath. “Jack was right. I fell for you. And that was a mistake.”
My heart sinks and tears spring to my eyes.
“I don’t mean loving you was a mistake,” he adds quickly. “I mean getting caught up in our games, letting you get into trouble. Enjoying your rebellion instead of just squashing it outright.”
It’s only been a handful of days since we met. This has been a whirlwind of sex and danger and death. I was just as intoxicated by it in the beginning, but now that I’ve seen the consequences, I don’t feel like it’s such a fun game.
Ethan takes me by the chin and directs my gaze to his eyes. “I’ve fallen for you, Casey. I want to keep you as my own. But if you want to leave after tonight, I will understand. I won’t keep you anymore. I’ll put a security team on you and they can look after you. You can live your life as you see fit.”
“I don’t want to leave,” I say softly.
“If you stay, the rules don’t change. I will own you, Casey. You will be mine. With all that entails. All of it.”
“You own me anyway,” I say. “If you let me go, that’s because you choose to let me go. That doesn’t mean I’m any more free. I’m always going to be yours.”
He smiles widely. “Well…”
I’ve finally come to terms with what I’ve been fighting against all along. I have been bought. Or rather, I sold myself. The moment I walked into his world, the deal was struck. There is no escaping this now, and I don’t want to.