Standing in an alley near the docks ten minutes later, Damon forced himself to move though every single muscle in his body ached. He had to face certain truths. He was damaged. His body was ruined. Possibly beyond repair. He might look all right on the outside. He might be able to fake his way through looking fit, but he wasn’t. He’d lied to himself, to everyone. He’d hidden from the fact for the last six months, but it was brutally true and he’d discovered something else about himself.

It didn’t matter. He didn’t even care that he’d lost consciousness, nearly wrecked the operation. All that he cared about was the fact that Penelope had held onto him briefly and then shut him out again.

“Are you sure this will work?” Taggart asked.

Jake Dean used a crowbar to force the crate open. “If it doesn’t, we won’t be any worse off than we are now. I already called Chelsea. She’s back on board. She and Jesse cut their trip short once they confirmed it was a distraction. She’s worked the system. They’re expecting crate number 1021009 in housekeeping. It’s supposed to be a new shipment of organic cleaning equipment. Jesse’s back on board, and he’s going to sign for it. He’s waiting for the crate and then we’ll move it to storage and get him back out again with no one the wiser.”

Him being Brody Carter, who was still unconscious. Simon wound rope around the bugger’s massive wrists and Taggart held out a ball gag setup that would have made the subs spit and scream his way, but it would totally work for what they needed to do.

There was more than one way to get on the boat, and they were using it.

If only he could get Penelope to look at him.

She’d clung to him, crying into his shoulder and holding him tight, but when the van had stopped and they’d had to get out and be cruise ship passengers again, she’d pulled away from him.

He couldn’t stand it. He hated not touching her, not being close to her.

It shouldn’t matter. They had the package. Everyone on the crew was fine. The cops weren’t waiting at the boarding level of the ship. It was successful despite the fact that they didn’t have Bennett or Baz. He should have been okay with it, but he didn’t give a shit because Penelope wouldn’t look at him.

“Should we stay here and look for Walter Bennett?” Penelope asked quietly.

At least that was a question he could answer for her. She wouldn’t allow him to do much else. “That’s not a good idea, love. After the debacle at the church, we have to be worried about the police. We need to question Carter and it’s going to be easier to do that on board, where we can control our surroundings. He knows where Bennett is. If we need to come back to find him, we will. But we’ll come back with a full team and support.”

They stuffed Carter in the crate, his dead weight a massive burden. Jake brought in a handcart and they got the crate on wheels. Jake nodded toward him, waving him off. He and Simon would board on the cargo level with the shipment. The rest of them had to get back on the boat with smiles on their faces like they’d had a brilliant time in Finland. Charlotte and Penelope had been trying to fix Candice’s makeup. She looked pale but walked solidly ahead of them.

His chest still ached with every breath. He kept his footsteps steady, but he had to think about it, had to focus. There was a small wound on his left bicep that still stung a bit. He was wearing Taggart’s jacket to cover up the small stain on his shirt.

“Are you all right?” Penelope asked as they moved toward the cruise terminal. All around them happy tourists flocked to buy candies and small souvenirs to take back to loved ones at home.

He had no one who cared where he’d been or what he’d done. No one who cared truly if he lived or died. He’d had Penelope, but he’d ruined that somehow. “I’m perfectly fit.”

Candice looked back. “Can I go to my room?”

Damon nodded. “Yes. But don’t leave there. We might need you.”

“I would like to talk to the big guy, if I could. I’m worried about Walter. I’ve never met him, but after talking to him for weeks, I feel like I know the bloke. I’m sorry about panicking.” Her cheeks flushed as they moved onto the gangway that led to the boat.

Penelope put a hand on her arm. “Everything turned out all right.”

He pulled his keycard out. It was everything to the ship—key, passport, credit card.

She nodded and went silent as they headed through security. The tourists were all talking about the terrible things that had happened at the church, but Damon didn’t engage them. Even Candice went silent as she handed over her card and was buzzed through. She waved as she headed up the stairs toward her room.

He and Penelope walked to the lifts and found themselves blissfully alone for a moment. Charlotte and Ian were heading to the cargo decks to pick up the package. The interrogation could be a long process.

It would be the perfect time to hold her tight and reassure himself that she was alive and all right, but she stepped away from him. He pushed the button for nine.

“I won’t let you punish me. I know I didn’t do exactly what you said, but you can’t expect that I would allow you to do that to me.” She stared straight ahead at the ridiculously ornamental doors to the lift.

“Of course.” He stood to the opposite side, not wanting her to think he was going to attack her. Punishment in D/s was consensual despite the meaning of the word. The submissive had to allow herself to be corrected or it was abuse, and he had no intention of abusing her. He’d been too rough, gone too far, and now she would lock away that part of herself that he could have freed had he not been such a ham-handed idiot.

She sniffled though she still didn’t turn his way. “I’ll be honest, Damon. I didn’t expect that of you.”

She shouldn’t have expected anything from him at all. He shrugged slightly. “It happens all the time at The Garden.” She should truly understand how rough he could be. “I’ve done it to submissives before.”

The door opened and he allowed her to walk out first. She moved with stiff accuracy. “Well, it’s no wonder you don’t have a full-time sub. I suspect they don’t like to be shared in such a manner.”

There were so many reasons he’d never had a full-time sub, the chief one being he’d never had one move him the way Penelope did. “It’s common enough. Jane enjoyed it. She thought it was fun. She would close her eyes and try to figure out which Dom was spanking her. I’ll be honest. I wasn’t going to go through with it. It was a stupid thing to say. I tried to come up with ways to let them spank you that didn’t involve touching you at all. How silly is that?”

She stopped. “Spanking?”

He shook his head, reaching for the keycard again. At least the operation would be over soon. He could get Penelope off the boat at their next port. He wouldn’t have to lie next to her at night and wonder where he’d gone wrong. “Like I said, it was stupid of me. I was very angry. No. I was scared. I was scared of losing you so I threatened you with the worse thing I could think of.”

“Allowing other Doms to spank me.” She seemed to struggle with the words as though they didn’t fit properly in her mouth.

“I wouldn’t have.” He had no idea what to say to her. How was he supposed to tell her how much he was going to miss her? How much he wanted her to stay with him? How much he regretted not being the right kind of man for her?

In the end, he simply turned and started down the hall. The ship would be moving again soon, and he had preparations to make. He needed to think things through. Bennett had to be found, and the Aussie was the only connection they had now.

Unfortunately, Aussies weren’t known for being gentle, cooperative souls.

“Damon?” Penelope was a good ten feet behind him.

“Come along. We need to get ready.” He frowned her way as she stood there. “I won’t touch you, Penelope. You have my word. You might think very little of me, but I won’t hurt you again.”

“Damon, it’s not that,” she began.

A couple of stewards walked through the narrow hallways, shoulder to shoulder, interrupting whatever Penelope might have said.

“Did you just see that? What the hell?” the taller of the two asked.

“I have no idea, man. I’m keeping my eyes closed until this cruise is done. These people are freaks.” He flushed when he realized they weren’t alone. “Evening, sir.”

Damon nodded and allowed them to move by and then he saw what they were complaining about.

Ian Taggart had the big Aussie gagged, his hands behind his back and his shirt off. Charlotte walked next to him, a crop in her hand.

“Bad sub. You are a bad, bad sub and there will be punishment. You never talk to your mistress that way.” She slapped his ass with the crop.

Carter’s head came up, and he looked Charlotte’s way. He seemed to be trying to talk around the bright red ball gag that was strapped to his mouth. He struggled, moving his shoulders hard and to the right, trying to buck Taggart off him.

“You need some help with that one, Tag?” It was a good excuse to end the painful conversation with Penelope. He hurried down the hall, but noticed Carter’s head was back up.

He made some incomprehensible sounds.

Charlotte leaned over. “We’ll get it off you as soon as we make it to the cabin. It’s going to be okay, Mr. Carter. And besides, I’m having fun playing the mistress.”

She lightly tapped his rear with the crop.

“Don’t get used to it. You’re going to be the one taking the crop tonight, Mrs. Taggart. Get his other side, Knight. He’s a heavy son of a bitch.” Taggart hauled him back up.

Damon moved to Carter’s right, but he seemed to cooperate a bit more. His feet didn’t drag now and he stood straight, walking along.

Penelope moved to get the door to their cabin open. She held it while they managed to get Carter inside.

“This is what the world is like in my dreams,” Tag said with a smile on his face. “An all D/s world where it’s perfectly normal for an almost seven-foot dude to get his ass cropped by a Domme. Wouldn’t everything just be better this way?”

Charlotte shut and locked the door. “I’m sure it would be better for you, babe. I, on the other hand, like wearing clothes from time to time. Don’t laugh. You know I do. And if you had your way, we’d all just run around naked.”

Damon did see a couple of flaws in Tag’s plan, though Penelope always being naked and available for him was a tempting idea. But they had bigger things to deal with than Tag’s dream world.

Of course, he likely wouldn’t see her naked again.

Carter slumped to the couch.

“Damon? Can I talk to you?” Penelope caught up to him.

He wanted to avoid “the talk.” She seemed ready to finally give him the chat where she told him never to touch her again. Thank god he had a job to do.

“Later. It has to wait.” He turned his attention back to their guest.

It was time to lay his cards on the table and figure out if he had a winning hand. He looked down at Carter, though not far. Even sitting the man was as tall as a lot of men standing.

He stood in front of the Aussie, crossing his arms over his chest as he began. “My name is Damon Knight. I work for British intelligence, SIS or MI6, if you prefer. I would like to take that gag out of your mouth so we can have a pleasant chat.”

“Damon, please do keep it friendly.” Penelope put a hand on his arm, the first time she’d willingly touched him since the dungeon. She looked right up at him. “I don’t think he’s the bad guy.”

He hated the fact that she could manipulate him, but it didn’t matter. It was exactly that—a fact and there was nothing he seemed to be able to do about it. “Why do you think that, love?”

He would soften, listen to her, very likely give in to her just to keep her looking at him.

“I shoved a needle in his neck, and he seemed horrified that he hit me.”

Anger flared through his system at the thought. “He hit you?”

Carter outweighed Penelope by a good seven stone. He could likely crush her without even thinking about it. What had she been thinking going after the man? She should never have been in that position. She’d been forced to kill and then to attack a man three times her size.

He couldn’t do anything to the man she’d killed, but he could deal with this bastard.

Carter shook his head and he nodded Penelope’s way.

Penelope put a restraining hand on Damon’s shoulder. “Damon, I had just attacked him. He can be forgiven for lashing out a bit.”

Damon didn’t have to forgive him. He didn’t even want to. He wanted to pull the big bloke’s head off with his bare hands.

“He kind of freaked when he realized she was a chick,” Charlotte explained. She held the keys to the cuffs in her hands. “It was weird. He tried to help her up. I think Pen’s right and he’s a big old softie under all those muscles.”

Carter grunted in obvious disagreement.

“He’s got a Special Air Service Regiment tat on his forearm. I seriously doubt he’s a softie.” Taggart inspected his left arm. “Unless it’s just decorative.”

Carter grunted again, his eyes flaring.

“I think that means no,” Charlotte said.

“Can we at least talk to him, Damon?” When had Penelope started to smile at him again? She was looking at him with an amused expression on her face, the one that he’d mistaken for affection before.

It looked like he would have to forgo thrashing the bloke. Penelope seemed to have taken to the bugger like he was an overgrown house pet. “I’m going to remove the ball gag. If you shout out, I’ll have to replace it.”

Gingerly, he released the gag and pulled the rubber ball from Carter’s mouth. Charlotte was right there with a towel, wiping off the guy’s chin.

“Hey, I know what that feels like,” she explained. “And hopefully I didn’t really hurt you too much with the crop.”

Carter moved his jaw, stretching it out a bit. “Not at all, though I have to say I’d prefer to be on the other end of that crop when it comes to a pretty bird like you, sweetheart.” He turned to Penelope, his face serious. “Did I hurt you?”

Fuck. He really did seem upset. He was giving Penelope soulful eyes. His mouth turned down.

Penelope shook her head. “I’m perfectly fine, thank you. How about you? I’m so sorry I had to use that needle on you, but you didn’t seem like you wanted to stop and have a chat.”

“I’m just glad you didn’t get hurt, luv.” He gave her a smile that changed his face from slightly scary to something resembling handsome. Despite the big scar he had running along his left cheek, the Aussie wasn’t hard on the eyes. A woman like Penelope might like him.

Oh, there was going to be none of that. He might have to deal with the fact that he’d lost her, but he wasn’t going to watch her flirt with someone else. “All right, Romeo, if you’re done flirting, perhaps we can get on with it.”

Carter turned distinctly predatory the minute he focused on Damon. “Listen up, you pommie bastard. You’ve got a few roos loose in the top paddock if you think I’m giving you anything.”

God save him from Aussies. It was bad enough to be surrounded by Americans. “You think I’m crazy? Mate, I’m not the one working for a terrorist. Are you angry with the crown? Is that why you want to help Nature’s Core hit London?”

“What are you talking about, you fuckwit?” Carter shook his head. “You think Walt is a terrorist?”

At least he wasn’t denying he had a connection to Bennett. “I think Walter Bennett stole something very important, and he means to sell it and he doesn’t care who gets hurt in the process.”

“Bite my arse.” Carter sat back.

“Oh, Ian. I like him. Can we keep him?” Charlotte asked, obviously amused.

It was nice someone found the situation humorous.

“Absolutely not. I don’t think he’s housebroken, baby,” Taggart shot back.

“You’re former SASR? I assume you aren’t current.” He would have to go about this a different way. He needed the man’s cooperation. Unfortunately, the room was really small. He required a bit more space to really get his torture on. And then there was the fact that Penelope would likely object if he started pulling the man’s fingernails out one by one. So he had to appeal to his reasonable side. If he had one.

“I got out three years ago,” Carter said. “I was in the service for almost twelve years. Took an IED in Afghanistan. Apparently having a skull that’s more metal than bone means I can’t serve anymore. I wasn’t ever much good at anything else.”

“You a mercenary?” Taggart asked, his voice serious for once.

Carter frowned at the word. “Nah. I’m a bodyguard. I cop the bullets. End of the day, I’m just dumb muscle. And I sure as shit don’t hire out to terrorists. Tell MI6 to get better intel.” He shrugged against the cuffs holding his hands behind his back. “And what bloody right do you have to hold me? I’m a private citizen.”

“In the post 9/11 era, that doesn’t mean a thing if you’ve got the wrong connections and you know it. We have places we can take you, Carter. Places you don’t want to go.” Places that would take far too long, but he couldn’t come out and say that.

“Damon, that seems a bit rude. Mr. Carter, we really are trying to help,” Penelope said. “We only know what Candice has told us. The intelligence we’ve heard leads us to believe that Mr. Bennett is attempting to smuggle something dangerous into the country. I find it hard to believe a decorated officer such as yourself would help him.”

They’d been able to find out a lot about their captive in the short time between when they picked him up and when they’d made it to the boat. Brody Carter had been highly decorated, his service record unblemished. His career had been cut short by his injury. He’d been working private security for the last couple of years. They’d asked the questions to see if he would lie.

“Even decorated officers can go bad when they feel they’ve been wronged.” Damon seemed to be the bad copper in this scenario, but the good news was he was perfectly comfortable with the role. “Did you decide to help with the attack after you realized your military career was over?”

“I’m not helping with any bloody attack,” Carter shot back.

Penelope reached out, putting a hand on his knee. “Could you please tell me what’s really going on? Because I don’t believe for a second that you would hurt innocent people. You couldn’t hurt me and I was attacking you.”

“I can hurt people. You have no idea how I’ve hurt people in the past, luv. I’ve killed more than my share. I just don’t like hurting women. It makes me sick, to tell you the truth. But your boy there is wrong about Walt. He isn’t bad. He’s trying to do the right thing, but none of us really knows how to do that anymore.” He got quiet for a moment. “Is that bloke there really Ian Taggart?”

He knew Tag?

Ian stepped up. “I’m Taggart. I run a firm called McKay-Taggart.”

Carter stared at him. “You used to be a Green Beret. You knew an SASR officer named Harrison Craig?”

Tag nodded, his lips curling up with humor. “Hell, yeah. I know Harry. He gave us ground support on a couple of NATO missions. How the hell is he?”

“He was my half brother and he died a while back, but he always told me if I got in trouble that I should trust you. Fuck a duck, mate. I tried calling your offices but they said you were out of the country.”

Ian put a hand on the big guy’s shoulder. “Your brother was a good man and an excellent soldier. I’m sorry to hear he passed. Harry told you to trust me so I need you to listen to me. Damon’s a good man. You haven’t heard of him because most of his military time was classified. He’s going to take care of you.”

Carter shook his head. “I can’t trust anyone but you. And if you’re working for the government, I won’t even trust you. I want to hire you. Outside of the CIA. What Walt has, no government should own. Fuck, mate, no one should have it.”

Instinct started to pulse through his system. Something was wrong and it always had been. The Collective wasn’t working with them. If they really had the trouble they said they had, why wouldn’t they be working with the agencies?

Baz wanted whatever Walter Bennett had back.

Nature’s Core had always been peaceful.

Candice was an idiot and no terrorist in his right mind would use her.

But a dumbass scientist who thought he was saving the world just might.

“What was Agro developing? What was so dangerous that Bennett thought he had to risk his life to steal it and expose it to the world?”

It was the only thing that made sense. Bennett had zero ties to any terrorist organization.

Carter’s face froze.

“Please, tell us,” Penelope pleaded. “We want to help.”

Carter’s eyes went to Taggart.

“I promise I’ll do whatever I can to protect you and Bennett, if you deserve it,” Taggart replied.

Carter’s eyes closed briefly and for a moment Damon was certain he would spout some crazy Aussie curses and be done with all of them. But finally he looked straight at Damon. “All right then. It was too much to hope for anyway. Walt’s been working for Agro on a system that helps identify the DNA of a virus. I’m not smart like him but apparently it’s important to get the DNA of emergent viruses. He’s been working in the real tight labs. And that was when he found it.”

“Found what?” Damon asked.

“Apparently even when we eradicate a virus, it never really goes away. The way he explained it, we just made it so it’s hidden. Like it’s behind a barrier because we immunized whole generations and now it’s behind that wall.”

Cold fear ran up his spine because he had an idea of what Carter was talking about. “And they want the wall to come down?”

“No one immunizes for it anymore. Not since 1972. And the immunization thing….it don’t last forever it seems. Everyone is vulnerable now.”

Fuck. Smallpox. Mandatory vaccines had ended in the seventies and the medical community considered it eradicated. But a dirty company like Agro could come up with a million ways to make a buck off something like that. “You’re talking about smallpox.”

Carter nodded.

Taggart shook his head. “The CDC has enough vaccine stored to immunize everyone in the States against smallpox if we have to.”

“This isn’t the same virus you’ve read about,” Carter explained. “Agro made it stronger. Smarter. More resilient. They figured out a way to weaponize it. And only they have the vaccine. They’re going to take out large swaths of the Third World. They plan to scare the crap out of the rest of us and then charge us through the nose to save the world. Millions will die so they can make a buck. Do you understand?”

Penelope gasped a little. “He was trying to warn us?”

“He still is. It’s why I took the job. Walter Bennett isn’t the enemy. Agro is. Walt got out with all the research. He wiped the drives. He took the samples and destroyed them. He wrecked his entire career because he couldn’t stand the thought of all those people dying for corporate profits. He took an oath, you see.”

Bennett was a virologist, but he was a doctor, too. He’d had to make a Hippocratic Oath, and it looked like he took it seriously.

And Damon had another mission.

He was going to save Walter Bennett. Penelope looked up at him, her eyes shining like he was some kind of hero.

He was going to save the whole bloody world if he had to.