As if I wasn’t in pain enough, the throb to the back of my temple made me wince. Why did every fucker always hit you in the spot that hurt the most?

Opening my eyes, I groaned in dismay when I found Euan sat in a chair watching me. His long fingers were wrapped around a glass tumbler of whisky, the golden liquid slightly sloshing as he mindlessly twisted the glass in his hand.

“What the hell, Euan?”

He remained quiet, his fierce glare observing me as I tried to pull at the chains securing me to a thick metal ring embedded into the wall above the bed I found myself on. Well, at least I was comfy this time.

“Why does every bastard have to use chains?” I muttered as I attempted, unsuccessfully, to slip out of them.

He leaned forwards and rested his elbows on his knees. “Why?”

“A one-word question requires so many more to answer it.”

I jumped when he threw the glass across the room and shards of glass sprinkled over the carpet. “Don’t play fucking games with me, Elsie. Not now.”

“I take it you’re angry then. What a fucking shame! How rude of me to dare upset you!”

He gritted his teeth at my insolence, his jaw clenching tightly, and glowered at me as he settled back into his chair.

Glancing around the room, I checked for a clock. “What time is it?”

“Put it this way.” He smirked. “It’s way past death o’clock.”

“Shit, Euan,” I hissed, pulling at my chains once again.

“Why are you so fucking eager to die?!” he screamed, rage seeping from him in a thick haze.

“Because then you fucking live!” I screamed right back at him.

He narrowed his eyes, but then surprised me when a hearty laugh burst from him. “Seriously?”

“You actually think us running away together like star-crossed lovers will keep us safe?” It was my turn to laugh now. “You’re a fool, Euan Sinclair.”

“I may be a fool, but falling in love with you was never foolish. It was the only thing I ever got right in my life.”

I blinked, the rage in me dispersing as quickly as it had built. “How can you say that?”

He shrugged. “Quite easily, Elsie. I love you.” Opening his hands, he stared straight at me, showing me the honesty in his eyes. “It is actually that simple.”

“We run, then when Frank finds us, and he will find us, Euan,” I emphasised. “He will have no qualms in taking you down too. In fact, he will most definitely make a point of forcing you to watch my death before he kills you.”

“He can fucking try!” he growled.

“Now your life has changed forever, and not for the better; I can promise that. We’ll constantly be looking over our shoulder, forever looking at new friends with suspicion in case they’re a lure. Every time we hear a noise in the night, or a knock at the door, or a suspicious package in the mail. That’s not a life, Euan, that’s a charade, an imitation of existence.”

“And what about my existence when I lose you? You think my heart will continue to love after that?”

“But it will still beat!” I quarrelled, begging him to see sense.

“Except, it won’t have a purpose to.” Biting into his bottom lip, he shook his head. “I know you can’t comprehend someone willing to give their life to keep you alive, Elsie. Your life is priceless, even for the cost of my own.”

“But I love you! You want to keep me alive because you love me, and I want to keep you alive because I love you.”

“Then it’s stalemate, sweetheart.” He was so undaunted by the fact he would now be terminated alongside me.

My soul ached inside me, calling out for me to keep trying to save its mate. “Is there no reasoning with you?!” I yelled. “You – are – going – to - die!”

“And if I do, I get to take the next adventure right there with you.” He shook his head and came to sit on the edge of the bed next to me.

Stroking the back of his fingers down the side of my face, the prior furious expression dissolved into one of tenderness. “I will do everything in my power to keep us both alive. I promise. And, if we die, then we die. But, fuck, at least let’s live while we wait for our lives to end. What is the point if you only merely exist? Even if we only get a couple of months, it’s still eight weeks of life that will be beyond anything either of us has ever experienced.”

He was correct with that. I knew in the depth of my soul that our lives were coming to an end, it was already written. Yet, I couldn’t help but hope, long for the perfect time I knew we could have together, no matter how short.

He wasn’t ignoring the fact that we would die, he knew it wasn’t fiction. Nevertheless, he was unrelenting in fighting for that little bit of heaven we could give each other.

Running the tip of his nose down the length of mine, his lips came to rest against mine, and he kissed me so softly I melted into him, the warmth he gave my soul thawing the habitual ice that resided in every fibre of me.

“In that case,” I conceded. “I may need an antibiotic shot if you want me to live long enough to do this.”

He grinned at me, excitement altering his natural silver-grey eyes into spheres of liquid graphite.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” I asked when he made to leave the room.

He turned and frowned.

I rattled my chains, notifying him that he’d forgotten to remove them.

He chuckled and lifted an eyebrow at me. “I know you think I’m a fool, Elsie, but I’m not that bloody foolish.”

“What the hell?”

“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” he claimed. “I know you won’t trust yourself. I’ll release you, and in a few hours, doubt will start to trickle into your mind. Frank’s control will start to manipulate those doubts until you give in to them.”

“Euan,” I tried, shaking my head at him. “I won’t. We’re doing this. I know we are.”

“Good.” He smiled and still left me chained to the damn wall. Bastard.

 

***

 

“Seriously,” I griped. “I really need to pee!”

He looked at me with a smug smile. “Uh-huh.”

“Euan! I swear if you don’t do something soon then you will definitely have to change the damn bedding!”

Rolling his eyes, he left the room, and I screamed out in frustration. However, a couple of minutes later he was back – holding a bucket and wearing a grin.

“No!” I protested, spitting daggers at him with my glare.

He shrugged, and locking the door behind him, he placed the bucket on the floor and unclasped the cuffs around my wrists. “If you need to pee so badly then there you go!”

“You know I could take you down and just take the keys from you,” I declared with a smirk.

Chuckling, he nodded. “Perhaps, but it won’t make a blind bit of difference since, in addition to me locking it from the inside, one of my colleagues has bolted the door on the other side.”

“You’re such an arsehole!”

“Yup.”

Scowling like a child, I yanked down my jeans and hovered over the bucket. He had the grace to turn away, but nothing masked the sound of my pee hitting the bottom of the bucket.

“Where the hell are we anyway?” I asked, blushing when my bladder took forever to empty itself.

“Agency safe house.”

Shock prohibited the flow, and I stared wide-eyed at Euan’s back. “What? I thought MI5 would be the first to call for my conviction.”

He sighed and turned back to me as I tugged up my jeans.

Leading me over to the bed, he sat me down and settled beside me. “I explained your situation and...”

“Like that will benefit my case?” I cut in, stopping him mid-sentence.

“Wait,” he ordered. “They have a proposition for you.”

Unsure whether I liked the sound of that, I braced myself for what was coming.

“The agency is currently in the process of setting up a new subdivision.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Go on.”

“Most of the agency work comprises of lots of intel gathering before an outcome can even get underway. It’s time-consuming and bloody annoying.” He twisted his lips. “So, while a specialist tech team takes charge of information collection, the new division will focus on the end part of each assignment.”

“You mean the assassination of anyone that is deemed a risk to the country.”

He nodded. “And, in exchange for all charges against you to be dropped, they want Three Blades to take over that detail.”

My brows shot high in astonishment. “They want to integrate with Three Blades? The secret service and a lawless organisation? That’s ridiculous!”

“Is it?” he posed. “Is it really? Weapons are world-known because they’re the best. They get the job done quickly and cleanly. Many agents lose their lives to this life, Elsie, and the agency is willing to congregate with Three Blades to reduce the risk, whether they are legal or not.”

I snorted. “You mean risk Weapons instead of MI5 agents?”

He cringed but nodded in agreement.

“But it won’t matter anyway,” I muttered with disappointment. Having all the charges relating to the slaughter of Peter O’Keefe and his men revoked seemed too good to be true, but even if it were genuine deal, it was a futile hope. “Even if Frank was up for it, it won’t matter to me. As soon as Frank has access to me, I’m a dead woman.”

Euan bit his lip, agitated, and I narrowed my eyes when his expression made my heart stutter with apprehension.

“Euan?”

Inhaling deeply, he took my hand in his. “They want to do business with you, Elsie, not Frank.”

“But that’s impossible. I’m just a Weapon. I don’t govern Three Blades.”

“No,” he concurred. “But they want you to.”

His hard stare expressed what he couldn’t say verbally. My blood ran cold, and I blinked at him in amazement. “You mean they want to remove Frank?”

He nodded slowly, and his single answer drove fear into the core of my bones. “Permanently.”