Darkest Before Dawn

“Three minutes,” Copeland called from the front seat.

Honor nodded her understanding, squaring her shoulders.

Minutes later the vehicle came to an abrupt stop, causing Honor to lurch forward, the seatbelt ramming into her belly. To her surprise Conrad was there before Hancock to catch her, and then he carefully eased her back against the seat.

Conrad got out first and then the others piled out. Only Viper stayed behind the wheel. Hancock reached over to unlatch Honor’s harness. His arm pressed into her side in order to reach the latch buried under the folds of her burka.

She winced and her face went pale. What the fuck?

He quickly unsnapped the buckle and prepared to help her out of the vehicle. But when he drew his arm back, the one that had pressed hard into Honor’s side, he was stunned to see fresh blood smeared on his skin.

Dread took hold of his spine.

He lifted a hand to Honor’s cheek, staring her intently in the eyes.

“Are you hurt?” he asked in a soft tone.

Her eyes were wide and frightened. She’d seen the blood on Hancock’s arm. She was pale and shaken as her lips worked to answer his question.

“I don’t know. I didn’t think so. I felt a twinge of pain in my side, but I fell and just thought it was sore. But it hurts now,” she said, gritting her teeth.

Hancock swore viciously and guilt, not an emotion he was well acquainted with at all, gripped his chest like a vise.

“Let me get you in the other vehicle. We can’t afford to stop. But I’ll take a look and see what’s going on. If it’s serious, we’ll have to risk taking you to the hospital.”

Fear immediately filled her eyes even as she shook her head.

“I’m alive. I’m not dying. I just hurt. And I’ve dealt with pain for over a week. I’ll deal with it now,” she said quietly.

Once again a surge of pride overtook him. She simply didn’t know the meaning of the word quit. If only he weren’t destined to betray her. To sacrifice her for the greater good. The world needed people like her, and it fucking sucked that the good ones were usually the sacrificial lambs.

“Let me help you. We don’t know what’s going on and I don’t want you making it worse,” he said in a low voice.

She nodded her agreement.

Hancock leaned in and slid one arm beneath her knees and the other between her back and the seat, gently lifting, watching for any sign of pain or discomfort in her eyes. He should have known he wouldn’t find any no matter how much pain she was in. She had too much pride and determination to give in and appear weak in front of him and his men.

He retreated from the interior and turned Honor’s face into his neck to protect her eyes from the scorching, blowing sand.

“Open the back,” Hancock said as he strode toward the waiting vehicle. “Honor and I will ride in back for a few miles. I need a flat surface so I can see about her injury.”

“Injury?” Conrad demanded. “What injury?”

“I don’t know yet,” Hancock said calmly.

Conrad let loose with a string of obscenities and continued to mutter and curse under his breath as he opened the vehicle and hastily arranged a comfortable place for Honor to lie. Then he stood back as Hancock positioned her carefully on the blankets Conrad had spread out. But Conrad didn’t budge. In fact he pressed in close, touching elbows with Hancock, a grim expression on his face.

Hancock didn’t reprimand his man. Beneath the fury, Hancock could see . . . worry. And guilt. Conrad assumed she’d taken a bullet meant for him, and it would eat him alive. Hancock and his men, every single last one of them, were protectors. Yes, they didn’t always protect the good and innocent. Sometimes it took becoming the very thing they hunted so relentlessly in order to take out evil in the world. So that the innocent would prevail.

Only this innocent he couldn’t save. Her fate had already been decided and written. Unchangeable. It would have been far more merciful for her if she had died in the clinic bombing. Because the short future she faced wouldn’t go by quickly. It wouldn’t be merciful. In fact, it would tear her down to her soul, and in the end, that would fade too, leaving only a hollow shell of the fierce woman she used to be. She would welcome death. Pray for it. And it would only make her captors all the more determined to prolong her hour-to-hour agony.

And he was responsible. He would have done that to her. Make it possible for her to be treated with less regard than an animal. And for what? The greater good? It was the philosophy Titan had always held as their creed, even when Rio led Titan. The man who’d taught Hancock everything he knew.

Hancock had always believed in that motto. He understood it. He lived it, breathed it, risked his life to uphold it. But for the first time, the idea of Honor’s sacrifice being responsible for Maksimov, Bristow and ANE going down and saving hundreds of thousands of innocent people in the process made him . . . sick. It disgusted him.

Maybe it was time to hang it up. Disappear somewhere and start a new life where he would be known to no one and not relentlessly hunted. Somewhere he could be alone, never having to deal with the oblivious people he’d lost his soul for in order for them to continue their ignorant, happy existence.

But no. He had family. By love, not blood. They were the only people in the world he felt . . . anything . . . for. Affection. Love. Unwavering loyalty. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for any of them.

He couldn’t simply walk out of their lives and never return. They deserved better of him after all they’d done for him. They’d saved him. They’d given him purpose and a place in the world, even if it was a place so steeped in shadows and sins that he doubted he’d ever see the light again.