Rebecca Zanetti - Blind Faith

“Fuck you.”

“Good start.” The commander smiled. “Where is your new headquarters?”

“San Diego.” Nate let the truth slip out, not sure if he could stop it. Sins Security was based in San Diego and counted as headquarters. Of course, it wasn’t where the family had dug in, but the commander hadn’t asked that question. “Why did you let somebody shoot Jory?”

The commander sighed. “I didn’t approve that. I needed Jory to bring you all back in.”

Needed? For the first time, real pain sliced into Nate’s chest. “So he’s dead?”

“I didn’t say that.” The commander leaned closer, his minty breath brushing Nate’s skin. “How’s the heart? I had to restart it twice.”

So he’d died twice during the night. Interesting. “Still pumping. Where’s Jory?”

“I can stop your heart again if I wish. When are Matt and Shane coming to get you?”

Nate smiled and fresh blood washed down his chin, cooling aching bruises. “They’re not coming here. Period.”

The commander blinked.

Triumph, almost sadistic in its intensity, flew through Nate. He’d made the bastard blink. “You know I’m not lying.” He couldn’t at this point.

“Hmmm.” The commander rubbed his chin. “Yet they know you’re here.”

“Yes.”

The clinch on Nate’s head loosened, and the commander stepped back to study him. “Why aren’t they coming?”

“I told them not to. It’s more important that they figure out the codes to the chips… and find Jory.” Nate spit out more blood. “We have the computer program but not the codes. Yet.” He should probably worry about the internal bleeding going on right now.

“No.” The commander shook his head. “They wouldn’t have listened.”

“They did.” Nathan’s voice sounded oddly strangled and hoarse. How long had he screamed during the night? The whole thing was a blur. “I thanked them for being my brothers and hugged them.”

“And they?”

“Shane told to me to shut up, and Matt told us both to shut up. That was the end.” Nathan rose up on his toes as his leg cramped.

“Interesting.” The commander drew out a cell phone to type in a text. “So they figure I won’t kill you… might even reprogram your chip. You’re here to get information.”

“I would like information.” Nate’s vision blurred. “Why do you want Matt and Shane here, anyway? We won’t work for you.”

The commander’s jaw hardened. “You will work for me. There’s important missions to be accomplished, and after I filet Matt in front of all of you, you’ll do what I want.”

“Filet?” Nate’s brain fired.

“Yes. He took my training and betrayed me. He tried to take my place with you and your brothers.” The commander nabbed the back of Nate’s head and jerked. “You follow me ,” he spat.

It had always been personal between the commander and Matt. “So you want him dead?”

“Yes, and I want his brothers to follow my command.” Spittle flew from the man’s mouth. “Forever.”

The commander truly hated Matt.

Nate spit out blood and spoke directly from his heart. “You will never beat Matt. Ever. He’s twice the soldier and man that you’ll ever be. And. You. Know. It.”

The commander yanked hard, and Nate’s vision blurred.

Then the leader released him. “I’ll kill Matt slowly.”

Nate grimaced. “Where’s Jory?”

The door opened, and a solider wheeled in a laptop. “I received your text.”

“Thank you. Leave.” The commander pressed a couple of keys on the keyboard, and the soldier scrambled out of the room.

Nate tried to raise an eyebrow. “We’re going to watch a movie? I haven’t seen the new Disney one. I love monsters that talk.”

The commander glanced over his shoulder. “You’re under the influence of potent truth-inducing drugs. You really do love Disney movies.”

Nate tried to shrug. Disney movies rocked.

The commander chuckled and rolled the screen closer to Nate. “This is a different movie.”

Nate tried to focus and keep his gaze stoic as Jory came into focus. His baby brother, the one who’d grown huge, the one who never exploded in temper, sat bound on a chair, bloody and furious. A woman’s high heels came into view as she shot three rounds into Jory’s chest. Jory fell to the floor, and the screen went blank.

Nate’s heart thundered fast enough to hurt his broken ribs. “I’ve already seen that movie.” Hundreds of times, actually. He’d studied it frame by frame, trying to find any clue.

“Yes, I figured.” The commander leaned over and punched in a new code. “But you haven’t seen this one.”

Everything in Nate stilled. The drugs disappeared, the cold room faded into the background. The screen showed Jory’s massive body on a surgical table, surgeons scrambling to save his life. They lost him once, but he came back.

Nate lifted his chin. “He survived being shot?”

“Not exactly.” The commander pushed a button, and the video fast-forwarded through the surgery to Jory lying unconscious in a hospital bed, tubes hooked up to him everywhere. “Coma. Brain dead.”

Please, no. Nathan turned a cold look on the commander. “This won’t break me, either.” But he’d watch. If these were his younger brother’s last moments, he’d watch and experience them with Jory. He’d be there for his brother, even if it was too late.

“I think it might.” The commander smiled without humor. “I’ve always known that physically, you can’t be broken. Emotionally, you’re the easiest target in the Gray family.”

“Isss that a fact?” Nate slurred.

“Yes. You need them so much more than they need you. Without them, you’d free that beast I know lives in you. You’d be the cold-blooded killing machine I fucking created. It’s in your DNA.” The commander’s smile turned triumphant.

The truth of the words slithered deep into Nate’s gut, taking root. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe not.” He levered up to get better balance, even as his wrists bellowed in pain. “But I do have brothers, and Matt made sure I stayed human. Jory and Shane kept me good instead of bad.”

The commander shook his head. “But that need in you? The need to be other than who you are? That’s what makes you weak.”

Did it? Or did it give him strength? Nate blinked blood out of his eyes. “You’ll never understand me.”

“Oh, I get you. Let’s see, shall we?” The commander turned back toward the video and fast-forwarded through scenes, each day documented with a date. Day by day, Jory didn’t move. He became paler and his muscles lost definition… but he didn’t move. For nearly two years, he didn’t even twitch.

Nate allowed no emotion to show on his face, but inside, knives sliced through everything he was. Everything he’d hoped for, and everything he’d wanted to be. He’d failed his little brother, the one he’d promised to protect. Jory, so good and powerful, had wasted away in a hospital bed. Alone.

The commander pushed PAUSE at a date six months ago. “I actually hadn’t planned on showing you this, but you’ve left me no choice.”

“Finish it,” Nate ground out.

“Fair enough.” The commander pressed PLAY and stepped away.

The date blinked on the bottom of the screen, and the beeping of medical machinery filtered through the speakers. A monitor to the side of Jory’s bed blipped with his heartbeat.

Nate watched three months pass, waiting for the final moment when the beeping ended. Something inside of him started to crack.

Jory opened his eyes.

This was definitely a bad idea. A horribly bad idea. Audrey crept through the hangar storing three helicopters. Only three? Yeah. The commander had another base somewhere, without question. The smell of gasoline and motor oil assaulted her.