Gail Barrett - Tough Justice - Twisted

Her heart lurched. “You mean Andrew Moore.”

“That’s exactly what I mean.”

“I don’t—”

“You’re strong enough, Lara. And it’s time to deal with this.”

“I already have.” She’d spent the past year anguishing over her failings and coming to grips with her mistakes. “I’ve already put it behind me and moved on.”

“Have you? Really? Because I believe that unless you confront it—meaning you’re willing to talk about what happened—you won’t be able to fight back. And then he will win, Lara.”

Her defenses rising, she crossed her arms. The last person she wanted to discuss with Dr. Oliviero was Andrew Moore. But she refused to continue running from her problems.

And deep down, she suspected the psychiatrist was right. Unless she truly confronted her past, she’d never reclaim control of her life—and the people around her would pay the price.

“All right.” Dreading it, she forced her mind back to Chicago, to those final days with Andrew Moore. “I liked him. He wasn’t what I’d expected. Maybe I wasn’t what he expected either. Maybe that’s why he trusted me, why we got so close. Too close.” Her face warmed, her stupidity shaming her even now. How could she have made such a huge mistake?

“That didn’t stop me from doing my job, though. I continued gathering information even during our affair. We were getting ready to make the bust.”

“Did that bother you, that you’d be arresting Andrew Moore?”

“Of course.” The guilt had nearly driven her mad. “I wanted to warn him, to get him out of harm’s way, but I was torn. I couldn’t blow the mission. We had too many people undercover—people who’d be in danger if the truth got out—and I couldn’t predict what he would do. So in the end, I didn’t tell him. I waited.” Despising herself all the time.

“We still hadn’t found Moretti. Until we did, we couldn’t make the bust. We knew he’d just relocate his organization and set up shop again somewhere else unless we put him behind bars.”

But the noose had been tightening around her. The closer she got to Andrew Moore, the greater the chance that she’d blow her cover, a mistake that could have gotten them all killed.

“Andrew didn’t suspect you were FBI?” the doctor asked.

“I don’t think so.” Maybe he’d sensed her desperation. Their lovemaking had taken on a note of urgency toward the end. Or maybe she’d imagined that—just as she’d imagined what he’d felt for her.

“I decided to help him find his buddy’s sister. I figured that even if I was going to bust him, even if I was going to put him in prison, at least I could help him save that girl.”

“You wanted to make amends.”

“Yes—which was idiotic, considering how badly he’d lied to me.”

“But you didn’t know that then. You were making decisions based on the information you had.”

True enough. But it still galled her that she’d let her emotions blind her to the truth.

“So, what happened next?” Dr. Oliviero asked.

She knotted her hands, forcing herself to return to that awful night. “I’d learned that some girls were being moved, transported out of Chicago for a special event, a play-off game that would attract a lot of johns. I had information that his friend’s sister might be involved, so I went to the warehouse to find out.”

“Was she there?”

“Not that I could tell. But Andrew showed up. I figured he was doing the same thing I was, looking for that missing girl. But I couldn’t get close enough to him to ask.

“After the trucks left, I tried to find him. I had to stay quiet in case Moretti’s people were still around. I was on the point of giving up when I heard a voice—a man’s voice. It sounded like Andrew’s, but the voice was deeper, and it had a different cadence, like the rhythm was slightly off.”

She inhaled. This was the hard part. The moment when her world had fallen apart, when she’d learned that everything she’d once believed was wrong.

“I got as close as I could and hid. I didn’t want to barge in on whatever Andrew had going on. I thought he’d arranged a meeting. Then I worried that someone had surprised him, that he might be in trouble and need my help. But when I peeked around the corner, I saw that he was alone. He was talking on the phone. But I still didn’t understand.”

She closed her eyes, the lengths to which she’d gone to deny the obvious sickening her even now. “I thought he’d put the phone on speaker, that the voice belonged to whoever else was on the line. But then I heard him giving orders to move some cargo from a south side warehouse to headquarters later that afternoon. And I realized the voice was his.”

She met Dr. Oliviero’s eyes. “I still didn’t get it. I knew Andrew was sharp, probably the smartest man I’d ever met. I figured he had a reason to change his voice.”

“Did he?”

She let out a bitter laugh. “Oh, yeah. He had a reason, all right.”

“And what was that?”

Andrew Moore—the wounded ex-soldier, the arms commander she’d come to admire and respect, the tortured man she’d confided in, made wild and passionate love to—was a total myth. Instead, the man she loved was a monster.

“Andrew Moore was Moretti.”

Chapter Two Contents Cover Title Page Tough Justice: Twisted (Part 5 of 8) Gail Barrett About Tough Justice About the Author RITA® Award finalist GAIL BARRETT always knew she wanted to be a writer. After living everywhere from Spain to the Bahamas, earning a graduate degree in linguistics, and teaching high school Spanish for years, she finally fulfilled that goal. Her books have won numerous awards, including a National Readers’ Choice award, a Book Buyers’ Best, and RWA’s Golden Heart® Award. Visit her website: www.gailbarrett.com . Dedication To Rob Carusone, with enormous thanks. Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Extract Конец ознакомительного фрагмента. Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес». Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес. Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом. Copyright Конец ознакомительного фрагмента. Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес». Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес. Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.

As mistakes went, it was colossal one. Falling in love with a man like Moretti had to be the most revolting thing she’d ever done.

“You hadn’t suspected the truth? That they were actually the same person?” Dr. Oliviero asked her.

“No. I was shocked. I just stood there, reeling at the discovery. All this time, I’d been searching for Moretti, and he was the man I was sleeping with.” The head of a brutal empire. The man who’d single-handedly ruined thousands of lives. The monster who’d condemned innocent children to a hellish existence, who’d tortured and killed without conscience.