Mission: Marriage. Karen Whiddon

Always have, always will.”

      “Our marriage is over.”

      He swallowed. Though she hadn’t meant it to be, that sentence was the most hurtful of all. “I’m not talking about our marriage. We are a working team, colleagues. You know that neither of us can get to the Hungarian alone. And to try to do so is suicide. Quit being so stubborn and admit it. Before you get yourself killed.”

      Tilting her head, she considered his words, forced by their vehemence to put aside her personal feelings. “You may be right.”

      “You know I am.”

      Ignoring this, she continued. “If we’re going to be a real team, we need to lay down some ground rules.”

      This should be interesting. “Like?”

      “I’m in charge.” She said it so smoothly he wasn’t certain he’d heard correctly.

      “Uh, no.”

      She cocked her head, crossed her arms, and merely looked at him.

      Still sexy as hell. But ten times more infuriating.

      “Natalie, sweetheart—”

      “I’m not your sweetheart.”

      He tried again. “I’ve been doing this sort of thing far longer. I’m a trained assassin, for pity’s sake. I’m older, stronger and male.”

      “So? Men lead and women follow, is that it?”

      Since she had it pretty much in a nutshell, he didn’t see the need to elaborate. “You’ve got it.”

      He waited for the explosion.

      Instead, she threw back her head and laughed.

      It was a truly amused, gut-rolling, belly-shaking laugh. The sort of laugh a confident woman had, a woman who knew what she was and where she was going.

      Natalie had never, in the entire time he’d known her, laughed like that.

      He stared at the beautiful woman who’d been his wife and finally acknowledged the truth. She’d become a stranger. Two years had passed, an eternity of living separately, time enough for both of them to change.

      Though he might long for things to be as they’d been, too much water under the bridge ensured that could never happen.

      Yet he couldn’t stop wanting her.

      Despite the desire coiled in his gut, Sean had to sleep. Though his restless mind and tumbling thoughts tried to pump him full of adrenaline, his exhaustion was so complete that he found himself nodding off in the middle of Natalie’s next question.

      “What?” he repeated, groggy and slow and wishing he could simply wrap himself around her and drift off to sleep.

      “Get in the bed,” she repeated. “You look like you might pass out at any moment.”

      Grateful, he crawled for the pillow, barely registering her touch as she tugged the blanket over him.

      Outside, the rain beat steady and heavy, drowning out the noise of the traffic and the city. Sean’s last thought as he drifted off to sleep was how he’d give anything to wake up with Natalie warm and willing in his arms.

       Chapter 6

      “Sean, I need the truth.”

      He started, yanked up out of a light doze. The soft question came out of nowhere, the dark room amplifying the sensual sound of her breathing, of her silky voice. “I gave you the truth.” Blinking, he cleared his throat. “Honestly, I told you what really happened.”

      “No. You told me pieces.” Her tone made it clear she thought there was more. “You left part of the puzzle out. The biggest piece. What’s the real reason the Hungarian wants to destroy you?”

      His heart thudding dully in his chest, he swallowed. She’d asked the one question he’d dreaded for so many years. The one question that, if he answered, might completely and utterly destroy whatever speck of love remained in her heart for him.

      Propped into the corner of the high-backed chair, her elegant neck looking impossibly long, her short, copper-colored hair sticking up in wanton disarray and her half-lidded amber gaze appearing sultry, she made him want her all over again.

      He couldn’t help but wonder if she knew her beauty struck him dumb. Fervently, he hoped she didn’t.

      While he stared, she stared back. Finally, she narrowed her eyes, the dim light from the lamp making them appear to glow golden. “Are you even awake enough to talk?”

      He could have taken the coward’s way out—told her he wanted to go back to sleep and they’d talk about this in the morning. But he was tired of running, tired of hiding. And, even though he’d given her a partial truth, he was damn sick and tired of having her think he’d disappeared because he didn’t care.

      “I’m waking up.” Sean couldn’t help but wonder if she remembered the way he always woke around her—aroused and ready. She used to love teasing him, until they both were panting and breathless.

      Damn. Remembering didn’t help his current situation at all. Pushing himself up, he plumped up the pillow and propped it against the headboard. He was careful to keep the blankets piled on top of his lap.

      “At the time, I believed I had no choice.” It was the closest he could bring himself to admit he might have, in the awful grief and rage, made an error in judgment.

      “I thought our marriage was based upon trust. Love. Respect. You’ve proved me wrong with your lies. You weren’t the man I thought you were, Sean.” Her voice broke. “The man I loved.”

      He opened his mouth, closed it and swallowed. In this, with secret upon secret upon secret, he wasn’t even certain where to begin. There were some things he’d believed he would never have to tell her.

      Now, he knew he had no choice. If they were ever to have a second chance together, Natalie had to know everything.

      She misread his hesitation as refusal. “Cut the crap. Tell me everything.”

      Everything. He closed his eyes and sighed. The rest of what he had to tell her tasted like bile, though he knew someday she’d have to know the truth.

       All of the truth, no matter how much it hurt.

      “Start at the beginning, so I can keep this straight.” Her clothes rustled as she moved. “Begin with the family reunion.”

      Though his feud with the Hungarian went back much further than that, the family reunion was a good place to start. Natalie had been scheduled to arrive close to the same time as his parents. A missed flight had saved her life.

      Clearing his throat, he began. “What the Hungarian did to my family earned him a special niche in hell.

      “I arrived on the island early, planning to surprise my folks and you. I’ll never forget jumping out of the rented boat and jogging toward the main house, full of excitement.

      “The pool of blood on the front porch was my first clue something was wrong.”

      He tasted bile and swallowed, forcing himself to continue. “Bloody footprints in the foyer had me running for the den. My family was there—or what was left of them. The killers had dragged them into the center of the room and tossed them in a horrible, bloody heap.”

      Eyes wide, she watched him. “Dead?”

      “Oh yes. They were all dead. Brutally murdered. Missing limbs, or eyes or heads. From the expression on their faces, they’d suffered horribly before they died.”

      The blood leached from her face. “I’m so sorry.”

      Ignoring her, he continued. “Frantic, my first thought was for you, my wife. I couldn’t find you. Your body wasn’t in the