“Yes. Again, I don’t know the hows. I know Mum and Hannah lived in Scotland and I was in England. I left them alone. I was in a position where someone could use them against me and I didn’t protect them. I don’t even remember if I loved them. All I feel is guilt. I look at their pictures and all I feel is despair, and I’m glad they aren’t around because I’m pretty sure those women in the pictures wouldn’t have been proud to call me kin.”
She was still for a moment and then finally she spoke, her words coming out thin and tortured. “Do you hate me for that?”
“What?”
Tears began to slip from her eyes. “I was scared. I ran and I didn’t do what I should have done. Owen, I was so scared. I didn’t even understand what truly happened until tonight. I believe I was given a dose of the time dilation drug by Steven. He wanted me to leave because he thought Dr. McDonald was going to choose me over him. He didn’t want to lose his place at her side.”
His breath caught in his throat at the thought. He knew what that fucking drug did. He’d read everything he could, every report available. “What did he put you through?”
She went quiet. “I don’t want to talk about it. I’m not even certain what happened.”
“Depending on how he used it, what the dosage was and some other factors, it could have felt like a dream state,” Ariel explained.
“A nightmare,” Becca said, and he thought she was saying it more to herself than anyone else. She seemed to shake it off. “I’m sorry I don’t know where the package is. I don’t remember getting anything from her. If I had, I would have studied the material. This was right before I came to Canada?”
“Yes.” He didn’t want to talk about the mission. He wanted to drag her onto his lap and keep her talking. He wanted to assure her that he didn’t blame her for anything, but she wasn’t ready to listen. She might never be. “From what we’ve discovered, Dr. McDonald sent a package to you roughly two weeks before the raid on her compound in France.”
“I believe she knew Taggart was closing in on her.” Ariel’s voice had gone professional again as if she understood they couldn’t handle any more emotion. “She might have sent you that material in order to try to protect it.”
“Or it might be complete crap and we’ve done all of this for nothing,” Robert said with a long sigh.
“It wasn’t for nothing.” He hadn’t meant to say it out loud, but he couldn’t hold it in. “Green would have come after Becca at some point. He believes there’s something in the package, and he would have figured out that Becca has knowledge he can use. If we hadn’t been here, he would have taken her one way or another.”
“But she didn’t send anything to me,” Becca insisted and then she took a long breath. “Wait. How would she have sent anything to me? She didn’t have my address at the time.”
“It was before you moved here. You were living in Boston,” he explained. “Wasn’t that your address when you worked at Kronberg? They would have known your address.”
She nodded, clearly thinking it through. “But Gary and I split up right after I got back from Germany. He had his affair while I was there and I found out when I came home unexpectedly. I moved out that day. Yes, Kronberg had that address, but Gary lived there at the time. Not me. He lived there up until a few months ago. Oh, shit. I know where it is. It’s at my apartment. About three months ago, he sent me two big boxes of stuff I’d left behind. He’d put it up in the attic but I never made time to go get it. He and Britney decided to sell the house, and I asked him to mail me the boxes. I put them aside. I was busy and I honestly didn’t want to look at anything that would remind me of that time. They’re sitting in my guest room closet. It’s got to be in there.”
He hated what he had to tell her next. “It’s not there.”
She shook her head. “If Gary got mail for me that I didn’t pick up, he would have put it in the box he sent. He even said something about having some packages I never came to get. Britney said she wanted my shit out of the place before she called a real estate agent. I would have told him to throw it all away, but he’d already shipped it. It’s got to be there. I never opened the second box.”
“But I did.” He had to put it out there. “And by now Levi’s gone through it, too. There was nothing there but some clothes, a couple of stuffed animals, and some books. There was no package.”
She stilled. “Of course you did. That’s what you were there to do. You waited until I was asleep. You did a good job tiring me out. I slept like a log when you were there.”
Because he’d fucked her so long and hard and well, he’d wanted to sleep, too. Instead he’d crawled out of her bed and gotten his job done.
“If it hadn’t been Owen, it would have been me.” That was Robert, always trying to help a friend out. “We had cameras stationed around the building so we would know when you were coming and going. If Owen hadn’t searched your place, I would have done it while you were at work. Sasha and Dante searched your office. They weren’t able to get to your lab. They were moving into those shifts next week.”
“Of course.” She was staring out the window again. “The lab would have been a bust, though they’ll take my research now. Paul will likely move forward with it on his own.”
“I’ll try to get it back for you.” He could steal it. He could have Jax hack into Huisman and take it back for her. The data would be stored somewhere. It could be a team job.
Her face had settled into a stubborn expression. “I want to tell you to fuck yourself, but I need it. It will be helpful in my new work, my work no one will likely ever know about because I’m a fugitive.”
“You won’t always be,” he replied, hoping she understood he wasn’t going to leave her like this. “I told you, I’m going to fix it. I’ll find a way.”
“You also told me you wanted to be my lover. You’ll excuse me if I don’t believe you.”
“I wanted to be your lover the minute you stepped into that lift. Maybe before. Is it really my fault you also happened to be the target?”
“Yes, it’s your fault.” At least she was looking at him again.
“I think we should take a moment,” Ariel began.
“Stay out of this.” Becca looked like she was ready to take them all on. “This is not a therapy session and while we’re discussing it, how do you reconcile lying to people? You’re a therapist and you help these guys put people into positions where they will inevitably need your services. That’s quite a racket you have going.”
“That is certainly not my plan, Rebecca,” Ariel replied primly.
Robert chuckled. “Actually it is a great business plan when you think about it, babe. Tell me you weren’t already planning Becca’s sessions?”
Ariel frowned his way. “Of course I was. She’s going to have trust issues. She already has them, and I’ve only recently realized that they aren’t merely caused by her childhood. They’ve also got an enormous amount to do with what happened to her at Kronberg. We’ll need to work through that.”
“I don’t have trust issues.” Becca argued, pointing Owen’s way. “Well, I didn’t until I met this one.”
“That’s not true,” Owen replied. Ariel wasn’t the only one who’d made a study of Rebecca Walsh. He’d gotten to know her, spent long hours thinking about her. He’d come to some conclusions. “You don’t have friends, Becca, and you’re the type of woman who needs them.”
She seemed to think about that for a moment. “I have Cathy.”
“How much does she know about your life?” Owen asked. “Think about this. You see her at work and you talk about research and what you’re going to eat for lunch and how her children are doing. When do you tell her about your hopes and dreams? She set you up with the most boring lawyer on the planet and why? Because all she really knows about you is how hard you work.”
The tears were back in her eyes and he hated the fact that he was the one who had to point this out to her.
“I wanted to take some time after the divorce,” she said. “I guess I didn’t realize how much I isolated myself.”