Replica

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Nadia found her courage eventually and glanced up at Nate’s face.

He wasn’t looking at her. In fact, she didn’t think he was looking at anything, his eyes clouded and distant. She’d never seen his body language look so defeated before, and if she’d thought he’d let her, she’d have risen from her seat to give him a hug.

When she couldn’t stand the silence anymore, Nadia cleared her throat. Nate’s eyes came back into focus, but he didn’t look at her, and she wasn’t sure she could blame him. She’d had good reason for doing what she’d done—and for not telling him about it—but she’d still betrayed him. How could she expect him to forgive her for something like that? Especially when she’d just brought him the most damning evidence of all that Bishop really was responsible for last night’s ambush and beating?

“Please don’t confront Mosely,” she begged quietly. “Not unless you want to see me dragged off to Riker’s Island.”

“I won’t,” Nate said in a flat, dull voice. “Maybe you’re right and I would have flown off the handle if you’d told me before you’d stuck a knife in my back. But right now I don’t care enough to bother.”

Nadia tried not to flinch.

“I’ll do my best to keep up appearances for the time being, but I don’t care what my father wants: I’m not going to marry you.”

Nadia didn’t even try to hide her flinch at that news, though it wasn’t exactly a surprise. She’d known all along that the moment she opened her mouth, everything they’d built together would crumble. She couldn’t say she’d ever truly looked forward to her future as Nate’s neglected wife, but she’d been at least marginally content with it, satisfied that she would be married to a man who could be her friend if nothing more. Without Nate, her future would very likely include a husband like Gerri’s, one whose only redeeming qualities were breeding and power. One she could never love, or even be friends with. And, while she was sure her parents and Gerri would still love her, she doubted a day would go by when she didn’t sense their disappointment in her.

Nadia’s throat ached, and she wished she hadn’t come over. She might have thought she could mitigate the damage by telling Nate the truth in person, but now that she was here, she realized that was wishful thinking. All it meant was that she had to sit and watch her future die in Nate’s eyes as their friendship turned to dust. Maybe she should have called Bishop’s bluff and let him deliver the bad news to Nate. Although why he would bother—or think Nate would listen to him—after what had happened last night, she didn’t know. In fact, the threat didn’t actually make a whole lot of sense under the circumstances.

“Wait a minute,” she said, thinking out loud. “If Bishop is so through with you that he had Angel and her friends beat you up last night, then why did he send me the note and tracker?”

Nate made a growling sound in the back of his throat. “I just told you I’m not going to marry you. Did you hear me?”

There was plenty of pain and dread still roiling around in Nadia’s stomach, but now that her mind had latched onto the thought, she couldn’t seem to let it go. “I heard you.” She met his eyes briefly before her courage failed and she looked away. “It’s not like I didn’t expect it. But what Bishop did doesn’t make sense. Why would he need me to stop you from looking for him after last night?”

Nate leaned back heavily in his chair, crossing his arms over his chest in what she suspected was a protective gesture. “Maybe he wanted to make doubly sure I knew he was behind what happened.”

She shook her head. “If that’s what he wanted, he would have sent the note to you, not to me.”

“Maybe he just thinks I’m a stubborn ass and you have influence on me,” Nate snapped, too angry to look at the logic of his own words.

Nadia stared at him, willing him to think it through. There were even more facts that didn’t add up, now that she thought about it. “You were sure he’d taken enough dollars to secure transport out of Paxco. But if he’s fled Paxco, then how did he get his hands on the tracker and send me a handwritten note in so little time?” Digital information might travel at the speed of light, but not so handwritten notes and crushed circuitry.

For the first time, she saw a hint of uncertainty in Nate’s eyes. Anger and hurt still reigned supreme, but he was thinking again, rather than just acting on knee-jerk emotions. He frowned.

“It doesn’t make sense,” he muttered, more to himself than to her. “With the dollars he took, he could be on another continent by now.”

“And yet he’s close enough to get that note to me in a matter of hours. If he’s so through with you, and so desperate to get you to stop looking for him, why is he delivering the message through Angel and trying to blackmail me into helping? Why didn’t he just do the deed himself last night and tell you to your face he never wanted to see you again?”

Nate gave her a look that was equal parts cold and stubborn. “Maybe he was worried someone had planted a tracker on me and I’d lead Mosely right to him.”

“Or maybe he knew that if he tried to deliver the message personally, he wouldn’t be able to hide what he really felt,” she countered, warming up to her own argument. Maybe she was the world’s worst judge of character, but she couldn’t see Bishop betraying Nate the way he supposedly had. No, there was something else behind his actions, and Nadia realized she had a good guess as to what.

“He loves you, Nate,” she said. “He just doesn’t trust you to be careful enough.”

“What?”

“I didn’t tell you about Mosely because I thought you would fly off the handle the way you do and that I and my family would suffer for it. And Bishop doesn’t want you getting anywhere near him because he’s afraid you’re going to be careless and lead Mosely to him.”

Nate looked at her as if she were crazy. “That’s ridiculous!” Color warmed his cheeks, and she wasn’t sure if it was from anger or embarrassment. “I’ll admit I’m a bit … impetuous sometimes. But I’ve been very careful about everything. Paranoid, even.”

“Mosely knew you visited the Basement on Tuesday night,” she countered. “That’s why he had me plant a tracker on you last night. Which you wore into the Basement while looking for Bishop.”

“So it’s my fault that you planted a tracker on me?”

Nadia held on to her patience, though it took a concerted effort with the way her emotions were rioting. “All I’m saying is that as careful as you were trying to be, you were still taking risks. Risks that could have led Mosely to Bishop. As it is, you can be sure Mosely is going to question Angel, since he must know you talked to her.”

Nate shuddered. “Mosely probably had someone spying on me. They wouldn’t have seen what actually happened—we were in a closed room—but they’d know I left the place in bad shape.”

“Hopefully, they’ll just think you got mugged for asking too many questions,” Nadia said, though she didn’t have high hopes. “If she’s brought in for questioning, do you think she’ll talk?”

Nate’s scornful expression was answer enough, and, in truth, Nadia had known it was a dumb question. She doubted even the noblest of human beings could stand up to the kind of pressure Mosely could apply, and a Basement power player like Angel was not going to be the noblest of human beings. If she knew where Bishop was hiding, she’d tell Mosely and it would all be over.

“Let’s hope that when Bishop found the tracker, he realized what it meant for him and took appropriate precautions,” Nadia said, though she wasn’t honestly sure what precautions Bishop could take if Mosely was close on his tail. Why on earth was he still in Paxco if he had enough money to get out? There had to be a damn good reason.

Nate rubbed at his eyes like he had a headache. “I really want to believe you’re right.” He gave a grunt of frustration. “But why won’t Kurt talk to me, damn it!” The frustration propelled him to his feet, and his sudden wince of pain proved that sudden movement wasn’t a good idea.

“How could he have had me attacked and beaten instead of just telling me to back off?” he said more softly, rubbing a hand over his apparently sore ribs.

Nadia had to fight the urge to reach out to him. Nate was in more than just physical pain, and she was responsible for some of it. “He hurt you because he thought making you think he was the bad guy was the only way to keep you away,” she said as gently as she could. “We both know you’d have ignored him if he’d just asked you to quit.”

Nate hunched in on himself. “They beat the crap out of me,” he said in a voice so subdued it hardly sounded like him. “You really think Kurt could have them do that and still … care about me?”

“He’s from a different world, Nate. A much harder world. He did what he thought he needed to do to protect himself. And I’m sure he feels bad about it.”

“Not as bad as I feel.” But she could tell she’d gotten through to him by the renewed life in his eyes. He wasn’t going to wallow in his misery for long. Which might or might not turn out to be a good thing.

“Nothing’s changed,” she reminded him. “Bishop is obviously very, very serious about not wanting you to look for him.”

“And you’re still spying for Mosely.” The cold was back in his voice. “You’re going to repeat this conversation for him as soon as you have a chance, aren’t you?”

Nadia hadn’t even thought of that, so absorbed in her own guilt she hadn’t considered the full implications of what she’d figured out. She’d come to Nate to unburden herself, but the fact remained that Mosely had ordered her to find out what had happened last night, and she just had. He would no doubt be in contact before the day was out, demanding to know what she’d learned.

“I don’t know how much he’ll know about what happened last night, how much the tracker would have told him. But he will question me, and if he’s anywhere near as good at knowing when people are lying as he’s supposed to be, it could get ugly.”

Suddenly, the weight of it all was too much, and Nadia bowed her head as her chest tightened with another stirring of panic. There was no way she could repeat everything she and Nate had discussed this morning to Mosely. Nate had gotten too close to finding Bishop last night, and while the information they’d shared wasn’t enough to conveniently lead Nate straight to Bishop’s doorstep, it could very well be everything Mosely needed. So she couldn’t tell him. And yet she couldn’t face the consequences of not telling him.

“I won’t let him hurt you,” Nate said, his voice softer and gentler than it had been from the moment she’d blurted out her confession.

He meant the words to be comforting, but she wanted to scream at him. When was he going to accept that he couldn’t make promises like that? He’d probably told Bishop the same thing when he’d made him his valet, and look what had happened!

“Please don’t tell him what I just told you,” Nate continued. “He’s probably already watching Angel, but he has no way to know for sure that Kurt’s been in contact unless you tell him. And if you tell him that Kurt stole my dollars, he’ll make the same assumption I did, that Kurt’s not in Paxco anymore.”

Nadia shook her head, not sure how she was going to keep Mosely from prying this information out of her. She swallowed hard. “Do you have any idea what would happen to me, what would happen to my family if Mosely catches me lying to him?”

“I won’t let him hurt you or your family, Nadia. I mean it.”

She glanced up at him in exasperation. “Wake up, Nate! You can’t stop him from hurting me. You can’t stop him from getting pissed off at me and taking it out on my niece or my nephew. You think he can’t get some scumbag to hurt them for him? Without ever dirtying his own hands? All he needs is a little plausible deniability, and he can get away with just about anything. You think throwing a temper tantrum is going to stop him?”

“He’s not invincible!” he snapped back. “And I’m not some whiny, powerless kid. Can I officially order him to leave you alone and expect him to listen to me? No. But I can sure as hell make a lot of noise he would find inconvenient, to say the least. He can threaten you all he wants, but if it comes down to actually acting on the threats, that’s a whole other story.”

He’s already hit me once, she thought, but refrained from saying, afraid the words would have the absolute opposite effect from what she wanted.

Nate might be right. Mosely might be making empty threats. Not because he didn’t have the power to carry them out, or even because he would fear the consequences of doing so, but because if the situation escalated to that point, she wouldn’t be useful to him anymore. Once Mosely followed through on the ugliest of his threats, if he actually had Gerri arrested and sent to Riker’s Island or had someone hurt Corinne or Rory, the threat lost its power to control her.

But even if Nate was right, even if Mosely didn’t plan to follow through on his threats, how could she possibly risk her family’s safety on that assumption?

“Please, Nadia,” Nate said again. “You can tell him I told you I got beat up by Angel’s bouncers because I was asking stupid questions at her club. I was half expecting to end up in some kind of mess like that anyway. Walking around a Basement club asking questions isn’t a very good survival strategy, and it shouldn’t surprise anyone that it backfired on me. So tell him they beat me up and robbed me. It’s true, after all. The only part you have to leave out is the link between Angel and Kurt. And whatever you do, don’t tell him Kurt contacted you.”

Nate let out a heavy sigh and sat back in his chair, like he was trying to look relaxed. He didn’t have much success. “I understand why you did what you did,” he said, but that was a lie and they both knew it. “I’m not sure I can forgive you for it, but I’ll try. But only if you don’t tell Mosely about Kurt.”

She swallowed hard. “You want me to risk everything on the hope that you’ll try to forgive me?”

The coldness in his eyes chilled her. “How about if I try to forgive you and I don’t interfere with our engagement plans?”

She let out a humorless laugh. Of all the things she’d expected from Nate, this wasn’t one of them. “Taking a page from Mosely’s book?”

“You want to protect your family. I want to protect Kurt. Our marriage was always going to be a business arrangement anyway, so let’s make it official.”

Nadia’s throat ached, and there was a lump in it the size of a tennis ball. She’d confessed all under the understanding that it would destroy the engagement, that she would doom herself to a future marriage of convenience with a stranger she could never love. Nate was offering her hope where none had existed. So why did the offer hurt so much?

When the smoke cleared, it would look to all the world as if her life had returned to normal. She would marry the Chairman Heir, her father would be promoted to the board of directors, and all her immediate family members would become eligible to have periodic backups and even Replicas. She would have all the material trappings and powers she would have had if none of this had ever happened. The only thing she wouldn’t have was Nate’s friendship. The pain of that loss threatened to rise up and swallow her whole.

“Do we have a deal?” Nate prompted as she struggled with the pain.

Her chest and throat too tight to speak, Nadia could only nod.