Sea Haven 01 - Water Bound

come back. Waiting to see her eyes again. And that was just about the stupidest thing he’d ever done in his life.
    He thought he might have been unconscious for a short while. The boat creaked and rocked, and the motion would have been soothing if it hadn’t been for the nausea and the ever-present headache. His skull felt like it was about to explode. He was thirsty, but it was too much effort to lift the water to his mouth.
    He sat there and tried to piece together his life. It came to him in images, jagged pictures, all violent. Scraps of boyhood memories haunted 44

    him with blood and pain. Bullets slammed into his body, piercing flesh and bone, shattering his insides. He felt the blade of a knife, stabbing at him over and over, cutting deep. Something pounded the soles of his feet. Pain engulfed his body. He accepted it. He could stand while in pain. Fight while in pain. Perform while in pain. He could withhold information, lock it away in a part of his mind even he couldn’t access.
    Discipline . The word repeated itself over and over in his head. He murmured it like a talisman to hold on to. Discipline .
    “Yes,” a voice agreed softly. “Discipline is important.”
    The voice was soft. Feminine. Too young. He shook his head to clear it. So many of them died and he couldn’t stop it. Like a flood.
    “Shh,” he cautioned. “Don’t make a sound, no matter how much it hurts. You can live with the pain. They’ll just hurt you more if you make a sound.”
    “I won’t. Don’t worry. I won’t make any noise.”
    A cool hand touched his forehead and he caught the wrist, pinning it down. His eyes flying open. He didn’t like anyone touching him. The face in front of him wavered—he couldn’t center on it. He tightened his grip, not understanding what was happening to him. It was difficult to see, but eventually, through all the haze, he made out a pair of heavily fringed eyes looking back at him. His world narrowed to that intense gaze. Black as night, so black the eyes were nearly purple. Liquid, like the sea on a stormy night. A man could drown there if he let himself. His breath hissed out. “Sex is a tool. Nothing more.”
    “It’s all right. It’s going to be all right.”
    He shook his head. “I can’t save you if you won’t listen to me.”
    “It’s all right. I’ll get you out of this.”
    Her choice of words puzzled him. He was the one to get her out. But he’d failed. He’d failed them all. How could she know what needed to be done when he didn’t know? She didn’t try to fight his hold on her, rather she stayed very still, almost as if she knew any movement might set off his instincts—and none of his instincts were good.
    Discipline mattered. Pushing the shattering pain away, he forced his brain to function. His thumb stroked back and forth over the inside of her palm. She’d removed her mittens and he was touching bare skin. The center of her palm drew his attention until he pressed the pads of his fingers there, tracing two small circles over and over, as if he could etch them into her skin.
    “They’re missing,” he muttered, his eyebrows drawing together in a frown. “The symbols. They should be right here.”
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    “You’ve got a concussion,” she explained. “You need to be in a hospital.”
    He closed his fingers around her hand, holding tightly. “They’ll kill me.
    If you take me there, they’ll find me and they’ll kill me.”
    “Don’t worry. I’m not going to let anyone kill you.”
    He had no way of telling her he was her enemy. He couldn’t form the words. And that told him he really wasn’t thinking clearly at all. Everyone was either his enemy or a tool. There were no friends in his business. He just needed a safe place to rest, to figure out what was going on.
    “I’ll take you somewhere safe.”
    Her voice was soft. Melodious. A fantasy. He knew a hallucination when he was in one. There were no beautiful eyes promising him a sanctuary, looking at him as if they saw inside of him and past every shield, stripping him down until he was vulnerable. If someone really saw him, they’d kill him and throw his body overboard, not fight to save him—and if they didn’t manage his death, he’d have to kill them to protect that vulnerable part of himself.
    “You’re in danger.” He tried to warn her. If she was real and she was looking at him like that, then for once in his life, he had to take the job personally. Just this once. For