Page 58 of Lethal Sins

Her sharp intake of breath cut through the drone of the engine. “What? You and ... my father?”

Myriad emotions played across her face: confusion, hurt, and then a flicker of something else. Anger? Betrayal? He couldn’t quite tell.

“But ... that doesn’t make sense.” She leaned forward, her brow furrowed in concentration. “Dad distanced himself right after the scandal. Why would he do that if he helped you frame me?”

Cody ran a hand through his hair, searching for the right words to explain the complex web of deceit and protection he and Atticus created.

“You’ve already figured that part out. He pushed you away because he was working within the Consortium to take it down. He didn’t want you in harm’s way.”

Her eyes locked onto his, searching for truth. “You’re saying he stayed away to protect me?”

Cody nodded. “He loved you too much to risk your safety. We both did.”

The silence that followed was deafening. He braced himself for the anger, the betrayal that was sure to come. But Paige’s response caught him off guard.

“The Cody I knew at college, and the Cody I know now, would never hurt me intentionally,” she said softly. “You must have had a good reason.”

Her understanding, her faith in him, lifted his soul beyond reason. “I was in love with you. Still am.”

The admission hung in the air between them, charged with years of unspoken emotions. He plowed ahead, unable to stop now that he’d started. “I was recruited by a small group inside the NSA—what became the Consortium—my sophomore year at MIT. By the time I met you as a senior, I already knew I’d made a horrible mistake.”

Paige’s eyes widened, but she remained silent, letting him continue.

“You were on their radar before you even hit college. The men who eventually created the Consortium planned to recruit you too after you graduated, whether you agreed, or not. I couldn’t let that happen. So I ...” Cody’s voice faltered. “Your dad and I manufactured the cheating scandal. Got you kicked out a month before graduation.”

She pressed her lips together, staring straight ahead, her eyes unfocussed.

He searched her face, trying to gauge her reaction. Would this be the moment she finally saw him for who he really was? Aliar, a manipulator, a man who had derailed her entire life out of some misguided attempt at protection?

37

Paige’s world tilted,reality skewing sideways. Her heart thundered, elation and disbelief warring in her veins.

The plane’s engines faded to white noise as she locked onto Cody’s face. She searched for a tell, a hint that this was some cruel joke. But she found none.

“I ...” The word caught in her throat, years of longing threatening to choke her. Paige swallowed hard, forced out a whisper. “I’ve had feelings for you forever too.”

The confession hung between them, electric. Charged particles danced in the narrow space, years of unspoken desire made tangible.

But as the initial wave of joy subsided, a shadow crossed Cody’s features. She swallowed hard, a knot of dread forming in her stomach. “There’s more to the story, isn’t there? You might as well come clean now.”

He nodded, his expression grave. “Your father was my mentor within the Consortium.”

She closed her eyes, fighting back a sudden wave of nausea. She knew he’d created the security system for the lab beneath the Castle, but it was very possible he hadn’t known who his true employers were. It was a government building, after all. Herfather was dead. Did she really need to know the rest? But even as the thought formed, she knew she couldn’t hide from the truth any longer.

“How long?” she asked, forcing the words past the lump in her throat. “How long was my father involved with the Consortium?”

“Longer than me,” Cody replied, his voice heavy with regret. “They got him the same way they got me. I had no idea who I was working for until it was too late. Or it would have been too late, if your Dad hadn’t talked me into working undercover. We created the Tanner persona, and we fed intel anonymously to anyone we could reach.”

“Like Jason,” Paige said, the pieces suddenly falling into place.

“Exactly,” Cody confirmed. “He was one of our best pipelines.”

As Cody continued to explain, detailing how her father had tried to get him out and their subsequent decision to work deep undercover, Paige felt as if she were seeing her entire life through a new lens. The cabin shrank around her, the truth of her father’s sacrifice pressing in from all sides.

“So that’s why he shut himself off from me,” she whispered, her voice catching. “To keep me far away from the danger.”

The realization brought a fresh wave of grief, tinged with a bittersweet understanding. Paige looked at Cody, seeing him—truly seeing him—for perhaps the first time. In his eyes, she saw a reflection of her own pain, her own longing, and beneath it all, a glimmer of hope for what might still be possible between them.

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