Page 10 of Crossover

Married men maybe. When Mom discovered he was married, didsheknow he’d lied about his name, too?

Oh my God.

A cascade of revelations began to weave their way through my chaotic thoughts. The first of which was…

“You’re Bob,” I realized. “It wasyouall along.”The guy who’d catfished me online, having enough personal knowledge about my father and my desperate need to get money for my Grams’s medical care, and lured me to that parking garage with the intent of killing me.

I swear, the musty air grew a hell of a lot thicker, and that dim light from the single overhead fluorescent decided now was the perfect time to flicker. Like I needed the warning that this situation was about to be filed in the folder labeledRoyally Screwed.

And because the hairs on my arms weren’t raised enough from the chill and nerves, my eyes decided to sweep over the concrete floor. More specifically, the mosaics of stains on the surface—a twisted artwork of darks and lights that spoke of the horrors unleashed down here, erased with industrial cleaners.

Concealing the truth of what happened in this room.

Who the hell was Steve? I mean, Daniel. And why did the name Daniel sound so familiar? My mind raced, trying to figure out what was going on.

And then it hit me.

Daniel. That was the name of Grayson’s boss, a leader in the CIA—the very organization who’d ordered my death.

So, my mom’s ex-boyfriend was actually CIA?

Even if he was…

“Why?” I asked with a tremble to my voice. “Why did you try to kill me?”

Or more urgently, why was hecurrentlytrying to kill me?Again.

And didn’t the CIA target guilty people? Not innocent civilians? I suppose he could believe the evidence against me was real, but I’d been targeted before that evidence came to light.

At least…I thought so. Maybe the evidence was in play all along? But he’d been dating Mom for two years. Surely, he, a CIA operative, would know I was actually innocent, would he not?

Daniel walked to the far side of the room and spoke to one of my captors, who had been in the back of the van with me, then turned his head over his shoulder and said with a little too much glee, “Romantically?”

No.

“I never said Grayson and I were in a relationship,” I insisted.

Daniel put his hands in his pockets and fixed his gaze with mine as he walked back over. “You don’t have to; it’s written all over your face.”

“Leave Grayson out of this.”

He tsked. “Well, I can’t very well do that now, can I?”

I swallowed, a fresh wave of dread rocketing through my limbs.

You need to find a way to escape, Ivy.

I pulled on my handcuffs. The left one dug into my wrist hard enough to scrape the bone, but my right hand, it was looser.

Could I…

I pulled slightly, the handcuff inching up above my hand a millimeter. I’d have to take this slow and steady to not get caught, but maybe I could get my wrist out and make a run for it. The only way to do that, though, was to either hope the men would leave me alone—which, based on their body language, they had no intention of doing—or keep Daniel talking.

“Why?” Tears flowed down my cheeks, my jaw trembling. I didn’t even try to hide it, either. It was better to make him think I was too emotionally devastated to fight back. “Why did you try and kill me?”

Daniel looked at his watch casually, then mumbled to his soldiers, “Give us a few minutes.”

They marched up the staircase and left me alone with a man my mom had once said she wanted to marry, who’d now tried to kill me—let me count the times.

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