Shit.
It seemed that she couldn’t take a last moment before she had to tell them the truth.
“It’s not your fault,” she told him as she moved off his lap and crawled to Alexei.
“What do you mean it’s not our fault?” Alexei said. “If anyone is to blame, it’s me. Pinky holds a grudge against me because I was a spy in his midst.”
“He does.” She kissed Alexei lightly. “I’m surprised he hasn’t beaten you worse than me.”
Alexei frowned and opened his mouth as though to question her further, but she moved to Roman.
Her ribs were burning, her entire body throbbing in pain and she still wanted to throw up. But she reached Roman.
“Just how badly are you hurt?” Roman whispered as he lightly cupped her face between his hands.
“Physically? I’m a mess. Emotionally? I’m ruined.” She moved away from him, from them all, and slid up against the wall.
Her breathing had grown shallow, and she felt light-headed.
Come on.
You have to do better than this.
You’re their only hope for getting out of this alive. Even if you have to sacrifice yourself, you have to save them.
“What are you doing?” Alexei demanded. “Get back here, Bunny.”
“No,” she croaked.
“Pet, come here. We need to protect you and to do that, we need you close.”
“Don’t worry,” Roman reassured her sweetly. “We’ll look after you.”
“Nothing like this will ever happen to you again,” Salem told her.
“We promise to protect you better from now on,” Alexei said gruffly.
“You can’t protect me.” She had to be careful with what she said as she knewhehad cameras in here.
“We will keep you safe,” Alexei told her.
She shook her head with a sad smile. “You’ll all change your mind once you learn the truth.”
“What do you mean?” Salem asked. “What truth?”
“The truth of who I am.” Tamsyn cleared her throat. She didn’t know how long she had, and she had to get this out quickly or she might not be able to get it out at all.
“What are you saying?” Roman asked.
“It’s not a coincidence that I met you all or that the agency sent me to work for you. That was all set up. Everything was a set up. I was there to spy on you and feed back information to him.”
“You . . . you’re working for Pinky?” Alexei said in horror.
She could feel everything changing. It was like their disgust and hatred was pushing down on her, making it hard for her to breathe.
“Work isn’t the word I would use. He . . . he has something on me. And he uses that as a threat to keep me in line. To keep me doing what he wants.”
Were they all right? Had he hurt them as revenge?