Page 48 of Assassin's Game
“I’ll take watch at four,” Remi told him. “Split the night.”
All nice and neat, plugged into shifts, but I noticed Eli said nothing. Those golden eyes watched me, waited. For what? Right now all I wanted was to punch something. Hard. Maybe then the loop playing in my head of Rhys dying would go away. “I’ll shower, then relieve you,” I told Monty. When he went to argue, I gave him my commander look.Stand down. I’ll keep watch.
I needed to.
My clothes were still damp from the rain, adding to the roil of emotions filling me too full. I went upstairs to the room Maris and I shared, and grabbed some clothes out of the duffel I’d used since I was a teen—army green, my dad’s initials on the outside. I was digging in the pocket for underwear when a knock sounded on the door.
“Go away,” I grumbled under my breath. Not as loud as I wanted to, but then, whoever was knocking probably didn’t deserve the words. I rounded the pallet I slept on and jerked the door open.
Scratch that—I definitely should’ve ignored that knock. “Go away, Eli.”
The arrogant prick grinned and, before I could follow my instincts and shut him out, pushed his way past me.
“That’s the wrong direction,” I snarled, holding the door open.
Eli’s grin widened. Combined with the riot of half curls the rain had made of his hair, the look was almost boyish.Almostbecause no one would mistake that body for belonging to a boy.
“You want everyone to hear this?” he asked.
Good point. Damn it. “Are you trying to tell me you’re not going to go away?”
In answer, he leaned back against the wall. I rolled my eyes and closed the door. If I was careful not to slam it, I told myself it was because I didn’t want to disturb Rhys and Monty downstairs and have them come up. Or have Remi come out into the hall.
I leaned back against the closed door and waited, refusing to look away from Eli’s intense stare. It was like paint stripper, peeling away the layers to see things I didn’t want anyone to see—uncertainty, imperfection, failure. I’d failed my team by not being at their backs. Keeping them safe.
Jesus, Rhys could’ve died.
I dropped my gaze to the floor. That was the second time. Fuck.
The shifting of fabric told me Eli was straightening; footsteps brought him closer. My breath hitched before I forced myself to relax. Dark boots came into view, stopping far too close to mine. Eli’s heat soaked into me through our clothes, and I wondered how mere proximity could wake my body up so fast.
Sweat beaded between my breasts.
“Mikaela.”
God, I wished he wouldn’t call me that. Another layer of the armor I so desperately needed fell away. “What?”
If the snap in my voice was a deterrent, Eli didn’t let on. No, he stepped even closer, his body brushing mine, his hand coming up to nudge my chin until he could meet my eyes.
An electric jolt hit me. Those eyes.
Fuck.
“You know you’re not to blame for what happened to Rhys.”
He made it a statement, a fact, when it was anything but. “No, I don’t know that, Eli. Neither do you.”
“You can’t be everywhere at once.”
“I can be with them,” I argued. “We never should have split up.” And that was my fault. Period. I’d made the decision.
“Bullshit,” Eli growled. “You have grown men on your team, Mikaela. Do you think if you gave an order they didn’t believe in, didn’t feel safe with, that they would follow you?” When I tried to look away, he gripped my chin to keep me still. “They know the risks and thought them acceptable. No one can be in control a hundred percent on an op. You do what you can to minimize risk; that’s all any of us can do.”
“Wrong!”
The word came out a shout, an escape of the frustration and anger tearing at me. “They are my responsibility just like they were my father’s—”
“And do you think they never went on a mission without him? That’s bullshit, Mikaela, and you know it.”
