Page 20 of A Lady’s Handbook of Espionage

“You don’t need to torture someone who loves their mother,” she continued, quieter. “You just need to mention her name and promise to care for her. Then remind them what happens if they disobey. You don’t run when he’ll slit your family’s throat for it.”

“Christ,” he whispered.

“I never told him about Emma or my mother. But I think he knew someone existed. He’s good at finding weaknesses.” She looked at him now. “Lonely girls will let a man fuck them. But desperate ones don’t ever say no when he hurts them.”

The question burned on his tongue before he could stop it. “How old were you?”

The cabin creaked around them. Seconds stretched by.

“Sixteen,” she finally said.

Something cold and heavy settled in the pit of Callahan’s stomach. His fingers twitched with the sudden, savage urge to wrap around Favreau’s neck. He wanted the bastard’s blood. Wanted to watch the life drain from his eyes. He’d make damn sure Favreau never touched Isabel again.

Callahan took a long drag from his cigarette, forcing the rage down.

“Go on, little thief.”

“By the time I was eighteen, I was valuable enough that he kept me close. Being useful had advantages. The more he trusted me, the more freedom he gave me.” Her lips curved into something too bitter to be a smile.

“He’d let me travel alone for heists sometimes.

Only when necessary, and always with his loyal men, but it was enough.

I just needed him to believe I’d always come back. ”

“Hong Kong,” he prompted. “You were fleeing?”

“Trying to.” She tapped the cuffs against the bedframe in agitation.

“I planned it for months. Made him think it was his idea to send me to Hong Kong. By the time I killed the men he sent to watch me, I’d be gone.

I had papers arranged. Money hidden. But I needed more for passage and bribes.

” She exhaled slowly. “And then you walked in. Exactly where I didn’t need you to be. ”

The gambling hall’s smoky interior flashed in his memory – the scent of opium, the drunken laughter, and Isabel across the room, her face a careful mask that didn’t quite hide her desperation.

“And fucked your exit strategy,” he finished for her.

“Yes.”

“You looked half-dead when I saw you there,” he said, voice low. “Like you hadn’t slept in months.”

A sharp, humourless laugh escaped her. “Sleep isn’t something you get much of in Favreau’s bed. And after all that careful planning, you blundered in. I had to improvise.”

“Improvise? Or simply choose a more attractive mark?”

Her eyes slid over him, taking her time.

“You have your uses,” she said finally. “But when you spotted me in Hong Kong, I ran out of options. Favreau would destroy anything in his path to get me back. Not just because I’m good at what I do.

Because I’m his.” She blinked hard. “Do you want to know the worst part? The part that makes me hate myself?”

Lantern light caught on the shine of her hair, the curve of her throat. He couldn’t speak. Could barely breathe.

He held himself still.

“Sometimes I miss him,” she confessed. “His attention. His approval. I’d have crawled through glass and debased myself at his feet for a single scrap of regard. And whenever he graced me with it, I was pitifully, revoltingly grateful .”

Callahan inhaled deeply, holding his breath until his chest burned, then slowly letting it out. Trying to control the rage building inside him.

When he looked up, Isabel was watching him. Waiting. Like she was ready for his judgment, his disgust. As if any decent man could look at her and feel anything but fury at the one who’d put that desolation in her voice.

She’d been so young – just like him.

He cleared his throat. “When I was a lad, I belonged to a bloke named Whelan,” he said roughly.

“Ran a pick-pocketing ring in the East End. Whelan taught us how to steal from the rich, but that wasn’t enough for him.

Men with money would come around and pay to use us however they wanted.

” He swallowed hard and gestured at his face.

“Pretty boys fetch a price, and I’m more than aware of my appearance.

So, believe me, I know what it is to trade your dignity and your body for scraps.

You carry no guilt in this. None. Favreau saw a girl he could break, so he twisted you into something he could use. ”

Isabel was quiet. All that bravado and confidence was gone, replaced by the same vulnerability he saw when she woke from her nightmare.

She looked away first. “Do you plan to leave these cuffs on all night?”

He knew that voice – the one that said she’d retreated somewhere he couldn’t follow. Behind walls he’d never be allowed past again tonight.

“No.” He reached for the key. The lock clicked, and he eased the manacles from her wrists. “Your bandages need changing,” he said softly. “May I?”

A pause, then a mute jerk of her chin.

Callahan soaked a rag in the tepid water in his room’s basin and took the tin of salve out of his bag. Gently, he peeled the cloth off her torso.

“This was close,” he said. “Luck seems to like you.”

“Luck isn’t a word I’d use to describe my existence thus far, Agent.”

“You’re still breathing, aren’t you?”

“For now.”

The rain beat harder outside. Callahan worked in silence, his fingers tracing a path around her injury, then the other marks – the faded lines on her stomach. Some were thin, others raised and jagged.

“How many of these were heists, and how many were Favreau?” he asked, following a mark curving over her hip.

“My scars aren’t up for discussion.”

Right. He knew when not to push.

The silence stretched between them, filled only by the distant slap of waves against the hull. He tended to her carefully – cleaned the wound, applied the salve, and added a fresh bandage. When he finished, he secured the end with a small knot.

“There. Should hold till morning.”

She angled her chin at his shoulder. “Your turn. Let me see my handiwork.”

Callahan held her gaze as he removed his shirt.

He wasn’t shy about his body, but something about the way she watched him made his fingers clumsy.

His body had scars layered on scars until there was barely an inch of skin that wasn’t filled with bullet holes, knife wounds, burns, and lash marks from Whelan’s belt.

Each one was a reminder of the endless bartering of blood, the slow erasure of self.

Annihilation, one scar at a time.

“We match,” she whispered. “Don’t we?”

Yes.

They were both fluent in the language of brutality and life’s cruelties. The singular agony of knowing how it feels when your body belongs to someone else.

She focused on his shoulder. “Impressive needlework. The stitches are nearly invisible.”

“Lady Alexandra patched me up. All those years embroidering pillows finally put to practical use.”

He grabbed a roll of fresh linen, tore a strip with his teeth, and began rebinding the wound. He’d performed this ritual a hundred times, in a hundred rooms, but never with an audience. Never with every vulnerability laid bare.

“So,” Isabel said, leaning against his pillow as if she belonged there, “am I to be your prisoner for the remainder of our voyage to Boston?”

Callahan tucked the end of the bandage, then looked up at her. Something dark and hungry unfurled in him at the sight of her naked in his bed.

He moved before he could think better of it, crawling toward her until he had her caged against the headboard, his arms braced on either side of her. Her thighs fell open.

“Are you asking to be cuffed again, Trouble?” he asked.

Her exhale was shaky. “No.”

“No?” He smiled. “I thought you had deviant tastes. Wasn’t that what you told me in Athens when you tried to shock me with this vulgar mouth?” He grazed a finger over her lower lip.

“Maybe you’re more depraved than I am.”

“Am I? Because I think that one day, you’ll offer me these wrists and beg me to bind them.”

“Is that what you think?” Her voice was teasing. “That I’ll wake up desperate to be at your mercy?”

“Not desperate. Eager.” Her pulse jumped under his lips when he pressed them to her throat.

“I’d take my time with you and find all the places that make you gasp.

The ones that make you beg. And when you’re shaking .

. . when you can’t remember your own name .

. .” He brushed his mouth against hers, not quite a kiss.

Just a whisper of contact that had her leaning toward him.

“. . . I’ll show you what it means to be worshipped until you forget you were ever anything but holy. ”

Her eyelids fluttered closed. For a moment, she surrendered. Softened beneath him.

And then he fucked it all up.

“Stay with me tonight,” he whispered against her lips, “and I’ll make it worth your while. For every question you answer about the Syndicate, I’ll give you pleasure.”

The change was immediate. Her entire body went rigid, and the softness in her eyes hardened.

Shit.

“Trouble—”

“Get off me,” she said, shoving at his chest.

Callahan moved back. She scrambled from the bed and grabbed her clothes, yanking them on with quick, angry movements.

“I’m going to my cabin. If you try to chain me again, trust that I won’t tell you a damn thing.”

“That came out wrong.” Callahan raked a hand through his hair. “I didn’t mean it to sound like that.”

“No.” Isabel straightened, fully dressed now, and pinned him with a look so cutting he almost flinched. “You meant exactly what you said. I’m worth more to you as an informant than a woman.”

She slammed the door behind her.

“Well done, you absolute fucking idiot,” he muttered to himself.