Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 145091 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 484(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145091 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 484(@300wpm)
If Kyle felt the fact that he had glass buried in his palm, he didn’t show it. He merely set what was left of the glass down and stared at Drake with dark eyes. “You didn’t call me first?”
He’d known he was taking a risk. “I wanted to sit down and talk to you in person. I made sure Mae was safe, but I thought this was the best way to tell you. I would have talked to you earlier, but you took a nap.”
“Well the next time your psychotic sister decides to threaten my girlfriend, wake me the fuck up.” He stood, ignoring the glass around him. “I think I’ll talk to my uncle myself.”
“Go see Tucker first.” Drake stood and started to go after him. “You need to get that hand looked at.”
“Fuck you, Drake.” Kyle strode off.
Damn it.
The last thing he’d wanted to do was fight with Kyle.
“You’re not going to win with him.” Brad moved from behind him as the bartender scurried over and quickly had the glass up and off the table and floor.
“I’m not trying to win.” He was surprised to see Brad down here. He’d expected him to hide in his room the way he had in Wyoming.
“No, you’re trying to get that friendship back, and you can’t. It was a moment in time, and what happened in Singapore marked the end of that time. You were friends because you had similar interests and were stuck together in some ways. Your interests have now diverged, and the friendship won’t last.” Brad had a beer in his hand and sat down across from Drake, avoiding the chair Kyle had used. “Do you think I don’t understand how that feels? It’s hard to maintain relationships in our business.”
“Relationships are the nature of our business,” Drake heard himself saying. It was what his father had told him time and time again. He’d been taught how to manipulate people into trusting him, into believing he was who he said he was.
“Yes, and that’s why it’s hard,” Brad replied with a sad sigh. “Because our job is to trick people, to make them do what we want. It can be hard to shed that coat and be ourselves because our everyday work requires us to not ever truly be ourselves. Kyle Hawthorne would never be able to completely suppress himself. He’s incapable of it.”
He felt the need to defend his friend. “He was good at his job.”
“And what was his job?” Brad asked pointedly. “Don’t tell me he was the lead because I’ve read the mission reports.”
“He wasn’t muscle.” Kyle had a strong background in weapons and hand to hand, but he wasn’t merely there as backup.
“He was support,” Brad insisted. “He was quite deadly and excellent in a fight, but he rarely worked assets. He was the guy you sent into a dangerous situation to pick up a package.”
It wasn’t exactly true. Kyle had been in on all aspects of the operations the team had been involved in. He wouldn’t have left him out, but Drake had been the one to handle much of the undercover work. Kyle had often gone in with Julia, posing as her husband or boyfriend, but Julia was always in charge of those. Julia wouldn’t allow anyone else to be. He’d thought she was merely a control freak, but now he knew she’d used that control to get away with her crimes.
“I’m trying to explain that Kyle can’t truly understand what it means to do the job you do. He can’t understand the function you serve, and it’s an important one,” Brad said. “I’ve looked into him, you know.”
“What do you mean looked into him?” He didn’t like the idea of Brad doing research on Kyle.
“When I understood that you were going to let him come back, I made a study of him.” Brad set his beer down. He was as casual as Brad ever got, wearing khakis and a collared shirt. “I delved into his past. He was in grad school when he quit and joined the Navy.”
“He was going to business school. He was in an MBA program. You are not telling me anything I don’t know.” He’d recruited Kyle. He knew his history backward and forward, and yes, he’d definitely known about his relationship with the Taggarts. It was precisely why he’d been sent to recruit him when Kyle had shown aptitude in the Navy.
“I know you understand him on paper, but I don’t think you’ve analyzed him the way you should have,” Brad explained. “You liked him and he seemed to like you, and you hadn’t had a friend in a long time. You did figure out he’s not capable of the true manipulation the rest of us are. Have you thought about the fact that you were attracted to him for the same reasons Julia was? Obviously not sexually, but friendship is a type of attraction.”