“No,” he said in a pissed-off voice. “No, I will never let them believe you simply died. I will tell them the truth. That your life and death meant something. That your death saved hundreds of thousands of other people. So they never think your death was senseless and random. They deserve that truth.”

“So it doesn’t matter what I want, but then that should be obvious to me by now,” she said, self-loathing filling her for even considering for a moment that it would.

She turned up her face to him and saw him recoil from whatever terrible look was in her eyes. Or perhaps it was the lack of what he saw in her eyes. Life. Meaning. That she no longer cared and had given up. Finally defeated.

“Why did you kiss me?” she whispered fiercely, hating herself all the more for this display of utter weakness. “Why bother making me care? Making me think you cared at least on the level of one human caring about another? Do you despise me so much then? I can’t conceive of the kind of hatred that drives you.”

She shivered and ran her hands up and down both arms, folding inward, becoming smaller and more inconsequential with every passing minute. Preparing herself, her defenses, strengthening them for the terrible future that awaited her.

“I care,” he denied harshly. “I care too goddamn much, and that’s why I’m so fucking pissed off, Honor. Because I’m not supposed to care. I’m not supposed to be human. I’m a killer. A mercenary. Call me what you will, but it’s all true. Every possible terrible thing you can conjure. It’s true. But you can never say I don’t care, goddamn it. Because I care too much.”

In that moment, Honor knew. She knew that Hancock wasn’t quite as incapable of emotion as she’d thought. That he likely hated what he knew had to be done. But that wouldn’t stop him because he believed in whatever his mission—job—was. And in order to, as he’d put it, save thousands of other lives, hers must be forfeit.

And he hated that.

But he hated that he cared even more.

How lonely and stark must his existence be? Devoid of all the things she took for granted being raised in a huge, loving family, surrounded by unconditional love and support. Things he’d obviously never had—never would have—because he’d never allow himself to have those things.

He didn’t think he was worthy or that he deserved them.

She hated him for betraying her, but she understood in a twisted way. In his own way, he was honorable. Doing what most couldn’t do but had to be done to rid the world of monsters. Even become the very thing he hunted. A monster of the worst kind.

Maybe if he hadn’t made her care about him, the man, she wouldn’t be as hurt or feel so betrayed. Perhaps she’d even understand better that her sacrifice, as he’d deemed it, was necessary.

But she couldn’t simply put it aside like he did and turn off what made her human. It still hurt. It hurt more than the thought of torture and death. It hurt her that she’d trusted him, that she’d cared about him on a deeper level. That they had shared the intimacy—a bond—that she’d shared with no one else and it had all been thrown back in her face.

It hadn’t meant to him what it had meant to her, and for that she felt foolish and humiliated.

Was her hurt pride truly worth the loss of so many lives? Did it even matter how she died or how she was sacrificed if so many others could be saved by one woman? Her?

And why now was she preparing to try to absolve him of the terrible guilt and suffering she’d seen so briefly in his eyes? What kind of naïve fool did it make her to even believe she could give him absolution or peace?

“I understand, Hancock,” she said, allowing some of the cold aloofness in her voice to fade away, sincerity taking its place. “And I forgive you, for what it’s worth. You’re right. What is the good of the one compared to the good of the many?”

Hancock swore savagely, getting up so swiftly that it rocked the bed, and she braced herself, fuzzy from the pain medication. He paced the floor like a caged animal, rage radiating from him in wave after wave.

“Don’t you ever forgive me,” he hissed. “And you sure as fuck do not offer me an apology that disguises itself as understanding.”

She gazed at him, allowing sorrow to fill her eyes. And resignation.

“You can’t control my feelings, Hancock. You control my fate, yes. My ultimate destiny. My life even. But you can’t control me. You don’t get that choice over whether I grant forgiveness or understanding or even apologize that I’m not stronger, that I can’t just stop fighting and accept that my death will save the lives of so many other innocent people.”

Hancock stood still, stopping his pacing as he faced her, his hands in tight, clenched balls at his sides as he shook with uncontrolled rage. She sucked in her breath at the raw agony swamping unguardedly in his eyes, something he’d never allow—or want—anyone to see. But she saw it where perhaps no one else would. Where someone else would merely think he was dangerously angry.

“I don’t make many promises, Honor. And you shouldn’t even trust me to keep them if given. But one thing I vow before all else is that you will be remembered. Your sacrifice will not go unheralded. Your family will be told the truth. Every ugly part of it. Because you and they deserve that much. Your life will not be forgotten. And goddamn it, you matter. You matter.”

His gaze dropped and his fingers uncurled and curled in rhythmic motion she wasn’t sure he was even aware of. And when he looked back up at her, she inhaled sharply at all that she saw in that one unguarded moment.

“You matter to me,” he said hoarsely.

And then he stalked toward her bed, the predator that he was, but when he once more settled onto the bed, there was something fierce in his eyes that had nothing to do with the predator and everything to do with him, the man.

He framed her face in his hands and kissed her, pouring all of the tightly held emotion into that kiss. He devoured her mouth like a man starving. His tongue swept hotly over hers, leaving her breathless and aching.

He kissed her as if there were no tomorrow, as if this single moment were all they had, were all that mattered.

The kiss went on and on until she surrendered, relaxing against the strength and warmth of his muscled body. Then, surprising her, he pressed tiny kisses over the entire line of her lips, pausing at the corners, licking at them delicately with his tongue, and then he simply pressed his mouth to hers and left it there until they both had to gasp for air.

“You matter, Honor,” he whispered against her lips. “Never think you don’t. You matter to me,” he said, echoing the same words he’d uttered just moments earlier. “You matter too goddamn much.”

The anguish in his voice was nearly her undoing.

CHAPTER 22

HONOR awakened and the first person she saw hovering at her bedside was Hancock. She glanced accusingly at him, still shaken from the last moments before she’d succumbed to the effects of the medication.

Hancock sighed. “It was only pain medication, Honor. After we spoke, you were exhausted, not just physically but emotionally drained as well. Nothing would have kept you from drifting off. I gave you what you wanted. Answers.”

He’d given her a hell of a lot more than the answers to the questions she’d asked. Much more. And she hadn’t had time to sort through the tangle of emotions swamping her. She was confused, heart and mind completely at odds.