Read Taken by Fire for Free Online

outside again. Sunlight streaked across his face, bathing his handsome profile in a golden glow. The harsh line of his jaw tightened as his gaze scanned the narrow side street, but after a moment he turned back to her. “I’m not fucking you, so I guess we wait.”
    Thank God. The man wanted to kill her; she doubted he’d be all that considerate with her body during sex. “Well, we can’t just sit here. I need to eat.”
    He gave her another one of those looks of utter disbelief. “Yeah, let’s just waltz down to the corner café and see if we get grabbed.”
    “We’ve got to do something.” She came to her feet. “If Phoebe comes out with an empty stomach, she’ll be pissed.” Well, that was true enough, but the
real
truth about why she wanted to eat wasn’t something she was prepared to share.
    “She’ll deal.”
    Fear knotted in her empty stomach. He wasn’t going to budge, was he? “Please … you have to promise me one thing.”
    He folded his arms across his broad chest. “You haven’t figured out by now that I don’t have to promise you shit?”
    She raised her chin and tried hard not to let desperation bleed into her voice. “This is easy enough. When Phoebe comes out, tell her I fought you. Tell her it was you who injured me instead of those thugs.”
    “I already said I’d make it clear that you didn’t cooperate with me.” His eyes narrowed, as though he suspected a trick. He watched her with that intense, intelligent gaze for a long time before saying, “Something here isn’t making sense. If you want anything from me, I want the truth.”
    “That works both ways, you know.”
    “Not when you’re the one who’s not in charge. Keep in mind that killing you would be a lot easier than keeping you alive.”
    Good point. “Can you at least tell me who you are? Who you work for?”
    “You don’t know?” When she shook her head, he said, “Ever heard of ACRO?”
    Several times, actually. People who worked for Itor seemed to constantly be at odds with whatever this ACRO was. “I have, but I don’t know what it is, exactly. I know Itor doesn’t think well of them.”
    “That’s because my agency opposes everything Itor stands for. We’re the good guys.”
    “That’s funny,” she said quietly, “because I didn’t think good guys kill innocent people.”
    “You aren’t innocent.”
    “I wasn’t responsible for what happened to your friend.”
    Instantly, she regretted bringing up the dead man, because everything about Stryker went cold, from his gaze to his voice. “Fuck you,” he snarled. “I’m not buying your multiple personality bullshit. You might have a bunch of alters, but deep down, it’s all the same person. So here’s the thing. I want to know why Phoebe would do things to hurt you, because that doesn’t make sense. Which personality is dominant?”
    She didn’t want to tell him anything, but really, what would it hurt? She held no loyalty to Itor or Phoebe. Besides, if he knew the truth, maybe he would be a little more hesitant about killing her. “I used to be dominant, when we were kids. But now Phoebe is,” she admitted, eyeing him warily, because he still looked ready to throttle her for killing his friend. “But she’s not a personality. I’m not an alter.”
    He snorted. “Is that what some quack psychiatrist told you?”
    She started pacing, doing her best to contain her nervous energy. “I’m not suffering from multiple personality disorder, and don’t give me that look. I’m telling you the truth, and no, I’m not delusional.” Reaching deep for some elusive sense of calm, she continued. “Phoebe and I are the result of laboratory experimentation. One egg was fertilized, and it split. We should have been born identical twins, but scientists forced the eggs back together. Sort of how sometimes you hear some freaky story about how one twin absorbs the other in the womb. Except this was more of a joining than an