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this piece of shit? When?”
    “After you left me for ACRO,” Tag snapped, as if he wasn’t the one who’d refused to go with Justice after years of swearing he would. “Used Mom’s life insurance and the money I earned on a crab boat. So yeah, Justice, glad you approve of my dream home.”
    “This is Justice ?” Ian asked, and Justice almost enjoyed the man’s anger. “ The Justice? He’s ACRO?” Ian didn’t wait for Tag’s answer, looked over his shoulder at Justice. “So you’re the asshole who fucked up Tag’s head so bad?”
    He snarled at Tag and hoped the sound of the knives rattling on the counter was just in his imagination. “You told an Itor agent about me?”
    “I didn’t know he was Itor at the time,” Tag growled before turning to Ian. “And you . . . you have no right calling the kettle black. I fucking trusted you. I loved you, and believe me, after Justice, I didn’t think that would ever happen.”
    And then there was total darkness.

    The noise, the blackness, the anger . . . All of it took Ian back to that horrible day Itor was attacked in a coordinated ACRO sweep of every major Itor site of operations on the planet, including the Madrid offices that housed Tag. Ian had been close to the compound—close enough to feel the ground shake and smell the scorched metal. He’d prayed to find Tag alive . . . but he hadn’t found him at all. He’d prayed Tag had survived, but he’d been unable to search him out immediately, for fear of creating suspicion, or putting Tag in danger.
    Ian had been patient, waited for Itor to approach him . . . and they had, because he’d been the one to bring Taggart in originally. Itor had told him in the beginning that Tag would no doubt be one of his most difficult jobs.
    They were so right, but not in the way Ian had thought.
    And then, to discover Tag alive—to walk in on him in the aftermath of fucking another man, only to find out that man was Justice—well fuck, he’d barely been able to breathe.
    Just thinking back on it right now was causing the same reaction, but he couldn’t stop his mind from going there, now that he didn’t have the distraction of Justice gunning for him.
    Now that the seeming rejection—and anger—from Tag to him was still burning a hole in his chest, even as he remained backed up against Taggart, could feel the heat from his body burning through him.
    And they were trapped. Together. With Justice.
    Yeah, someone certainly had a sense of humor.
    Taggart had fucking ruined him. Broken through every single defense he’d built up over the years, and when Itor took him, Ian hadn’t known what the hell to do with himself. All he could think of was to find Tag, to explain. Try to get him out of Itor. But after ACRO’s attack, Itor’s main buildings were dust . . .
    He’d had no way of knowing if Tag was dead or alive, and that’d slayed him. The only saving grace was that during better times, Tag had shared enough about the cabin “in bumfuck Alaska” to give him a starting point of where to look. He’d also shared his feelings for Justice, about how his love and anger and hatred for the man were all twisted and gnarled together . . . although he’d left out the bits about ACRO and Justice having some sort of yet-to-be-determined special ability.
    It shouldn’t have come as any surprise that during Tag’s time of need he’d call Justice and not Ian.
    Ian had betrayed him. Sold him into the slavery of Itor, even though he’d tried his best to convince them that Taggart wasn’t the best candidate for their purposes. He’d told his handler, “He doesn’t have the makeup for what you want him to do.” And despite the fact that he’d fallen for Tag and hadn’t wanted to see the evil empire anywhere near him, he hadn’t been lying.
    Itor hadn’t cared, not then . . . and not now. It was one of the main reasons they’d sent him to retrieve Taggart again.
    Tiny round emergency lights recessed into the walls