Arrow to the Soul by Lea Griffith Page B

The child, you see, is precious to me and a simple, ordinary nanny would not do.” She stared at him, daring him to stop her. Surely he knew where this was going. “I set her up in Shanghai, told her she wouldn’t be allowed any communication with her family for the duration of her time as guardian for the child. She agreed and she was honest to a fault. She never swayed from the duty she’d accepted. She never faltered.”
    His eyes flinched then, just the barest reaction to her tale.
    “Until the day the President of China sent in a squad of killers to attempt to take the child. On orders from Joseph Bombardier, Ching Lan was shot and beheaded in front of the child she’d become guardian to.”
    She moved so close to him the tips of her breasts brushed his chest. His heat called to her but there was no time to berate herself. “But you know all this, don’t you, Mr. Collins? After all, you were there.”
    He blinked just once. It was enough.
    She nodded. “I was too. But I was too late, her body was still warm, the boy gone, but there you were. You and Mr. Nodachi. You covered her body, but I took her home and only I heard her mother’s cries. Ching Lan took an honorable position as guardian and Joseph had China’s president ,” she sneered the word, “kill an innocent. Do you know why, Mr. Collins? Do you know why the boy was so important?”
    “I don’t,” he admitted into her silence.
    She leaned even closer to him, eyes closing for a blissful second as their bodies meshed together almost perfectly. For a moment Arrow mourned her birth. Would that she could have known the touch of this man.
    He didn’t stiffen, didn’t push her away, but she heard his knuckles pop as he fisted his hands.
    “He’s important because he’s ours . Do you have any idea what we would do for those we consider ours? We would kill most definitely, Mr. Collins, but it goes beyond even death.”
    “You cannot be judge and jury,” he said in a hard voice.
    She stepped away then, shaking her head. “It has nothing to do with right or wrong. As the boy was ours, so was Ching Lan. What is ours no one has permission to harm or take. It is simple, Mr. Collins, the strongest survive. And the ones that aren’t strong, if they aren’t killed first, we do our best to protect. I realize Bullet wants to see Joseph and The Collective ended. We all do. But ultimately, it has always been about possession. We are the boy’s guardians. I was Ching Lan’s guardian. As she guarded the boy, I guarded her. And I failed. Her bullet-ridden body and her head lying two feet away attested to the fact.”
    She took a deep breath and leveled her gaze on him.
    “From the moment her life left her, the President of China became mine. His death is mine to dispense.”
    •●•
    Adam wanted to sink to his knees and weep. Never had the need to do so been so great. Her pain reached between them, its fingers clawing and ripping into his soul with vicious, sweeping strikes.
    Her gaze sought to finish what her words started. Her amber eyes were beautiful; he’d not ever seen anything quite so lovely in his thirty-two years, but she was death. And it didn’t matter. He would hold her but knew she’d turn from him, never allowing the comfort of his touch.
    He had been there when the woman was killed. Had just confirmed she was the one he was searching for when men in black masks stormed the house at the sea’s edge. The men moved like smoke and he’d been unable to get a bead on them with his scope. They’d killed the woman and begun searching for the child before he’d been able to get in position. Arrow was wrong about one thing: the child had not seen Ching Lan killed. He’d been safe though the men searched mightily for him.
    The woman hadn’t pled for her life. Not once. Adam had wondered who she was being loyal to. Now he knew. The child was her priority and she’d been willing die for him.
    “Where is the child, Mr. Collins?”
    “I have