Whispers in the Dark - Maya Banks [80]
Nathan was already shaking his head. “She’s tough, Van. She’s saved my ass more than once. Her looks are deceiving. She’s got more steel in her spine than a lot of men I know. She won’t accept us sticking her in some hole, and furthermore I don’t want that. I want her with me. All the time.”
Donovan blew out his breath. It went against his grain to ever put a woman in danger. His instinct was always to bury them as far underground as possible and then go kick whoever’s ass threatened them.
But Nathan knew that Shea was different. She’d been on her own for a year, and she wasn’t going to fall apart at the first sign of danger. They were…partners…for lack of a better term. He needed her every bit as much as she needed him. She kept him centered. Grounded. And the only way he’d ever be convinced of her safety was if he could see her at all times.
Donovan opened his mouth to speak but then fell silent, his gaze riveted to Shea. Nathan turned to see her get up from her seat. She wobbled a little as she started toward where the men were gathered. Her face was pale and her entire demeanor told him she was in shock.
She gripped the closed journal and took another step. This time he hurriedly rose and crossed the distance to take her other hand. He led her to where the others sat and then simply put her on his lap so she could be near him.
He wrapped his arms around her and whispered close to her ear. “It’s okay, baby. Whatever it is, we’ll face it together.”
“You need to know this,” she said, her voice scratchy.
Realization hit him in the gut. She’d been crying, even though the signs were gone from her face. He pressed his lips to her shoulder, not knowing what else he could do to comfort her. Not until they knew what she’d learned from the journal.
She raised haunted eyes to his brothers before turning her gaze on Nathan, hurt and confusion brimming in her liquid gaze.
“Grace was right. They weren’t our real parents.”
CHAPTER 26
SHEA’S chest hurt so badly that she could barely squeeze air into and out of her lungs. She was more afraid than ever. Terrified.
And everything she’d thought she’d ever know about herself—her life—was all a lie.
Nathan kissed her shoulder again, and his hand slipped up and down her other arm in a soothing pattern. His brothers and Swanny looked curiously at her, their gazes going from her face to the journal she held so tightly in her grasp.
“I don’t even know how to explain it.” Numbness was rapidly spreading through her veins until she felt disembodied.
“Start from the beginning,” Donovan said gently. “What did you mean by they weren’t your real parents?”
Her breath hiccupped out of her mouth and her shoulders drooped with fatigue and disillusionment. “Apparently my parents…the people who raised me…were scientists. They were heading a top-secret, government-funded project. No one but a few high-ranking government officials even knew of its existence, and they were all military officials. My mother remarked in her journal that it was doubtful the president or members of Congress ever knew about the project.”
“What the hell were they researching?” Ethan asked.
“They weren’t researching,” Shea said softly. “They were creating. Me and my sister, Grace. Though now I wonder if she’s even my sister.”
Nathan stiffened against her. “Wait a minute. Back up.”
She stood, suddenly no longer able to sit still against him. She paced away and then turned to face the assembled group again.
“According to my mother…” She shook her head and swallowed back the knot in her throat. “According to Andrea Peterson, Grace and I were lab-created experiments. Who knows who my real parents were. I doubt they even knew each other. They chose ‘samples’ from a selection of people who were particularly gifted and possessed ‘unusual talents,’ though none of the so-called abilities are outlined in her journal. And then these samples were basically mixed, implanted in a volunteer uterus, and they took the baby when it was born.”
The looks of horror on the men’s faces