Read Online After the Dark by Max Allan Collins - Free Book Online

Bisexual? Don't care. All your family money's gone? So what.”
    His eyes met hers. “Max . . . it's about Seth.”
    She tensed. “Seth . . . my brother, Seth?”
    “I knew him, Max.”
    One of the X5s who had tried to escape that night back in Wyoming, Seth had been caught by the Manticore guards. He escaped at a later date, and Max—living in Los Angeles at the time—had tracked him to Seattle. They were reunited at the top of the Space Needle in 2019, ten years after Max split from Manticore. The reunion had been short-lived: Seth died that night, plummeting from the top of the Needle.
    “When we first met, Max, you'll recall I knew a lot about the X5s and Manticore . . . Not information the average guy on the street is privy to.”
    “What do you mean . . . you ‘knew' Seth?”
    “On the needle that night—those people you interrupted . . .”
    “The bad guys.”
    “Bad guys, right—they were involved in criminal activities that Eyes Only wanted to stop.”
    “
You're
Eyes Only, Logan.”
    “. . . Yes.”
    “You mean . . . Seth was working for you that night.”
    All Logan could do was nod.
    “I wasn't the first X5 you recruited, then.”
    “No. Seth.”
    She felt tears welling. “That night at the Needle, taking on Jared Sterling and all those Koreans—Seth was on a mission for Eyes Only.”
    Logan's voice seemed small. “Yes.”
    “And he died. He got killed. You got him killed.”
    “. . . I know. I've had to live with that a long time.”
    Something burned in her stomach and rose to the back of her throat. Swallowing hard, she got it down, but just barely.
This couldn't be happening—not now, not when the virus was vanquished and nothing stood between their love . . .
    Except betrayal.
    And lies.
    She rose and her eyes locked with his—his had a terrible softness, while hers blazed. “There were nearly a dozen men there that night—the Koreans, Sterling and his own thugs—and you sent Seth in there
alone
.”
    “I did.”
    She glared at him, her lips curled in anger. “And you never
told
me? Not until
now
?”
    He shook his head and gave her a pathetic little shrug. “We all have our secrets, Max. You didn't tell me everything, not at first.”
    “You've known all there is to know about me for a long, long time. I've leveled with you; I've opened myself to you in a way I haven't to anybody, ever.” Her voice was rising in pitch and intensity, but she couldn't seem to stop it. “You don't
not
tell someone something like this by . . . by accident. This was no oversight. It's willful, Logan—you
lied
to me.”
    He swallowed thickly. “In a way.”
    “For what?” She was almost shrieking now. “Why? Why would you lie to me?
Me?
”
    “At first, you were . . . how can I say this?”
    “Find a way.”
    “You were just the second recruit . . . and if I told you what had become of the first X5 I'd taken on, you might . . .”
    “Hesitate to get my ass killed for you?”
    Logan winced. “Something like that. And then . . . as we grew close . . . I just couldn't find a way. You made it clear how deep your love and commitment for your siblings ran . . . and for me to admit causing the death of one of them, I was afraid . . .”
    “Afraid of what I'd do to you?”
    “Afraid you'd hate me.”
    “Good call.”
    He stood staring at her as if she'd punched him.
    Her tears ran now—hot tears of sorrow-tinged anger as she thought about Seth, and the man she loved who'd got him killed, this man in front of her, the man who was supposed to love her. “Were you
ever
going to tell me?”
    “Max . . . I just did.”
    “Oh, so better late than never?”
    Logan said nothing.
    “You kept me dangling,” she said, “so I'd continue to do your bidding—serve your various self-righteous agendas . . . same as you did with Seth. You couldn't tell me because you might lose a valuable resource in Eyes Only's crusade.”
    “It wasn't that at all.”
    “What the hell was it then?”
    “Max . . .