“I get things every few months,” I continued, calming slightly as I went through the facts, as I focused on something other than his presence, looming large in my living room. “There’s no pattern to it. No way to trace the packages. They’re always postmarked from different cities in the metro area.”

“I didn’t send you those papers. I never would have put you in the middle of something like that. Do you have any idea how dangerous that information is?”

My gaze drifted over the trashed living room. Definitely bullet holes in my pillows.

“Yeah, I have some idea,” I answered, my tone wry. “I have copies in a safe-deposit box. I wasn’t totally stupid.”

“I want to look at them. Tomorrow.”

I hesitated. “Fine. But only if you tell me what happened to you. You want answers? You have to share what you know. I’m in this. I’ve been in this for a year. Longer, really. Don’t try to keep me in the dark here.”

His mouth tightened into that harsh line again, but he nodded.

“You can start sharing.”

“Why you?” he asked, ignoring my impatience.

“What do you mean, why me?”

“Why is someone sending this stuff to you? You said it’s been a year? Why you? Why not someone else? Someone in the media? Someone with the connections to investigate this and release the information.”

My half sister, Jackie, had been a blogger for the notorious blog Capital Confessions. Part political blog, part gossip column, Capital Confessions had exposed many a scandal throughout the past few years—including Jackie’s relationship with her then-boss and now-fiancé, Will Clayton, Virginia State Senator. Jackie had begun blogging for them and had used the media pulpit to attack our father as much as possible. When her secret blogging had threatened her budding career as a political consultant and her relationship with Will, she’d made the decision to step down from Capital Confessions and unknowingly given me the inspiration to strike at my father.

I’d used Capital Confessions as a vehicle to leak information about my family—anything and everything I could think of to chip away at my father’s image and standing. Unfortunately, I’d done the unforgivable and I’d utterly fucked up, hurting my sister Blair in the process.

Considering the packets had begun arriving around the time I’d started feeding stories to Capital Confessions, I didn’t doubt that it wasn’t a coincidence. Despite the intense secrecy behind my identity there, someone had figured it out and seen an opportunity to filter documents to me. I just didn’t know who. Matt would have made sense, but once you took him off the table, I was back where I’d started. Completely in the dark.

“Do you know the blog Capital Confessions?”

Matt nodded.

“A year ago, I began sending them information about my family. Stuff about my father.” I swallowed, my throat tight, not wanting to give him the rest, not wanting to see the look in his eyes when he learned that I’d violated my sister’s trust. “The packages began arriving after I started working for them, so I figure someone wanted to use the connection,” I continued, hoping he wouldn’t push for more details. “And, considering what the packages contained, they knew I had a vested interest.”

“You worked for a gossip site? What were you thinking?”

I stiffened. “I was thinking that my father needed to be taken down a peg or two. I was thinking that I’d lost the only man I’d ever loved, and that my father was somehow involved. It wasn’t anything formal. I never interacted with them in person or anything. I was careful to keep my relationship with Capital Confessions a secret.”

“Wait. You said that you started feeding them information, and then you started getting packages. Your issue with your father began before you got the wire transfer paperwork and the classified documents. Why were you suspicious of him?”

“I overheard an argument between our fathers after your funeral. They were in my father’s office at home and the house was supposed to be empty, but my plans had changed at the last minute. I couldn’t hear what they were saying exactly, just that ‘it had to be done.’ They were talking about you.” I sucked in a deep breath, the memory coming back to me. “I confronted my father.”

“And?”

“He told me to stay out of it. That I was mistaken. That I’d misunderstood what I’d overheard.” I shook my head. “I saw the look in his eyes. I saw it and I knew he was involved somehow. That was pretty much it for my relationship with my parents, and I made myself a promise that I would find out what happened to you and that if he was responsible, I’d destroy him.” My gaze met his. “Except you’re not really dead. So I need to know the rest of it.”

Matt sat down on the end of the couch, putting distance between us. My fingers itched to reach out and soothe the cuts on his face, the growing bruise, even as my heart felt like he’d stabbed it repeatedly tonight.

He cleared his throat. “I was on a mission in Afghanistan.”

We’d been told that much when we were notified that he’d died. He’d been Special Forces, a few months into a six-month deployment when we’d received the news.

“My unit was charged with protecting a warlord who was supposedly a U.S. ally.” He looked down at his hands. “He wasn’t.”

I leaned forward, listening while he painted a picture for me of the life he’d lived since he’d been gone. As he filled in the details of a day that had haunted me for years.

“We were ambushed. There were six of us. I was the only one who survived.”

“How?”

“They shot us. They thought I was dead. I pretended to be. Hell, I nearly was.” His knuckles turned white. “They piled us into a ditch. A mass grave. When they left, I crawled out. Some farmers found me. Took me in. Brought me back to life.”

Oh my god.

Bile rose, the image of him like that …

It was a moment before I could speak.

“How did you get out of Afghanistan?”

“I made connections while I was there. Called in a few favors.”

“Where did you go after that?”

I was so hungry for this part of him, desperate to fill in the blanks of our time apart. I’d always known him better than anyone, and it seemed wrong to feel like he was a stranger now, like he’d shut me out, leaving me on the other side of a locked door, no idea how to break it down.

“I just drifted. Someone wanted me dead. The smartest thing seemed to be to pretend like I was.”

“Does everyone think you’re dead? Your family? Friends?”

He nodded, still not meeting my gaze.

“How …” Tears clawed at my throat. “I would have gone anywhere with you. If you were in danger, I would have run with you.”

“It wasn’t safe.”

“I wouldn’t have cared.”

His gaze whipped to me. “I cared. I wasn’t going to put you in danger.” He rose, his arms reaching out, gesturing to my ruined living room. His big body tensed. “This is what I was trying to avoid.”

“I don’t need protecting.”

“Are you fucking kidding me? You had someone in your apartment who could have easily killed you tonight. What would you have done if he didn’t come here to steal something? Or if I hadn’t been here? Do you really think a baseball bat would have protected you against a hitman?”

“It brought you down.”

He glared at me.

I ignored him.

“Why was someone targeting your unit in Afghanistan? You don’t think the warlord was acting on his own, do you?”

“No, I don’t. They had weapons they weren’t supposed to have. We protected him for a while. There were private security forces with him.”

“Intech,” I answered, filling in the blanks.

“Yes. We saw things. Money changing hands between Intech employees and the Afghanis. Lots of money. Things we shouldn’t have seen.”

I’d grown up around Matt’s family. His father wasn’t exactly warm and fuzzy, but I’d never thought he was a complete and total monster. Never thought he was capable of killing his own son.