She stops talking and I’m still playing her words over in my mind. It comes across as a hesitation, so she makes to get up. But my brain kicks in before her feet find the floor and I pull her back onto my chest. “What do you want to know about me? I’ll tell you anything you want.”

She thinks for a moment and I imagine every horrible question she can possibly dream up.

What did it feel like to kill the first time?

Why did it take them so long to rescue you when you were captured?

Do you think your parents love you?

Why didn’t they fight harder to keep you safe from the Company?

Do you miss your brother?

What happened to your sister?

I draw in a breath, running all the ways in which I’ll have to lie to her when these questions are asked. But all of that’s unnecessary. Because her question finally comes out. And everything about it throws me off my game.

Chapter Nineteen - Harper

“What was the best present you ever received?” I ask him. “As a kid, like a little kid. Because the best present you ever received as an adult was me.” I bat my eyelashes at him to let him know I’m not mad. And I’m not mad. I’m not trying to push him away, I just need more… details. More personal things. More job things. More killing things. Getting to know someone is a process. And I don’t want to skip it. I don’t know if I love him, but I like him. A lot. And knowing he’s been with me since I was a kid, even in just that small, distant way once a year, it means something. It makes him more than just a guy. He’s a guy who knows things about me. About my family. And he still wants to stick it out.

Or… he’s using me to get to Nick. Which might be the case. And this is a good way to figure that out as well.

I have trust issues. I know this. But either way, getting closer—more personal—this will meet the objective no matter what. He’s watching me with a very skeptical look as I think all this through. Probably a mirror of the confusion I’m battling internally as well.

“Well…” He clears his throat. And then he pauses so long I decide to pick it up.

“I’ll go first. OK?” I tip my head up and smile. He’s considering his options, I can tell. He’s trying to decide to be honest or lie. If I want something from him, I need to give it first. This is how they work, right? The assassins thrive on favors. You owe me, I owe you, and we’re even.

So I lie back down in his lap and start.

“My best gift was not that stupid Hello Kitty notebook you gave me.” His chest expands as he takes a deep breath and I bite my lip to stop the smile. “It was a fish from my brother.” James threads his fingers through my hair and that feels so good, I want to close my eyes and moan. But not yet. “He always gave me presents when we were small. Little things. An extra piece of fruit at breakfast. Rocks and seashells. One time he made me coconut dolls.” I smile so big when I think about this and I almost let the sadness seep in and ruin the moment. But I push that down and remember how happy he made me. “That was a great present too. And he scraped all the coconut husk off the shell, except where the big bushy eyebrows went. And I had a mom and dad and a brother and a sister. The perfect family.” The sigh comes out before I can shut it down and James traces the curve of my lips. “That was such a good present. But the very best present was a lionfish.” I look up at James again and he’s shaking his head with a grin.

“He caught you a lionfish?”

I nod. “He did. I was obsessed with them. I told you that day we became Six that I touched them. And I did. Every time I saw one snorkeling my hand just reached out.”

“And they didn’t sting you?” James asks with a laugh. “They’re venomous, you know.”

“I know. And I did get stung, like four or five times. My dad was so pissed, he finally said I wasn’t allowed to snorkel anymore.”

“This was before or after the present?”

“Before.”

“So Nick gave you the forbidden fruit. And you were allowed to keep it? On the ship?”

I nod as I remember. “Yeah. We had a nice tank. We were twelve. Old enough to take care of it ourselves. It was big too. Of course, we had a guy on board who really took care of it. But back then Nick and I felt like we were in charge. We had a pufferfish too.”

“You did not.” James laughs. “Pufferfish venom is another calling card of mine.”

“We did,” I exclaim as I try to sit up and make my case. But James pushes me back down into his lap, and I’m too comfortable to fight it. “That came after. Because one day we came upstairs and all the fish were dead. Oh my God, I cried so hard over those fish. No one knew what happened. My father was furious. I’m not sure if it was because I was crying like an idiot over it, or the inconvenience of replacing them. But we cleaned up the tank and a few weeks later we were near a reef and Nick got permission to go catch fish.”

“And he came back with your lionfish.”

“He did.”

“He loves you, I guess,” James says as he drags some hair off my forehead.

“I know.”

“Did you ever give him such a fantastic present?”

I shake my head but suddenly it’s difficult to talk as a lump of sadness appears in my throat. I swallow it down and find my voice. “I could never think of something special like he could.”

“I think you were his something special, Harper. I’m sure he didn’t need a present to let him know you loved him.”

“Yeah.” I sigh. “But I wish he had something to think about like I do. The feeling when you receive a gift from someone who loves you. And everything about that gift says you’re special.”

“Well,” James says through his own sigh. “I can’t think of a single gift I’ve gotten that actually… meant something.”

“You never got gifts?”

“No, I did. Cars. Trips. Shit like that. Shit rich kids get. But to me, they were just things. Were you spoiled, Harper?”

“Hmmm.” I think about it for a second. “I guess. I had a nice life.”

“Did your father buy you things instead of spending time with you?”

“No, we didn’t get a lot of frivolous presents. And my dad hardly spent any time with us at all. We were mostly ignored except at dinner or parties. But when you live on a two-hundred-and-twenty-foot yacht and your whole life consists of sailing around the tropics visiting paradise, that’s probably enough to qualify as spoiled.” And so that was my life. The beaches, the boats, the water. And once a year on my birthday, a party. I think back to those birthdays, but they mostly run together. Presents, beaches, swimming, fireworks… They all run together except for one. “What did you think when you first saw me?”