Necessary Evil of Nathan Miller (26 page)

I leaned over the desk so I could meet
his eyes. "Yeah, they knew what it felt like to rape me while I was
helpless to stop them. That's something no one wants to hear,
unless you get off on that sort of thing."

“
You were part of Al
Himar!” he insisted.

I stopped dead. “Where did you hear
that name?” That was what Laura had called Nathan.
He's as
crooked as they come. I wonder if it was just the sex or if she
paid him in money, too? She can't have been that good in bed. It
must have been a lot of money.

His grin was fierce. “That’s the name
of your terrorist group, isn’t it? I’m onto you, you little
bitch!”

I laughed. “No one calls a terrorist
group Al Himar, least of all the people in it, unless they’re a
bunch of asses. Don’t you have an Arabic translator? My Arabic’s
bad, but even I know what that means!”

He jumped to his feet. Now his face was
red. "ASIO do NOT negotiate with terrorists! You can't blackmail me
into a recording contract for you and your band! Public celebrity
isn't part of witness protection! You'll go into witness protection
quietly or I'll…"

"You'll what?" I asked. "I like my life
as it is. The people who hurt and hunted me are all dead. I'm not
at risk any more. If you want me to go into hiding as a favour to
you, then you'll deliver the modest conditions I asked for. And a
couple more."
No normal ASIO staff member would agree to this.
If he does, he has a hell of a lot to hide. Like Laura.

"What else do you want?" He looked
ready to explode.

"You're going to arrange a television
appearance for my band. Then you'll see if anyone notices it's the
same girl in my exclusive interview and the music performance.
Hell, make sure the band appearance is the same day they air my
interview. I bet no one notices." I kept my eyes on him.

"You're not giving a television
interview on a matter of national security! I won't let you, you
little…"

I cleared my throat. "Little tragic
heroine, little rape victim, little innocent who suffered as a
result of your incompetence? It's not only bought and paid for,
it's done. And Nathan sat beside me, answering questions, too."

"You little Arab bitch!"

"My mother was Persian. You want to get
racist about this? I’ll report you and get you dismissed. Maybe I
should add that to what I tell the press. Racist ASIO staff,
verbally abusing the tragic little heroine…" I watched the words
sink in. "That's right."

He swallowed, sitting down heavily. "So
you gave a fucking television interview? And he did, too? What did
you say?"

"Nathan came out looking like a bigger
hero than Superman. As for my interview questions…" I smiled. "I
don't believe I have to tell you that."

"Like hell you don't!" he exploded. He
rose to his feet and leaned over like he was trying to intimidate
me.

Maybe before my abduction it might have
worked. Somewhere along the line, my fear had died. Anger burned in
its place. This bastard had sold both Nathan and I to Laura.

I regarded him calmly. "That's right, I
don't. I don't work for you. I don't have to keep anything
confidential because all of your so-called terrorists are dead.”
All but one,
I thought but didn’t say. “So you can make a
deal with me for whatever I'm willing to tell you and my silence
after that or you can find out from the front cover of tomorrow's
West
, the same as everyone else."

He thumped down in his chair, glowering
as he picked up the pen. "Your…demands, then?"

I ticked them off my fingers as I
recited them. "First, the contract and television appearance. For
the band, of course, not me as an individual. Medical school and a
new name. And then there's the matter of Nathan Miller."

"Nathan's our top undercover
interrogator – he goes as deep as he needs to in order to get
whatever we need. He's not going to take a bribe from you." He
dismissed me with a flick of his fingers.

I frowned. "He was damaged when you
took him on and he's worse after working for you. What about
counselling, helping him find another job? He shouldn't be working
on this case or any case like it."

"He took on the job knowing the risks.
That's not my problem."

I smiled. "Did he really know the
risks? Did he know you'd order him to do whatever it took,
including making him hurt another girl the same way they killed his
sister?"

His eyes held a touch of fear. "He knew
when he took the job. He agreed to do anything he had to in order
to save his sister. What are you complaining about? He got you out
alive."

My words came out bitter. "You know
what he did. He was acting under your orders."

"That's bullshit! He was supposed to
watch them kidnap you and take them into custody! Instead, he
disappeared. When he turned up three weeks later, it was in a
police report with your half-dead body. We had to cover up the mess
from whatever he'd done while he was AWOL," he insisted.

I shook my head. "Either he's obeying
orders or he's a rogue. You can't have both. I was never the target
– it was him they wanted. They set him up to take the blame for a
hate crime – against a Persian girl. Me. He was always the target."
I saw from the way his eyes flickered that he knew. "And you sent
him to his death. Was he just bait to catch your suspects, or did
they get to you and offer you something for him? They didn't want
to kill him. They threatened his sister so he'd cooperate, but she
was never really in any danger. They wanted to turn him into a
racist rapist. Then they'd let him kill himself."

"That's not…she didn't…that's
bullshit!" he stammered.
He knows she was in charge. Fuck – he
really is one of Laura’s bastards. He sold Nathan to her. And me.
He fucking sold us, like pieces of meat.

"They didn't even know my name," I said
softly. "Nathan wasn't supposed to survive, was he? You know,
deliberately sending one of your staff to die can land you in jail,
under the occupational health and safety laws. I'd say negligence
doesn't cut it here – in your case, it'd be murder. But all that
goes away if you give him an office job, far from here and this
case, like he should have been in the first place. He's so damaged
he can't see you're responsible for the mess in his head – but I
can. He needs intensive therapy because he's not safe the way he
is. You need to reassign him to some other government department
where the most traumatic thing he has to deal with is a paper jam
in the printer."

I wanted to cross my fingers, knowing
that his bigger crime was a matter of national security and nothing
to do with safety laws at all. But I didn't dare say it. If he
knew, he might risk killing me himself. I needed him angry enough
not to think straight, but not angry enough to kill. A hell of a
balance for a girl who struggled to walk straight.

He stared at me. "I can't. With his
successes on this case, his application for operative training has
been approved. Full training and a five-year contract. A television
interview will seal the deal – making him a public hero and our
best interrogator. There'll be girls paying to get into his
pants…and they'll tell him anything, just like you did."

No! Not Nathan. He won't make it
through training and more of this work – it'll kill him or drive
him mad. What will happen to him without me?
"Nathan's in more
danger than I am – you know he is. This bunch might be dead, but
whoever hired them might hire more. He's the one you should send
into witness protection – to protect him. Nathan is part of the
deal or I'll have none of it."

"First you want your band and now you
want to take Miller as your gigolo? Everyone knows you've been
fucking him. No wonder he's the best undercover operative we have –
he's been busy lubricating your cunt! Pumping you for information,
the best way he knows how. He won't turn down the job he's always
wanted just to keep fucking a damaged little slut like you. You can
shove your deal where you let terrorists shove their…"

I stood calmly, wanting to gut the man
but restraining myself. "I think you should apologise for that, as
a very small beginning. Suggesting I asked to be raped will sink
your career like a bad radio DJ. Especially if I leave here and
ring the press with the other half of my story. ASIO agents
deliberately letting me get hurt so they can catch their suspects,
active participants in the abuse, callous about my injuries…Whether
I have or haven't engaged in sexual intercourse with Nathan is none
of anyone's business, least of all yours. But I will tell you for
free that I'll never sleep with a man who raped me, no matter what
his reasons were. You should check out your surveillance people if
they tell you otherwise."

"You little bitch…"

I inclined my head. "That's what the
so-called terrorists called me and they died for it."

"Are you threatening me?" he spat.

I smiled again. "Finally, you
understand. Yes. Prison, losing your job, possible terror
charges…and death. These are all very real threats and I don't have
to be alive to carry them out. I've made some very detailed
accounts, entrusting them to people who will release them to the
media if I meet with a mishap." I slapped a CD case on the desk.
"This is what I'll be giving to the police tomorrow. It's what
you've been trying to get Nathan to find out from me, though it's
not a complete account by any means. You'll find the dates and
requirements for the TV appearance and recording contract on there,
too. You have until close of business tomorrow to let me know the
details. Or you get to find out what rape's like in prison, because
I remember everything that happened. Plenty more that's not on that
CD. And if Nathan raped me on your orders, I’ll pay your cellmate
to do the same to you ten times over for every time he did it to
me.” I glared at him, praying he wouldn’t call my bluff. I knew
Nathan had done no such thing, but I hoped Mott didn’t.

"Fucking Miller…I knew he couldn't keep
it in his pants." He swallowed and reached out for the CD. "No,
wait! Honestly, I can do all of it, except for the bits involving
Miller. He'd have to give up his whole career. That's not my call
to make. And he'll never do it – not for you. He won't give up
everything he's worked so hard for to spend all his life with you
and a shrink."

You don't know Nathan.

I shook my head. "No deal."

"If he raped you, why in hell would you
let him anywhere near you?" he asked suddenly.

I thought fast. "He did what he had to.
No cruelty, no more pain than necessary. Always because of his
orders. And the guilt of what he had to do on those orders eats him
up inside, so he'd do anything for me to make up for it. Even kill
for me." I gritted my teeth. "He knows he owes me. I want him to
pay his debt. And just in case I'm wrong, I want to know where he
is. I don't want to be looking over my shoulder, worrying where he
might be." I held his gaze until he looked away.

He swallowed a couple of times. When he
did speak, he sounded desperate. "All your other conditions, fine,
but all I can do is present your offer to Miller. Whether he agrees
to counselling and taking an office job near you or the successful
career he's earned is up to him."

But I don't have to ask him to do that.
You're going to give him the ultimatum, you prick. I wish I could
see his face…

I wet my lips. Slowly, I nodded. Nathan
had a choice, after all, and forcing his boss to make my offer
sounded like fun to me. Proper payback for being a prick. "Put it
all in writing and I'll consider it." I stood up. "One thing,
though. If Nathan's sister really was in danger, and you believed
him when your top interrogator told you she was their next target,
why didn't she have anyone guarding her? Why was I the one being
babysat?" I didn't wait for an answer. Instead, I left, closing the
door carefully behind me.

The walls weren't thick enough to
prevent me from hearing his final word on the matter.

"FUUUUUUCK!"

I smiled.

I didn't think he'd keep his job long
enough to follow through on all of it – but I was counting on the
band arrangements and Nathan. After all, if he was stupid enough to
leave evidence on Nathan's phone, surely ASIO could find enough to
arrest him.

Navid drove me home from this meeting,
too.

"Making him angry will only mean
trouble," he said as soon as the building was out of sight.

I shrugged. "He called me a terrorist,
an Arab bitch, a slut and damaged besides. He also suggested I'd
invited rape. Before he accused me of being a member of a terrorist
group called Al Himar."

Navid laughed. “He called you Al Himar?
What an ass. We really need to get a translator. Oh, I’m sorry. The
rest isn’t funny, but that...” He collected himself. "For the rest,
I'll report him. That's not acceptable. Don't give him any
information – keep it to yourself until we get this sorted."

"I already gave him a copy of
everything I remembered – what Nathan's been trying to get out of
me," I admitted.

Navid shook his head. "You shouldn't
have done that. Several records of interrogations have disappeared
in this case – including ones on Laura, the woman who…"

"Died," I supplied. "He knew things
that he can only have heard from Laura. Someone needs to
investigate him – I think he sold Nathan and I to her."

He looked grim. "I've told you before –
that's a very strong accusation to make."

I glared at him. "Would you arrange a
music recording contract and a TV appearance for someone you were
forcing into witness protection?"

He laughed. "Shit, no! That'd be
stupid. What's the point of witness protection if you're not going
to hide the witness? It'd be like telling the people that want to
kill you exactly where to find you…" He stared at me, realisation
hitting hard. "Keep copies of everything. Get Nathan to do the
same."