“Of course.”

“Good. The first thing we’re going to do is pay a visit to Mr. Verbeek.”

“He’s a dangerous man, and he’s not going to just volunteer information on a client.”

“We’ll be persuasive,” Isabel said.

Even as she said the words, she knew what that meant, and she wasn’t completely sure that she could go that far. What was she becoming? Torture, murder, working with crime bosses and professional killers. Christopher had said that Mobius would bring out the evil in her, but she had never realized how close to the surface that evil had rested.

Christopher put down his glass and leaned forward in his chair. He took the files from her hands and then took her hands in his, looking deep into her eyes. Part of her wanted to smack him, and part of her was too dumbfounded to move.

“You know, a part of me hoped that you would refuse to go on this trip,” he said. “I imagined that you would stand on the moral high ground. But another part of me is very glad that you did come.”

She couldn’t speak, mesmerized by his baby blues and deep baritone voice. What was this? Was he coming onto her?

“I admire you and your determination, Isabel. I admire your courage. And I understand how painful it must be to have lost your boy, but your life didn’t end with his. I understand the pain, but I don’t understand why it’s broken you so badly. You are one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever met. You’re intelligent. Tough. And even in the short time I’ve known you, I can see that when you love something, you love it with your whole being, every part of you. I admire that passion. I wish that I could be more like you. But I can’t understand why you would try to end your life.”

She felt her hands trembling, and breathing became a chore. She willed her heart to calm. “I don’t know. There was just no point anymore. The despair, the nothingness in my heart, it was all too much to bear. When I woke up in the hospital, I made a promise to myself that instead of feeling sorry for myself that I would do whatever it took to find the people responsible for Tyler’s death.”

“Being a mother was very important to you, wasn’t it?”

“My own mother abandoned us and cleaned out all of my father’s accounts. I wondered for a lot of years what was wrong with me that she could just leave me like that. Marriages break up. People get divorced. But why did she abandon me? Then I realized that it wasn’t me that was broken, but her. And there are a lot of other kids out there that have been abandoned or are alone for one reason or another. I wanted to help some of them to realize that it wasn’t their fault. That even if their real parents couldn’t be there for them, that they could still be loved. That they weren’t alone. That they weren’t broken.”