Handcuffed Rebel

12. A little push can go a long way

12. A little push can go a long way

Niko
After that strange talk with Kaitlyn yesterday I realised there was only one person other than her who could make me understand the person she is now. "I need to speak with you."

"Mr. De Luca."

"Call me Niko, please."

"Niko. What can I do for you?"

"It's about Kaitlyn."

"What about Rose?" I frowned.

"Why do you still call her that?"

"It's her name. I've always known her as Rose. That hasn't changed."

"Tell me about Turkey, when you met her."

"My brother is the one who met her. He just sort of passed her off to me."

"You lived with her. Something tells me you know her better than your brother."

"Why do you want to know?"

"I need to know what I'm up against."

"That isn't an answer."

"The why isn't so important right now."

"If you can't admit it to yourself how are you going to admit it to her?"

"Admit what?"

"Nothing. From what my brother and Rose herself has told me she went to Turkey to find her husband who hadn't contacted her in days. My brother helps people like her. She was just another job, a next pay cheque for him. But it turned out her husband had been killed and it was a set up by a man who had worked for him since he was a child. Bayar said she lost it and killed him. She shot him."

"She killed someone?"

"Yes. She was never the same after that. She told him she wasn't going back and from that point on she was dead."

"How did you get involved?"

"She needed to be a dead person and I was the one who could do it. Bayar is the rescuer and the rebel and I am the one who protects his ass. He decided to stick with Rose, pledged his damn loyalty. I had no choice. So I gave her a new identity and everything she needed to start a new life. But she didn't want that. She wanted to die."

"How many times did she try to kill herself?"

"I've already told you."

"How many times?"

"Enough for me to slip her pills to keep her from harming herself."

"When did it stop?"

"I'm not sure really. She just got up one day and decided she wanted to live. I think it might have been the first time she felt the baby kick." So even knowing she was pregnant she still tried to end her life. I knew that relationship was unhealthy. It was unhealthy to the point of it being destructive and poisonous. She couldn't imagine being without him so she tried to join him in death. That's not love. That's obsession.

"So she turned her life around and started rescuing kidnapped foreigners?"

"She rescued mostly Americans. I think it was her way of coping with the loss." I guess I could understand that.

"Has she been with anyone?" I should be asking Kaitlyn this, but if she has, hearing it from someone else would soften the blow.

"She hasn't been with anyone during the time she stayed with me."

"What about you?" He laughed.

"Rose and I aren't like that." I hope not. He saw her give birth to my child. That's not something I'm happy about. "She's the sister I never had. I'd trust her with my life."