“TBD—but likely. A key is used for entrance. We’ve got a handful of the St. Louis players under surveillance, but we haven’t identified the brains behind the operation. We could grab the secondary people and shut down this location, but unless we get the head of the ring who has the connections to the cartel in Mexico, the pipeline will adapt and continue to flow.”
“So you came in as a Spanish teacher. Lucky timing—for you.”
“I was prepared to play a number of roles, depending on what worked best and was most plausible, but the Spanish teacher gig is a strong fit without any finagling on our end. We jumped on it as soon as we got wind of the opening. It was a scramble to assemble the fake credentials.”
“Which were . . . ?”
He filled her in on his backstory.
“Extreme adventure firm in Spain. Clever. Is the limp fake too?”
“No.”
“What happened?”
“Raid gone bad.” His cryptic response didn’t come close to capturing the chaos that had erupted in the Sonoran desert when the Mexican Feds had shown up too early during a negotiation with a major cartel operative and blown his cover—but why share all the gory details?
“Recent?”
“A year ago. I’ve been doing desk duty for the past few months while I recover. I’m not quite ready to return to my usual type of assignments, but more than capable of handling this job. Since I’m familiar with this area but have been gone long enough to reduce the odds of anyone at Ivy Hill recognizing me, it was an excellent fit. I intended to lay low—and I didn’t expect to run into anyone I knew.”
“Surprise.”
“On both sides, I expect. Why are you here?”
She gave him a topline of her assignment and her backstory, turning the page of the book as she concluded. “Where’s the drop spot?”
“An abandoned barn near the western end of the property.” He indicated another word on the page, keeping his attention on the text.
“I wonder if Stephanie and her boyfriend met up there and ran into trouble with the drug crew?”
“It’s possible. We don’t know how long that pickup point was in use prior to November, or if other drops occurred here. I heard about the disappearance, but it’s a peripheral angle that probably has little bearing on the outcome of my investigation.”
She glared at him. “That disappearance is my main focus—and your investigation is secondary to me.” A hard edge crept into her voice. “Like I was secondary to your career.”
The moment the words spilled from her mouth, her eyes widened, a flush rose on her cheeks, and she jerked her chin down, feigning interest in the book.
In the sudden, oppressive silence, Zeke stopped breathing as shock reverberated through him.
After all these years, her anger hadn’t dissipated. Her hurt hadn’t healed.
Did that mean . . . ?
“Cate—you did meet someone new. Get married. Right?”
She swallowed. “Not that it’s any of your business—but no.”
The selfish wave of relief that swept over him was all wrong.
She should have married. She deserved a happily-ever-after.
Hard as their breakup had been—on both of them—Cate was a strong person. A survivor. How could she not be over him? How could she not have moved on? Found someone else to love?
For the same reason, it appeared, that he hadn’t done any of those things either.
His feelings were too strong—and no one had ever lived up to the only person who’d stolen his heart.
He may have thought he’d buried his feelings, locked them away forever—but they’d been lying dormant, waiting to surge to the surface at the first opportunity.
Like an unplanned reunion at a girls’ boarding school.
“Are you married?” Cate’s cheeks remained flushed, her knuckles white as she gripped her pen.
“No.”
A few beats ticked by.
“Let’s talk about our jobs.” She cleared her throat and tried for a businesslike tone—but the tiny tremor in her voice betrayed her unsettled emotions. “I propose we conduct our investigations independently. If either of us comes across information that may be useful to the other party, we arrange another meeting here. Agreed?”
A practical plan workwise—but it came nowhere close to dealing with the electricity zipping between them.
Yet given the taut line of her shoulders and firm set of her jaw, any suggestion that they also discuss personal issues would shut her down.
The wise course was to approach that loaded subject gradually—and with caution.
“I have a counterproposal.”
“What is it?” Her inflection was wary.
“Let’s meet here twice a week for a short tutoring session. I’ll reserve the room. If there are developments that require an immediate conversation, we can schedule an extra session.” He jotted down his cell number on a slip of paper and set it on the table in front of her. “You can text me with times that work for you—preferably during the day or right after school.”
After a brief hesitation, she picked it up. “Unless our two investigations happen to intertwine, we aren’t going to have much to discuss at these regular sessions.”
“We’ll find something to chat about.”
The look she lasered at him would have intimidated a lesser man. “We have nothing else to chat about.”
“Maybe we do.”
“No, we don’t.” She closed the textbook and shoved it into her backpack.
“A regular schedule of meetings will call less attention to itself.”
“Fine.” She yanked one strap over her shoulder. “Do you need anything else today?”
Yeah.
A lot.
Like forgiveness . . . and understanding . . . and perhaps a chance to see if the relationship he’d shredded on that beautiful autumn day could be repaired.
But he didn’t say any of that.
“No. I’ll wait to hear from you.”
She rose, hefted the backpack into position, and pushed through the door.
He watched until she disappeared through the stacks, then killed the app on his phone and stood.
Wobbled.
What the . . . ?
He grabbed the edge of the table . . . and sucked in a breath as the cause of his unsteadiness registered.
His legs were shaky—both of them, not just the one that had taken two bone-shattering bullets.
Staring into the eyes of cold-blooded killers, facing torture and death if his cover was blown, had never rattled him as much as the past fifteen minutes had.
More proof he wasn’t over Cate.
But much as he’d like to have a heart-to-heart with her about personal matters, that would have to wait. She wasn’t receptive—and they both had a job to do.
Before he left St. Louis, though, the two of them would hash this out.
In the interim, he had a ton of thinking to do—about evolving career aspirations, an unforgettable woman . . . and how to make amends for what may have been the second biggest mistake of his life.
Cate rounded the corner of the hallway that led away from the library . . . verified she was alone . . . and slumped against the wall.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.