Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Ana set a box down and reached a hand around to brace her lower back.
“I guess it’s true, once you’re over thirty, your body becomes more sensitive to everything.
” She continued to massage her back. “Or my cardio workouts aren’t cutting it.
” Sleep deprivation from working nonstop didn’t help either.
Plus, her department clearly considered ergonomic office chairs a waste of money.
Adriana rested a tan forearm on top of a pile of boxes, not the least bit out of breath. “You can always join me for workouts.”
“You work out with your husband whenever he’s in town,” Ana reminded her. And maybe what she needed right now wasn’t rest or water but a bottle of wine. She allowed her hand to fall to her side, then circumvented the wall of boxes blocking her path to the kitchen.
When she turned with a bottle of pinot grigio in hand, Adriana was standing at the breakfast bar, which separated the kitchen from the living room in Ana’s new rental. She set her palms on the counter and popped onto the barstool.
“Our reward.” Ana uncorked the bottle with a regular corkscrew and not the complicated device her ex always insisted they use simply because it’d been a wedding gift from their old boss.
He cursed the thing every time he opened a bottle, too.
Inwardly, she’d always grinned because well, he was stubborn.
“I get satisfaction in just helping out. You don’t need to bribe me with a glass of wine. But I won’t turn it down.” Adriana accepted the glass, her lips teasing into a smile.
She and Adriana were night and day in terms of looks, and, apparently, physical fitness.
Ana had red hair to Adriana’s dark. Fair skin to her tan. Adriana was tall and well-endowed up top. Ana was petite and not even close to filling out a C, let alone a D. She was lucky to fit a modest B cup on a good day.
“I feel like a mistress, you know. A dirty little secret I don’t want my husband to find out.” A dark brow arched as Adriana sipped her wine.
Ana set her glass down and braced the counter. “I’m sorry. We’ll tell Knox soon that we’re friends and that I live in D.C. now. I promise.”
“He won’t be able to keep you a secret from A.J., so I get it.” Adriana’s expression had slowly changed to her thoughtful, I want to say something but don’t know how to face. In the few months they’d been hanging out, Ana had learned to read her well.
Then again, between Ana’s college degrees, training, and working for the FBI, it was basically her job to profile people. Couldn’t turn the switch off, not even with friends.
Work. She didn’t want to think about the nightmare at the office right now. She was being forced to take the day off, so she was doing her best to shut off her brain and forget who signed her paychecks.
“Any particular reason you don’t want A.J.
knowing you’re living in D.C. and that we’re hanging out?
” Adriana asked, which wasn’t her first time.
But Ana was never forthcoming, and Adriana wasn’t a quitter.
Nor was she pushy. So, she inserted the question every so often to test the waters. See if Ana would finally swim.
“You saw A.J. with me back in Charlotte. You know how he is.” Ana’s eyes fell to her glass. She’d nearly drained the bottle with their two very full pours. “Flirty. Funny.”
“Got your heart pitter-pattering, did he?”
Yes. “Kyle and I were only separated when A.J. and I met. Plus, we were on the hunt for the person who had tried to assassinate a presidential candidate. I shouldn’t have, um, noticed him.”
Before Ana’s promotion to Headquarters, she’d worked at the Charlotte FBI field office.
And because A.J.’s friend happened to be the son of then-presidential candidate Isaiah Bennett (now president), A.J.
and his former SEAL buddies had provided security for Knox’s dad.
Well, in all honesty, they’d done more than that.
They broke the case. Took down the real bad guys.
Adriana had been assigned to Secret Service security detail for Knox’s father as well.
“You don’t need to rationalize whatever you should or shouldn’t have been feeling for A.J. when you met him,” Adriana came to her defense, like the strong kind of woman she was.
It’d been a nice surprise when Ana had bumped into Adriana outside the Hoover Building on her first day, and Adriana insisted they get a drink.
The one caveat to hanging out was that Ana had sworn her to secrecy.
At least for the time being. Adriana wasn’t allowed to tell her husband or his buddies that she was spending time with Ana.
It seemed ridiculous when Ana said those words out loud, but . . .
“We were busy. It was intense in general. I’m sure I’m remembering everything differently,” Ana said in a near whisper.
But that spark. The insane connection I felt the moment he introduced himself to me. She was pretty sure she’d actually flirted with him, too. Engaged in witty banter. When had she learned how to do that? It wasn’t her at all, and that part had been a touch exciting. Something different and new.
Thinking about A.J. was definitely a distraction from work. Probably not the distraction she needed, though.
“And if you didn’t feel something then, you wouldn’t be so afraid to see him now.” Adriana was a master at pulling off an inquisitive look by using her brows and narrowing her eyes. She could have taught their UC division at the FBI how to get informants to better open up.
Adriana was right. Of course she was right. Or why else would Ana be avoiding A.J.? She was coming up on about eight months divorced.
With her glass in hand, Ana left the kitchen and made her way to the living room, dropping onto the gray-blue couch from IKEA with a sigh. It’d been her first official purchase following her divorce. “I’m not ready to test out my single shoes.” Especially not given my current assignment.
“Does that mean he’d be the guy you’d like to date when you are ready?” Adriana came over to stand in front of the couch. She positioned her back to one of the columns that served as a divide between the room and the hallway off to their left.
“The fact I still haven’t forgotten about him since we worked that case together last year .
. . you really think that means something?
” She frowned, embarrassed to be talking like this so openly.
This kind of conversation wasn’t in her wheelhouse, not when it came to discussing her own life.
She could psychoanalyze and profile people better than anyone else, but she herself was off-limits.
Adriana sat next to her and slapped a hand to her knee. “I’m thinking so. But listen, Knox and I waited like twenty years to be together. So, I’m basically the last person on the planet to give dating advice. Probably the galaxy.”
Ana smiled. It was easy to do with someone as nice as Adriana. So accepting. “I’m a shitty friend. Having you lie to Knox as to where you are tonight. I’m sorry.”
“Hey, he kept me a secret from his friends for like forever,” she replied, her tone casual. “I can handle Knox. I just think—”
“I should woman up and not hide from your friends?” One friend in particular. “And what if A.J.’s dating someone? If we ever see each other again, he might not be interested.”
“Or maybe you won’t be.” Adriana was already on her feet again.
Clearly, she’d gotten her eight hours of sleep last night, unlike Ana.
She set her wineglass on the oak coffee table and faced Ana with her hands on her hips.
“And A.J. hasn’t so much as looked at a woman sideways since he met you.
Now, I say that two people who still can’t stop thinking about each other after so much time has passed, well, that definitely has to mean something. ”
“Has he mentioned me?” She swallowed the ball of nerves down her throat, nearly coughing like a cat choking on a hairball.
“What do you think?” Adriana asked while at the same time answering her question with a vigorous nod, then went over to a stack of boxes and cut one open. “You never want to talk about him, so I didn’t bring it up. What can I say?”
“I’m not great at the talking-about-me thing,” Ana admitted the obvious.
“Most of the guys on Knox’s team are the same. Trauma can do that to a person.” She closed her eyes as if regretting her words. “I’m sorry. I just assumed that maybe . . .”
Ana let go of a deep, uncomfortable breath and rose, her legs a bit wobbly.
Her feet sank into the plush area rug beneath the coffee table.
The air-conditioning was making a sputtering noise from the vents as if it were on its last leg.
Another thing to fix. If it weren’t for the rooftop patio and its view of the Capitol building dome in the distance, she probably wouldn’t have lived there.
The place was a fixer-upper that the owner clearly didn’t feel the need to fix up before renting out.
Her section chief, Porter, had mentioned it was available a few weeks ago when he realized she was still living out of a hotel.
Since his place was only five blocks away, they took turns carpooling to the Bureau.
“It’s okay,” Ana finally spoke up. “Not many people can read me. You’re talented.”
“Occupational hazard,” Adriana said with eyes now open, her focus back inside the box. “Plus, my husband is suspicious of everyone and everything, so I swear that man always has me on alert about who to trust these days.”
God, she felt that in her bones more than she wished to admit. “Where is Knox, anyway?”
They usually only hung out when her husband was out of town, which was quite a lot lately.
“Overseas doing something with Luke.” Her vague answer was typical.
They both had secrets, and maybe that was why their friendship worked so well. Neither would push or press. “And the rest of his friends?”