43. No More Roman
No More Roman
The box had been sitting on Chris Walker’s dining room table for three days.Camila had noticed it the first night.Brown cardboard.Federal evidence seal along one side.A case number printed across the top.Nothing particularly interesting to anyone else.But every time Chris walked past it, he looked at it.Every time he looked at it, Camila noticed.Tonight, she finally asked.
“What’s in the box?”Chris stopped halfway through opening the refrigerator.
“Nothing.”Camila looked up from the couch.
“Chris.”He closed his eyes.He’d learned that tone. “What?”
“You’re a terrible liar.”He turned around slowly.Camila raised an eyebrow.
Chris stared at her.“You realize that’s objectively false.”
“Not with me.”That shut him up.Camila smiled.“What’s in the box?”Chris grabbed a bottle of water.“Work stuff.”
“That’s your second lie.”
“Technically—”
“Christopher.”His eyebrows rose.“Oh, we’re using the full name.”
“Box.”Chris sighed.Then looked toward the dining room.“Roman.”
Camila’s smile disappeared.“What?”
“Everything that’s left of him.”Her eyes moved toward the box.
For weeks, Chris Roman had existed only in fragments.
A name people occasionally still used during FBI debriefings.
Evidence photographs.Transcripts.Surveillance recordings.
Reports.A fictional criminal history created by people who’d needed Mateo Vargas to believe Chris Roman had existed long before he ever walked into that garage.But he hadn’t.Not really.Chris Walker had.The man beneath him.
Camila stood.“Can I see?”Chris hesitated.Then nodded.“Yeah.”They walked to the table.Chris pulled out a chair.Camila sat beside him.He broke the seal.The cardboard flaps opened.And Chris Roman came back to life.Just a little.Chris reached inside.
First—a wallet.He opened it.Cash.Cards.Fake insurance information.Then a driver’s license.Camila immediately grabbed it.Chris sighed.
“Of course that’s the first thing you take.
”She held it up.CHRISTOPHER ROMAN.The photograph was Chris.But different.Slightly longer hair.Stubble.No smile.The expression she’d once thought made him look dangerous.Now she knew he’d probably been irritated with whichever FBI employee had taken the photograph.Camila looked at the date of birth. “Even your birthday was fake?”
“Yep.”
“Address?”
“Fake.”She read it.“You never lived there?”
“No.”
“Where is it?”
“Apartment the Bureau maintained.”Camila looked offended.“So when I asked where you lived—”
“I took you to my real apartment.”She paused.“You did?”Chris nodded.
“That was Walker.”Something about that mattered.More than she expected.
“You took me to your actual home.”
“Yeah.”
“Wasn’t that dangerous?”
“Extremely.”
“Then why did you?”Chris looked at her like the answer should have been obvious.“You asked.”Camila’s heart squeezed.“That’s stupid.”
“I’ve heard.”She looked back at the license.Chris reached into the box again.
Credit cards.All fake.Another identification card.Security credentials.
A gym membership.Camila laughed.“Wait.”
“What?”She held it up.“Roman had a gym membership?”
“Cover histories need boring shit too.”
“Did you use it?”
“Twice.”
“Was Mateo’s organization monitoring whether you went to the gym?”
“No.”
“Then why?”Chris shrugged.“Good gym.”Camila stared at him.Then started laughing.“What?”
“You were undercover in a cartel and took advantage of your fake identity’s gym membership.”
“It had a sauna.”She laughed harder.Chris smiled.God, he’d missed that sound.
Not the frightened laughter from the chase.Not the emotional laughter after they’d survived.This.Normal.Camila laughing at him in their home.Their home.That word was still new.Chris liked it.He pulled another document from the box.Fake employment history.Private security records.A fabricated street-racing arrest that had never happened.Camila read it.Her eyebrows climbed. “Illegal racing?”
“Fake.”
“Three arrests?”
“Fake.”
“Assault?”
“Fake.”
“Possession of an illegal weapon?”
“Fake.”She slowly looked at him.“You made Roman sound like an asshole.”
“Mateo wasn’t exactly hiring choirboys.”Camila continued reading.Then she found the driving history.Her expression changed.“So none of it.”
“What?”
“The street racing.”
“No.”
“You never raced illegally?”
“Not once.”
“And the driving?”Chris leaned back.“Federal training.”
“How much?”
“A lot.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It is if I don’t want to spend the next hour explaining advanced tactical driving courses.”Camila’s eyes narrowed.Chris smiled.“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Do that.”
“Do what?”
“That smug FBI thing.”
“Can’t help it.”
“You absolutely can.”
“Nope.”She threw the fake license at him.Chris caught it.Then another object appeared near the bottom of the box.A phone.Roman’s phone.Camila’s smile faded.
She remembered that phone.Messages.Calls.The nights Chris had disappeared to answer it.The times he’d stared at the screen and changed instantly.Roman entering.
Walker disappearing.Chris picked it up.“Dead.”
“Good.”He looked at her.“You hated this phone.”
“I didn’t know I hated it.”
“You did.”
“I thought you had another woman.”Chris blinked.“What?”Camila stared.
“The morning Sloan called.”Chris thought back.Then realization hit.“Oh.”
“Yeah. Oh.”
“You thought Sloan and I were—”
“Yes.”Chris looked genuinely horrified.“Sloan?”Camila laughed.“I didn’t know!”
“She threatened to break my nose during tactical training once.”
“That’s strangely comforting.”
“She also beat Logan unconscious.”Camila blinked.“Why?”
“Training.”
“Your workplace is insane.”
“You’re only realizing that now?”Fair.Chris placed the phone inside the box.
Then another.Burner.Another.Keys.Receipts.A watch he’d worn only as Roman.
A cheap chain.Then—a photograph.Camila reached for it.It was surveillance.
Chris outside the Vargas garage. The first week.She stared at him.“That was you.”
“Yeah.”
“No.”Camila shook her head.“That was Roman.”Chris didn’t answer.She looked at the photograph again.The swagger.The clothes.The expression.The man who had looked at Mateo Vargas and refused to be intimidated.The man who’d looked at her across the garage.Something interesting?
Not anymore.Camila smiled.“You were such an asshole.”Chris laughed. “You liked it.”
“I absolutely did not.”
“You kissed me.”
“Eventually.”
“You climbed onto my lap.”Her head snapped toward him.“We’re not discussing that.”
“Seems relevant.”
“Christopher Walker.”His grin widened.Camila shook her head.Then her expression softened.“Were you scared?”Chris’s smile faded.“When?”
“The first day.”He looked at the surveillance photograph.“No.”She waited.Chris exhaled.“Yes.”That surprised her.“You were?”
“Not the way you’re thinking.”
“How?”He considered it.“Undercover isn’t about pretending every once in a while.
”His fingers touched the photograph.“You wake up as somebody else. Eat as somebody else. Drive as somebody else. Answer to a name that isn’t yours.
”Camila listened.“You can’t forget where you are. ”His voice became quieter.“Not once.”
“Because you’d get caught.”
“Because I’d get killed.”Camila’s hand moved toward his.Chris intertwined their fingers.“And when I met you…”He stopped.“What?”
“That made it harder.”
“Why?”
“Because Roman could lie to Mateo.”Nothing.“Roman could lie to Diego.”His thumb moved across her hand.“Roman could lie to everybody in that mansion.”
Chris looked at her.“But I hated lying to you.”Camila swallowed.“You still did.”
“Yes.”No excuses.No justification.That was new too.“I did.”She nodded.“I hated you for that.”
“I know.”
“Part of me still does.”Chris’s eyes dropped.Camila squeezed his hand.“Not you.”
He looked up.“The lie.”Silence.“I hate what it did to me.”Chris nodded.“I understand.”
“But I understand why you did it now.”His expression softened.“That’s different from saying it didn’t hurt.”
“Yes.”
“Good.”Camila smiled faintly.“Therapy is working.”Chris groaned.
“Don’t tell Mercer.”
“Why?”
“He’ll become unbearable.”She laughed.Then she reached deeper into the box.
Another wallet.Another ID.Roman’s final credentials.She held the driver’s license again.“Can I keep this?”Chris laughed.“Why?”
“So I can remember the asshole I first met.”
“I still exist.”Camila looked him up and down.“No.”
“No?”
“You’re worse now.”Chris smiled.“Good.”
“Roman at least occasionally shut up.”
“That’s because Roman was trying not to get murdered by your brother.”
“Fair.”Chris reached for the license.Camila pulled it away.“Mine.”
“That’s technically federal property.”
“Arrest me.”Chris stared at her.Her eyebrow rose.His mouth twitched.“Dangerous thing to say to an FBI agent.”Camila immediately started laughing.“Oh my God.”
“What?”
“That sounded terrible.”Chris nodded solemnly.“It really did.”They both laughed.
And somehow—that was the moment Roman finally stopped hurting.
Not completely.Maybe never completely.But enough.Camila looked at the license again.“Seriously.”
“What?”
“Can I keep it?”Chris considered it.Then shook his head.“Evidence.”She frowned.
“But—”
“I’ll get you a copy.”
“A good one?”
“Yes.”
“Laminated?”Chris stared.“Why would I laminate it?”
“So I can preserve the asshole.”He laughed.“Fine.”
“Thank you.”
Chris returned the license to the box.
One by one, he placed everything inside.
The phones.
The documents.
The cards.
The keys.
The fabricated criminal records.
Every piece of a man who had never existed.
Then he closed the box.
Camila watched him.
“You okay?”
Chris’s hands remained on the cardboard.
“Yeah.”
“You sure?”
He nodded.
“It’s weird.”
“What is?”
He looked at the box.
“I spent months making him real.”
Camila waited.
“Learning his history. Memorizing stories about things that never happened. Knowing where he supposedly grew up. Who he supposedly worked for.”Chris shook his head.“And now he’s just…”He tapped the box.“Evidence.”Camila studied him.“Good.”Chris looked at her.“Good?”
“Yeah.”She stood.Walked around the table.Then stopped in front of him.“I didn’t fall in love with him.”Chris went still.“You thought you did.”
“No.”Camila shook her head.“I thought his name was Roman.”She touched his chest.
“But everything I loved was you.”Chris stared at her.“The way you watched every door.”
Her hand moved upward.“The way you protected me.”She touched his cheek.“The stupid jokes.”
“Stupid?”
“Very.”
“Keep going.”
“The driving.”Chris smiled.“Definitely Walker.”
“The nightmares.”His smile faded.“The scars.”Her fingers moved gently over his shirt.
“The way you looked at me when you thought I wasn’t watching.”Chris swallowed.
“The man who came back for me.”Silence.“That wasn’t Roman.”
“No.”Camila smiled through the tears filling her eyes.
“That was you.”Chris pulled her closer.“Yeah.”She kissed him.Not desperate.Not forbidden.Not hidden inside an SUV where her brother might find them.Not fueled by adrenaline after nearly dying.Just Chris and Camila.When she pulled away, she noticed something on the counter behind him.His wallet.
She reached around him.“What are you doing?”
“Something.”She opened it.Chris watched suspiciously.Then she removed his badge.
His real one.Camila had seen it so many times now.But she still remembered the first.
Heavy metal falling from his dresser.Landing on the floor.Her picking it up.Seeing his photograph.Seeing the letters.FBI.The moment her entire world had changed.Camila stared at it.Then held it toward him.Chris looked down.She placed the badge in his palm.
Closed his fingers around it.“Chris Walker.”He looked at her.“Yeah.”No Roman.No fake driver’s license.No invented criminal history.No pretending.Special Agent Chris Walker.
The man beneath everything.Camila smiled.“I think I like him.”Chris stared at her.
“Think?”She laughed.“Don’t ruin it.”
“I’m just clarifying.”
“I love him.”That stopped him.Camila’s eyes filled.“I love you, Chris Walker.”He set the badge down.Then took her face in both hands.“I love you too.”She smiled.“No lies?”
“No lies.”
“No Roman?”
“Never again.”
“No secret phones?”
“Work phone.”
“Chris.”
“I have to have a work phone.”She laughed.“Fine.”He kissed her forehead.Camila rested against him.His hand instinctively settled over her stomach.She looked down.“You do that constantly now.”
“What?”
“That.”Chris looked at his hand.“Oh.”
“You know there’s nothing to feel yet.”
“I know.”
“Then why?”He shrugged.“I like knowing they’re there.”Camila’s heart melted.“They?”
“Could be a boy.”
“Could be a girl.”
“I know.”
“You keep saying they like we’re having twins.”Chris’s face changed.Camila stared.
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Do not put that into the universe.”He laughed.“One Walker might already be more than society can handle.”
“Exactly.”Chris kissed her.Then looked toward the evidence box.He picked it up.“You ready?”
“For what?”
“To get rid of Roman.”Camila looked at the box.Then at Chris.“Yeah.”He carried it toward the door.Camila followed.Before Chris opened it, she stopped him.“Wait.”He turned.
She took his real FBI badge from the table.Then walked over and slipped it into his hand.
Chris looked down at it.Then at her.Camila smiled.
“That one comes home.”Something in his expression broke.He nodded.
“Yeah.”He put the badge back into his wallet.The Roman box went with him.The Walker badge stayed.Exactly where it belonged.Chris opened the door.Camila reached for his free hand.Their fingers intertwined.And together, they walked out.No cover.No cartel.No Chris Roman.Just Chris Walker.And for the first time since he’d walked into that garage—that was enough.