1. Easton #2
“Why are you here?”
“To get a second goodbye, so it would seem.” Her brows lift twice to add a little extra attitude there.
“Should’ve never said a goodbye in the first place.” I draw a hand to the nape of my neck to squeeze at the tension barking up my spine and into my skull.
“I suppose that’s something we can agree on.”
“Not what I meant.”
I never should have shown up at that wedding reception in South Carolina.
Not that I made it farther than the white tent’s entrance before trying to escape.
Gwen spotted me and tracked me down on my way to the parking lot.
We exchanged a few words, and I wasn’t supposed to see her anytime soon, especially not tonight.
“Well . . . we went from three months apart to only three days. That’s progress.” Her breath is visible in the freezing air, and I nearly open my mouth to catch it as my hand returns to my side. “Since I have another chance to talk to you in person, will you tell me what you’ve been up to these—”
“You know exactly where I’ve been and what I’ve been up to.” In my dad’s guesthouse doing a whole lot of nothing other than PT. Told her as much over texts, too.
Despite swapping messages here and there in the last few months, I’ve also felt her eyes on me twice. Well, over CCTV footage, that is. Once at Arrowhead Stadium, and another time at my favorite barbecue joint. Place has the best burnt ends in Kansas City.
“Don’t pretend you didn’t check on me.”
Her mouth curves, the faintest smirk forming on her shiny lips. Since Christmas is in ten days, she’s probably wearing her candy cane lip moisturizer.
“You can’t help yourself, and you know it.” I’ll never admit I like that she cares enough to break a few federal laws to spy on me.
“Once a hacker . . .” She tilts her head, strands of blonde hair falling across her face, partially blocking her gorgeous blue-gray eyes.
It takes everything I have not to brush away her hair. I’d have done that in the past without a second thought. A friendly thing. A nothing thing. For some reason, now it feels like it’d be an everything thing.
“So, really, why are you back? Just to torture me?”
I laugh, and the heat in my chest is a welcome contrast to the bone-chilling cold I’m trying to ignore. “I didn’t realize my presence is so—”
“It’s your absence that hurts.”
Her remark nearly cuts me in two, and I should walk back a step, but stupidly, I go forward.
“I miss you, and you know it.” She pouts, and it’s almost enough to do me in. To have me wondering whether I can be absolved of my sins and come back.
“I don’t know what to say.” My heart can’t possibly beat any faster without physically breaking free from the prison I’ve kept it in for so long.
“Say you miss me, too.” She reaches out and pokes my chest like she’s done a hundred times before.
“It’s not that easy.” I urge her arm back under my jacket, hoping it keeps her semi-warm out here, then jam my hands into my pockets.
“Fine.” Her response comes equipped with another hard-hitting dose of pout.
I’m gonna blame the frigid air for the slight tremble in her chin, though.
She can’t possibly miss me that much. “Just tell me you’re here because you changed your mind.
That you’re coming out of retirement, and that’s why Carter called Falcon in.
” Why do her words always land like poetry dressed as orders?
“They’re all here?” I don’t need any of them on my ass. I’ve already spent months being lectured by Juliette and my teenage nephew, Colin. Even my sister’s hard-ass Italian husband, Constantine, wouldn’t give me a break.
“They are. My dad, too.”
Of course. Because the hits just keep on coming.
“They’re in a meeting. My first mission since the accident.”
You mean since I almost killed you.
“I was checking the cameras when I spotted you. I almost fell out of my chair. I told them I was using the loo.”
“I don’t think your thing has anything to do with mine. Mine’s a temporary—”
“Thing?” She tightens my jacket around her shoulders. “Side note, living here was supposed to be temporary. Now look at me. Over two years in this place.”
Yeah, in a hotel full of ghosts with missions to complete and people to kill.
Gwen, being her usual goofy self, likes to joke that The Sapphire has an unofficial motto.
She even printed it beneath the letterhead once—an April Fool’s stunt to make Carter laugh: Luxury by day and lethal by night.
Where loyalty is currency, and love is collateral damage.
Carter wasn’t amused, especially by the last line. But she wasn’t wrong.
“So, what’s this thing of yours?”
Reality slaps me hard in the face at the fact she’s going on an operation without me. “Are you sure you’re ready to operate again?” I deflect and ask instead.
“Rather it be you behind the yoke than that new guy Carter hired, but apparently you’re not here for me.”
If only I could be. “You’re, uh, in capable hands with Nash. Don’t worry.”
“Still rather be in your hands,” she whispers without letting my words take time to breathe between us.
Now would be a good time to escape without telling her why I’m really here before she presses again.
Give her that Midwestern two-finger wave goodbye and go find somewhere warm to wait for my marching orders.
But instead of doing that, I remain rooted in place, letting the word, “Anyway,” fall from my mouth.
She flips her eyes skyward, making it clear she knows what I’m doing—avoiding anything and everything I possibly can.
“Anyway . . .” I say again, dragging the word out to be as dramatic as she always is. “You look good. Like you didn’t almost die.” I’m about to add on, Stay that way, and be safe on your mission, but she talks before I can.
“You already complimented me in your weird way in the garden last weekend. You know, right before you accidentally trampled the flowerbed trying to make your getaway.”
“You didn’t need me there. Dumb idea to show up. Besides, you had your date to get back to, so I didn’t want to—”
“Not a date.”
Sure looked like it, the way that billionaire hacker had his hands on her waist on the dance floor.
“Will he be rolling out with you on this mission?” There I go again, asking about her mission while dodging sharing intel about my own. “Is Julian part of the team now?” I shouldn’t have asked that, but I’m just . . . curious, that’s all.