Damn. He loved this woman so much. There were so many reasons not to kiss her, not to take this step or go down this road with her again, but he couldn’t stop himself.
Besides, he could love a friend, and friends kissed...right?
She reached up and ran her fingers through his hair, pulling him closer to her, like she couldn’t get enough. This. Her. It was all so hot.
But they couldn’t. No.
Not right now. Possibly, not ever.
He removed his hand from her face as he leaned away, breaking their kiss. “I’m glad to have you back in my life. I don’t know how I survived without you...and your friendship.”
The light in her eyes flickered and dulled. “My friendship,” she said, her words equal parts question and pain. “Yeah.”
He didn’t know what to do to make the light in her eyes reappear, but he wanted it back. She reached down and started the car, effectively putting an end to the moment, and it pained him. He put his hand on hers as she reached for the gearshift. “Summer, you know I never stopped caring about you.”
She pulled her hand away. Putting it on her knee, she tweaked the fabric of her pants. “You can’t do this to me.” She sighed and looked down at her fingers.
“Do what?” he asked, not exactly sure which “this” she was referring to.
“I can’t get my heart broken by you again. It hurt too much last time. I was stupid for thinking we could take things to the bedroom last night. I regret it. I shouldn’t have even made that an option. At least, not yet.” She sounded as if she was at odds with herself.
“Not yet? Does that mean you think there could potentially be something between us? Beyond co-parenting?” he asked, not sure if he should press her with questions.
“Our co-parenting arrangement needs to come first. Joe. He needs to come first.” She pulled her hands into fists and then opened her fingers. “There are so many things going on right now... I’m afraid if we kiss again—if we do whatever—that we will both come to realize it was a mistake. And there is no going back. I don’t want to relive the past.”
He knew all too well about wanting to redo the choices he’d made in his past. His thoughts flashed to the agony on her face the moment he had told her that he couldn’t marry her. If there was one moment he would want to take back, that was it.
Things could have been so different.
“You’re right, Summer,” he said, yielding to their complicated reality and the validity of her words. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have kissed you.”
“You didn’t see me pushing you away.” She smiled gently, looking over at him. “I—we—just have to both be strong and do what is right. At least, right now.”
He had to find solace in the fact she had left the door slightly ajar, just enough for him to slip into her life and perhaps someday find a relationship. But he held no hope it would be the same as before, or that it would even really happen.
For now, he just needed to be in the moment.
“What other leads do you have?” he asked, trying to pull himself out of the heaviness of the air that surrounded them. “Please tell me that we have another diaper-wearing man to look into,” he teased. “That was unforgettable.”
She laughed, the sound sprinkled with stress. “I’m sorry. I never—Again, I had no idea.”
“Oh, don’t apologize for that. It was awesome.” He laughed. “We need to find Joe, but part of me wants to go back and get pictures of that dude. Troy and AJ would get a kick out of that.” He took his phone from his pocket, about to text his family.
“What are you doing?” All the laughter was stripped from Summer’s voice, catching him off guard.
Why would she care who he was texting? Was she jealous?
“I was just going to tell the fam about the dude. They are going to laugh so hard.”
She frowned, but nodded slightly. “Ah, okay.”
Something was off, but he wasn’t sure what he was picking up on—the weirdness of their relationship or something else.
“You want me not to tell them?”
She smiled, the action forced and false. “You know that if I see them again, they will tear into me for taking you there.”
“Nah, they are cool like that. If anything, they’re going to be jealous they didn’t get to witness it firsthand.” He laughed, the sound as off as her smile.
Her phone vibrated and she retrieved it. “Hello?” she said, answering.
He looked out the window as she put the car into gear and they started to slowly drive away from the man whom neither would forget.
“Any leads?” she asked, her sentence clipped.
He couldn’t make out the words coming from the other end of the line; all he could hear was the timbre of a man’s voice. It must have been someone she worked for. And then a thought struck him...she didn’t work for STRIKE and she’d said she had worked for Rockwood, but who did she work for now? Who was on the other end of the phone, feeding her information and asking her questions?
He tried to check himself before he grew suspicious of Summer or read too much into what was happening. She had told him more than he could have asked for. If she hadn’t told him something, it was for a reason. He didn’t have to like it, but his life was also cloaked in secrecy, and he had to accept their reality. He, too, was limited in what information he could share, and with whom.
She glanced over as he looked at her, guilt flashing across her features.
Could she tell what he was thinking?
He turned, looking out the passenger-side window as they drove toward the highway.
He couldn’t get sucked into the endless confusion of questions and second-guesses. He could be aware, but he couldn’t force Summer to do anything or to tell him anything she wasn’t ready to tell him.
In the meantime, he could wait—as long as it didn’t interfere with their finding Joe.
“Sure,” she said to the person on the other end of the line. “Thanks.” There was a flatness to her voice.
She dropped her phone on top of the khaki bag sitting between them on the console.
He wanted to ask her who she had been talking to and what was going on, but he held back. She would open up to him when and if she wanted to. Until then he had to be patient.
“Who else did you want to look into?” he asked, trying to make the look of disappointment lift from her face.
“The next one on my list doesn’t quite fit the profile we are looking for.” She seemed to forget about the phone call on purpose, like she didn’t want him to think anything about it.
Fine, two could play the ignore-the-obvious game.
“This time I have a lead on a man and a woman,” she continued. “From the video I pulled, it appeared they were having a tense discussion in the formula aisle before getting the brand we recommended. They have no child on record and the man is on the federal watch list.”
How would she know who was on the federal watch list? Was it possible that she was now working for the government?
Some of the pieces seemed to click into place.
“I’m sure your team has a pretty good idea of what they are doing and who they are looking for, but it seems to me that most new parents have probably had some kind of fight in the middle of Costco.”
She laughed. “You have me there. You’re probably right.”
If he kissed her again, would she open up? They had put a pin in anything between them, but damn, he was tempted to try to make her forget herself again.
He thought of Troy and Kate. Kate worked for the FBI. Maybe he could make a call and she could get in touch with her people in the Bureau and they could look into Summer and find out who she worked for and maybe even why. And yet, the idea made an empty thud within him. He didn’t want to have to do this kind of digging on the woman who had been such a big
part of his life for so long.
Here Summer was, bringing him into her life with one open hand while pushing him away with the secrets she held in the other. Frustration filled him and a grumble slipped from his lips.
“What’s the matter?” Summer asked.
He wanted to unleash the truth, to tell her all the things he was thinking, and then at the same time he wanted to rise above it all and not give in to the swirling mess of his thoughts and feelings.
“Summer, can I ask you something?” he said, glancing over at her.
“Sure,” she said, but she didn’t sound it.
“Something is bothering me about you, and I don’t want you to get upset, but I need to make sense of a few things. Okay?” he asked, hating that he was going to have to take a roundabout to get to the truth of who she had become and why.
She slowed the car, but didn’t stop driving. “Shoot.”
He nodded, almost unconsciously. “So, you told me that things went south with STRIKE and you went to work for Rockwood. You don’t work for them anymore. Yes?” he asked, treading lightly.
“Yep.” She gripped the wheel tight, pulled the car over to the side of the road and put it in Park. Letting go of the wheel, she stared over at him. She opened her mouth like she was going to speak, but stopped. She motioned as if to speak three times before she made a sound. “I know what you are getting at. And I’m not as good at this as you are.”
Had she meant for her words to be a jab? He wasn’t sure what “this” she was talking about and he wasn’t sure he would like it once he did, but he had to know.
“Good at what, Summer?”
She stared at her hands like they held the answers. “Did you tell your family about Mayfly? Did you tell anyone?” Her tone made him feel like he was the one on the spot and not her.
“I didn’t. I wouldn’t. You asked me not to. Why do you ask?” He made sure there was not a single twang of falseness in his voice; she didn’t need to read anything into him that wasn’t there. Right now, she had to be looking for anything to keep her feet out of the fire. “I wouldn’t betray your trust, never again.”
He could see her mouth form words and her eyes take on the storm that came with a fight, but just as quickly as the tempest started, it receded. She gave a resigned sigh. “I just needed to make sure you won’t betray me, and that you know I will never betray you, Mike. I couldn’t just run headfirst into this thing, whatever it is, without first doing some checking into you.”
“Uh-huh.” He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back in the passenger’s seat as he waited for the rest of her storm to play itself out. He tried not to be hurt by the fact she hadn’t trusted him and she’d run a background check. If anything, he should have been flattered that she would go to that much work to have him in their lives. “And what did you find?”
“Nothing so far, but I’m still looking.” She watched him as if she could find the answers she was looking for in his features.
“You mean your team is looking into things.” His words sat sour on his tongue.
She cringed, the motion so subtle that if he hadn’t been looking for it, he would have likely missed it.
“Yes, my team.”
“You gonna tell me about who you are working for, or are you going to make me drag it out of you, Summer?” he asked.
She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel. “I’m not trying to be difficult, Mike. I swear.” She paused, collecting herself. “You know if I tell you, I could be further compromising your safety and mine. Don’t you think I’ve already compromised you enough, given the amount of information I’ve already shared?”
“I’m in the fray. You can’t stop talking to me now.”
“But will it make a difference if you know who I’m working for? Will it matter in getting Joe back?”
She had him there. “Based on this,” he said, lifting the Faraday bag for her to see, “you must be working for a group made up of a lot of initials. I need to know how much trouble I’m going to be in if it comes out that I’m working with you. So, which alphabet soup organization is it? Please tell me that you are working for the government and not another group like Rockwood.”
Her mouth fell open with shock. “No. No. I’m not working with the bad guys. It’s nothing like that.”
This woman was in deep. Only how deep was yet to be discovered.
“Did you come to Missoula just to meet up with me?”
She didn’t meet his eye.
“So, yes?”
“I needed someone I could rely on.” Her words were charged with emotion. “You were the only person I knew with connections to Rockwood who wouldn’t know I had infiltrated the group. I needed information, but I also needed to stay in the shadows. My boss wants me to find out how much Rockwood had ended up pulling from ConFlux after I gave them the keys.”
“Who are you working for, Summer? You have to tell me.”
“The man on the phone was my boss at the DTRA. I’ve been an agent for them for the last twelve months. They have been great.”
“The DTRA?” He was familiar with a lot of the acronyms within the federal government, but this wasn’t one of them.
“The Defense Threat Reduction Agency. We are a part of DARPA. Technically, I’m working remotely out of an outpost connected to the New Mexico office.”
DARPA, he had heard of; it had been created during the Manhattan Project. Did that mean she was working with weapons of mass destruction? “Holy hell, Summer. Are you working with nuclear weapons?”
“I’m not—at least, not right now.” She shook her head. “Right now, I’m still working on low-level threat assessments and implementing effective neutralization strategies.”
“So, let me get this straight...you are the one who finds ‘threats’ and then calls in teams to wipe them out?” He frowned as he tried to make sense of what she was saying.
“In layman terms, yes.” She nodded. “And to answer your next question, yes, the DTRA is the reason I was working with Rockwood. Like I said, I had been infiltrating their company. Basically, Rockwood should have gotten nothing. It’s why I needed you. Why I’ve been asking you about Rockwood. Do you know if they know my real identity? Have I been exposed?”
“Do you think they found out about your being a double agent and they connected the dots?”
“It’s the only reason I can think of for why they are coming after me for the codes. I mean, why else would they target me—Joe?”
“Damn, Summer. Just... Damn...” He sounded breathless even to himself.
She put the car into Drive and merged back into traffic. “You can say that again. But I’m still not sure how they figured out that I was a double agent. There were a few times they might have found out, but the links would have been thin. I mean, how would they know I had access to any of the codes, codes I sent to my boss? For all Rockwood should have known, I only broke into the network. That was it. They shouldn’t have known about any codes.”
They sat in silence as she made her way onto the highway. He had no idea where they were going, but he didn’t bother asking.
He chuckled as he watched her. “You do know how cool you are, right?”
She jerked slightly as she looked over at him. “What? What are you talking about?”
“Really. You may actually be one of the coolest chicks I know.” He gave an amazed laugh. “Here I was, thinking that you had totally just screwed up your life and gotten yourself into major crap without intending to. And yet, I was wrong.”
“No, you’re not wrong. I definitely got myself into some major crap.” She sent him a coquettish smile.
“Yeah, but what happened was entirely outside of your control. You didn’t know these people would infiltrate your family and steal Joe as a result of your work,” he offered, hoping that his support would help rid her o
f any guilt she may have been feeling. She had only been doing her job. Nothing more. “So, explain the thing with Ben. Do you think it was him who sniffed out your identity?”
“He is smart, but I don’t think he did. I was so careful around him. My team at DTRA ran strong cover for me. Like I said, I don’t think he is the one behind the kidnapping or them asking for the ransom to be paid in the stolen code. I think he came to my apartment to win me back, and saw you. He was just hurt and angry. He is jealous.”
Just because she didn’t think Ben was behind Joe’s disappearance, it didn’t mean Mike would stop hating the dude. If anything, he wanted to punch him in the face more now than ever.
“Does Ben still work for them?” he asked.
She nodded.
Yep, he hated him. But sometimes two people didn’t need to like each other to find common ground. “What if you called him? Do you think he could help lead us to Joe? Maybe he knows what they did with him.”
She smiled. “I don’t know...but that is a good idea, after all. I know I rejected it at first. Maybe he has someone he can go to. He loved Joe, too, you know.”
The words burned at him, but he tried to cover them with the salve of possibly getting some much-needed answers. “I’m glad. Joe needs to have as many people in his corner in life as possible.”
Yeah, being a parent was going to be one heck of a kick to the ass if these last few days were any kind of preview of what was to come. Underprepared and overwhelmed didn’t even begin to encompass all the feelings he was having about becoming a father to this little boy. However, it came with the knowledge that when something involved his son, he would do whatever it took to make sure he was safe—even if that meant putting himself in dangerous and uncomfortable situations...with or without a grown man dressed up as a baby.
“Summer, you are having a hell of a big life.” He smiled over at her. “I’m proud of you for making the best out of a bad situation. And again, I’m sorry I forced the change upon you.”
She met his smile with her own. “I’d be lying if I said it has been easy, but at the same time, I have to admit that since we split, I have done a lot. I’m proud of how far I’ve come. How much I’ve learned. You forced me to grow in ways I never thought possible, and for that I can be grateful.”
Harlequin Intrigue March 2021--Box Set 2 of 2 Page 29