“I’m falling for you, too, Yasmine. But you have to hear me out.”
Her smile faded. “You sound so serious.”
He sat up and pulled her up with him, holding her hands in his. “This is serious,” he said, then took a deep breath. It was now or never. “I haven’t been honest with you, and I need to explain why.”
“What haven’t you been honest about?”
“I’m not who you think I am,” Alex said.
She expelled a nervous laugh. “What? You’re really a secret agent, infiltrating my life to see if I’m hacking into government computers?”
When he didn’t laugh, her expression went from tentative to concerned.
“Not exactly,” he said.
“Kyle? What the hell does ‘not exactly’ mean?”
Damn it, he hated himself right now.
“My name’s not really Kyle,” he said as he held her hands tighter, hoping she wouldn’t run away, forcing himself to breathe evenly. “It’s Alex. Alex DiCarlo.”
She blinked and shook her head, as if her brain was circling his words, trying to make sense of them. Did his name sound familiar to her?
Did it linger in her mind as a sentence in the worst chapter of her life? Did she ever see his face in her memory, on the witness stand?
Her mind registered the words, and she jerked her hands away, then crossed her arms over her chest.
“Why the hell did you lie to me about your name? Who’s Kyle Kramer?”
“Just a name I made up. I lied because I didn’t want you to recognize me,” he forced himself to say.
“I don’t get it.”
“Do you remember the FBI agent who testified against you during your trial?”
Two vertical creases formed on her brow. “Sort of. I mean, I have a vague memory….”
Her eyes widened as she stared at him. And her mouth opened as if she were about to say something, but no words emerged.
“Do you recognize me now?”
“You’re the one?”
“That was me. I testified against you. I worked on the case and gathered the evidence that helped convict you.” He said the words in a gush of air before he could stop, lose his nerve, forget all about honor and honesty so he could hold on to this woman.
She sprang up from the couch, her gaze searching him for some hint of his old appearance. “You? But you don’t look the same.”
“I grew my hair longer, it got bleached out in the sun, and I got colored contact lenses.”
He wanted to take her in his arms and hold her, get rid of that growing look of betrayal darkening her features, but it wouldn’t do any good.
“Why? Why are you here in disguise? Sleeping with me, pretending you’re someone else!”
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I lied to you. You were one of the suspects in a case I was investigating before I left the FBI. I had to know if you were really involved, and I had to know if I’d really let myself miss the facts because of my attraction to you. I’ll admit, there was some desire for revenge involved at first. If you were guilty, I wanted to be the one to prove it, out of some stupid sense of pride.”
“And you slept with me to find out the truth?”
“No. Not exactly.”
“Are you still an agent?”
“No, I was forced to resign six months ago.”
“For your creative investigating methods?”
“I didn’t intend to sleep with you. At least not at first, not until I realized how attracted we were to each other.”
“Why are you all of a sudden coming clean?”
“Because this has become a hell of a lot more than a weekend fling. I know you’re not involved in any illegal activities, and I just want us to have a real chance together.”
“Why the hell are you still investigating me if you’re not an agent anymore?”
“I lost my career over this case. I needed to know the truth—”
“You bastard,” she said, her voice barely controlled as she grabbed her clothes from the floor and started putting them on.
“Let’s not end it like this. Please don’t leave. Stay and talk to me.”
“Still hoping I might know something that could get you your job back? Or are you angling to get another farewell screw?”
“No, I just want a chance to prove to you I’m not a bad person.”
“And then what? We can reminisce about old times? You can remind me what it was like during the trial? How you were so busy lusting after your sixteen-year-old suspect you could hardly pay attention to the facts of the case?”
“That’s not true. I was just doing my job, and I never let anything interfere with that.”
Finished dressing, she tugged her boots on and grabbed her coat from the rack. “I can’t believe you just slept with me, before you told me your big fat secret. What the hell kind of move was that?”
“A damn stupid one. I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking with the right head.”
She jerked open the door and turned back to him with fire in her eyes. “Go to hell,” she said. “And when you get there, don’t even think of calling me with a weather report.”
He watched as she closed the door, the weight of failure sitting on his chest, making it hard to breathe. He couldn’t have messed this up any more than he already had. Couldn’t have made things much worse or had any crappier timing.
Damn it, he’d screwed up.
And yet, even in his failure, he felt a tiny sense of relief that he’d been right all along. She wasn’t involved, wasn’t the criminal he’d suspected. He hadn’t let his attraction to her cloud his judgment, as had been claimed. He’d been right.
It was cold comfort.
YASMINE DROVE HOME with tears streaming down her cheeks, a white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel and her foot too heavy on the gas pedal.
She’d been so stupid.
Everything made more sense now. The eerie feeling that she’d known Kyle—Alex, whatever the hell his name was—from somewhere before, his odd behavior at his apartment that first night, as if he was trying to hide something from her, and his midnight use of her computer.
She’d been an utter and complete fool.
She’d let down her guard, had sex with him as though he was the last man on earth, and even let herself start falling in love with him.
With a guy whose name she hadn’t even known. A guy who’d once testified against her. A guy she’d been foolish enough to think could see past her surface, when really he’d been obsessed with the way she looked for a decade.
She should have trusted her instincts. He was just like every other guy who’d been mesmerized by her appearance to great detriment. And maybe she’d brought that on herself, unwilling as she was to change the way she looked. Maybe she liked being pretty, but she hated that no one bothered to look deeper.
When she pulled into the parking spot in front of her apartment building, she couldn’t remember how she’d gotten there. She went to her apartment and undressed without thinking. Went into the bathroom and turned on the shower, undressed and got in to wash off every trace of Alex DiCarlo from her body.
She jerked the shower curtain closed and submitted to the assault of the showerhead’s spray of near-scalding water. She wanted to wash away the past week, wash away the emotions, wash away all the hope she’d managed to build up in such a short period of time.
How she’d let herself be lied to so brazenly, seduced so thoroughly, she couldn’t begin to understand. And how could a relationship built on lies have felt so good and so real to her? How could she have had the feelings she did for a man she barely knew, if it was all lies?
The lengths he’d gone to—changing his name and his appearance, insinuating himself in to her workplace and then in to her bed—horrified her. Her stomach churned, and she closed her eyes as the water sprayed her face, washing away tears.
To think of how far she’d gone in their sexual relationship…. Her face burned as she recalled
the peep show. She’d never put herself so far out there, never acted with such a lack of inhibition. Alex had made her feel comfortable enough to do almost anything, and now everything they’d done embarrassed the hell out of her.
She didn’t want to remember any of it.
Old memories crowded out new ones as she tried to picture Alex ten years ago. She’d been so young, so scared, so far in over her head back then. Remembering the time of her trial always brought back a feeling of loss. She’d known she was losing a year of her life, a year that should have been filled with senior portraits, parties, prom, football games—all the normal stuff kids did.
She’d lost it all.
Instead, that year had been filled with a drab white room in a drab beige building. Windows with bars and kids with scars, both internal and external, that kids so young shouldn’t have had. She hadn’t fit in with most of those kids.
And they’d sensed her privileged upbringing. Persecuted her for it.
Maybe she’d deserved it.
She’d spent the year being stoic and reclusive, trying to keep to herself and fending off the harassment of her less-privileged peers. For months a group of girls had threatened her and jeered at her, until one day they’d caught her in a rest room and cut off all her hair, hair that had hung to her waist back then, too. She’d grown it back and still wore it that long partly as an act of defiance and partly as a security blanket.
And now in the shower was when her hair felt heaviest, weighed down with water, and she imagined cutting it all off again. Imagined letting go of it, becoming someone new, the way Alex had.
But she wouldn’t. She was who she was, and she’d never disguise herself. She’d learned to live with her scarlet letter, and her hair was a part of that, too. It made her unmistakably recognizable to people who’d seen photos of her in newspapers all those years ago, and she’d gotten to a place in her life where she didn’t care anymore.
She’d gotten past being the subject of an FBI investigation. It was a part of her, but it was in the past. Just like Alex. He was a ghost from her past that she needed to put to rest, and one way or another she’d get over him and move on.
15
YASMINE LIKED TO SPEND the last few days of the year deep-cleaning her apartment, so that when the new year began, she could start totally fresh. It was possibly her most anal-retentive habit, one she avoided mentioning to her friends for fear of coming off sounding like her own mother, who, although she generally didn’t do the cleaning herself, insisted on a spotless household.
Today Yasmine’s cleaning was fueled by rage, and her wood floors had already reached a level of shine that presented issues for the cat, who kept seeing his reflection in the floor and freaking out.
She didn’t want to think about Alex, didn’t want to keep being mad about him, so she took out her anger on the dirt.
When her doorbell rang around noon, and Yasmine opened the door and saw an FBI badge glinting in front of her, she felt as if she’d been struck in the chest. All this time, she’d been a law-abiding citizen, and she’d sworn to herself she’d never cross paths with the Feds again.
She’d never wanted to see another one of those badges.
The first thought that flashed in her mind was that Alex had told the authorities about her hacking into terrorist Web sites…but what would be the point of his doing that?
“Ms. Talbot, I’m Agent Connelly. I’m a field agent for the FBI’s National Infrastructure Protection Center, and we have some questions for you about your recent Internet activities.”
Yasmine gripped the door frame to steady herself.
It struck her only now that maybe Alex had lied about more than just his name. Maybe he’d lost his job because he was a crooked agent, and maybe he was trying to frame her for something. She’d been so dumb, she hadn’t even checked out her computer after he’d used it, and now, for all she knew, he could have set her up for any number of false accusations.
“I haven’t done anything wrong. I’m not a hacker anymore,” she said, her mind turning over possibilities.
Just how far could Alex have gone? And if he had set her up, why did he do it?
“I understand, Ms. Talbot. But I’ll need you to come with me. You answer our questions, and then you’ll be free to go.”
She considered saying no, saying she’d only talk with an attorney present, but really, she hadn’t done anything wrong, and some niggling urge to prove it won out over her reservations.
“Fine. Let me just grab my shoes and purse,” she said as she left the door.
After tugging on her boots and grabbing her bag, she followed the agent down to his car and got in the passenger side, then buckled up. It all felt eerily similar to the first time she’d ever been brought in for questioning. Only, then she’d been scared out of her mind, barely able to breathe, on the verge of tears throughout the ordeal.
They had to have seen she was just a scared kid, a spoiled brat teenager with too much time on her hands, but then again, maybe they hadn’t. They’d wanted to prove a point with her, show the world that the FBI was cracking down on hackers regardless of their ages or seeming harmlessness.
At least now she wasn’t so scared, and she knew what to expect.
Agent Connelly got in on the driver’s side and started the car. As he steered it out into the street, she tried not to let her nerves get the best of her. He headed south, and it only took a moment for Yasmine to remember that the FBI field office was in the opposite direction. Unless they’d moved it.
“Why are we going this way?” she asked.
He cast a glance at her, then turned his attention back to the street. “I’m trying to avoid traffic.”
She stared straight ahead, a lump of doubt forming in her belly as her neighborhood passed outside the car window. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe he knew some roundabout shortcut. Or maybe she didn’t really understand what was going on here. Maybe she shouldn’t have gotten into this car at all. A film of perspiration formed on her upper lip, in spite of the cool temperature.
The only thing he would avoid by going this way was a route to his claimed destination.
And then it occurred to her. Agents always seemed to come in pairs. From what she’d seen, they never worked alone when handling suspects.
“Where’s your partner?” she said. “Aren’t you supposed to have one whenever you deal with the public?” Even as the words formed in her mouth, the feeling grew in her that something was not right.
Agent Connelly stared straight ahead, silent for a moment too long. “He’s sick today.”
She was stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Hadn’t she learned anything in her entire life? Like never get into a car with a stranger?
She glanced around, looking for clues. To what, she didn’t know. Finally, anger overwhelmed fear and she knew she couldn’t go anywhere with this man.
“You’re lying. Who the hell are you?” She gripped the door handle, peering ahead for the next stop light where she could jump out of the car.
Agent Connelly’s hand dipped into his jacket, and he withdrew a gun, then rested it in his lap aimed at her with one hand as he continued to steer with the other.
“You’re not going anywhere, so don’t even think of jumping out.”
Yasmine’s throat constricted and her stomach turned sour. Fear iced through her limbs until she felt cold all over.
“What do you want with me?” Her voice came out sounding tight and near hysterical.
“Like I said, I’m just taking you in for questioning.”
“Then why are we still heading in the opposite direction of the FBI office?”
“I never said I was taking you there.”
“Then where?”
“Someplace private where you can provide me with the information I need.”
“I don’t know anything.”
“You know plenty about accessing places you shouldn’t, don’t you?”
“I don’t do that anymore,
I told you!”
“But you still know how.”
“What difference does that make?”
“You help me gain the access I need to certain information, and I’ll let you go. After I’m finished with you.”
He glanced at her then, and his gaze felt unclean, as if just by looking at her he was soiling her.
“Who are you?”
“I’ve been watching you. I know everything about you. I know you’ve been screwing my former partner, when you should have been screwing me. He’s always the one women notice, but I’m the one you’ll remember most.”
His words registered a few at a time. Penetrating her anger, then her fear and sinking in deeper still. He’d been watching her. He was Alex’s former partner. So he was, or had been, an actual FBI agent. And his intentions were far from good.
She tried to imagine how he knew she’d been sleeping with Alex. Had he bugged her apartment? Had he been in contact with Alex? Could it be that they were still working together somehow?
No. He sounded genuinely pissed off at Alex. And she couldn’t let herself believe right now that Alex was capable of that depth of betrayal.
She had to get away.
But for now, while the car was moving too fast for her to make a move, she had to distract him.
“Why me?” she asked. “Why did you pick me?”
“I’ve had my eye on you for years. I saw your picture in the paper when you were a teenage wet dream, and I knew back then that I’d have you someday.”
She bit her lip to keep from saying anything. Of all the reasons she had to be sorry for her childhood mistakes, this one had just gotten bumped up to number one. She knew she’d attracted the attention of some creepy guys, but after all these years, she’d thought that was behind her.
“I wrote to you back then, told you what I wanted to do to you. But you never answered me. So now I’ve had a lot of years to think of all the things I want to do with you.”
Memories of all the creepy e-mails she’d gotten came flooding back to her. She tried to recall if any one stood out to her as more disturbed than the others, but she’d done her best to forget details like that. And she’d always deleted the sleazy messages back then—never dwelled on them.
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