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“Maybe she was trying to spare you.”
“Spare me? The woman ruined my life.”
“She didn’t mean to die, Connor.”
“No, but she forgot how to live. She wanted the life Armond had promised her, but all she managed to do was rack up bills and...leave me in debt. How can I ever explain this to Deidre?”
“What can I do to help you?” Josie asked, her heart buckling. “Connor, what?”
He grabbed her, held her there in front of him. “You can find a way to release me from the FBI. Because if you don’t, I will leave, Josie. I’ll just go and take my chances.”
“And what about us?” she asked, tears gathering in spite of her tightly clenched jaw. “What about us, Connor?”
“Like you told me, there isn’t any us. Maybe there never was.”
He turned away before she could argue. Then he walked toward the high fence that stood between them and the flowering crape myrtles, his head down, his hands in the pockets of his jeans.
Josie waited for him to look back.
He never did.
Two months later
London, England
She had a visual. The little café on the corner gave Josie a perfect view of three different London streets. She knew Connor had been staying in a flat around the corner. Now she just had to wait for him to come to this little café for his morning coffee. So she sat sipping her own cappuccino and nibbling on a pastry while her heart did little dancing spasms of doubt coupled with anticipation.
He’d walked away.
From the FBI, from his father and from her.
Just like that.
The FBI had released him from his duties, citing his work to bring down former special agent in charge Joseph Sherwood and breaking up the Armond crime family for good.
The SIM card had verified what Vanessa and Sherwood himself had told them. And Armond had backed it up, giving his confession with a clear conscience and what seemed like a sigh of relief.
But he’d given Josie a message to his son. “Tell him I’m sorry and that I didn’t know about him until his mother came back to ask for my help. I didn’t know. I tried to make amends. I did.”
Sherwood had purposely brought Connor to New Orleans to lure Armond, but he’d withheld the truth out of fear that Connor would bolt to the other side.
Armond had called Connor to the opera house that night to warn him and to confess that Sherwood was in cahoots with Vanessa. He’d guessed who’d killed Lewanna and he was afraid Connor would be next. But Sherwood had made sure Armond wouldn’t be able to talk to Connor. He’d shot Armond and faked his own injury before whisking Armond into hiding.
Sherwood had hoped to find the evidence and then kill all the principle players before Connor and Josie figured it out.
A man’s career gone.
A father’s love destroyed.
A son’s heart broken.
And one former FBI agent sitting in a café in London waiting for the man she loved.
Josie leaned forward in her chair and wondered how Connor would react to seeing her again.
Before she could imagine that reunion , a strong hand came around her shoulder and held her mouth shut. “Don’t make a sound.”
She recognized that cultured, accented voice.
Connor.
She tried to glance over her shoulder, but his breath on her neck stopped her. “What do you want, Agent Gilbert?”
Josie wrestled herself around and turned to stare up at him. “I want you, of course. And...that’s former agent to you.”
He let go of her and sank down beside her. “You quit?”
“Of course I quit. I had to bring down the man I worked for. Not very good for PR around the office.”
Connor stared over at her, giving her a chance to see the blue of his eyes, the stubble of his shadow of a beard and...the trace of hope in his hardened expression. “I would think you’d receive a medal and a promotion.”
“I was offered a promotion but I decided to try something new.”
“And what’s that?”
“Tracking down a wanted man.”
He grabbed part of her pastry and chewed. “Me, a wanted man? Imagine that? Who wants me now?”
“Just me,” she said on a shy smile. “Just me—unemployed and bored and...lonely me. I told you if you left I’d find you.”
