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No, though, he wasn’t so sure.
Francesca—Frankie—didn’t live like a woman hiding from her past.
She had roots here—a business, friends, a surrogate family, one he knew well, considering that he and Carter and Chance Jackson had practically been the Three Musketeers growing up. The Jacksons were solid, good judges of character. Mostly because they had two former FBI agents in their family—and one current now that Lex was back in proximity to them.
Because that was one thing he’d never doubted.
They may not be blood, but DNA didn’t limit who the Jacksons viewed as theirs.
Lex was theirs.
And…so was Frankie.
But she wasn’t what she pretended to be.
He knew it from that case file, from the stack of folders that went with it.
So, he watched as she made her tea, watched as she tugged on a sweatshirt, flicked off the light, and changed to night vision to watch her exit through her apartment door, shifted to the shop windows as she descended the interior staircase, waited until she reappeared downstairs.
Lights on.
Binoculars switching modes again.
And then ice speared right through his heart.
Ice filled his veins, his cells.
Ice had him moving, pounding down the stairs from the apartment he’d taken up, the one that was located over Carter’s and Chance’s PI firm, the one with its own interior staircase, so he knew the exact layout of Frankie’s space.
Fifteen steps down.
Thirty of his long paces across Carter and Chance’s office.
Forty to clear the sidewalk on this side, the road, the sidewalk on the other.
Three to the front door.
One booted foot connecting with the lock on the plate glass door.
It exploded inward, causing the two people inside, one looking pale and shocked, the other ice cold with a gun in hand, to spin toward Lex.
“FBI,” he commanded. “Drop the gun and get on the ground!”
“Lex,” Frankie began. “This is my—”
He knew who the man was.
That was why he was here in Darlington in the first place.
He’d hoped—
Well, it didn’t fucking matter what he’d hoped.
Francesca Lyon was in front of him, interacting with a known member of a crime conglomerate.
“You too, Frankie,” he ordered.
She blinked, paling further. “What?”
“Get on the ground and lace your hands behind your head.”
