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“No, you stayed home with Kala. They kept you to themselves.I would bet they still do. I meet with an old group of friends for drinks oncea month. We’ve talked about you a lot. You could come next time. You’ll seethere were a lot of people who looked up to you.”
But she’d had everyone she’d needed back then. Did she havethem now? It was such an odd feeling to know what she wanted was right therebut never be able to reach out for it, to take it for herself. She had to admitthat if TJ was her actual boyfriend, she wouldn’t need anyone outside of hercircle, but here she was. She had friends who felt like family, and not one ofthem could give her the love she knew she needed. So it was time to expand.“That could be fun.”
His smile kicked up. Yeah, there was a reason she’d said yesto him all those years before, and it hadn’t all been about the fact thatsomeone, anyone, asked her out. When he wasn’t a high school boy jerk, he wasquite charming. “So you are not with TJ? Like with withhim. I don’t care if you’re his friend. I can handle that now. But I don’t wantto step on his toes either.”
“TJ and I have never been together that way. He’s in theArmy, and I only see him from time to time.” She would see him less now that theywere in a fight. He hadn’t called in weeks. He’d probably found a girlfriend.Well, that wasn’t the word she should use. He’d found a sub to top for a while.He tended to go silent for weeks at a time and then she’d hear a rumor he’dbeen playing. He never acknowledged it to her, never mentioned it and neverbrought one home, but she knew. When he was at The Hideout he always tookdungeon monitor duties and watched anyone she played with closely. He could bea dick about it.
But she knew there were nights at a place called The Club.
There was only the tiniest ounce of her that kind of wantedto see what TJ would think of her dating Dennis. But only a little. It was timeto end this somewhat toxic cycle in her life. “But I should tell you I don’tknow anything could work out between us. I would like to see some of the peoplefrom high school, but…”
“You want to go as friends,” he finished for her.
“I wouldn’t say we’re friends,” she corrected.
“Not yet.” He sat back and looked her over. “I meant what I said,Lou. I liked you then. I like you now. I agree to all your terms. Come with me,and we’ll see what can happen when TJ Taggart doesn’t come between us.”
“Lou, I need to talk to you.”
She turned, surprised because she knew that voice. Zach Reedwas standing right there in the middle of the coffee shop. Zach shouldn’t behere at all. He should be at CIA headquarters. Zach was the team’s militaryliaison, and when they weren’t working, he went back to DC where he coordinatedwith other teams as well. So why was he here? “Zach? How the hell did you…”
“It’s work,” he said with a grim twist of his lips.
Of course. She grabbed her bag and shot Dennis an apologeticlook. “Sorry. Work calls. Something must have broken down. But I will join youat the drinks reunion thing.”
“That would be great. I’ll text you, and maybe next time wecan have lunch,” he offered. “It was good to see you.”
“We should hurry, Lou,” Zach said. “It’s about the LTProject. It’s in trouble.”
A shiver went down her spine. It was an old joke betweentheir parents and TJ. They still sometimes called him the littlest Tag, thoughhe certainly wasn’t. That was how they often referred to him when they spoke incode. He was LT. TJ hated it, which was probably why the twins loved it.
TJ was in trouble?
What if he hadn’t found a woman and gone dark for a fewweeks? What if something had gone wrong on a mission?
What if someone was after him?
She ran out, following Zach and completely forgetting aboutDennis.
It looked like things weren’t over between her and TJ. Notyet.
* * * *
Somewhere in Germany
In his dreams, things went differently. It was weird. TJknew he was dreaming, knew his body was hanging by chains waiting for the nextbrutal assault, but in his head he was in a completely different place. A placewhere the pain couldn’t touch him.
With her.
He walked into one of the smaller rooms at The Station, theBDSM club in Sydney where his unit had collided with Lou’s. Somewhere in theclub there was a pissed-off Canadian operative, and he rather thought Tash hadsome serious explaining to do to the dark-haired dude she seemed to have someconnection with, but none of that mattered.
Lou was here, and she’d thrown herself in his arms when he’dcalled for her, and all was right with the world.
She turned, looking up from her laptop and smiling. “Hey, iseveryone still alive? It looked like it was getting pretty heated down there.”
That was what happened when the left hand didn’t know whatthe right one was up to, but that was the Agency for you. He would rather beworking for Lou’s team, but he was still a grunt for the most part.
He moved in and hugged her, unable to keep his hands offher. He shouldn’t have been able to see her for another couple of months, buthere she was. He fucking hated that she worked for the Agency, but at least shewas safely behind a computer. She wasn’t a field operative, at the whims ofbosses who wouldn’t care if she lived or died as long as the mission gotcompleted. She was the brains of the team, and they wouldn’t let her doanything dangerous.
