Internal Affairs (11 page)

“Among other things,” he said cryptically. “Coffee and bagels will be up in a few minutes.”

“And after that?” she said, figuring there was nothing to be gained by delaying.

“I don’t need more pentothal,” he said simply.

It took a moment for the words to penetrate, another for her to grasp their meaning. “You remember the rest of it now?” Maybe sleep had helped his brain sort out the flashes. She had the sinking feeling that wasn’t what he was saying, though.

He shook his head, grimacing. “Not just now. I remembered it all right away.” He paused, and then said harshly, “I lied when I told you I didn’t remember anything past the prison break. I had all of it, right up here.” He tapped his temple, as though daring her to respond.

She would have, but she didn’t know how. “What…” She trailed off, brain spinning, and was saved from continuing to flounder when a knock at the door announced the arrival of their coffee and bagels.

Her appetite was gone, but she went for the coffee while Romo tipped the hotel staffer for the delivery. Loaded with cream and sugar, the coffee warmed her where she’d gone cold, steadied her where she’d gone unsteady. Her body vibrated with confusion and the hollow hurt of betrayal, but over all that was a stinging sense of self-disgust that she’d left herself open for his apparent lies and betrayal by doing exactly what she’d promised herself time and again that she
wouldn’t
do.

Yes, Romo had lied to her; yes, he’d betrayed her. But she’d given him the opportunity and power by letting him back into her heart when she knew better, damn it.

When they were alone again, she returned to her seat on the bed and wrapped her chilled fingers around her mug of coffee. Romo took his own coffee and leaned against the bureau. His eyes never left hers as he lifted his mug and sipped, waiting for her response, braced for the fight, for the recriminations and the blast of her fury.

“I’m not going to yell at you, or get hysterical, or cry and accuse you of being all the things you already know you are,” she said finally, feeling a wave of weariness that cut through her to her bones, chasing away the warmth she’d so recently felt in his arms. “Why bother? It didn’t seem to make an impact one way or the other the last time, and this time is no different.”

Something flashed in his eyes, and he moved as if to set the coffee aside and cross to her, but stopped himself and stayed put. His voice, though, grated with raw intensity when he said, “This time is entirely different.
I’m
different.”

“Not from where I sit,” she said. When he would’ve argued, she raised a hand to stop him. “Please. Let’s not do this. There are more important things to deal with than who said what, or who did or didn’t do the right thing.” She paused, waiting for his shallow, tight-lipped nod before she said, “Tell me everything.” Which, she suspected, wouldn’t actually be everything. Instead, it would be what he chose to share with her. As usual.

“You were right from the very beginning,” he said, as though that should matter to her at this point. “I can’t tell you all of it, for both our sakes, but suffice it to say that when I was contacted by what I thought could be an arm of al-Jihad’s network, looking for a programmer with federal database experience and an expensive lifestyle, I played along while contacting someone we both trust higher up in the task force. He put me in touch with the right people, and we cobbled together a plan to put me undercover. Al-Jihad’s people faked my death and set me up in that crummy apartment, with a fat offshore account and all the computer power I could want. I hacked into the accounts they told me to, cracked the codes they needed, always just seeing little pieces of the puzzle, never the whole.” He paused and fixed her with a look. “And like I said, I had lots of time alone to think about where I’d gone wrong in my life.”

Sara shook her head. “I can’t care about that any
more.” She knew she should feel vindicated to learn that she’d been right about him, knew she should probably be proud of him for sacrificing his life and his freedom in an effort to bring peace back to Bear Claw. All she could find inside her was emptiness, though. “What was the mission?”

“My federal contact wanted me to find a missing USB key that Lee Mawadi had hidden in a ceramic statue belonging to his wife, Mariah. She had divorced him while he was in prison, but the statue was her mother’s, and had enough sentimental value that he figured she’d keep it with her. Shortly before the prison riot, the task force became aware of the existence of this flash drive, and that the statue had been returned to Mariah’s mother. The FBI almost retrieved it in time, but Mawadi got to one of the drivers, nearly got to Mariah, too. She survived, thanks to her FBI protector, Grayson, but al-Jihad’s people had the flash drive. That was right about when I was first contacted, so the thought—the hope—was that they’d called me in to work on whatever information was contained on the drive. We figured my first few assignments were more tests than anything, so I played them straight, trying to work my way into the terrorists’ confidence.”

Sara’s stomach soured on the image of Romo sitting alone in that depressing apartment, working for the terrorists. He would’ve been in fear for his life every moment of every day. Technically he’d already been dead, at least as far as the rest of the world had been concerned. One misstep, one mistake, and the terrorists could have killed him and hidden his body, and only a
few people would’ve known anything had gone wrong. From what little she’d learned of Fax’s undercover experiences—and she had to assume Fax was the “mutual friend” Romo had gone to for his undercover contact—the covert agency he’d worked for was quick to cut its losses, and was as compartmentalized as the terrorist networks it targeted, meaning that help and trust were often rare commodities.

She thought about how he must have lived, and instinctively knew it’d been worse than she could probably imagine. “What happened in the end?” she asked dully.

“I earned the trust I needed, and got called to meet a couple of guys on one of the state forest access roads. They brought me to a cabin, handed me a laptop and ordered me to break the encryption on a group of files that dated back to when Mawadi hid the flash drive. I cracked the code, waited until they weren’t paying attention and copied the files to my own flash. I erased the hell out of my tracks, but somehow I tripped up and they figured out I was working for the other side.” He grimaced. “Either that, or my work was done and they had decided I was expendable. Regardless, it became clear real quick that they didn’t intend to bring me back to my truck.” He lifted a hand to his healing shoulder. “I fought them off, killed one and went after the other. I’d warned my contact where I was going, so when I got the Mayday out, he had a team after me almost immediately. Unfortunately—and this is where it’s still a little fuzzy—I took the bullet and the blow to the head, and lost track of who I could trust.” The look he sent her said,
Except I knew I could trust you.

She couldn’t let that matter, though. Not anymore. “Where’s the flash drive?”

“Hidden in my shoe.” His lips twitched. “An oldie but goodie.”

She glanced at the battered boots he’d retrieved from her gun cabinet that first night, and sighed. “So what now?” She knew she should be relieved to know they weren’t on their own anymore, that he knew who he could call for help, that maybe they would be able to deal with al-Jihad’s threat, after all. But the realization did little to improve the hollow, empty feeling that came from knowing that Romo hadn’t changed at all. He’d lied to her. Again, and for the last time.

“I called in already.” Romo glanced out the window. “There are cars on the way, one to bring me in, the other carrying a couple of guys who’ll take you someplace safe while we get this taken care of.”

He might’ve couched it all in very vague terms, but she got the gist that she was to be locked away under protective custody while the covert group, using the information encrypted on Romo’s flash drive, tried to bring down the terrorist mastermind once and for all.

A week ago, she would’ve jumped at the chance to disappear from the dangerous situation. She was a pathologist, not a cop, an agent or a spy. She had liked her life simple and even-keeled, and had wanted more than anything for al-Jihad to be recaptured and life in Bear Claw to return to normal, including plans for the special election that would—she devoutly hoped—replace Percy Proudfoot with a somewhat more forward-thinking mayor.

Now, though, she found herself resisting the idea of passivity. She wanted to go with Romo, wanted to understand how he could walk away from his life with no guarantee of safety or success.

He’d said he’d lusted after her from afar, that he’d gone into counseling, hoping that they could start over. But how did that mesh with his decision to go undercover? How did a man who wanted a future throw his present away and let the woman he supposedly loved think he was dead?

He’d been watching her process all the new information, and must have seen something of that confusion on her face, because he crossed to her and touched her cheek. “This terrorist thing is bigger than the two of us, Sara. It’s bigger even than Bear Claw. I didn’t have a choice. Al-Jihad doesn’t make many mistakes, but he did with me. I had to take advantage of that. I hope you can understand that, and forgive me.”

His words and the fleeting caress left sparks behind, making her want to snap at him because of the way he could make her body respond, despite everything that kept happening between them. But because her body’s response was her problem, not his, and because he was right about the terror threat being more important than individual lives at this point, she held in her frustration.

Just because she understood, though, didn’t mean she had to forget. She lifted her chin and looked him in the eye. “I can forgive you for dying on me. But I can’t see that there’s any excuse for you not telling me all of this until just now. You should’ve told me last night.”

He looked away. “I wanted to tell you how I felt without the other stuff overshadowing what I needed to say.”

“Baloney,” she said, sick at heart because she saw the lie for what it was. “You wanted to get laid.”

His eyes went very hard, and it was entirely the old Romo who said, “That’s ugly.”

“Truth hurts.”

“Especially when it’s your version of the truth.” His voice was as cold as his expression, though she thought she saw a layer of hurt beneath.

“There’s no such thing as different versions of the truth,” she retorted. “It’s either true or it isn’t.”

He gritted his teeth, looking furious, but his voice was somehow soft and sad when he said, “I was miserable without you, Sara, and crazy with it. I was just starting to get less crazy when this undercover thing came up, but instead of making me more crazy, somehow it simplified things for me. I want to be with you,” he said, while emotion froze her in place and stole the voice from her throat. He continued. “But I’m not perfect. I want you, and when this garbage is over I want to try to make a life with you. But I can’t tiptoe on eggshells, trying not to make mistakes and trigger your no-second-chances button. You’re going to have to learn to accept an apology and move on, or this can’t go anywhere.”

The sense of hope that had tried to flare died beneath a wash of cool reality. She rose from the bed, moving past him. “I assume your reinforcements are waiting for us downstairs?”

His eyes blanked. “They should be.”

“And you’re sure you can trust the men in this group?”

“Fax does,” he said, as if he instinctively understood that she’d take her friend’s word over his own at this point.

She nodded. “Let’s go.”

But he blocked her at the doorway, the chill in his expression losing way to cold fury and hot, spiky frustration. “That’s it? That’s all I get from you?”

“You want more?” She drilled a finger into his chest, forced herself not to let the touch linger. “Fine, here goes. Fundamentally, people don’t change. I’ve always known that, and I’ve always applied the knowledge to choosing the people I care for. But you know what? It applies the other way around, too. You’re asking me to accept that you are who you are. I can respect that, but I don’t think I can do it, because you’re asking me to change something that’s fundamental to me. You don’t like my take on no second chances? Well then, tell me where it stops.”

She gestured around the room, encompassing the two of them, and their shared history. “I’m supposed to forgive you for cheating on me, because you were scared, and because you were dealing with some baggage that you’ve gotten some counseling for. Okay, so say I forgive you for that one. But after that you practically stalked me in my office, endangering my job just because you wanted an excuse to be near me.” She ticked off the points on her fingers. “Then you fake your own death and disappear on me for half a year. After that, you come to me, endanger my life, put my friends’ lives at risk, tear me away from my work and my home…and when you finally have an opportunity to come clean, you
don’t. You tell me just enough to make me want to be with you again, saving the rest for the morning after.” She broke off, breathing hard, as though she’d been running for her life instead of listing off his sins. “So you tell me. Where does the flexibility stop and the truth begin?”

Romo’s eyes had gone hooded during her recitation, his face set in stone. At her question, he dipped his head so they were eye level when he said, “It begins with faith. And you have none.”

Without another word he turned and yanked open the door, and all but hauled her downstairs. He handed her off to her new guards—two stone-faced men in gray suits who could’ve been bookends for each other—and slammed into the second car without looking back.

Sara climbed into the dark SUV her guards had arrived in, and held herself stiff and still as they pulled away from the hotel, headed for a safe house.

For the first few miles, she saw nothing but Romo’s face, heard nothing but his voice. After a while, though, she put that aside, realizing none of it had an answer. Looking around herself, she saw that she was separated from the driver and his buddy by a layer of dark, tinted glass. There were no lock releases on the doors, no button to buzz down the partition, suggesting she was riding in what might normally serve for prisoner transport. The realization brought a flash of unease, quickly swept away when she remembered what Romo had said about Fax trusting the people she was with. That was good enough for her. It was going to have to be.