And, just maybe, once the hurt subsided and she could fix herself a cup of coffee at the office without her soul wincing, maybe then she would be able to look back on these last two months and actually smile.
She wasn’t there yet.
For now, she would continue her steadfast effort to put Daniel and everything about him out of her head. She was content to find her joy in this new, precious baby girl that had entered their lives.
***
Daniel sensed the moment she spotted him. Her steps halted midstride, and her shoulders stiffened.
He had been standing in her condo building’s lobby for over two hours. The afternoon security guard, whom he’d never met before, recognized him from the news coverage of the Trendsetters bust. He’d spent over an hour asking Daniel about everything under the sun when it came to his undercover work. Thanks to easily uploadable cell phone pictures and searchable hashtags, it would be a while before he could go out in the field again. The takedown had happened so quickly that he forgot to assume the guise of the clueless coworker. Now his face was everywhere.
His relief had been immediate when the evening security guard took over. This one, who had been on duty several times when he’d previously visited, kept his eyes on his paperback novel and allowed Daniel to wait in peace for Samiah to get home.
Now, he wondered if he should have come here at all. Now that she stood only a few yards away, it felt as if he was forcing this meeting. She didn’t owe him anything, not even her time.
But he had to see her. He needed at least one more chance to explain himself.
The past week had been the hardest of his life. He no longer questioned whether she hated him. How could shenothate him after the way he’d betrayed her trust? But maybe if he knew the extent to which she hated him, he could gauge whether he had any chance whatsoever of earning her forgiveness. Not that he deserved it.
He’d spent the past week toiling over what he would have done differently if given the chance. The hard truth was that there was little he would change. Except for one crucial thing.
If wishes were being granted, he wished he had never left her bed the night he stole her access card. If he could rewrite the past, he would have come clean to her as he held her in his arms. He would have told her the real reason he’d taken the job at Trendsetters and would have tried his hardest to impart just how important it was to access that database.
And he would haveaskedher permission to use her credentials to infiltrate the security system.
There was a possibility she would have turned him down. Maybe she would have even gone to the powers that be at Trendsetters and clued them in to what he was doing, but it would have been better than him going behind her back. With that one decision, he’d shattered her trust in him. He wouldn’t get it back. He didn’t have a right to it.
Still, he hoped for the chance to tell her how sorry he was. If that’s all she granted him, that would be enough.
Daniel stood with his hands in his pockets, waiting for her to make her next move. She’d entered the building from the side door near the garage, and had been on her way to the alcove that held the mailboxes when she’d spotted him. Her steps had immediately halted. Puzzlement shrouded her expression, as if he was the last person she’d ever expect to find here.
And why should she expect to see him? He hadn’t contacted her since she’d asked him to leave last week. He’d wanted to—had erased no less than a hundred text messages before he could send them. It hadn’t felt right to contact her via text. Even a phone call seemed too impersonal. He had no idea what state she was in, and the last thing he wanted to do was cause more pain.
Instead, he’d waited until he could get a day off and booked a flight to Austin. He was scheduled to fly out on a six a.m. flight back to Virginia in the morning. Even if the only thing this trip accomplished was giving him these few moments with her, it would have been worth it. Just seeing her face again, breathing the same air she breathed, made him whole.
Daniel walked to where she still stood, just to the right of a round glass table that held a large vase filled with fresh flowers.
“Uh, hi,” he said.
Silence followed his ungraceful greeting. It was awkward and tense and so incredibly uncomfortable it made his skin itch, but his comfort wasn’t important right now.
Finally, she responded. “What are you doing here? I thought you’d gone back to DC.”
“Virginia,” he said. “Vienna, just outside of DC. That’s where I’ve been since…well, since the day after I last saw you. The debrief after months-long operations takes some time.”
“Are you back in Austin?”
“Just for today,” he answered. “Just for right now. I have to fly back tomorrow.”
“Tying up loose ends, I assume? Like the apartment you share with your ‘friend’s brother’?”
Damn, even her air quotes seemed angry. Daniel swallowed hard. There had been so many lies.
“I moved out of the apartment last week. And my roommate, well, I guess you figured out that Quentin isn’t exactly what I presented him to be.”
“Is he your partner at whatever place you work up there in Virginia?”
He shook his head. “Quentin is with DHS, Department of Homeland Security. I’m an agent at FinCEN.”
