Like her, Isaac opened his box, as if the kiss never happened. Was he regretting it? Marie pushed that thought away. There was no way he had regrets, not with the way his body had hardened against hers and the passion in his kiss.
“That was the office.” He pulled one of the items from the box and began to unroll the packaging around it. “Cass lost the car the perps were in. She was tracking them through cameras, and there was an area where there wasn’t any surveillance. It looks like they didn’t continue following that road, but turned off within that dead spot. She did get a lock on the plates, but thinks they were probably stolen, so we can’t trace it through that avenue.The one they’d left behind was a dead end as well.”
Marie clutched the bowl she’d unwrapped to her chest. “So that’s it? There’s nothing more that can be done?”
“No. If I know Cass, she’s going to be triangulating that area where they disappeared and see if she can find it again.”
“You don’t sound convinced that she can do that. What do you think about it all? And I want the truth, don’t say something just to make me feel better.” The last thing she wanted from Isaac was to treat her as if she couldn’t take anything harsh. After what he’d seen her do in San Carlion—the circumstances within which she was working—he’d know that she could deal with anything he had to say—good or bad.
“I wouldn’t do that to you. It doesn’t help anyone if you don’t know all the facts or what-ifs about things.” Isaac put the vase down he’d unwrapped and closed the distance between them. “Cass is amazing with her computer skills. She will do everything she can to find out who they were and if you were their real target.”
“How can she do that? Is she going to personally go and demand answers from them if she finds them?”
Isaac smirked, and she wanted to slap his chest. This wasn’t a joking matter, it was serious. “I doubt Irish would allow her to do that, but he’d go on her behalf.”
Marie’s mind whirled with the casual way he was answering her questions, as if it was afait accomplithat they were that invested in what happened to her. “Why?” she demanded.
“It’s simple. They’ll do it because they know you’re Yolanda’s daughter and,” he stroked a finger down her cheek, and tingles shot through her from the light contact, “because you’re important to me.”
Chapter Eleven
At his declaration,Marie took a step back from him. Isaac’s arm dropped to his side, and he wanted to reach out and pull her tight against him. But he didn’t. It was clear she wanted space, and he would give it to her.
“You can’t be serious. You hardly know me.” Marie grabbed another wrapped item from her box, her movements jerky as she tried to rip the tape off it. “Until you ran into me, you haven’t seen me for months.” She stopped her attempt to loosen the tape, and Isaac readied himself for what she was about to say. “How did you know I was going to be leaving the building right then? Who’s to say you aren’t involved with all of this.”
Isaac took her accusation on the chin. He couldn’t deny it was convenient that he happened tobe going into the building at the same time as she was leaving. “I was coming back from my own lunch break. Was it a coincidence that I was there when shit went down? Yes, it was. But…” He crossed the room so that he was back in her personal space. He waited for her to meet his gaze. It took a few seconds, but she did, although he was sure she was looking at something over his shoulder. It didn’t matter, at least she wasn’t looking at what she had in her hands. “If you think I haven’t thought about our brief encounter in San Carlion, then you’d be wrong. There hasn’t been a day gone by that I haven’t thought about you.”
“You left though.” Her tortured whisper pierced his gut, and he gently took the wrapped item from her hand and laid it back into the box before he wrapped his arms around her waist, holding her loosely.
Isaac waited a couple of seconds to see if she would pull herself out of his hold, but she didn’t. He let go of the breath he was holding. “I did, and I’m so sorry. I didn’t want to, but I thought it was what you wanted.”
He would never forget the finality in her voice as she said goodbye after giving him that light kiss.
Had he read the situation wrong though? Had she wanted him to stay? He couldn’t have even if he’d wanted to.
Marie placed her hand on his chest, right over hisheart. Could she feel the way it was beating faster than normal? That this was what he wanted from her?
“I thought that was what I wanted. I’d just had a breakdown in front of you. You held me and made me feel safe, but I knew there was so much more that needed to be done. My focus had to be on the people who required my help. But when you didn’t turn up the next day, I knew I’d been wrong in saying goodbye in that way.” She stopped, chewing on her bottom lip. He brushed his thumb against the soft flesh, releasing it from the grip of her teeth.
Hearing those words lightened his heart, but he also knew that if he hadn’t interpreted her words the way he had, he would’ve had to walk away anyway. “It was probably for the best that you did what you did,” he said.
“Why?”
“Because I wasn’t who I am. I was Samuel Rodrigo. A person with no past and no future. I was a drifter who happened to land in San Carlion. I didn’t know how much longer I could stay there.”
Her eyes softened, being a lighter blue as they filled with compassion. “Was it hard? To live like that? To not be able to get close to people?”
Isaac shrugged, not wanting to delve too deep into the shallowness that had been his life for over a decade. The way he’d kept people at arm’s length. The way hestill tended to do. Although, he was learning to lower those unconscious barriers he’d erected the moment he’d entered the Ramirez Cartel. Or maybe long before that when he’d handed over a little girl to the CIA and put her through a torturous situation that would’ve broken other people.
The urge to pull out of Marie’s hold so that all his past sins didn’t taint her soul was huge, but he resisted, because letting go of her didn’t feel right. “It’s better not to, then you won’t lose sight of what the end goal is.”
Damn, how callous and uncaring did he sound? He wouldn’t be at all surprised if she was the one who pulled herself away from him and told him to leave.
Shock sailed through him when Marie did none of that, but instead, laid her head on his chest and hugged him. His eyelids drifted down, and a full body sigh rippled through him at the contact. A genuine contact that he hadn’t felt for a long time.
He didn’t count the hugs that Cass persisted in giving him. This hug from Marie was different. Was it because he was attracted to Marie? Or was it because, even after all this time and Cass’s assurances that the past was in the past, that he had tremendous guilt about how his actions all those years ago put Cass in the clutches of a sinister side to the CIA. A side he knew existed. He had been a DEA Agent, and was wellaware of the lengths government agencies would go to achieve what they wanted. Feelings and people didn’t matter to them. The good of the project was all they focused on.
“I don’t know if I could do that,” Marie said leaning back to look up at him.
