Nina props herself on one elbow. “It’s work, Chris. Go.”
“We’re not going anywhere,” I say, settling back against the pillows.
Chris finishes dressing. Checks his phone. At the door he pauses, glancing back with a half-smile that’s equal parts relief and want.
“I’ll text when I can,” he says. “And I want details later. About whatever you two get up to while I’m gone.”
My skin warms at the implication—permission and invitation wrapped together.
He takes one last look as if memorizing the sight of us. Then the door closes. The room goes quiet.
Nina smooths the sheet beside her. “That was fast. She’s only been operational since last Tuesday.”
“Chris said she wouldn’t make contact unless it was solid,” I say. “Must be important.”
I turn toward Nina. Her profile catches the morning light. She’s only had one session with Tatiana, but that’s all she needs to form an assessment that matters.
“What’s your real read on Tatiana? Not the official assessment—what does your gut tell you about her?”
Nina worries her bottom lip while she considers. The unconscious gesture stirs something protective in me. The professional armor she wears starts to slip.
“She’s sharp,” Nina says finally. “Guarded. Tests boundaries constantly—pushes just hard enough to see what happens, then pulls back when she hits resistance. Covers fear with sarcasm, but the fear is real.”
“Dangerous?”
“Not harmless,” Nina corrects. “But not unstable in the way I expected. Beneath the performance sits anger—deep, controlled anger. At the people who used her. The people who made her what she became.” She pauses. “She hates her old bosses the way Chris hates his.”
The comparison jolts me. “What do you mean?”
“She won’t betray the people who helped her escape. She wants revenge on the people who trapped her in that life. There’s a difference.”
My mouth goes dry. She speaks with such certainty about Chris’s feelings toward his former target. Like she knows something specific.
“Nina.” I keep my voice steady. “What do you know about Chris’s old assignment?”
She looks at me with genuine surprise. “Not much. Just that he was undercover with someone violent. Someone who hurt him.” Her voice quiets. “I expected him to come back with trauma. Anyone would. Why? Is there something I should know?”
The discomfort rises in my throat. She doesn’t know that the “someone violent” Chris was undercover with is the same person she’s been gathering intel from, the same man she now reads as genuine and committed to reform.
But Chris insisted last night that Nina’s evaluation of Vicente and Arturo couldn’t be compromised by knowing his history with Vicente. That she needed to assess them as they are now, not through the lens of what Vicente did to him years ago.
It made sense then. Now, watching Nina draw conclusions based on incomplete information, it tastes wrong.
But it’s not my choice to make. Chris gets to decide what parts of his story to share and when.
“You’re right,” I say finally. “About Tatiana, I mean. If she’s motivated by revenge rather than self-preservation, that makes her more predictable, if not actually trustworthy.”
Nina nods, but she doesn’t miss my deflection about Chris’s past. She’s too perceptive.
“He’s good at keeping secrets,” she says. “Even from himself. Maybe especially from himself.”
I can’t disagree. Her insight into Chris cuts close to the bone—even without knowing his full history.
Nina studies my face. “How long has this been happening? With you and him?”
“Denver was the only time since the wedding,” I admit. “But it wasn’t just physical. There was something... I don’t know. Something I wasn’t expecting.”
Nina pulls her knees up to her chest beneath the sheet. “Did you ever resent him? For coming back and disrupting what we had?”
