I'm sorry I can't be sorry for the choice I made. But I'm sorry for what it cost you. That's the only truth I have. —D
I read it twice.
Delete it.
Sit at my desk and open his assessment files, because the mission matters more than my feelings, because I learned that lesson from him, because in forty-eight hours we're hunting the man who sold us and I need to be ready.
The data is good. Better than good. He's anticipated scenarios I hadn't considered, identified vulnerabilities I missed, proposed contingencies that actually make sense.
He's still the best tactical mind I've ever worked with.
That doesn't change what he did.
Doesn't change what I've become.
But maybe—for forty-eight hours, for one mission, for the chance to find Webb and get the answers that might let me sleep—maybe I can work with the man who left me.
As long as I remember:
He'd do it again.
The math hasn't changed.
And neither has the part of me that would kill him for it if the situation required.
Professional, I remind myself.
Coordinated.
Tactical.
Just two soldiers hunting a traitor.
That's all this is.
That's all it can ever be.
I close the files. Stare at the photograph still on my desk.
His hand on my shoulder. My smile. The people we were before ninety seconds taught us what we'd become.
I should put it away.
Instead, I leave it out.
A reminder.
Of what was lost. Of what can't be recovered.
Of exactly how far I've come from the woman who thought love meant someone would choose you when it mattered.
Tomorrow, we start hunting.
Together.
The word tastes like blood.
Chapter 2
