“You can’t!” Bray snapped, suddenly coming back to life.
The director jumped at his outburst and turned her stern gaze to him. “Agent Bray, what I can and can’t do is not up to you. You’ve clearly displayed in recent days that you are incapable of making sound decisions, so as of this moment, I am removing you as Ms. Daniels’s handler.”
“No, you can’t do that,” he tried to protest.
“Yes, I can, and I just did. She will be formally passed to an alternate handler while she remains on the Del Rio case.”
Bray all but leapt forward and placed his hands on her desk. “Mom, they are going tokillher. The only reason I did what I did was because you wouldn’t listen to me about her being in danger. She needs to be protected, and I was going to solve the case on my own to prove to you that I can handle it.”
The director didn’t even flinch. “Clearly, you can’t, Calvin. And as far as Ms. Daniels’s safety, the expendability of assets is inherent to their use. That’s a risk that comes with the job.”
I was at a total loss, watching my life get tossed back and forth like a beach ball as they argued.
“Let me fix this,” Bray protested.
“No,” she said back.
“Mom, please.” The plea in his voice made my own heart ache.
Finally, she stood from her chair. “Calvin, this is not up to you. Now, I don’t know what personal feelings might have sprung up between you two, but they cannot be permitted to persist. People already think I give you special treatment, and if word gets out you’ve been running around taking private flights and staying in fancy hotels with your girlfriend on the DSA’s dime, it will bemewho has to answer for it. I can’t have you jeopardizing my position as well as your own. You are no longer her handler, you are off the Del Rio case, don’t even think about touching the classified case, and if I catch you within so much as ten feet of her, I will put you back on a desk. Do I make myself clear?” The finality in her voice rang around the room like a cold gong.
Bray looked like he might stage one final attempt to fight back, but he sighed in defeat. My guess was it was the threat of being put back on a desk that did it. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Good,” she said with a nod and then turned to me. “Ms. Daniels, you will be escorted back to your residence in Del Rio and assigned a new handler. Please stand by for more information on your assignment.”
Had I been thinking straight, I might have told her my cover with Melanie Browning was already blown, and there was no way I could continue to penetrate her operation. But I was too stricken by what had just happened. In mere hours, I’d gone from being in bed with Bray to being forbidden to see him. And now I had to go back to the place where the ghost knew to find me. Like a damn sitting duck.
“Yes, ma’am,” I muttered.
“You are both excused,” the director said and sat back in her chair.
We left the room in a numb silence. I left my body for a moment and floated around in a world where I wasn’t an object to be passed around. What a dream to just walk away.
The feel of Bray’s hand closing around my elbow brought me back to earth. He glanced over his shoulder and led me back into the stairwell where we’d stood a few days ago when we lived in a different reality.
The concrete shaft felt extra icy today.
“Erin, I’m so sorry. I’ll fix this.” He looked at me with a pained plea. Ramesh had told me Bray didn’t take advantage of his position as the director’s son, but clearly, everything he’d done to protect me had involved special treatment. Too bad it led to nothing.
I stood with my arms crossed for warmth and to keep myself from falling apart. “You can’t, Bray. You heard her. I’m just an asset. I have no rights here.”
“That’s not true. You are more than that.”
“Am I?” My voice was as cold as the stone walls.
“Yes! To me you are.” He stepped forward and placed his hand on my arm.
I looked down at it, thinking of his touch and how it had felt to be wrapped in his arms, to sleep so deeply beside him. I silently wondered if there was a world where we ran away together. Where we just saidto hell with thisand disappeared. But I knew as soon as I thought it there wasn’t. No. There was only the world where he was a government agent and I was a criminal indefinitely paying my dues, forever in captivity.
I placed my hand on his to remove it. “Maybe that was all a mistake. There’s no way this was ever going to work.”
Bray’s face folded into a defiant frown, like he was going to protest, but then softened in defeat, knowing I was right. There was no world where we made sense.
“Goodbye, Agent Bray,” I said and turned to go.
I made it one step before he gripped my shoulders and spun me around. Before I could take another breath, he had me pinned to the wall. His mouth found mine, and in his kiss, I felt a plea. A deep, longing ache to make me stay. To make this work. To live in a world where he could kiss me like this without worry. Where he could make my heart pound and my blood scream for more, and then give it to me.
For one indulgent moment, I kissed him back, wrapping my arms around his neck and shivering. I was caught in the dichotomy of his hot, hard body and the cold, hard wall. I wanted to exist in the slip of space forever. Caged in his arms, inhaling him as he sucked and nipped and stroked my tongue with his.God damn ithe could kiss. If I stayed any longer, I would never leave.
