“The government needs our help for leverage with him?” Sydney asked.
“I think we both know what leverage will work,” Sauda replied gently.
Sydney felt something in her chest twist.
“You do the honors,” Sauda went on. “After tomorrow, he’s not going to talk to anyone again for a very, very long time. But in spite of all his despicable actions, he cared about you. If there’s anything to tell, we have the best chance of him telling you.”
Sydney looked away. Tems had lied and cheated, had stolen from the agency more viciously than Sydney ever did. He had taken Niall from her, the only man Sydney had ever seen as a father.
Still. There was some part of her, however small, that felt sorry for him. Even now, perhaps, he believed he’d done it to honor a friend. How strange an emotion love was, how powerful it must be to fuel kindness and hatred and empathy and revenge and grief, all at once.
“Did Niall know?” Sydney asked in the silence that settled between them. “That you loved him?”
Sauda didn’t answer. Out of instinct born from years of training, Sydney found her gaze falling on the woman’s hands and arms, noted the way she tensed, how her shoulders pulled slightly forward, as if protecting herself. She waited as Sauda stared for a while at the screen.
“No,” Sauda said at last. “I never told him. And he never told me. We never uttered a word to each other about how we felt, but it didn’t matter. I knew. I could feel it every time we were together in a room, every time we had a late-night chat or shared a laugh or confided in each other. Every time we grieved together over a failed mission, over a lost ally, over his estrangement from his daughter. I don’t know how to explain it. But love is something you don’t need to explain. When it’s there, you just know.” She looked at Sydney, and in the woman’s eyes, she could see an endless ocean of grief. “We both understood the dangers of our work. We have prepared our entire lives for this ending.”
Somehow, Winter’s song came back to Sydney now.You are my meditation. Am I ever yours, too?
She could feel the pain rising in her chest, could sense the ghost of her mentor in the room. She thought of why Winter chose to leave his heart open, in spite of all that could happen. Her eyes glossed with tears.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered.
Sauda just nodded at her words, swallowed, and looked away.
“I know you understand,” she said softly, before walking out of the room.
When Sydney stepped inside his cell in solitary confinement, Tems looked tired, dark circles prominent under his eyes. His skin was pale under the cold wash of fluorescent light. He sat on the ground, because there was no furniture allowed in his room—not even chairs—and regarded her, his head tilted.
“Sauda sent you, did she?” he said.
Sydney felt her rage rise at his words. “Does it matter?” she replied.
Tems sighed, then straightened and looked away from her. “She wants me to tell you everything, because she thinks I care about you.”
“Well?” She leaned against the cell door. “Do you?”
She hadn’t expected her words to wound him, but she saw a slight wince in his eyes. “What do you want, Syd?” he said tiredly.
She chewed her lip for a moment. “There are others you worked with, aren’t there? Those we don’t have the names for yet.”
He was silent. “You really think I’m going to talk to you,” he finally said.
She let out her breath, thought for a minute. “You know, you’re not the only person in the world who cared about someone. Niall loved others, too. He had a daughter he cared for, who he’ll never see again. He loved Sauda. And whether you want to believe it or not, he worried about your safety when you were out in the field.”
Tems let out a sarcastic chuckle at that and turned his head away. “Sure.”
“I will never forgive you for what you did,” Sydney replied, her face sober. “But I do think you cared. In your own, twisted way.” Her voice quieted. “I know that love and anger can make people do the worst things.”
He grimaced at her words and leaned back against the wall. “What’s this?” he muttered. “A gentler side of Sydney Cossette?”
“I’m giving you a chance to be understood, Tems.”
“Ah, well. Thanks for that,” he said in disgust.
They sank back into silence. She knelt back down and took a seat on the floor across from him. “You’ll live out your life in here. But maybe there will be people alive because of your help. Maybe someone out there will feel gratitude for what you did, even if they don’t know who you are. Maybe you’ll save someone who was friends with someone else.” She crossed her arms. “And if none of those things matter to you, then why are you here at all? Why all the effort to become an agent? Why put yourself through all this?”
He didn’t look at her, and in frustration, Sydney looked away, too. Her eyes went to the lone window at the top of his cell. It was barely one square foot in size, the only view of the outside world that he would have, possibly for the rest of his life.
