Page 115 of Until You

How could I have known the woman I’m in love with is the same woman standing beside Kaleo Makani? A man I know from my time in narcotics. A man who is the furthest thing from a good human being?

But it’s her.

The hair is darker now, her slight curves a little fuller too, but it’s Tennyson. I’d stake my life on it.

It only takes a few seconds for me to pull up on my phone article after article about Tessa Makani’s death. About the recent murders in Maryland.

The fiery crash after being chased off the road by an unknown vehicle.

The over-the-top funeral that her widower somehow managed to arrange from his prison cell.

Not Tennyson West’s. Fucking hell. It’s the missing piece. The piece I haven’t been able to put my finger on.

Pieces begin to fall into place.

The panic attacks. The perfect record that was too squeaky clean. Tenny not wanting to tell me lies. Tenny hiding from newspaper pictures.

Her confession that she can’t give me what I need.

I don’t deal in assumptions, but I’d bet the farm that Tenny’s presence here was more of a placement by the Federal Witness Protection Program than by her own choice. Her fear. Her skittishness when we first met. The freak-out over thinking someone had been in her house.

If Makani can have his second-in-command killed from prison, if he doesn’t believe she’s really dead . . . then she could be his possible next target. She could be forever on his radar.

Fuck.

Fucking hell.

Just as I wrap my head around the thought as best as I can, Tenny’s Jeep flies up the driveway toward the house, leaving an agitated plume of dust in its wake.

I stare at the photo again before tucking it into my back pocket and heading up to the house.

What am I going to say? I don’t have a fucking clue. I’m just glad the girls aren’t home so we can have this talk without interruption.

And that thought—what do I even say—becomes more prevalent when I walk in the house to find Tenny in her room, frantically stuffing her things in trash bags.

What the fuck is going on here?

How does she know that I know already?

But she’s so frenzied that she doesn’t even notice I’m there until she goes to grab her computer and sees me in her periphery.

“Crew!” She jumps back almost as if she’s afraid of me, guilt-laced surprise swimming in her eyes.

“Where’re you going in such a hurry?” I lean my shoulder against the doorjamb and tilt my head to the side.

“Um . . . back to the cottage. I think it’s time. I mean—”

“Don’t bullshit me, Tenny. Least of all don’t do that. This”—I point to the trash bags—“isn’t someone going back to the cottage, especially not how you were just doing it.”

“You’re right. It’s not.” She shakes her head, and I can see how hard it is for her to swallow over her lies. “I’m leaving. I got an opportunity in Atlanta. With a publishing house.”

I chew on my cheek. “No, you don’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just what I said. No, you don’t.” I take a step toward her. “You can stop running now, Ten. It must be exhausting.”

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN