“I’m no one important,” Cassidy said. No hitch, no hitch. She was working hard to control that tell. “Just a girl in the wrong place.”
Sydney’s gaze searched hers. “At the wrong time?”
She nodded.
“Bull.” Sydney’s blunt response.
Cassidy let her smile fade. “You don’t want to dig into my past.”
“We’ve all got darkness dodging us.” Sydney edged a bit closer. “I just want to make sure your darkness won’t hurt Gunner.”
Mr. Tall, Dark and Scary. Who was obviously smitten with the blonde. “Gunner seems to be a man who can protect himself.”
“He can.” There was absolute certainty in her voice. Then Sydney pressed, “What’s your secret? Will it hurt Gunner?”
Yes. “I’m not an agent, and I’m not an asset.”
Sydney nodded. “You’re a personal link.”
“Yes.”
She’d made the reveal because she wouldn’t let her past hurt these people. Going in blind? No, that wasn’t what she wanted.
Wasn’t it past time that she stopped following Mercer’s orders?
“Personal...to Mercer,” Sydney said, seeming to understand.
It was Cassidy’s turn to nod. Before she could say anything else, the door opened. Cale was there, looking strong and determined and so sexy that he made her ache.
For a few hours, she’d dared to dream of having something more with him.
Then reality had come crashing down on her. The cold press of reality hurt.
“Is Cassidy’s tracking signal set?” Cale wanted to know.
Sydney stepped back, moving with surprising speed despite her pregnancy. “Yes. She’s good. We can find her anywhere.”
“Good.” Cale offered his hand to Cassidy. “Come with me.”
Anywhere. No, that wasn’t what she was supposed to say. She was supposed to keep playing it cool, uninvolved. So what if Cale was the first man who’d actually seemed to want her in years?
Not the false image that she presented to the world. But the real person she kept hidden inside.
Her fingers curled around his.
“We leave in forty-five minutes,” Gunner reminded them.
Cale nodded, and then he guided her from the room. He hurried her outside through the narrow hallway. She wondered if they were going back upstairs to meet with Mercer, but—
But then Cale opened a door on the right. He led her inside the small office and locked the door behind them.
He seemed to fill that space. His scent wrapped around her, and she remembered—too vividly—what it was like to be locked in his arms. To be holding him tight in the darkness.
“Mercer doesn’t want me near you.”
Ah, yes, those blunt words were what she’d anticipated.
“I told Mercer to screw off.” Cale pulled her against him. The heat of his body seemed to sear her. “I’m not ready to give you up.”