at work, occasionally her mind would wander and she’d always send up a little prayer that he was safe. But the nights? Oh, those were the longest, and the hardest. When she had nothing else to occupy her mind, alone in bed with nothing but the darkness surrounding her, she’d envisioned one horrific scene after another until he came home again. They lived together for nearly a year before he ran, but in that time, she could probably count the weeks they’d actually been together on two hands.
“It was my job, Peyton. You know that.”
“A job you never talked about. I knew what you did was dangerous, but you never once told me what it was you were doing when you’d be gone for weeks at a time.”
God, why were they even having this conversation? What did it matter to her what Jared did? He no longer had that kind of hold on her.
“You know I couldn’t talk about my assignments.”
“Something, Jared. Anything would have been preferable to the constant fear and worry that you were never coming home. When you did finally disappear, it was almost a relief because I knew then that you wouldn’t be back.”
He came out of the chair and walked toward her, his eyes as thunderous as his expression. “You sure as hell didn’t do anything to stop it. You invited the bastards into my own home. Our home.”
Once again, they’d come full circle and were back at square one. Anger nipped at her and she snapped, “I didn’t have a choice!”
“So you keep saying.”
She balled her hands into tight fists and kept them at her side as she stared him down. “If I’d let you explain, if you’d told me anything, anything, it would have been used against you. They were going to charge you with murder, Jared. The kind that would have had you strapped down to a table with a needle in your arm and a big burly guard pressing a large round green button. I’m sorry, but once the death penalty has been carried out, there’s no way to reverse it. And you are a prime candidate for lethal injection, based on the evidence I’ve seen.
“If I didn’t cooperate, they could have prosecuted me for harboring, or aiding and abetting. We weren’t married, we were only living together. Only a wife has the privilege of not testifying against her husband, which means you weren’t afforded that protection under the law.”
“I didn’t kill Dysert or Santiago,” he roared.
“So you keep saying,” she shouted back. “But where’s the evidence to the contrary? I’m a lawyer, Jared. A prosecutor for the United States. I know solid evidence when I see it.”
He let out a harsh breath. “You think I’m guilty.” He didn’t question, he stated.
She sighed and fought for a calm she was nowhere near feeling. After he’d disappeared, she’d striven for order so she could survive yet another nightmare in her life. In a matter of hours, his presence had shot all her efforts for the past three years straight to hell.
No surprises. What a joke.
Nothing too emotional. Calm and serene had become painful and chaotic all over again.
“I don’t know what to think.” She struggled for an even tone. “You haven’t told me anything. Nor have you told me why you brought me here.” She lifted her hand to stop him from interrupting. “You keep saying it’s dangerous for me, but how do you know that? Why would they come after me? As far as anyone knows, we haven’t seen each other since the night you took off without a trace.”
“They’re going to use you to get to me.”
“If that’s true, then what are you doing here?” she asked. “Anywhere near me should be the last place you’d want to be.”
“I know what they’re capable of,” he said. He sat on the edge of the bed and looked up at her. Pain flashed in his eyes and her heart twisted. “I’m here because I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
She sat beside him and reached for his hand. “It’s been three years, Jared. It doesn’t make sense that they’d bother with me now. Besides, after the first few months, the FBI finally left me alone. You didn’t fail me, Jared. You failed yourself, and the law.”
He laced his fingers with hers. “Yeah, it does make sense. This is a game I’ve played before. I failed then, but I swear to you, Peyton, I won’t fail this time.”
Something in his voice frightened her. Whether it was the cold determination or the hollow sense of dread, she couldn’t decide, but figured they both deserved equal attention. “I don’t understand.”
He turned his head to look at her. “No,” he said. “It’s not you I failed.”
Caution and dread warred inside her. Whatever he was about to tell her was big, that much she knew for certain. “Then who?”
“My wife.”
4
“YOUR WIFE?”
Jared let out a rough sigh and wished he’d kept that part of his life to himself. Whether the desire to keep silent stemmed from not wanting to hurt Peyton—which didn’t make a bit of sense, since she was engaged to the legal-ladder-climbing Atwood—or to save his own sorry hide a revisit of the guilt of Beth’s murder, he couldn’t be sure. Of one thing he was certain: telling Peyton about the woman he’d married just might convince her he was telling the truth about the danger she now faced.
“You’re married?”
He hated that her voice was laced with pain almost as much as he despised the fact that she was questioning him when she’d given up that right the day she’d turned him in to the bureau. Besides, it wasn’t as if she’d spent the past three years pining for him, considering she’d agreed to marry another man. Just one more notch on her belt of betrayal? Or jealousy she had no right feeling?
“Not any longer,” he told her.
She stood and crossed the room before turning back to look at him. Her arms wrapped around her middle as if holding herself together. Combined with the hurt in her periwinkle eyes, she had his heart twisting behind his ribs. Damn.
More guilt? A sure bet, since he was becoming such a pro at it.
“I can’t believe I’m hearing this.” She shook her head as if to clear it. “You married someone.”
The accusation in her voice that he’d betrayed her ticked him off. “Don’t be a hypocrite, Peyton. That rock on your finger says you didn’t wait around for me, either.”
She looked at him as if he’d lost his mind, or as if her current premarital status didn’t even belong in the conversation. “When did you have time to find yourself a wife and get a divorce?” She took a step backward, resting her bottom against the cheap, laminated dresser. “Why didn’t they find you when you filed for divorce?”
A coldness crept into his veins that he couldn’t have kept out of his voice if he’d wanted to…which he didn’t. “Generally when one’s wife is murdered, divorce isn’t exactly a necessity.”
Peyton’s hands fell to her sides
