that you?”
Tess hadn’t even noticed that he’d hunkered down beside her to retrieve her purse. She let him take the picture from her.
“No, that’s not me.” She began to gather up the rest of the scattered odds and ends that had fallen from the backpack. “That’s who Joey thinks I am, but that’s not me.”
“What are you supposed to be doing here?”
Under the bed was another photograph facedown, this one not a clipping from the tabloid but a tiny photo-booth snapshot that must have originally been attached to a strip of pictures. She reached past him for it.
“I’m covered in blood so I guess I’m supposed to be taking a breather after going up against Bigfoot or a mutant lizard or something,” she replied curtly. “You said you were going to tell your area director to send someone out. Will Joey and I be riding back to Albuquerque in different vehicles?”
“That’s correct procedure.” Out of the corner of her eye she saw him shrug. “You’re my arrest. He’s my witness. I’ve pulled enough stupid plays tonight without adding to them by transporting the two of you in the same car.”
He looked away. “And if I could take back just one of the mistakes I’ve made since spotting you in that diner it would be the way I moved in on you a few minutes ago. I behaved like a jerk. If you’re wondering whether I’m going to be the one taking you in, don’t worry, I’ll hand you over to the agents Jansen dispatches when they come.”
He got to his feet. “I’ll make that call now.”
“That’s not why I asked.” Still clutching the second photo, she stood, too. “Can you give me some time alone with Joey? Just a few minutes, that’s all I need.”
Dark brows drew together. “What for?”
“To tell him he was wrong about me,” she said unsteadily. “I owe him that much, Connor. Joey Begand came to me thinking I was someone I’m not, and I should have set him straight right away. Instead, I let him go on believing in a bunch of faked photos and stories, and told myself I was doing it for him.”
She lowered her gaze. Aimlessly she turned over the small picture in her hand. “It’s too long and dreary a story to get into, but it’s more likely I was doing it for myself. I think I needed to believe that for once in my life I could—”
The breath in her lungs suddenly vanished, taking with it the rest of her unfinished sentence. A giant fist wrapped around her heart and squeezed, tighter and still more tighter. Her hand shaking, Tess brought the tiny photo up until it was only inches from her face.
It couldn’t be, she thought in shock. It just couldn’t be—life didn’t operate that way. Connor was right, she’d been living in the Eye-Opener’s fantasy world for so long that she’d lost touch with reality. Coincidences this colossal were reserved for the outlandish stories she dreamed up, not for—
It wasn’t a coincidence at all. It was why Joey’s mother had read everything she’d written, she realized, her throat closing in pain, why Darla Begand—so that was the name she’d taken, Tess thought achingly—had made Tess Smith out to be a hero to her small son. It had been the only connection Darla been capable of making with a past she’d tried to blot out.
“I can’t leave you alone with Joey, but I’ll let you explain things to him.” Connor was watching her. “He’s a kid, Tess. He’ll get over it the way kids do when they find out there’s no Santa Claus or Easter Bunny, for crying out loud. Right now you should be worrying about yourself. You’ve convinced me that you didn’t have anything to do with Leroy and what happened at the safe house, but you’re still facing serious charges. Kidnapping a child’s the worst of them.”
“Not if I had the right to take Joey. Not if I was his guardian, for all intents and purposes.”
Tess met his eyes and saw the impatience, quickly suppressed, that flickered through them. Connor’s lips tightened, and when he spoke, some of the harshness he’d previously displayed had crept back into his tone.
“But you’re not. Like I was saying, you should be thinking about calling a lawyer. Do you have—”
He bit off his words with a muttered oath and his hand shot out to grab hers as she reached down for her purse. She drew swiftly back.
“I’m not going for a weapon, Agent Connor. I need to show you something.”
“I don’t think so.” The brief humanity he’d shown a few minutes ago had gone. In its place was distrust. “I let those amber eyes of yours lull me into letting my guard down once already. I won’t make that mistake again.”
“My eyes are plain brown, for heaven’s sake.” She pressed her lips together. “If you’re worried I’ve got a weapon stashed in here, then you get my wallet out for me. It…it’s important,” she added. “I think you’re going to want to see this before you make that call to your director.”
She let go of her purse. He narrowed his gaze assessingly at her. “All right. I’ll let you show me whatever it is you think is so important, and then you stop stalling and allow me to make my call without having to keep a gun trained on you every second. Deal?”
“Deal.” She bit her lip as he extracted a leather wallet from the jumble of junk in her purse. “Open it. Pull out the plastic photo protector under the flap.”
He complied and handed the small sheaf of photos to her. In return she handed him the tiny one from Joey’s backpack.
“That’s Joey and his mom,” she said. “I guess she didn’t have the money for a department-store portrait, so she had their pictures taken together in one of those booths.”
“Yeah, it looks like. His hair’s slicked down, and she obviously arranged the two of them in a pose before she activated the camera,” Connor agreed.
He glanced at the curled-up figure in the bed beside them. “From what I know of his background, he’s already had more than his share of rough knocks, poor kid. His father was killed in a car accident before he was born, and his mother apparently couldn’t seem to keep even the menial jobs she occasionally found. He pretty much grew up on the street. When she died and he was put into the system, he kept hanging around his old haunts, like the alleyway where he saw MacLeish kill Quayle.”
He held the photo out to her. “It’s always better when family can step in and take over the responsibility for a child, instead of them being shoved into an already overloaded system. Too bad Joey wasn’t one of the lucky ones.”
“Joey’s luck just changed.” Tess didn’t take the picture he was holding, but instead slipped one from her wallet. “Everything just changed, Agent. This is a picture of me and my sister, the last one taken of us together. She ran away when I was nine and she was seventeen. Years later I tried to find her, but I never learned what had happened to her.”
She swallowed, and forced her next words past the lump in her throat. “Until now.”
She handed him the photo from her purse. She saw his gaze sharpen, saw him glance from one picture to the other. He looked up from the two photos to her and she nodded.
“That’s right, Joey’s my nephew. His
