Page 44 of The Spy Who Ghosted Me

I shook my head. “Actually, I’d like to hear the story of how you became a spy.” I was more than curious.

Cash’s face fell.

“I’m sorry. Did I say something wrong?”

“No,” Cash was quick to say. “It’s just that I’ve told no one that story.”

“Is it top secret?”

Cash ran a hand over his stubbled jaw. “I don’t know about that, but I doubt my director would like anyone to know how he recruits people to his organization.”

“SPI?” I laughed.

“Yes, SPI,” Cash conceded with a smile.

“So, how did he recruit you?” I desperately wanted to know.

Cash stared up at the exposed wood beam ceiling and sighed. “I haven’t thought about it in so long. I was a different person then.”

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” I said, even though it would disappoint me if he didn’t.

Cash turned, his gaze capturing mine. “I don’t know why, but I want you to know.”

I reached my hand out to him like it would lend him some courage to confide in me, not even thinking about the consequences of my actions or how Cash would construe them. It just seemed like the right thing to do.

Cash captured my hand like I’d offered him a lifeline.

Our connection was scary good.

Cash gathered his thoughts before saying, “You asked if I was a genius. The truth is, I’m what is referred to as near genius or potential genius. It was basically all I had going for me growing up. No matter what foster care situation I found myself in, I threw myself into school, knowing it was the only way I was going to get out of the hellholes the system had placed me in.”

I let out a squeak, hating the thought of any child in a hellish situation. “What happened to you?” I couldn’t help but ask.

Cash pulled my hand to his lips and kissed it. “I don’t want to burden you with the details. It was mainly indifference and neglect. It was better than the abuse I suffered at the hands of my parents.”

Tears filled my eyes. “Cash, I’m so sorry. You didn’t deserve that. No one does.”

“Please don’t cry for me, Sabrina.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t deserve it after what I did to you.”

“I will never say the way you left me was right, but I never want to be the kind of person who refuses to mourn with those who mourn.” Nana Rose would be so ashamed of me if I became that person.

He placed my hand over his heart. Oh, baby, did his chest feel good. But his words were even more intoxicating. “You are beautiful, inside and out.”

“Well, you are definitely beautiful on the outside,” I teased him, even though I had a sneaking suspicion there was a beauty inside the likes of which I’d never seen. Perhaps he didn’t even realize it existed.

He chuckled, pressing my hand deeper into his skin, making me want to hyperventilate. “Finish your story,” I stammered, hardly able to catch my breath.

Cash exhaled heavily. “The foster system took note of my academic achievements, and by a stroke of luck, or whatever you call it, they sent me to Des Moines for a large college fair. I was being courted by places like MIT and Colorado School of Mines.”

“Wow,” I gasped.

“They weren’t the only ones interested,” Cash said with meaning. “SPI, as you say, had their eye on me. I’d triggered their radar with a paper I’d written in history class about the eavesdropping tunnel the FBI had built under the Soviet embassy and the spy who exposed it. My assessment of the situation and how they should have known the mole’s identity within our government much earlier somehow made it to the desk of the director of SPI.”

Cash had my rapt attention. This sounded like something right out of a movie. “So they had a booth there or something?”

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