Page 26 of Tempting Tessa

As if unsure how to respond, she backed herself against the wall again. Cigarette smoke lingered in the air. Disbelief tinged her voice. “Your sister, Jessie.”

“After her funeral, I thought I saw her at the cemetery. One day before the embassy riot, I was heading to work, and I thought I saw her getting into a car with some guy. It always seems to happen in crowds. Talking about her this morning must have put her front and center in my mind, and then I saw someone who looked like her. That’s all.”

Her posture relaxed. “Perfectly normal. I still think I see my stepdad sometimes, and he’s been dead for twenty years.”

“Dead?”

“He was stabbed during a prison riot.”

“Well, that sucks for both of us. Yet, hearing that you hallucinate a dead person, too, makes me feel somewhat better. Maybe I’m not losing my shit, after all.”

She didn’t argue. “There’s a region of the brain called the right fusiform face area. It’s strongly associated with processing the patterns of human facial features. It’s why we can spot the faces of our loved ones in a sea of strangers. When it gets activated, it drowns out other conflicting messages. It’s like a megaphone at a town hall meeting. Of course, like many other processes in human brains, it’s easily tricked into making mistakes.”

“Do I want to know how you know that?”

“Research. When I thought I saw my stepdad, I looked into it.” She flicked a glance at him. “Is there anything else you’re not telling me?”

He stiffened. She was like a lie detector—she always seemed to know when he was holding back.

“Tommy.” Her voice was firm and too much like Jessie’s had been when she was mothering him. “Whatever it is, spit it out.”

The debate still raged inside him. It shouldn’t be an issue, but it was. He knew she wasn’t going to take it well. “Meg lied. About the virus on the USB.”

Her body tensed. “Explain.”

“Thereisa virus on it,” he admitted. “But not one Del wouldn’t catch. He’s too good. I put it there so if morons like Hagar or his death squad got hold of the thing, they would trigger the virus, and it would delete all the information on the USB. It’s well encrypted, but you never know. A computer genius like Del would have seen that virus and disabled it before it triggered.”

“Why would Meg tell me differently?”

“Why do you think? “

“She has no reason to be dishonest.”

“Doesn’t she? Do you think she and Flynn trust you more than they do me?”

Her jaw tightened, but she said nothing.

“And before you ask,” he continued, “no, I didn’t put anything else dangerous on there. I added data I was gathering about the Russian investors, the computer company providing the sabotaged hardware, and some other stuff to the items Jessie had on it.”

“What other stuff?”

There was no way he was telling her about the thread he’d been following. The evidence suggesting Jessie had ties to Hager and the Russian investors—and not because she was trying to expose them. He didn’t believe it—couldn’t believe it—but he hadn’t been able to let it go. Not until he had proof either way.

Which was one of the reasons he needed to retrace Jessie’s footsteps. “Nothing that’s important at the moment.”

“You’re a terrible liar.”

Before she could respond, the loudspeaker crackled, announcing their train’s departure. “That’s us,” he said, straightening.

Tessa grabbed his arm. “We’re not done with this discussion.”

Of course, they weren’t. “I know,” he said, tugging out of her grip. “But it will have to wait.”

They ran for the platform and were blocked by a group of tourists. He didn’t want to be separated from Tessa, but she refused to let him guide her through the throng. He did his best to create a path for her, but people kept getting in the way.

Some guy knocked her backpack off. She shoved him aside to retrieve it. By the time she’d done that and cut through the rest of the crowd, the final announcement for their train had gone out.

The platform they needed was on the other side of the station. Strangers or not, they both took off sprinting, dodging people, pets, and luggage, creating an obstacle course for them.

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