Page 33 of Tempting Tessa

“If sheisalive….” His voice choked again, the ramifications ramming into him like a tidal wave. “I just can’t…”

“I know.” She placed a hand on his shoulder. It was warm and heavy, reassuring. “We’ll figure it out.”

He glanced at the clock in the upper right-hand corner of the screen. “Our plane…”

“The plan has changed. We won’t be going to Arizona. Not yet, anyway.” She grabbed her cell phone off the desk. “I’m going to make a few calls. You’re going to check your clothes and bag to make sure there’s no tracking device hidden in them.”

Before either of them could say another word, the software program pinged.

There, on the screen, the shot from the train station up on the left, and a clearer photo taken from a CIA personnel file came on the right. Red dots highlighted the matching features in each image—there were only three, and only on the right side of her face.

But it was enough.

Tessa clenched her phone as Tommy swore under his breath.

Confirmation.

Jessie Mendoza was alive.

Thirteen

Tessa gripped Tommy’s shoulder again. He vibrated under her hand with a coiling intensity that she felt in her chest as well.

Evening had crept into the room from the narrow windows that faced the east gardens. The landscaping of well-manicured hedges and walking paths was already settling under a blanket of shadows.

Her heart ached. Her body did, too. She was exhausted by this cat-and-mouse game.

Maybe she was a fool, but she wanted to comfort Tommy. To believe he was innocent. That he hadn’t tricked her. Betrayed her.

Not like Jessie had.

If he had, she might break and never be able to put herself together again.

Jessie’s deception and treachery shredded her in a way she hadn’t felt since the night she’d witnessed her mother’s murder. How could she have been so stupid as to let herself get close to someone again? To allow her emotions to override her logic?

The voice inside her head demanded she cut herself some slack. The deception was first rate. She wasn’t even sure that Hagar had realized he hadn’t killed Jessie. Whoever the stand-in had been, they’d played the part perfectly. Had the woman even known what was going to happen to her?

Tessa gripped her cramping stomach. She couldn’t wrap her mind around the fact that Jessie would allow such a thing, but then none of this aligned with the person she’d known. That they’d all known.

Or thought they had.

“Why didn’t you become an operative?” she asked Tommy. It was time to put a few of her doubts to rest. “You have the skills. It comes naturally to you.”

His body slumped, a bone-weary exhaustion coloring his voice. “Just because I’m good at it doesn’t mean I like it. I saw what the missions did to Jessie. What her life did to the two of us.” He tapped the keyboard, his fingers flying so fast that she couldn’t read the code he was entering. “She was gone for months at a time without any communication. I had no idea where she was, what was going on, or if she was in danger. I hated it. At least as an analyst, I could discreetly check up on the swans. I had to be careful and not trip any flags Del put on their files, but I could occasionally find out where she was and what she was working on.”

“It must’ve been hard.”

He paused, typing to glance at her, hearing the sincerity in her voice. “Tough for you, too, wasn’t it? You were close with her and Meg. You never knew if they would make it back from their missions.”

She turned her back on him, staring out the window as the gardens grew darker and the solar lights flared to life. “Flynn originally recruited me for the swans, and I told him Jessie was a better candidate. I was right, of course, but after her death”—she hesitated—“herpseudodeath, I guess, I blamed myself for it. It should’ve been me that died that day, not her.”

He abandoned the desk and came to her, standing behind her close enough that she could feel his body heat. “You’ve blamed yourself all this time?”

A bitter laugh slid from between her lips. “Seems all of us have been caring around guilt over her death. It appears to be wasted emotion.”

Like all the emotions she’d felt for people over the years.

His hand touched her lower back. “I’m sorry.”

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