Page 38 of Tempting Tessa

Surprise, surprise, Tommy slid in beside her. “Nice try.”

Clarence caught her eye and winked before shutting the door and hurrying to his seat. They wheeled out of the circular drive and were off, the sharp acceleration pressing her and Tommy into the leather cushions.

“Better put on your seatbelt,” Tessa advised Tommy.

When they bounced onto the road, he did.

As the castle disappeared behind them, Tommy opened the laptop and checked the map. “It’s still there. Must be waiting for someone.”

Tessa watched the countryside blur past, her mind conjuring too many foreboding ideas. Viktor Renard. Kaltrain.

Her stepfather’s voice echoed in her mind, uninvited. “My little fox,” he’d called her. When her mother had married him, she’d replaced Vulpe with his last name at his request. And yet, Harris Brewer had taught Tessa the word ‘fox’ in a dozen languages: French, Russian, Romanian. The last of which was identical to the Latin form. It had been a game, the way he’d used the various versions as nicknames for her. Only when she’d gotten older and was living with her aunt had she realized he’d used it as a way of taunting her mother—reminding her that Tessa wasn’t his child.

When she’d turned eighteen, Tessa had returned her surname to Vulpe.

“Hey,” Tommy said, sliding a finger down her arm. “You okay?”

“Just thinking.” She couldn’t admit the truth—she was freaking the hell out. Thinking sounded better. Professional. In control.

All of which she wasn’t.

“Thinking about this Viktor fellow?”

She opened a search engine on her phone, her fingers hovering over the keyboard. “And other things.” It was a stupid idea, but she had to know. She typed in Harris J. Brewer, her stepfather’s full name. Everything that came up was old news, culminating with his death in prison ten years prior.

Next, she entered the name Cal Tovik on a whim. Then, she added the inmate status and death date, covering all her bases before she hit search.

The results were immediate.

Status:Inmate. Facility:High Securitywith the name of the prison her dad had been in. Date of death:N/A.

Tovik was still alive. Still locked away.

She exhaled her relief. It couldn’t be her stepfather’s old prison mate impersonating him under the name Viktor Renard, either.

The crease between Tommy’s brows deepened. “Care to share?”

“Just checking a couple of theories. Neither is viable.” She locked her screen and returned to staring out the window at the growing traffic.

“Whatever it is, you can tell me. You know that, right?”

She patted his arm. “I know. It’s my brain finding a conspiracy at every turn.”

“Hard not to right now. Seems to me some of our impossible ideas are valid, so don’t hold back. I’ve got a few of my own.”

“Let’s hear them.”

He wasn’t fooled by her turning the focus on him. He humored her anyway. “If Dr. Wyn is working with Renard, she’s our link to the Russian investors. I hate to say it, but I think we need to notify the swans and get the Agency to pick her up for questioning.”

That he would suggest such a thing surprised her. She hadn’t expected him to play it safe. To willingly turn over their investigation to Meg and the CIA. “They’ll go after Renard, too, and Kaltrain. I’d like to get a look at the place and see if we can identify who’s inside the Rover before we do that. If Renard or his friends get a whiff that the Agency is on their trail, they’ll disappear, and we’ll be no closer to bringing them to justice.”

He nodded. “Wyn might clam up, too. We need the Justice Department to offer her a deal in exchange for naming Renard and the others in the plan.”

Which would take a full confession on Tessa and Tommy’s parts, followed by days, perhaps weeks, of red tape with the CIA, FBI, DOD, and others. It gave her a headache just thinking about it. “Balancing the safety of innocent people against bringing those responsible to justice is never an easy call. Our first goal should be averting disaster.”

“Since the Agency already knows about the impending attacks, and Flynn has alerted the appropriate authorities, I’m not worried about that.” His face was a mix of determination and the previous day’s emotional turmoil. “I want to find Jessie and unravel what the hell is behind her faked death.”

Tessa feared it wasn’t something forgivable. And what would Tommy do, then?

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