Page 55 of The Blonde Identity

“I don’t know.” He caught up with her, lunging to block her path. “Nothing. Probably.”

And all Zoe could do was stand in the morning light, breathing hard, listening for all the things he wouldn’t say.

Like whether or not he meant it when he called her sweetheart... Like why he’d bought the ring... Like what was he thinking all those times she’d caught him looking, smirking, smiling at her... Like how had she been foolish enough to think she knew him when she didn’t even know herself...

“Zoe...”

“You know, for a good spy, you’re a bad liar.” She pushed past him, heading toward town.

“Zoe!”

“Actually,” she called back, “you probably aren’t even a very good spy!”

He threw his arms out wide. “I killed a man with a negligee!”

Zoe didn’t give him the satisfaction of a response. She had to get to town. She had to get to Switzerland. She had to find that bank.

And then she had to find her sister.

“Zoe...” Sawyer was beside her again, his stupid long legs with their stupid long stride. “Can we talk about this, please? Can we... Where are you even going?”

“Oh, me? I’m leaving you. Because I don’t need you, remember?”

“Zoe, wait.”

And for some reason she stopped. She looked up at him. It hurt, but she did it anyway.

“Can we . . .” he started, but she reached for him, arms sliding beneath his jacket and wrapping around his waist, her head against his heart. For just one second, she wanted to savor this—remember this—so she closed her eyes and sank into all his strength andwarmth because he was the best thing she had, but, turned out, she’d never had him at all.

“Hey.” His hands were warm on her cold skin as he tilted her face up to his. “I’m—”

She jerked the gun from his waistband—tossed it into the woods and stormed away.

“That’s my second favorite gun!” he called after her.

“Then go get it!” she shouted.

But she didn’t turn around.

She didn’t look back.

And she didn’t even think about slowing down.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Him

Sawyer found the gun, but he didn’t see his sanity anywhere.

She knew. She knew and he didn’t have a time machine, so where did that leave him besides cold and hungry and way more terrified than he wanted to admit?

He should have thrown that card overboard, tossed it into the fire. Because the moment she realized what it was, he knew it would change everything. Either she was going to hate him for lying about the card and the bank; or, worse, she was going to insist on going there herself. And now, Sawyer was pretty sure, it was both.

Oh, how he prayed it wasn’t about to be both.

The plan had seemed so simple in Paris: get her someplace safe, take the card. Come back for her if he needed her. But the part he hadn’t counted on was Zoe herself. And at some point, he’d made the cardinal mistake: he’d started to care. He wasn’t supposed to like her, trust her, need her. Want her.

To make matters worse, he’d lied when he should have told the truth and told the truth when he should have lied, and that’s how he ended up freezing and alone and scared out of his mind.

---