Black at Heart

Chapter 2

How strange it sometimes seemed that she had ended up living at the beach.

After what had happened, what she'd experienced, she should never have wanted to go near the ocean again. Memories of that night-feeling her life slip away on a cold, windswept shore, the crashing waves hiding her pathetic calls for help-should have made her want to be anyplace else. The salty air should have smelled like pain and tasted like death.

Yet she loved it here. The churning of the Atlantic's waves in an endless rhythm soothed her soul in a way nothing else could. Therapy, meditation, medication, physical training, solitude-they'd all helped. But the tide was what lulled her to sleep each night. And every morning it was what called her forth into the sad world she still sometimes longed to escape.

It could be because it was so steady, impervious to time or humanity. Nothing interfered with the crashing violence of the water against the rocks or the strong lapping of it slipping back out again. It was unstoppable, imperturbable. Strong and aloof. Much like she wanted to be.

When offered this refuge on the rocky coast of Maine, she hadn't been thinking about the sound of the waves or the possibility of being strong and unstoppable. She'd thought only of escaping the darkness. Healing. Being away from the world. Not forever, just for as long as it took to reclaim herself.

Now, though, the months had stretched on and she honestly didn't know how she would ever leave this place. The house hovering on a cliff high above the water didn't belong to her, yet it had become her home. Her sanctuary in the middle of an insane world where the raging currents could sweep those you loved in and out of your life with cold indifference.

A parent. A sweet little boy. A much-loved sibling.

Perhaps that was why she so enjoyed the sound of the surf from far below. Because it was a constant reminder that she was here, high above it and removed from it all. No one left to care about. No one whose loss could be the final blow that shattered her battered psyche.

No one.

Sitting on the terrace, spying on the rest of the world through her laptop, she wondered why she never felt lonely. She went down into town only once a week for supplies, nodding at the postal workers as she checked the always empty PO box. Or exchanging a quiet hello with the woman who ran the local general store that sold everything from apricot jam to weed whackers.

She sensed they all wanted more-conversation, a chance to share juicy gossip. Perhaps even a moment to warn her about living in a house many locals seemed to fear. But she didn't give anyone the opportunity. She remained distant, always paying for her few purchases with cash, never trying to use a phony credit card, or, worse, a real one that could leave a paper trail. That was the extent of her involvement out there in the world.

That world, however, did occasionally come here.

She'd had a few regular visitors at first. Now, though, only two people ever climbed up the steep, winding steps that led from the driveway and detached garage to the house itself, which was practically an extension of the cliff. One was her self-defense trainer, a former army sergeant who came a couple of times a week and worked her until she was so exhausted, she sometimes actually slept without dreaming. A blessing. With his help, she had molded her body to match her spirit, making it hard, lean, and dangerous. She would never be anybody's victim again.

As for the other occasional visitor-he came the second weekend of every month.

"So what the hell are you doing here now, a week early?" she whispered as a familiar dark sedan parked behind her Jeep at the bottom of the hill, far below the patio.

Completely in tune to her surroundings, accustomed to the reassuring lull of the surf that was the constant sound track to her new life, she had immediately noticed a new, unexpected sound a few minutes ago. An engine.! A car. Coming up the long driveway.

Her heart had begun to thud at the intrusion, but she hadn't panicked. Clicking a few keys on her keyboard, she had switched her laptop over to the surveillance system that monitored every square inch of this property. From the cameras mounted on either corner of the garage roof, she'd identified her visitor and breathed a sigh of relief.

Now, though, she was no longer relieved. Instead, in the few seconds it had taken her to process Wyatt Black-stone's presence here on a sunny, breezy Thursday afternoon, nervous tension had begun to flood her.

This change in routine wasn't like him. Not only utterly brilliant, Wyatt was also reliable and calm, as even and steady as those waves crashing on the shore. Whatever had driven him up here must be important, but she didn't immediately fear the worst. If she was in danger, if there had been any threat at all, he would have called her and told her to get out.

Last winter, or even spring, she would have done exactly that. Now she wasn't so sure. In fact, part of her welcomed the idea of confronting her deepest, darkest fear here, on her turf, with her newfound confidence and highly honed skills.

But Wyatt hadn't called and she sensed no danger. Something else had prompted the visit. He knew she didn't want him here, though, of course, she couldn't force him to stay away. It was his house, after all, even if he did seem to loathe it.

She had made it very clear a few months ago that he didn't need to keep coming up here and checking on her. The trip up from D.C. wasn't an easy or a direct one, and he'd made it every weekend for months. Finally confronting him, she'd asked him to limit the visits.

As usual with the enigmatic man, his reaction had revealed absolutely nothing about what he'd thought of the request. He'd simply honored it.

Until now.

The car door opened. She watched as he stepped out, clad, as usual, in a dark, impeccably tailored suit. She had only rarely seen him wearing anything else. Designer sunglasses hid the startlingly blue eyes, but didn't disguise the handsomeness of his masculine features-the sculpted cheekbones, strong jaw, chiseled chin, perfectly formed mouth.

How a man who looked like a movie star from Hollywood's golden age had ended up in the FBI, she honestly had no idea.

A soft ocean breeze swept through his thick, black hair, but didn't dare to tousle it. She'd bet Neptune himself wouldn't have the balls to toss ocean spray onto this man's shiny, immaculate shoes. He was that intimidating.

At least, she'd once thought so. He'd intimidated her to near incoherence once upon a time. Left her tongue-tied and awkward, not knowing what to say or how to act. But she consoled herself with the knowledge that j every other woman he met had the same reaction. And that she no longer felt that way.

Instead, as she watched him slam the door, then glance up toward the house perched so high above, she realized she felt nothing. At least nothing that could be construed as romantic emotions.

Physical ones? Well, they were another story. No matter how cold a person's heart, the white-hot flame of j sexual attraction could be hard to resist. Still, any physical attraction she might feel for Wyatt Blackstone was so deeply buried beneath her own layers of self-defense! and wariness, she would never give them free rein.

He reached the bottom step, carved into the rocky hill. Pausing, he glanced down to the right of it, at a clump of sea grass. Then he turned his head up toward the garage.

Toward her. Through the camera, he pierced her with that direct gaze even his dark glasses couldn't disguise, demanding entry.

"Okay, okay," she mumbled, flicking a few keys, disabling the nearly hidden motion detectors that would screech in alarm if he passed them.

He didn't even glance down again to ascertain that the light on the tiny sensor beside the step had changed from red to green. He merely began to ascend, knowing full well she had heard him arrive. Knowing she had been watching every move he made, knowing she wouldn't, couldn't, keep him out. Even if she wanted to.

She shivered, acknowledging the truth: Part of her wanted to.

But worse, another part of her, that tiny, hopeful little spark of her old self that she hadn't been able to entirely extinguish, didn't. You're just tired of hearing nobody's voice but Sarge's telling you to give him twenty more reps.

Maybe. Or maybe not.

Either way, she couldn't deny that white-hot flame burned the tiniest bit hotter at the sight of him on the monitor.

Wyatt rose up the hill, step by step, moving as smoothly and gracefully as a cat. She'd never known a man who appeared so fluid, so comfortable in his own skin. He'd always made her feel like an awkward, fumbling klutz.

A faint, humorless smile widened her lips. She was so not that girl anymore. Hard to remember what her former self had even been like. Or what she'd really felt about the man drawing closer and closer to her front door. Had her life once really been so innocent that a steady glance from a handsome man could put a blush in her cheeks? Had she truly sometimes fancied herself in love with him, even as out of reach as he had seemed?

Those reactions were gone, that sweet, innocent part of herself dead and buried. The only reminder of that person was a carved piece of granite marking her grave alongside the graves of her family.

She returned her attention to the monitor. Blackstone was broad-chested and hard. Lean, but not wiry. So in shape that the steep climb probably hadn't even winded him. And keenly perceptive. Which was why, when he reached the top of the steps and the high iron gate, he didn't even try to punch in the security code that would open it. He merely waited, certain she would have changed it since his last visit a few weeks ago.

"Fine," she muttered, again clicking a few keys, releasing the lock.

Then, knowing she'd run out of time, she took her reading glasses off and put them down. Rising from the small cafe* table, she clicked her laptop closed, and headed inside. Her feet bare against the golden oak floor, she noted its warmth and realized she'd been getting cold. It might be only early September, but already the weather was changing. Inside, though, the air was comfortable. A few last remnants of sunlight streamed in from the banks of windows flanking both the east and west sides of the cavernous living room that stretched the width of the house.

This room was her favorite. Light and airy, with just a few pieces of furniture. No shadowy corners. No odd shapes. No place to hide in the dark.

Not that it was ever truly dark. The sun might set; a chill might quickly descend. But with the security lights covering the entire property, her world was never entirely black.

She would not allow herself to be lost in the blackness again.

Thanks to him.

Her misgivings about Wyatt's arrival faded. She owed the man everything. If an occasional unexpected visit was the price she had to pay, she'd pay it.

And maybe she'd even manage to prevent him from ever realizing the truth-that she sometimes wondered if it would have been better if he'd never saved her at all.

"Stop," she told herself "The new you doesn't think that way."

Forcing the frown from her face, she strode to the front door, reaching it just as Blackstone's shadow darkened the grated window set in its center.

Taking a deep breath, she unlocked the dead bolt, the slider lock, and the knob, then pulled the door open. "Hello, Wyatt."

He stared down at her, the glasses still covering his eyes, the handsome face expressionless. Then, finally, he replied.

"Hello, Lily."

"Lily doesn't exist anymore. Remember?"

Wyatt nodded once, acknowledging the point. "I know. I just can't remember what false name you're using these days." It should have been easy to remember to call this young woman by a false name. After all, she no longer looked anything like the Lily Fletcher he had known.

The one everyone else in the world believed dead. Well, everyone except Brandon Cole.

And the man who had tried to kill her.

Gone was the long, straight hair that had fallen halfway down her back. Now cut short, it hugged her delicate face, emphasizing the haunted twist of her mouth and the gaunt hollowness of her cheeks. It was no longer a soft, sunny blond, instead dyed nearly black, a startling shade when contrasted with her pale blue eyes. He finally understood the comments he'd gotten throughout his own life, about the color combination. It was striking, did draw attention. Which was why she wore brown contacts whenever she left the house.

The hair had been shaved off by the doctors dealing with her injuries. The rest she'd done herself, choosing the contacts, the hair dye, the boxy clothes, all for the same reason she'd donned this alternate identity: for her own safety. She wanted to be anonymous, invisible, someone no one would notice, much less remember.

Funny, though, none of it-the hair, the clothes, the scars, the occasional dark smudges beneath her eyes- could change the fact that she was incredibly beautiful. If anything, the changes in Lily had made her even more so. Because instead of being a delicate, fragile woman, she was now a fully realized one, broken but rebuilt and aware of her own power.

She was almost intoxicating. And frankly, it was no wonder Brandon had gone from flirting with an office mate to falling for the woman they had both rescued. Who wouldn't fall for her?

Wyatt mentally shook off the line of thought, not wanting to go there, even in his head, when it came to Lily. She was his friend, his protégée.

"Can I come in?"

She stepped back, ushering him forward. "It's your house."

Perhaps on paper. Any emotional connection he'd had for this place had been sliced out of him decades ago. If not for it being a safe and secret place where Lily could hide and recover, he would never have willingly set foot here again. And even now, knowing it provided a haven for a young woman he was very concerned about, he still felt his heart skip a beat as he crossed the threshold, determined to see the house as it was now, not the way it had been in his childhood. Not the way it had been the night his childhood had ended all too violently.

Inside, he pulled off his sunglasses while she closed the door, securing every lock, testing them with a pull of the knob. He didn't smile at the overly cautious ritual. There was nothing funny about how seriously Lily took her privacy and self-protection.

Considering she had been shot, kidnapped, and tortured for a week by a madman, the surprise would be if she were not extremely careful. And this house didn't have a history of gentle security.

Perhaps that was one reason he'd brought her here. Because, really, lightning couldn't strike twice, could it?

"Can't be too careful," she said lightly as she triple-checked the dead bolt, wary and serious.

He just didn't know if wariness had slowly transitioned into blind rage. And he needed to know. Badly.

Did he really think the gentle, soft-spoken Lily Fletcher he knew could have killed the three men who'd been cut to pieces in those hotel rooms? That she'd lured them using their own sick desires against them, employing the names of her lost loved ones to do it? That she'd left a tiger lily to autograph her latest crime scene?

No. Deep down, he truly didn't believe she had it in her.

But the human mind could snap if pushed too far. He knew that, more than most.

"So what are you doing here?"

He had anticipated the question. "Monday is Labor Day. I thought I'd take a couple of days off and come up for the long weekend."

"You could have called."

"It's my house," he reminded her, his tone smooth and perhaps even a little bit mocking. This cold aloofness she'd shrouded herself in was almost too much of a challenge. He wanted her to be strong, knew she needed to in order to survive, but he sometimes found himself missing the Lily he'd once known.

He had to be honest, though. This woman fascinated him in ways he hadn't yet begun to evaluate. She was the living example of how a person could drastically change after one horrific ordeal.

Then again, she'd gone through more than one. He suspected the Lily he'd known had been different from the one who had waved her young nephew off to school or shared confidences with her twin sister.

He'd never know who she had once been.

"Suit yourself." She didn't even glance up at him as she spun on her bare feet and walked away from him, annoyance obvious in her tight shoulders. Her hips swayed, her long legs eating up the floor as she moved with determination toward the kitchen.

No, she couldn't be more unlike the young woman he had met a short fourteen months ago. That woman had been gentle and vulnerable, spiritually wounded after the terrible, tragic death of her nephew and her sister's resulting suicide. Lily had been soft-spoken and soft-tempered, with a quick smile, delicate, fluttering movements, and an eagerness to please that sometimes made her appear clumsy. But there had never been anything clumsy about the way her mind had worked. She'd been a brilliant programmer, a genius IT specialist, and he'd been damn lucky to get her.

That genius served her well in her new life. Not a thing could happen within a quarter mile of this house without her computer surveillance system warning her.

"I was just about to make dinner."

He followed, feeling a slow smile tug at his mouth. "Getting any better at it?"

Casting a quick glance over her shoulder, she smirked. "You won't choke."

Considering he'd tasted her dubious kitchen creations before, he'd reserve judgment. On the weekends when he came up, he usually brought fish or steaks to grill. This trip had just been too impromptu for him to do it.

After all, forty-eight hours ago, he would not have imagined he'd be traveling to Maine to try to find out if the young woman whose life he had saved really had slaughtered three men.

It's crazy. But he needed to be sure.

"Salad and grilled chicken okay? I went to the market yesterday."

"Fine. And you were careful in town?"

She gave him a Duh look. "In case you haven't been there lately, Keating is a tourist town. Tons of people in and out. I make sure not to draw any attention."

Huh. She drew attention no matter where she went, though she didn't see it. "Well, now that it's Labor Day weekend, be prepared for all that to change. The town is small enough that it will start to pay attention to anybody who sticks around."

"They've paid attention," she admitted, sounding grudging. Rolling her eyes, she gestured around the bright, airy kitchen with the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the ocean. Her tone dripping sarcasm, she added, "Enough to drop hints about this creepy house of yours."

The muscles in his body stiffened reflexively, but he forced himself to remain where he was, leaning against the doorjamb, his arms crossed. Nonchalant. Normal. Nothing to reveal just how much he hated being here and how right the townies were to think of this place as tainted.

"Just be warned, they're likely to be more nosy when they don't have other tourists to focus on."

"Duly noted."

Lily finally dropped it, thank God, and began to prepare dinner, pulling fresh produce from the refrigerator. As she worked, she would occasionally move a certain way, or her bottom lip would push out in frustration as she tried to decide which spice to use, and he'd catch a glimpse of the old Lily. She even unconsciously lifted a hand to sweep her short hair away from her face, as if forgetting she no longer had the long, silky strands.

"Your hair's really grown out," he murmured, acknowledging that for the first time.

She lifted a brow. "You just saw me three weeks ago."

"I know. But I can't see the scars at all anymore." At least, not the external ones.

This time when she lifted her hand, it was to self-consciously pat and smooth the hair over the top of her mangled ear. She would eventually need to get plastic surgery to repair it, but seemed to have had enough of doctors and hospitals for this year.

Lovesprettyboys, the bastard she and members of another Cyber Action Team had been trying to catch last January in a sting in Virginia, had shot her point-blank, aiming for her face. The bullet had instead skimmed the side of her head, taking off a chunk of her ear.

She'd been lucky. Damned lucky. Especially because the killer's second shot, straight to the chest, had been stopped by her bulletproof vest. He regularly thanked God that she'd been wearing it. She'd ended up with some broken ribs and bruises, but nothing major.

No, the major wound had been the third shot. It hit her in her upper thigh, so close to her femoral artery that another millimeter to the right would have been the end of her.

It almost had been, anyway. He still sometimes found it hard to believe she'd lived, especially given the amount of her blood they'd found inside the surveillance van where she'd been attacked. So much blood, it had been impossible to believe she could have survived, and despite the lack of a body, the world had decided she hadn't. Him included.

The grief of those standing beside a grave that held no coffin, who watched as a small marker with her name and the dates of her brief thirty years on this earth had been erected, had been genuine and heartbreaking. Something none of them had expected to get over. So when he picked up his phone that very night after her memorial service, hers was the last voice he had expected to hear. Weak and agonized, but Lily's voice.

It had been one of the most shocking moments of his life.

They had all believed her corpse had been swept away after the van had crashed from a high bridge. Now, of course, he knew that was what her attacker had wanted them to think. But then, answering that call, he had wondered whether someone was playing a sick joke.

"So how are things in the Hoover Building?" she asked as she reached for an onion and began peeling away the skin, taking a few usable layers of white with it. Talented in the kitchen, she was not.

"Fine."

"Everybody at the office okay? Jackie?"

"The same. She and Lambert still go at each other, especially when they start arguing about who's going to drive."

Her smile was faint, but it did appear. "She's dangerous behind the wheel."

"He's managed to survive."

The smile widened the tiniest bit as her guard began to come down at the talk of normal things. Familiar things. "Lambert turned out okay, though?"

"Yes, he's worked out very well." Jackie's partner, Alec Lambert, had been a new member of the team, on board for only a week when Lily's attack had occurred. "His profiling background has been a remarkable asset. Meanwhile, Kyle still manages to get off one-liners that leave Dean ready to laugh or growl-I can't quite tell which."

That put a sparkle in her eyes. "Mulrooney's a big, crass teddy bear, but Dean wouldn't trade him for another partner for anything."

Wyatt lifted a surprised brow. Because, though Lily was right, he wondered how she could know that. It had been only a year since the team had come together, and Lily had been absent for seven months of that year. When she left, everyone was still just a bit unsure, cautious, not quite melding into the solid unit they had become.

Funny, in a completely unfunny way. Lily's death had been the unifying moment.

"What about Jackie's family? Her husband? Her kids?"

"Everybody seems fine. The kids are growing up too fast, she says." He couldn't help adding, "She talks about you often."

Jackie Stokes had been the only other woman on the team at the time of Lily's attack and had taken the loss very hard. They had formed a solid friendship, and Jackie, though only twelve or so years older than Lily, had a mother instinct that ran deep. Despite her caustic exterior, the striking, brilliant African-American woman had grown protective of all the younger members of the team.

Many times, Wyatt had wondered just how big a mistake he had made in bringing only Brandon in on the rescue, and in letting Lily swear them both to secrecy about her survival. Jackie could have been a big help. All of them could.

But he'd had his reasons. Valid ones. And he didn't know that he'd make a different decision now, even knowing Lily's recovery was going to take so many months.

Still, he couldn't help wondering whether any of them would understand that, how they would react when Lily decided to rejoin the land of the living. They would be furious, would feel betrayed. And he couldn't blame them. He only hoped they eventually understood the choices he, Lily, and Brandon had all made that bitter January night.

"What about the new ones?"

"Anna Delaney's good, very thorough, although she doesn't have quite the instincts that you do. And Christian Mendez, who came in from the Miami field office, is very direct and single-minded, but I think he'll work out all right."

"Another Taggert, huh?"

"Not exactly. Dean was street-cop gruff. Christian's more quietly intense."

"And Brandon?" Her voice remained deceptively low, her attention on her task, as if she didn't want him to know she really cared about the answer to her question.

"Fine, though he still doesn't understand why you don't want him to come and visit anymore."

Her tremulous sigh reminded him that they had this discussion nearly every time he came up. "Maybe in the fall."

"That's what you said about summer."

She shook her head. "Look, it's bad enough you feeling like you have to come here and check up on me. There's no need for Brandon to go out of his way, too."

Shaking his head, Wyatt wondered if she really felt that way, if she didn't know that Brandon, probably a couple of years her junior, had feelings for her. I

Perhaps she did. And perhaps that was why she'd asked the other man to stop visiting altogether at around the same time she'd asked Wyatt to come up no more than once a month. Lily, it seemed, didn't want anyone to have feelings for her.

Not that she had ever been ungrateful. In the first few weeks after Wyatt and Brandon had rescued her from the bastard who'd held her captive, she'd been able to do almost nothing but thank them. Since then, though, as her body had healed, her heart had developed thick scar tissue, too. She no longer thanked him. He only hoped it was not because she was no longer glad they had found her and saved her life.

"So are you guys still called the Black CATs because nobody has the nerve to call you black sheep to your face?"

It was his turn to smile slightly. "Some things never change. Besides, we've decided we like the name."

"I assume you're still stuck in those crappy offices on the fourth floor that should be used as supply closets?"

He nodded in acknowledgment but lifted an ironic brow. "Which you, especially, should concede is not an entirely bad thing. It's much easier to fly under the radar when we're so far out of view of everyone else."

Her jaw tightened and her cheeks flushed. "I'm sorry."

He waved a hand in disregard.

"I mean it." She dropped the onion onto a cutting board, reached for a large, wicked-looking knife, and started to chop. Quick, hard, efficient. She had been practicing.

He shifted uncomfortably, not liking the flash of images shooting through his mind. Ugly ones. Bloody ones.

Could you? Could you really?

No. Impossible.

"On top of everything you did for me, saving my life, getting me medical care, letting me live here, faking my death…"

Shaking his head, he replied, "That, I did not do. Nobody faked your death, Lily. Not you, not I."

"You know what I mean."

"Yes, but remember, you committed no crime in not coming forward to correct the mistaken impression that you died. Filed no false life insurance claims, made no illegal moves at all. It was not your fault you were declared dead while you were…" He cleared his throat, unable to go there, even in his thoughts, not wanting to think about what she'd been going through while he and the rest of the team had been fruitlessly waiting for her body to wash up somewhere. "I repeat: You've done nothing illegal."

"I know. But I'm still sorry." Defiance and anger dimmed the warmth of the apology. "You caught the blame for it, didn't you? For what they all think happened to me?"

Wyatt merely stared, wondering how she could know that.

"Damn, it's unfair. It was nobody's fault but my own. You warned me to let the Lovesprettyboys case go."

Yes, he had, not liking what her obsession with an Internet phantom was doing to her. They had discovered the pedophile while researching a sick online site called Satan's Playground, where sadists and monsters gathered and enacted their ugliest fantasies. From the moment Lily had seen Lovesprettyboys' avatar, and the kind of revolting online games he liked to play, she had been determined to find the man before he could play those games in real life. Even after Satan's Playground had been shut down, after the rest of the team had moved on to other cases, having caught the serial killer who had been using the site to air videos of his brutal murders, Lily hadn't been able to let go of the need to do something.

"I should never have ridden along."

"You were supposed to be protected," he said, the words hard to push from his tight jaw. The whole thing still infuriated him. "Anspaugh should have kept you safe."

She rolled her eyes. "Anspaugh. The jerk. What did he get, a promotion?"

Special Agent Tom Anspaugh, who'd allowed Lily to help in his investigation without Wyatt's knowledge, had definitely not gotten a promotion. In fact, he'd been busted down so low, it was surprising he had remained with the bureau. "Quite the opposite. And you're lucky he doesn't know you're alive, because he holds you responsible for his disgrace."

"Oh, nice, blame the dead chick."

His lips quirked a little.

"Something tells me, though, that he's not the only one who got blamed."

No, he wasn't. Though Wyatt hadn't gotten slapped quite as hard as Anspaugh, he'd definitely taken a hit. But again, he had to wonder how Lily could know that. It wasn't as if Wyatt had raised his voice in Crandall's office when he'd gotten called on the carpet. Their heated conversation couldn't have been heard from beyond the walls of the DD's office, to be then whispered about, for, perhaps, Brandon to repeat to Lily.

"It doesn't matter."

Lily's fingers tightened around the handle, whitening under the nails. Then she tossed the knife down, turned to the cabinet, and retrieved two wineglasses. "After everything you've done, all the cases you've cleared, I can't believe they still treat you the way they do."

Watching her uncork a bottle of Merlot, Wyatt remained silent, not really wanting to talk about it. He'd long since come to accept that his career with the FBI would halt right where he was. His title would never be higher than supervisory special agent and some would never trust him. All because he'd seen some ugly, illegal activities going on and he'd done something about it.

Whistle-blowers, it seemed, were never promoted. Only shoved into the Cyber Division, where he'd never worked, and handed a new CAT that had been so narrowly defined, everyone had expected it to fail.

"Is Deputy Director Crandall still trying to drive you out by any means, fair or foul?"

Wyatt reached for the full wineglass she extended, and glanced at the ruby red liquid. Swirling it around, he didn't answer at first, not wanting her to see his reaction. "What do you mean?"

He was stalling. There had been nothing subtle about that query; she'd come at the matter head-on. The question remained: How did she know Deputy Director Crandall was trying to drive him out? Oh, certainly everyone in the bureau knew the DD hadn't been happy about the embarrassing scandal that had ensued after Wyatt had reported the evidence manipulation going on at the FBI crime lab. Especially because one of the agents implicated had recently been promoted to a position directly under Crandall. What made it worse was that high-level agent-Jack Eddington, now cooling his heels in federal prison-had once been Wyatt's good friend and mentor.

The way Lily had worded the question, it was almost as if she knew the deputy director truly hated his guts. That the vengeful man's actions had been personal, more than professional. Having his own office implicated in the crime-lab investigation had made Crandall his enemy for life, and he would have loved to fire Wyatt if he could.

He couldn't. Wyatt had too many friends in high places. Very high. He had a number of powerful supporters, the admiration of media figures who knew him and saw him as one of the few honest men in the FBI. No, Crandall couldn't force Wyatt out.

He could, however, try to get Wyatt to go on his own. And he'd done everything from criticizing him to reprimanding him to accomplish that goal.

That the reprimand had been over Lily Fletcher's death was something he would never let her know.

But how did she know the rest? He had shared details of the tense meetings, the argumentative phone calls, and the sniping e-mails from the DD's office with no one.

Wyatt alone was responsible for the decisions he made. He had known going into it that exposing internal corruption would be career suicide. Not to mention the end of friendships. So he would never bemoan the fully expected results of his actions to anyone now.

Others might whisper about it, speculate that while he'd gotten public commendations and made those high-level friends, in private, in the cutthroat world of the upper echelons of the FBI, he'd been vilified. Yet Lily seemed to be talking about more than the rumor and innuendo that had been surrounding him in the two and a half years since he'd crossed the blue line and done something about what he'd discovered.

And then he got it.

Wyatt lowered the glass to the counter, no longer trusting himself to hold it upright. The moment it left his grip, his fingers curled together, every muscle in his body growing tense as the truth washed over him. "Lily?

She opened her mouth to remind him of the name he was supposed to be using, but must have seen the steely flash of anger in his eyes and said nothing.

"You'd better not ever let me find out you've been hacking into our system."

She held his gaze, saying nothing, fearless and emotionless. Not denying it. Not justifying it. As if silently telling him she was good enough that he never would find out.

"Damn it," he snapped.

Anger rose. The kind of anger that one year ago he hadn't believed he was capable of feeling, so effective had his emotional control been for most of his life. The frustration caused an unfamiliar pounding in his head and every muscle in his body was hard and tense. What in hell was it with this woman that she continued to take these chances, with no regard for her safety or well-being?

He wasn't used to feeling this way. To ever being thrown off his normal, pace. Yet for the past seven months of dealing with Lily Fletcher, his life had been anything but normal, and sometimes he didn't even recognize himself.

Though Lily remained where she was, her chin up in silent defiance, he saw a flash of wariness enter her eyes. Wariness of him, which made him incredibly uncomfortable. "I need some fresh air," he said. "Don't hold dinner." Then, not trusting himself to discuss the issue with her calmly, he turned and stalked out of the room.