A Thin Disguise by Catherine Bybee

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Leo left her alone when she stopped talking to him, retreated into her notebook, and started writing down a long list of weapons and her knowledge about them.

What he saw of that list was downright terrifying.

He wanted to confront Neil, make the man level with him. But as she was ticking off all the ways she mimicked an undercover agent, Leo was ticking off a list of his own.

She was an operative. She worked for Neil. She knew about Navi and the case. Neil did not want Leo to know her true identity because why? Because Olivia wasn’t as innocent as the others? And how innocent were the others?

He’d looked up AJ Hoffman and found out why the man bucked authority as a child. AJ’s father was a politician, an ambassador to Germany. As Leo followed that bouncing ball, he uncovered a family photograph along with names. And an obituary for Amelia Hoffman, who had been found facedown on the bank of a river. As Leo dug, he found that someone had been arrested for the murder in Germany, but the who or why wasn’t on any public database. The fact that Neil’s team didn’t want to discuss it with him suggested it was connected to Olivia somehow.

Did she know something about AJ’s sister’s death?

If Leo could remotely tap into the FBI database, he could get the answers. But that wasn’t possible with the current setup they were using. Not without being detected, which would defeat the purpose of staying off the radar.

But the big question after today was what Olivia had uncovered herself.

Maybe the shooter wasn’t aiming at Leo.

And if that was the case, Neil and his team suspected it all along. In fact, they implied she had been the target, but Leo refused to see it.

So who would want Olivia dead?

Navi?

Did the man even know Olivia was in play?

If not Navi, or someone on Mykonos’s side, then who and why?

And this was where Leo and Neil were in the same position. Neither one of them knew for sure who the shooter was, or who hired them.

But in order for Leo to find that answer, he first needed to know exactly who Olivia was.

The action flicks that had prompted his path to the FBI had started to spin in the back of his head. Reminding him that sometimes the good guys were the bad guys. And the bad guys did good things. And wasn’t that the fine line Neil and his people treaded? And if Olivia was a part of the team, but at arm’s length . . . had she crossed that line? And, and, and!

Leo moved to the window in his room and peered into the darkness, his mind racing. Neil asked the team to respect Leo’s position and Olivia’s privacy. If Olivia did in fact cross the line, and Leo was told about it . . . then him staying silent about said line meant he grabbed her hand and jumped over that line with her.

Even though he didn’t want to be put in that position, he knew he was going to work overtime to uncover every last detail of Olivia’s past.

It was hard to imagine her as anything other than what he was seeing right then. A resilient, caring, sensual, confident woman who intrigued him first with her looks and then with the sheer mystery of what made her into the person she was. And yes, the chemistry was driving him straight to a cold shower several nights a week.

There wasn’t a lot of privacy in the house, which was probably a good thing. Especially now that Olivia was no longer convalescing and starting to thrive. The looks she cast his way, the teasing touch when she didn’t think anyone else would notice . . . the sensual, playful side of the woman had Leo looking forward to every morning and every moment with her.

Since their initial lip-lock in the kitchen, they’d all but abstained from physical touch.

Well, except that one moment where he’d pressed her up against a tree in the woods while they were alone on a walk. So much heat and friction . . . they were both breathless when they stopped and stared into each other’s eyes.

Her breath was heavy on her lips . . . swollen from his kiss. “You’re making it hard to resist,” she whispered.

“Me? You’re the one dragging your foot up my leg under the dinner table.”

A proud smile washed up her face. “I like watching you try to keep it together.”

He pulled her hips flush with his, enjoyed the spark in her eyes with the contact. “I think you’re trying to make me choke on my food.”

“We’re both consenting adults . . . Why again are we resisting what’s going on?” she asked.

The answer for him was easy. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

She glanced down at her chest. “I think I’m past that.”

He placed his hand on her face, made her look at him. “You don’t know who you are, and the last thing I want is for you to have any morning-after regrets.”

“The more I get to know you, the less I feel that’s possible,” she whispered.

“The more I get to know you, the more important it is for me that you’re in the right place when this does happen.” He’d be a fool to think it wasn’t going to.

She teased him with her hands. “I’m not opposed to tying you up.”

Why did that excite him?

“I have a feeling it won’t be the first time I’ve tied up a man.”

“You’re a dangerous woman.”

She leaned up, her lips close to his. “I’m worth the risk.”

Leo shook the memory from his head.

He removed his cell phone from his back pocket and opened up his photos.

Olivia had stopped and picked up a pine cone on their walk back, and Leo snapped a few pictures of her. When she caught him, he turned the phone around and took a picture of the both of them.

They looked relaxed. Considering what had brought them together, the image felt like such a contradiction.

“We look good together,” he’d told her.

She accused him of being sentimental. Something no other woman before her had done.

He’d likely have plenty of time to ponder the why of that at another time.

But for now, he needed to determine who the woman was behind the picture.

“Even I can’t steal any more of your money,” Pam told Neil, her duffel bag next to his by the door.

“I’m happy to keep you on longer.”

Olivia watched the two arguing over her.

“You needed me for two weeks tops. And even that was a stretch. It’s been a hell of a lot longer than that. I’m flying back with you.” Pam didn’t give him any room for argument. She turned to Leo and opened her arms.

Leo stepped in and hugged her goodbye. “Take care of her.”

Olivia laughed. “Her can take care of herself.”

Pam scowled over Leo’s shoulder at Olivia.

She moved on to Isaac, who hugged her briefly, patting her sides. “Much as I tried to fatten you up, it looks like I failed.”

“Maybe the next time,” she teased.

When Pam turned to Lars, her smile was a tad softer, and their hug lasted a little longer. She said something in his ear that none of them heard, and then Lars locked his lips to hers.

Olivia’s jaw dropped, unable to look away.

How had she missed this?

Pam stepped back. “Call me when you’re back in town, sailor.” She turned away, and Lars patted her ass.

“What the . . . ?” Olivia started.

“Oh, shut up,” Pam said. The older woman pulled Olivia into an awkward hug and let go quickly. “You know how to get ahold of me if you need me, you stubborn bitch.”

“You loved every minute of it.” Olivia glanced at Lars. “Apparently more than I realized.”

Pam’s humor softened. “Take care of yourself. And always remember that there are people out there who care about you.”

Olivia felt a strange pull in her chest. “Thank you. For everything.”

Pam shook away whatever emotion she was starting to show and turned to Neil. “Let’s go, big guy. I hate snow, and this place is about to get dumped on.”

“Did you say goodbye to AJ and Sasha?” Isaac asked.

“We’re all good.” Pam picked up her bag. “Till next time,” she said before heading out the door.

Neil grabbed his bag. “I’ll be back in two days.”

Isaac’s short staccato laugh had all of them chuckling. The reason Neil was leaving in the first place was to meet the guy who wanted to date his daughter.

“Try not to threaten the boy,” Lars told Neil.

Isaac’s laughter grew.

“Neil doesn’t have to say a word,” Olivia teased.

He drew in a breath, let it out slowly. Neil’s eyes fell on her. “You know how to get ahold of me.”

Not that she needed to, with everyone else in the house. “You’ll be back so soon we won’t have a chance to notice you’re gone.”

He glanced at Leo and then left.

Isaac’s laugh became contagious. “That poor kid.”

Olivia moved to Lars’s side and nudged her shoulder to his. “What was all that with Pam?”

He shrugged, looked between her and Leo. “Some of us are better at hiding what’s going on than others.”

Isaac just kept laughing as he walked away.

The sound of the SUV pulling out of the driveway brought Olivia to the window. She was going to miss the cantankerous, pushy woman. But she had been given her phone number and could see herself reaching out at some point.

Leo walked to the front door and grabbed his coat. “I’m going to bring in some more firewood.”

“I’ll help,” Lars offered.

“I’ll curl up on the couch and be a girl,” she said.

Lars laughed. “I never thought I’d hear you say that.”

Olivia found herself blinking several times at his words. Something about the way he said them . . . or maybe the words themselves.

Leo opened the door, and a rush of freezing air blew in.

Pam was right. Snow was coming.

Olivia welcomed it.

The quiet, peace, and cleansing of the landscape.

She was ready for a change in seasons.

Not again.

Blistering pain burned Olivia’s bare feet. The craters dug into her skin by hell’s surface were so deep that the sound of her own blood and flesh sucking against the fire and brimstone deafened her ears.

Somewhere in her mind, her conscious self was telling her to wake up. That the pain would go away if she just opened her eyes.

But it felt as if some kind of drug was weighing her down and stopping her from so much as turning her head.

The sound of the fire crackling, the smell of her flesh . . .

“Where are my goddamn shoes?”

She looked down and stared at her left hand.

Dangling from the tips of her fingers was a pair of sneakers.

The sight of them crushed her. All along . . . they’d been there all along and yet she walked all over hell without them on her feet.

She lifted them to eye level and started to cry.

With each tear the shoes melted from the heat of the fire, dripping . . . one oozing inch at a time.

“No!”

“Over here.”

A voice called behind her.

She turned to find a line in the surface where hell disappeared and cold stone and wooden cases filled with books took its place.

It had been there all along. Only one foot in the opposite direction and she didn’t have to have the pain.

“C’mon, Olivia. We don’t want to get caught.”

The voice belonged to a boy.

Young, energized.

“Take your shoes off so no one will hear,” he told her.

She looked at her hands, her shoes nothing but bits of plastic melted together. One foot in front of the other, she made her way out of the fire, her feet sloshing on the polished floors of the library.

“We’re going to get caught,” she said. But she wasn’t speaking in English.

“Only if you keep talking.”

Then a hand slammed over her mouth, and she tried to scream.