Moments later, they ended the call with Shaun, thanking him for his willingness to assist them. Shaun promised to send the cloud storage account information as soon as they were off the phone, but reminded them that now that they had this information about what appeared to be incredibly corrupt financial reporting at the Department of Defense, it would be up to them to figure out what to do with it.
Yasmine had an idea of her own, but she wasn’t sure that Noel would go for it. It was risky, but at the same time, it was the only option she could think of that wouldn’t end with them staring down the barrel of yet another gun.
“Thoughts?” she asked. “I know what I want to do, but you’re FBI. Let’s hear your plan first.”
He ran his hand down the side of his face. “I see only one way out of this, Yasmine. And I don’t think you’re going to like it. I really don’t.”
“Try me.”
He raked his eyes across her features as if searching for some falsehood in her words and tone. “I’m not joking.”
“Neither am I. Noel, we’ve been shot at, my brother is dead and even your FBI mentor is worried. This is no time to hedge your thoughts. Spit it out.”
He nodded and slipped his phone into his pocket. “You’re right. In that case, since we don’t know who else we can trust, I say we go straight to the source.”
“The Department of Defense,” Yasmine and Noel said at the same time.
Noel stared at her in surprise as Yasmine continued. “I agree. That was going to be my suggestion, too. Shaun said that the Department doesn’t typically behave this way, that they report federally just like any other government organization. There’s no way the entire Department knows about this, so there must be a few select individuals who’ve set this all up. I can’t even begin to guess where that amount of money is going, but if we take this paper trail information directly to the source as evidence—”
“—they’ll have to act. They’re not going to want this to continue or get out to the public. Could you imagine the damage that would do? The American public and the world’s media would skin the administration alive. Not to mention that millions of dollars funneling into a mystery account is terrifying enough. That could be going anywhere, to anyone. And that much secrecy—”
“—is worrying. Really, really worrying.” Yasmine rested her head against the back of the seat. “So, now what?”
Noel tapped the keys. “We fill up the tank and go to the Pentagon.”
“You want to drive all the way there?”
“You have a better idea? We’ve lost our tail, and I’m not willing to risk us being cornered on a bus or train. I know you’re in no shape to drive, so I’ll manage it.”
“Noel, the Pentagon is seven hours away.”
“We have no other choice. Wait here. When we’re full, I’m going to pay cash. I doubt anyone is monitoring our cards, but it’s a needless risk.” He slipped out the door, and Yasmine closed her eyes as Noel pumped the gas. God, give us strength. Seven hours in a car with Noel? He’d be exhausted by the time they made it to DC, but she agreed with his logic. Better to drive there and control the situation the whole time than risk being located and found on public transportation. It also put fewer civilians in the potential path of danger.
As Noel walked toward the station kiosk to pay, Yasmine leaned back in her seat again…and played back Noel’s words about credit card tracking. They couldn’t be too careful, sure, and yet here they were inside an FBI vehicle. Government vehicles are traceable.
Without a wasted second, Yasmine exited her side of the Suburban and crossed to the driver’s side. She opened the door and gingerly crawled onto the floor before flipping onto her back so that her legs dangled out the driver’s side while she stared up into the inner workings of the vehicle.
She scanned the dark mess of wires, looking for anything out of place. She wasn’t great with cars in general, but identifying and disabling a tracker was a basic military skill—and there it was, a small box about half the size of a paperback book attached to the inside of the dash. Aftermarket GPS trackers were effective but not complicated devices. She wrapped her fingers around it and pulled.
“Need any help there, miss?”
Yasmine sat up in surprise and nearly smacked her head. A middle-aged man stood by the vehicle, looking for all the world like he couldn’t believe a lady would be able to examine the inner workings of a car all by herself.
“No, I’m fine, thank you,” she began to say, but she made it only halfway through the sentence before the man blanched and backed away. He almost ran as he slunk back to his vehicle, a compact car that appeared to contain other passengers.
Weird. Yasmine lay back down. She gripped the GPS transmitter and tensed for one final tug. It came free, and she immediately ran her fingers along the edge for a switch, then thought better of it. She slid out from her place on the floor while ignoring her protesting ribs and looked up to see Noel walking too quickly back to her, his face ashen.
“We have to go.” He tossed a small white bottle to her but kept his voice low as he approached. “What part of stay in the car didn’t you get?”
She held up the tracker, then dumped it into the trash can next to the gas pump. “GPS. I don’t recommend destroying government property, but if we leave it turned on, anyone after us will waste time coming here, and we’ll be long gone.”
Noel’s cheeks turned a light shade of pink. “I should have thought of that.”
She shrugged. “You’re new. I should have thought of it earlier, too.”
“Still.” He motioned for her to get back inside the vehicle. “Let’s move. Don’t make eye contact with anyone, and keep your head down.”
“Don’t scare me. What is it? Have we been spotted?”
Noel’s grimace betrayed his frustration. “Please trust me. I’ll explain on the road, but we need to go. Now.”
She didn’t appreciate being told what to do, but after all they’d been through, she knew it’d be foolish not to take him at his word. With a slight nod, she rounded the vehicle, keeping her gaze lowered while trying to look inconspicuous.
She reached the door just as a man appeared from the rear, the same guy who’d asked a few minutes ago if she needed help. This time, he had a second guy with him. The first man reached toward her. “Hey, lady!”
She ignored him and pulled open the SUV door. What on earth was happening?
“Don’t respond. Get in,” Noel urged, already in his seat.
She tried, but the second man’s arm shot out to block her from getting inside, a mixture of fear and anger on his face. “I’m going to have to ask you to leave this woman,” he said, looking over his shoulder at Noel. The lunacy of his statement almost caused Yasmine to laugh, but Noel’s stiffened posture told her that would be a bad idea.
“I’m taking care of her,” Noel replied, his words curt.
“Yeah? Says who? Because I say you’re the one who came in here with the lady, and it was only after you arrived that the alert came up. Maybe you’re helping her escape.”
“Escape?” Yasmine stared at the stranger. “Listen, mister—”
Noel reached into his jacket, presumably to pull out his badge, but the stranger who’d blocked her path had diverted Noel’s attention. Yasmine shouted a warning as the first man appeared at the driver’s side and yanked it open to take a swing at Noel.
“What is going on?” she shouted at Noel.
“You’re on TV,” he grunted, still grappling with the man. “Get in! Get in!”
Yasmine looked up and saw other customers pointing at the gas pump TV displays. Her face and name were splashed across the screen—across every screen—and a red bar scrolled across the bottom of the image, decrying her as a dangerous person, wanted by the FBI.
“Oh, fantastic,” she muttered. “Auntie Zee is going to kill me.”
Arms suddenly closed around her neck and waist. She shouted in pain at the pressure on her ribs and reacted on instinct, grabbing the arms and shifting her weight to toss her attacker, the motion earning her another stab of pain. The man flew over her shoulder and landed in front of her with a thud. He was a citizen performing what he believed to be his civic duty, no doubt, but—
“I’m FBI!” Noel’s shout stopped the men in place. He held up his badge, flashing it to the other nearby patrons and the men who’d attacked them. As news of a ten-thousand-dollar reward flashed up on screen for information leading to her arrest, Yasmine realized just how motivated these people were to make a citizen’s arrest.
Yasmine climbed over the man on the ground and back into the Suburban as Noel held his badge aloft through the window.
“As soon as you tell me we’re clear, we go,” he said.
She checked to make sure they wouldn’t run over the man on the ground, then slammed her door. “Let’s get out of here.”
* * *
Noel pulled out of the parking lot before Yasmine had even buckled her seat belt. Once he saw she was secured, he stepped on the gas pedal and zoomed down the road. He buckled his own seat belt at the first turn, earning a look of frustration from Yasmine.
“We had to move,” he said, thinking she was upset about his delayed act of seat belt safety.
“It’s not that.” She sighed and thumped her head against the seat rest. “Wanted by the FBI. I thought Crais was on our side?”
“He is,” Noel growled. He has to be. “I’m sure there’s an explanation for this.”
“If the explanation is that we’ve been double-crossed by your mentor, we’re going to be in real trouble.”
“He wouldn’t do that.” Noel focused on the road again, trying to push aside the doubts and fears that assaulted him from every side. Crais betraying them? That would mean they really didn’t have anyone left to trust. There’d be no going back to the FBI, no career left for Noel after they sorted this out. Crais was too high up at the Bureau, and Noel would be a marked man for having assisted Yasmine during her escape from…whatever this was. From whatever they’d pinned on her. “It’s not possible.”
Even he heard the waver in his voice.
“But why only me, Noel? I don’t get it. Why don’t they want you?”
That was easy to answer, and Noel felt good to be able to explain at least one thing about what they were going through. “Because the FBI doesn’t want to lose face. Could you imagine putting a wanted notice out for a brand-new FBI recruit? They don’t let just anyone into the Academy, and the level of scrutiny we’re under during training is enormous. If they put my picture up as a wanted person, it’d be a simple process for the media to figure out I’m a new FBI special agent and get the Bureau torn apart in the media. The FBI would come out looking like an organization of fools who can’t do their jobs. Makes more sense to put up your picture as a wanted person and discipline me internally once I’m back in their hands.”
“Or maybe they don’t blame you at all. Maybe someone got to him? Paid him off when we evaded them, to avoid us going back to him for help?”
Noel’s stomach sank toward his shoes. “I guess that’s possible. Plausible, even.” He ran a hand down the side of his face again, wishing not for the first time that he had more experience. An FBI agent with a long history might have a better chance at outsmarting bad guys, but him? He was so green it was all he could do to keep his cool. Having Yasmine around seemed to be helping. In fact, he’d begun to wonder how he’d managed all these years without her.
So much about her had changed, yes—but in even more ways, she was still the same girl he’d had a crush on all those years ago. Only now, he felt something much deeper when he looked at her…and yet, they still had a massive wall of lost years between them.
He glanced at Yasmine, wondering if he should ask again about her time in Amar, but she’d turned to gaze out the window at the passing landscape as the sun sank the rest of the way below the horizon. He swallowed his curiosity and focused on the road. They had a long way to go and would need to form a solid plan before reaching the Pentagon. Getting inside wouldn’t be easy—Noel was well aware of that—but his status as an FBI agent meant it might not be impossible.
They fell into a comfortable silence, and soon he heard the slow, steady rhythm of Yasmine’s breathing. She’d taken the painkillers and fallen asleep with her head lolled against the window, one hand tucked underneath her cheek. How could she sleep like that? She’d wake with an awful cramp if she slept that way for long.
She looked so beautiful with her eyelids closed and her lips slightly parted. Her mouth was so soft, so inviting. If only they weren’t running for their lives.
“Eyes on the road, Fed,” Yasmine mumbled.
He flushed and stared straight ahead. He should have known better than to sneak so many looks her way. “Sorry. How’s the pain?”
“Okay. I’ll need to take more medicine before we reach DC.”
“Got it.” She sat upright and shifted in the seat, and from the corner of his eye he saw her turn toward him but then settle back in place as though she’d changed her mind about something.
After much time and many miles, Yasmine finally spoke. “Noel… I haven’t told you the whole story about why I stayed away.”
He swallowed the lump that immediately formed in his throat. This was what he’d been waiting to hear, but the strain in her voice made him wonder if he wanted to hear it, after all. “It’s okay, Mina. You don’t have to tell me.”
“No, I want to.” She sighed deeply and turned slightly toward him again. “I met someone in Amar.”
Noel’s stomach tightened. He remained silent, not wanting to spook her, because something in her tone told him that this was the thing she’d held back from him since they’d reunited. She’d been so evasive when he’d asked about Amar. He pressed his lips together to keep from blurting out his questions.
“His name was Marc. He loved computers and worked as an information technology specialist at the American University of Amar. We met while I was in school, long before I signed up for military service. It was only because of him that I enrolled. He hadn’t yet done his year of compulsory service, and the only way for me to be able to remain in Amar was to obtain dual citizenship, which required completion of the compulsory service.”
Noel wanted to ask why she’d wanted to become a dual citizen, but he had a feeling he knew what she’d say. His suspicions were confirmed by her next words.
“We were engaged. Immigration laws in Amar are very strict, so if I wanted to take the job offer I had, get married and stay there, dual citizenship was the only option. Turned out it was all for nothing.”
Noel clenched his jaw, getting an even worse feeling about where the story was going. “What happened?”
Yasmine’s tone shifted from sad to matter-of-fact. “Simply put? He cheated on me, and I only found out about it when I caught him. I thought he loved me, but it turned out I was wrong.”
“Yasmine, I’m so sorry.” The tension in Noel’s stomach turned quickly to anger. “That’s horrible. To have seen that, to have endured that kind of betrayal… I can’t even imagine.”
“He was an excellent liar,” she said, her voice lowered to nearly a whisper. “He had me fooled, Noel. We were together for nearly five years. How many other times had he done that behind my back? I still don’t know, and I don’t want to. I moved back to the United States partially to escape that memory, that pain of being in the same country as him. I just couldn’t be there anymore. I wanted to come home. Plus, Daniel was here, and Dad’s side of the family is spread out across the East Coast. And Mom’s sister is here, Auntie Zee—she came back when we didn’t. Still, I’m… I’m not sure I did the right thing, sometimes. Moving back here.”
Instinctively, Noel reached across the seats and took Yasmine’s hand where it rested in her lap. “You did what you had to do to move on. Marc was an idiot. Anyone who would do something like that…well…obviously never deserved you in the first place.”
She sniffed as though trying to fend off tears. “I know that. In my head, I know that. But still I wonder, was there something I could have done? Was I lacking in some way? Maybe it’s my fault he fell into another woman’s arms. Maybe—Look, I’m sorry,” she said, pulling her hand free from his. “I didn’t mean to make a big deal about it. I just thought you deserved to know the whole story.”
He cleared his throat, wishing not for the first time that he knew what to say. If Marc was anywhere in the near vicinity, he’d teach the man a thing or two about keeping promises. Yasmine deserved to be with someone who made her his world. He felt a strong urge to tell her, to erase that sadness from where it had settled across her features.
Noel maneuvered onto the side of the road, turned off the lights and cut the engine. “No, stop apologizing. Right now.” In the moonlit darkness, he saw tears glisten on her cheeks. He had a sudden urge to kiss away each and every one of them.
He wanted her to know that what Marc did wasn’t her fault, could never be her fault.
He wanted to make her whole again.
“You can’t blame yourself,” he said. “And I think you know that. It hurts—of course it does—but in the end, he made a choice to walk away from the promises you made to each other.”
She shook her head. “Maybe I was wrong to make those promises to anyone in the first place. Maybe I’m just not worth it.”
How could he explain it to her so she’d understand? Of course she was worth it. She was strong, capable, interesting. Unique. Beautiful. Driven. Everything that a man might want in a woman.
Everything he wanted in a woman.
Like a lightbulb illuminating the darkness, he realized a stark truth that he’d been trying to deny since the moment this woman had leaped across the hood of his car and plunged inside to escape an onslaught of bullets.
He might have spent ten years apart from Yasmine Browder, but she had never been far from his heart or mind. And that childhood crush? It had reblossomed in a short time into a deep, unconditional love.
Without thinking, he reached his hand behind her head and pulled her toward him. She pushed back, hesitant, for only a moment. Then she allowed him to draw her close.
“Worth it?” He whispered, his lips hovering a breath away from hers. “You, Yasmine Browder, are priceless.”
And then, after more than a decade of waiting and dreaming about the possibility of this moment, he kissed her.