Total pages in book: 59
Estimated words: 55606 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 278(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55606 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 278(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
“I used to wear a badge. Had my training at the Farm but was immediately tapped for undercover work.”
Yeah, this was going to fucking suck.
Chapter Five
Without memory, there is not healing.
Without forgiveness, there is no future.
~Desmond Tutu
The Farm. Two words he’d never expected to hear out of Jasmine’s mouth. Hell, when they’d first met and she’d looked like a junkie, that’s what he’d assumed and he’d rolled with it. Even at their last meeting at the courthouse, he still wouldn’t have pegged her to be someone who’d had the training he’d gotten later.
He didn’t push her, gave her the extra time it was obvious she needed. And not just her. Lance swigged some back as well, needing a few additional moments to wrap his head around this.
Even when the silence dragged on, he waited, the pain in her eyes too real for him to ignore.
“I was good.” Her voice low but shaky. “Damn good.”
He could see the truth in her simple words. This woman held herself to a standard he never would have expected when he first met her. Still, he hated the pain that lingered even though he had no doubt she worked hard to erase it. And that knowledge she was still hurting after all this time, whatever the reason made him want to fix it for her. There existed something deep inside Lance that made him want to pull her into his chest and hold her. Give her his strength. Protect her. Possess her. Locking down his limbs, he didn’t move. While the comfort would be offered, this woman was a firecracker in his arms and it would change to something sexual and he needed to hear this from her. Had to know what was going on.
Even so, he didn’t rush her. This revelation wasn’t something he would ever force her to divulge at the speed he wanted. He had to let her pick her own.
“We had an op in,” a shrug, “guess it doesn’t matter where it was. Multi-agency, blah blah, you know how it goes. Typically, the more letters involved, the stickier the situation becomes.” A deep breath. “And the more likely it is for a leak.”
He really didn’t like where this was going.
“There was a leak, and the entire op went sideways. Not just a little oops, we have a bit more paperwork to do and make it go away. More like a zombie apocalypse would have been welcome instead of what we went through. Agents died, covers were exposed, and some of us were left out to dry on our own.”
What the fuck?
“Who left you out to dry?” Anger vibrated through him.
“Doesn’t matter.”
“Was it Robert?”
“No.”
He held her gaze, desperate to confirm she spoke the truth.
“Him I met after Caro came into my life. And it turned out he was part of the group who had left me to fend for myself. Who burned me.”
“You said he wasn’t the one.”
She shrugged without a shred of remorse. “He wasn’t the only one. But part of it, yes.” Jasmine fell silent and he didn’t doubt she was figuring out how much to tell him. He wanted to demand she spill all of it, but one simply didn’t force Jasmine to do something she didn’t wish to.
Shit was clicking in his head. “So when I met you that first time, you had no one. You weren’t really a junkie, but a Fed who’d been hung out to dry.”
She shook her head, lips pursed, and held her hands up briefly. “I was a junkie.” Jasmine held his gaze without flinching, without trying to hide. “I’ll not make excuses for that time in my life. I fell into the life I’d been a part of for so long but without that anchor, it consumed me. I wasn’t strong enough to fight it off until I found Caro.” She pushed a hand through her hair. “I was an ex-federal agent who had zero ties to anyone. No history, because all of mine had been wiped aside from what I’d created. I agreed to go into WitSec after testifying so Caro could get back to her life.”
“Robert.”
She nodded. “I don’t trust him. The man’s a fucking incompetent asshole. I’m not an agent any longer but I hope to hell you have another backup plan in place.”
“What did he do to you?”
Her indecisiveness to tell him wasn’t difficult to spot. It took a short time but she shook her head. “No. I’m not willing to use my experiences with the man you are supposed to trust at your back. People can change so perhaps he has. I will never trust him, but you have to make up your own mind.”
Holy fuck, this woman. After all that man put her through, she still encouraged him to make up his own mind. Personally, he would have burned him to the ground. Lance strode to her, maintaining eye contract.