CHAS NEEDED TO see Geoff and Nils and Ezra again. Watching those newscasts with Ezra had made that clear to him. It had been less than five hours since Ezra had been rescued.

It brought back memories.

Chas needed to see him and the others. See if they could answer some of the questions he still had. Maybe it was best to get the closure everyone spoke about. Then he could move forward. Come out into the light again.

He would still be invisible. It was a trick of his trade.

But he didn’t have to be all the time.

And then he had business to attend to.

They owed him, big time. It was time he collected his debts. Put his affairs in order, so to speak. Before he could move on to the next stage in his life. That money would go a long way to buying him the kind of life he wanted.

And whether he wanted to admit it or not, it was time to move past Amelia. Chas was only thirty-four. Young enough to find another woman to love, to start a family with.

He would guard this one far more carefully than he had the last.

It was time he found what he needed. He’d thought about Ezra and the others most of last night. Remembered.

Chas half missed the feeling of having people around.

He was playing around on his laptop—he split his off time between editing the photographs he took and the sword and sorcery games he’d created—when he first saw the links with Ezra’s name right there emblazoned across his screen.

Ezra, who had left the army to join the FBI right after they’d returned stateside. He read the article summarizing how the man he’d once considered a friend had been abducted, then rescued by the superheroes of the FBI. PAVAD.

Ezra had been doing well, making a name for himself saving lost kids. He smirked. Ezra had always had a bit of a hero complex or something. Hollace hadn’t liked the other guy much at all. Said Ezra Hahn was just a damned poser. Needing the glory or something.

He didn’t know if he believed that, but Hollace sure had.

It was good to see that Ezra had been rescued. But it was the girl who’d also been abducted that had truly caught his attention. He had to wonder about her. There had been something on Ezra’s face in that last photo. He’d looked at the woman like she mattered.

Like Chas used to look at Amelia.

He tossed his soda toward the garbage can as anger and grief filled him.

There always was a woman involved. Men like Ezra pulled them to him effortlessly.

Men like Chas had to work for the women they got.

It seemed like there always was that disparity where some of the men he’d fought with were concerned. The woman’s name was listed: Agent Shannon Toliver.

He studied the photos of her closely. Ezra hadn’t been a real player, but he’d had girls who wanted him. More than Chas had. Were Ezra and this Shannon involved? She didn’t look like Ezra’s usual type. Ezra went for the model-gorgeous type—and got it, too, which had always burned Chas a bit—but this girl was more real-looking than that.

She was extremely petite, and...cute. Not model gorgeous. At most, she was pretty in that wholesome-kid-sister kind of way. She’d probably be a bit invisible in the crowd. Like Chas.

Like his Amelia had been before she’d been killed.

Chas would have seen a woman like her, would have wanted a woman like this Shannon Toliver. She was just the type Chas had always preferred. If he lived in a world where he wasn’t so deliberately invisible.

He kept reading links.

He watched a short video of Agent Toliver giving a press conference—dated a few months back—and smiled at how sweet she sounded. How smart. There was definite intelligence in her words, and humor. It was the unstated humor that had him smiling. And had him playing the video a few more times.

Once his business was done, he might just look up this co-worker of Ezra Hahn’s for himself. It would be easy to do. The laptop he played on was the best the government could afford.

He’d stop by and watch her. Make certain she was ok after the hell she’d no doubt just been through.

The news was saying the woman had foiled a terrorist attack.

He’d walked away with it and a half dozen other tools of his particular trade. No one had bothered stopping him.

He checked his watch. It was time.

He’d have lunch with Geoff. Get the answers the other man had. Then he’d make the next move in his plan.

He right-clicked the video of Agent Shannon Toliver and saved it to his hard drive, as well as the photos of her and Ezra after they’d been rescued.

He blew the first photo up, selected her face, and copied the image. It was so simple for him to do. He studied every feature of her face, committing her to memory. Just the same as he did every target he’d ever been hired to kill. The skills were intrinsic now.

She was beautiful in that real kind of way that actually mattered in this world.

He would have to find out more about her. See just how Ezra felt about her. It wouldn’t be a strain to watch for her while he waited for his latest assignment.