Matthias cut the engine on his bike and just sat there, straddling it in the visitor’s parking stall of Laurel’s condo. The wind was whipping hard, kicking around the tree branches near her darkened windows. His eyes focused on the black, empty spaces, portals to a world he thought he once knew.

He stepped off the bike and walked around the building. All Laurel’s lights were off. He thought back to the blackness of it, her empty apartment, her bedroom lit only by a nearby streetlight. Was she inside, maybe sleeping? Or maybe entertaining some new guest in the dark.

He tried not to think about that.

He tried not to get too crazy.

Dr. Smyth would probably view Laurel as a hindrance to his recovery. Too much too soon, he’d say. He was ready for challenges, but those of his own. The challenges that came from women, and romantic relationships with them—especially getting so serious so fast—were a whole other can of worms. A whole other IED minefield. It was proving a challenge tougher than the fear and pressure of battle.

Yes, he was returning to work. He was even hoping to accompany Ernesto on some actual, physically dangerous, and fun missions. He could think about that, about how he’d aim his gun without shaky hands. But how he felt now . . .

Starting up at her darkened window and trying not to succumb too hard to his insecurities—and his paranoia—might just be the hardest challenge yet.

He wasn’t ready.

He could barely get a handle on himself, let alone be enough of a man for a woman like Laurel. She deserved nothing less than him at his top form. He had no doubt that he could regain that form. But right then?

No, not ready.

Looking back, had he even been ready for their one night stand? No, it didn’t matter. It happened.

And now he had work to do.

Matthias walked back to his bike. He was weak—nothing like the solider, or even man, he once was. He would allow himself tonight, just one night, to feel this way. To accept it, and perhaps wallow in its pitiful depths. And then he would rebound and refocus for himself. Himself first, fixing and rehabilitating his mind, his psyche. His soul. And then, only then, could he focus on her.

If she would still let him.

At some point he might even focus back on his DARC Ops mission.

He was back on the bike now, riding away and feeling a little silly for coming all this way just to stare at her windows like some creep. Silly, too, that it took him so long to realize what he’d have to do. He’d have to give her some space while he figured out his shit. But somewhere through that, he still had to work with her, professionally. They were, after all, “coworkers.”

It would be like trying to stuff the worms back into the can, but he owed it to his work, and to her. Laurel might be in a shit load of trouble, and it might fall on her head soon. The mounting suspicions against her, the apparent sabotage job. Keeping her out of jail was more urgent and important than whatever was going on with their relationship. Keeping her out of jail, also, so that when he recovered, he just might have a chance with her.

Matthias pulled over to the side of the road. His cell had vibrated his pocket with an incoming phone call. His heart stuttered, his mind racing to thoughts of Laurel. Immediately everything changed. Fuck waiting. Fuck being responsible. Fuck all that. He wanted to hear her voice. He wanted to see her, maybe even tonight. He wanted to lay it all out on the table—his worrying findings about the sabotage, her boss’s suspicions, how much he liked and wanted her in his life in some real way.

He pulled the phone out, hoping to see her name on the screen.

It was Jackson.

Matthias cut the engine and answered it with decidedly less enthusiasm.

“Got some news for you,” Jackson said. “Something just came up here. We’ve had Tansy do a little digging around and it looks like our leaker is at Sentry after all.”

“Who?” said Matthias, his mouth drying up.

“Laurel Patterson.”

“Wait, Jackson—”

“Tansy hacked into H&L Houston and couldn’t find anything there, so then he looked over to Sentry.”

“Hey, Jackson.”

“What?”

“I’m confused,” said Matthias. “Why bother send me all the way down here if you’re just having Tansy hack it remotely?”

“Because we need someone physically there. Boots on the ground.”

Matthias sighed. “I think he’s wrong, Jackson. It’s not Laurel. I’ve been working with her closely. I’ve been watching her, and—”

“And you’ve been dancing.”

“What?”

“Ernesto told me about that.”

“About what?” Just how much had Ernie told Jackson about their wild night? He gritted his teeth an anticipation for Jackson’s response.

“Is that the reason you don’t think it’s her?” Jackson asked. “Because she’s your dance partner?”

“She was set up,” Matthias said.

“Set up?” There was a brief pause, and then, “I’m listening.”

“I thought it was her, too,” Matthias said. “Everyone at Sentry does. So I looked into her activity logs and found the same thing that Tansy must have read.”

“He also found some troubling stuff on the other side, where she sent the docs to.”

“Where?”

“She sent them to—”

“No, she didn’t send them anywhere.”

“Alright, alright. They were sent to a green energy company in Gainesville, Georgia. Wind turbines.”

That was a new twist. Wind turbines?

“Alright,” said Matthias. “What the hell do wind turbines have to do with this?”

“We’re working on that. But for now, it seems pretty clear that Laurel is working for someone else, releasing sensitive information that’s, intentionally or not, placing FBI agents’ lives at risk. Unless you came up with something better.”

“I did,” Matthias said. “I went deeper with the forensics and compared use patterns from the time the documents were sent, for that session, with patterns of the rest of Sentry System’s employee roster.”

“You know that can’t prove anything either way, right?”

“I know that it can point me in the right direction.”

“And what direction is that?”

“An employee named Caitlyn Morris. She’s got her fingerprints all over the session when the documents were sent. She could have hacked Laurel’s password and signed in as her, and then made the transfer so it could trace back to Laurel.”

“Or Laurel could have imported Caitlyn’s use pattern during the session, thereby setting up a red herring that could throw you off track. That, and the dancing. She really got to you, huh?”

“No. That’s not it.”

“Yeah. Sounds like she got in your head.”

Mathias hung his helmet onto his handlebar. “Listen, Jackson, I’m gonna need some help from Tansy. Vehicle tracking.”

“Whose vehicle?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“He can only track government vehicles, and only certain ones at that. Law enforcement, mainly.”

“Can you send him down here?”

“I’ll have him call you,” Jackson said.

“Thanks.”

“Hey Matt . . .”

“Yeah?”

“You okay?”

“Yeah.”

There was a loud sigh on the other end. “Don’t let her get in your head.”

* * *

Laurel had definitely gotten into his head. Her and a dozen other pressing issues that made sleep tonight not only improbable, but, eventually, impossible. There was no way he was going to catch a wink of sleep after his latest phone chat with Jackson. He’d called again from D.C. at 3 a.m., just when Matthias had finally begun to feel drowsy and heavy with the hope of sleep’s approach. If the ringing of his cell hadn’t been jarring enough, it was the sound of Jackson’s voice that made Matthias bolt up out of bed, rushing through the hotel room in a cold sweat, fumbling with his clothes, shoes, newly arrived gear, and then almost tumbling down the steps on his way to the parking lot to his bike.

The news was vague, but grim. Trouble with Ernesto. That was all Jackson could really say, that something had gone awry with his mission and Matthias had better get there as soon as fucking possible. Jackson gave him directions, a location outside the city, an abandoned airstrip. Had he known the location earlier, perhaps he’d have gone out there sooner. And then perhaps whatever trouble Ernesto was in wouldn’t have happened at all.

But there was no time for that. He was too busy looking for cops as his bike sped out of Atlanta in the hot, muggy night.

Something had gone wrong.

Had anything gone right?

Maybe one thing. He’d discovered evidence that might clear Laurel’s name. But Laurel, and whatever was going on with Sentry Systems, was now just a whole other headache he’d have to deal with. Another impediment to even just the bare minimum of sleep. He couldn’t think about that, not when Ernesto was out there. Alone and in trouble.

Matthias’ mind raced as the bike raced down the freeway. It would be so easy to just ignore the evidence and go with the flow, passing along the perception that Laurel could be the leak. He could forget about that night, forget about her, and move on, recover.

No. There’d be no recovery if he did that. Forget a relationship with Laurel. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself.

Pulling up sharply at Ernesto’s last known, an old runway with a single car parked on it, Laurel, AIDA and all the computer files between them blew out of his mind. He was focused on one thing: Ernesto’s white Impala, full of bullet holes, sitting, still running on the cracked pavement of the airstrip.

Bullet holes . . .

Not hail.

He pulled the beam of his flashlight away from the holes along Ernesto’s door. He’d seen enough. It was enough to remind Matthias of the panic, that shakiness he knew would start coming on. So far he’d only felt the subtle tinges of it, a foreshadowing that began minutes ago when he was crawling through the hundred yards of the tall, wild grass that had taken over the airport. He moved slowly on his belly like he’d done so many times, slithering past long blades of grass, some of them feeling like razors. He peeked his head up now and then, periscoping out of the vegetation to scan the surroundings. By the time Matthias arrived at the runway, and at Ernesto’s car, he could tell at a glance the entire location was empty, devoid of his friend or any attackers. Whatever had happened was over. Whoever put the holes in the Impala was gone. Matthias only cared about his friend. He hoped the car was the only thing that was full of bullet holes.

Shell casings. They made a tinny sound as they rolled under his boot. He followed them like a trail of breadcrumbs, stepping away from the car, imagining the scenario. Perhaps they were Ernesto’s shell casings. Ernesto firing back at his attackers, after they’d just shot up his car ambush-style, leaping out of the car with whatever injuries he’d sustained, and firing at a fleeing car perhaps, and then him winding up in the tall grass, maybe collapsing a few yards away. Maybe hiding. Maybe still alive.

Matthias looked for his path, for more shell casings. He saw bits of blood now, and a narrow swath of bent and flattened grass.

“Ernie?” he called. “Ernie, I’m here, Buddy. You’re okay.”

It was a lie. He didn’t know if he was okay, or if he was even around to hear the words—whether he was missing, or worse.

“Ernie?”

He stopped walking and listened for a response. But all he could hear was the sound of sirens in the distance.

Matthias looked around again, his flashlight sparking off beads of moisture on the grass. The sirens were getting louder. Police. Paramedics. But all the help in the world seemed a little too late right now.

He called for his friend again. Just how late was he?

The beam of the flashlight swept over a dark patch of blood. It looked almost black, like tar. Matthias followed the widening trail of it, until the toe of his boot clunked into something hard. The flashlight lit up the grass, and then a dark shape underneath. He could hear a babbling, gasping sound. A struggle for life. Matthias used his rifle against the vegetation, holding it to one side and revealing, to his horror, Ernesto. The big bloody mess of him, or what was left.

“Ernie!”

Matthias crouched next to him, closer to his friend’s face, closer to the wet and rattling breathing sound. He moved the flashlight across his friend’s body, sweeping it up down, checking for wounds, his hand shaking now more than ever, the light sweeping across dark patches of blood-soaked clothing.

“Ernie, I’m here.” Matthias grabbed his hand and squeezed it. “Who was it? Who did it?”

Ernesto groaned and tried to raise his head. The breathing sound got louder, that horrific struggle for air. And then his head dropped back down in the grass.

“Just hang in there.” Matthias felt at his neck for a pulse, desperately trying to stem the flow of blood. My God, there were too many holes. “There’s help coming real soon. They’re almost here.”

More groaning. No words. No movement. His hand felt loose and cold in Matthias’ grip.

With the flashlight in his other hand, Matthias waved it around above his head, slinging it madly through the air like a flare to guide the first responders. His gaze was still fixed on the ghost-white face of Ernesto. He had pink froth collecting at his mouth, a bubbly mix of saliva and blood. It would gurgle with each breath. But now even that had gone quiet and still. It was hard to tell if he was even breathing at all.

There was a screech of tires as the responding vehicles slid to a stop on the tarmac, and then the sound of boots hitting the ground and thudding over to where Matthias and Ernesto lay. Someone was pushing a stretcher through the grass, its wheels, bars, and straps bouncing and squeaking under the hushed voices of the responders.

“How many are left?”

“Where are they?”

“Where is he?”

“Matthias Wade?”

His friend was fading away, his face going white and still. His chest still.

“Stand up and identify yourself.”

Matthias stood from his crouch, turned, and looked down the barrel of a gun.

“Drop your weapon,” said one of the officers.

Matthias dropped his weapon, raised his arms, and then identified himself.

“DARC Ops?” asked the officer. “What the fuck is that?”

“Can I drop my arms?”

“Do you have ID?”

“In my pocket.” Matthias felt only a little better when he saw the paramedics surrounding Ernesto, crouching, working, and talking. He turned back to the officer who had a gun and flashlight still pointed at him. An FBI agent, perhaps, him approaching Matthias and patting him down while another fished out an ID card from his wallet.

“Nice to have you on board, Matthias.”

“I was a little late.”

“Us, too.”

Matthias felt a hand grab his arm, pulling him back. “Just give them room,” the officer said. “Let them work.”

He wanted to be with him, especially if that would be his last chance. But they grabbed him again, two big officers dragging him away from Ernesto.

“Hold on, sir. Take a breath.”

“I just want to see him!”

He fought against their grip.

“Easy does it, sir.” Someone restrained him, gently.

“Ernie!”

Matthias slipped out of their hold and raced through the tall grass, cutting through the blackness without a flashlight, and heading straight for another little patch of light where his friend fought for his life. A little light in the darkness, as frail and dim as Ernesto. He hadn’t moved an inch and now there was blood coming out of his nose. The paramedics had cut his clothing off, but there was so much red Matthias could barely see any skin.

“Is he breathing?” Matthias cried, his voice high and wild.

“Sir, come with me.”

“Is he breathing? Is he alive!?”

“Sir . . .”

More arms wrapped around him. More pulling.

“Ernie!”

“Sir . . .”

He felt their grip on him loosen. A hand was patting his shoulder.

“Sir, he’s gone.”