He was sitting on the big sofa, staring into the fire, when she finally got the guts to step back into the living room. She’d changed into leggings and a long-sleeve T-shirt, then added an oversized sweater and socks at the last minute. The house was warm despite the rain pelting the windows, the darkness closing in outside, but she needed as many layers between her and Braden as possible.

She was alone with him on a windswept island, ensconced in a tastefully decorated mansion made to look more modest than it was, a fire crackling in the hearth, the sea stormy as it crashed on the beach below.

In other words, she was on dangerous ground.

He didn’t look up as she entered the room, and she had the sense that something had shifted in her absence. It wasn’t anything she could put her finger on — call it instinct — but there was something almost challenging in the way he ignored her as she sat on the opposite end of the sofa. A change in the weather pattern that had been the dynamic between them since they’d left L.A.

He reached for two glasses filled with amber liquid on the coffee table, handed one to her.

She took it, drank. “Tell me,” she said.

He finished his drink in one swallow, then turned to face her, his eyes hooded, his expression unreadable. It was the face he wore for suspects in holding. The one he wore when he didn’t want anyone to see what he was thinking.

She tried not to be hurt by it. Whether Braden was holding something back from her was the least of her concerns. That was what her brain said anyway, even if her heart was very much in disagreement.

He started two years earlier, told her in broad strikes about the special projects he’d been assigned to with the Syndicate. It didn’t shock her that he’d been assigned to work with the criminal organization. She’d long ago resigned herself to the fact that sometimes bad guys were let go in order to bring in ones who were worse.

He told her about working to bring down Raneiro Donati, the Syndicate’s leader. None of it shocked her until he started talking about the other leaders — Nico Vitale, Farrell Black, Christophe Marchand.

She knew the names, had heard them whispered in the back rooms of the Bureau, knew they were protected by a vast network of legal organizations that shielded their criminal enterprise. But she wasn’t prepared for the fondness in Braden’s voice.

“I wasn’t supposed to like them,” he said. “But I did, and the truth is, I even came to admire them.”

“You admired them?”

He nodded slowly. “They had a code, and that code was immoveable.” He took a drink of the bourbon in his hand. “There was no bureaucracy, no watering down of the rules. You followed them or you were out.”

“Dead, you mean.”

“Sometimes,” he admitted.

“So you’ve been working for them,” she said bitterly.

“No.” His eyes were fierce. “I told you I wasn’t dirty.”

“Continue,” she said, falling back on the language she used when interrogating a witness, trying not to think too hard about the relief she felt hearing him reaffirm that he hadn’t been a dirty agent while at the Bureau.

“Nico told me about someone, someone who was like them but more… focused.”

“Focused?”

“On justice,” he said. “The Syndicate has an honor code, but their primary goal is profit and power. Although to be honest, I’m not sure either of those things are more dangerous in their hands than in the hands of the Bureau or the government or law enforcement.”

“We can debate that another time.” Her voice was hard. There was no question in her mind that profit and power was more dangerous in the hands of criminals, but now wasn’t the time for that discussion. “Tell me the rest.”

“This other… individual was a vigilante of sorts. Not a killer, but someone who did other things to even the scales, to right wrongs that had already been committed against people who were innocent.”

“What kinds of things?” she asked.

He met her eyes. “Thefts, hacks, dissemination of private information…”

A pit opened up in her stomach, expanding like a pool of quicksand threatening to pull her under. She heard the things he was saying — the things he’d been saying — as if underwater.

Thefts… La Jolla… San Diego County…

“Thefts?” She could barely get the word out.

He nodded. “Among other things.”

She stood, pacing the room. “Are you telling me you quit the Bureau to join some… band of thieves?”

He sighed. “That’s a little more poetic than I would have put it, but yes.”

“And did these people rob the First National Bank in Chula Vista last year?”

His face was perfectly still, revealing nothing. “You know I can’t tell you that.”

“What can you tell me, Braden?” She was fighting the abyss now, dropping like a stone in the sea, kicking for the surface, hoping desperately for a breath she knew wouldn’t come.

“Not much,” he admitted. “It will only compromise you.”

“Compromise me?” She laughed, but it was so brittle she thought it might break her in two on its way out of her body. “I was compromised the minute you fucked me.”

He clenched his jaw. “Well, you can take comfort in the fact that you’re not the only one who’s compromised at the Bureau.”

She stopped pacing. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I wasn’t dirty,” he said. “But someone is, someone on the Kalashnik sting.”

She shook her head. “That’s such bullshit, Braden. You’re just deflecting.”

“No,” he said. “It’s why I left when I did. I found something, and that guy who shot at us last night is proof.”

“That guy who shot at us last night was probably someone on the other end of your new business venture.”

He shook his head. “No one knows about that except you, and I haven’t done anything yet.”

His last words were like a lifeline. He hadn’t done anything illegal yet. It wasn’t too late to stop him.

“Then there’s still time to stop this,” she said.

“No.” His voice was firm.

“No, there’s not time? Or no, you don’t want to stop it?” she asked.

He hesitated. “Both.”

“Great. That’s just great. What exactly am I supposed to do with this information, Braden?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “You wanted the truth. This is the truth. The rest is up to you.”

“It’s up to me?” She shook her head, stalked to her bag on a bench in the foyer. She pulled out the file she’d packed at the last minute, walked back into the living room, threw it on the coffee table in front of Braden. Some of the papers spilled out. “It’s not up to me. Not anymore.”

He looked down at the file, reached for it slowly, like he knew it would change everything.

“What is this?” he asked, flipping through the pages.

“That’s the file for the new case I’ve been assigned to work with Shields.” She drew in a shaky breath before continuing. “It’s a series of thefts in San Diego County. A group of showy vigilantes. Oh, and they shot a guard last year. Does that ring any bells?”