We needed to do something, needed to make them hurt the way they’d hurt us.

You didn’t fight a battle by killing foot soldiers. You had to strike at the center of power, and more than anyone, I had the means to do it. I was done fucking around, done waiting for someone else to make the next move, done waiting like a fucking pawn in a game I didn’t know the rules for.

If Matt wanted to go off on his own, fine. He was a big boy, and as much as it pissed me off and scared me, there wasn’t a thing I could do about it. But I wasn’t the little woman, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to sit around twiddling my thumbs, waiting for him to bag big game and come home victorious. It was time to get on the board.

I pulled out my phone, my fingers dialing the familiar number, swallowing the bitter taste in my mouth.

Sometimes the ends justified the means.

She answered on the third ring.

I swallowed. “Hi, Mom.”

Matt

I stared out the window, regret coursing through me. Everything about this moment felt like déjà vu. Once again, I was headed to Afghanistan, leaving Kate behind in D.C. Once again, I was filled with the sense that I was doing something I had to do, and at the same time feeling like I’d left all of the essential parts of me behind, clutched in her small hands.

I didn’t want to love her.

It would be so much easier if I didn’t love her. If the sight of her, the sound of her voice, the feel of her touch, didn’t shatter my meager control. I’d learned the hard way that love could be a double-edged sword. Having it made you invincible; it also gave your enemies the ultimate chink in your armor. I lived in terror that someone would realize that I was still alive and that they would strike at me through the most obvious means—Kate.

I’d asked an old associate to watch over her, a guy who didn’t know me as Matt Ryan, simply as another mercenary, selling my skills to whoever would pay. I trusted him as much as I trusted anyone, and even though he didn’t know the full story, I knew the payment I’d promised him would secure his allegiance.

I hated leaving her.

I’d woken early and just lain in bed, watching her sleep. I’d thought about waking her and telling her that I was leaving, thought about sinking into her embrace and not leaving at all. But she was wrong—whether she thought it or not, I felt responsible for what had happened to her. She’d bled because of me, and I wasn’t the kind of man who could watch the woman he loved in pain and not do something about it.

I had to fix this. Had to find the missing pieces to connect our fathers to the death and destruction they’d wrought and put it behind us.

I tried to imagine a future with her, tried to envision a space for me in her life. Even if we managed to bring our fathers to justice, even if they were behind this, I wasn’t sure where that left me. This was bigger than two men; would I ever be able to stop running? Would she? I needed a fresh start, a new identity, needed to find a way to make a life that wasn’t roaming from country to country, traveling on forged papers, staying in shitty motels, taking jobs that left me feeling like no matter how many times I showered, I could never get the blood off of my skin.

When we were younger, we’d both had bright futures. I’d thought we could accomplish anything together, imagined raising a family; our life together had felt like the perfect fit. But now? I had nothing to offer her. She’d built a life for herself, had a prestigious career that I didn’t doubt she was great at. She had sisters she loved. I didn’t want her to give those things up to go on the run with me. Didn’t want her to know the feeling of constantly looking over your shoulder, of moving around every few weeks for fear that if you stayed somewhere long enough, your identity would be exposed and your life snuffed out.

All I wanted was to keep her safe, and I had no fucking clue how to do it, or if safe even existed anymore for people like us.

Chapter Eight

Kate Reynolds was seen at the Kennedy Center fund-raiser with her parents, Senator and Mrs. Edward Reynolds. Considering it’s been years since we’ve seen her in the company of her parents, we have to ask: Has the family rift finally been healed?

—Capital Confessions blog

Kate

God, I’d forgotten how much I hated these things.

Keep your friends close and enemies closer.

It had been three weeks since I’d been stabbed, since I’d last seen or heard from Matt, and I stood next to my parents, a champagne flute in hand, wearing a navy Calvin Klein gown that had wiped out my savings and probably meant I’d be skipping meals all month to avoid bouncing my rent check.

It was worth it to sneak back into their good graces.

I didn’t know if my father suspected anything; so far, he’d appeared genuinely happy to see me, the smile on his face broad as he stood bookended by my mother and me.

Considering how much of his platform included “family values,” the news that he’d fathered an illegitimate child had been a huge blow to his standing when Jackie’s paternity was revealed. Between that and all of the other things that made him impossible to deal with, Blair had withdrawn her support from his last Senate race, forcing him to campaign with only my mother representing the Reynolds family.

Losing Blair had been an irreplaceable blow considering she had always been the poster child for the Reynolds family—although the tarnish of her broken engagement and walking out of her wedding when she’d learned her fiancé was gay had taken some of the shine off of her utility to him.

I definitely wasn’t as valuable to his image, but I figured one daughter was better than none. Besides, I’d upped my game and put on the stupid dress and done my hair in a proper bun in an attempt to pave my way to reintegration.

I’d started with the phone call to my mother, figuring it was a little too obvious to reach out to my father directly. I’d played up my stabbing—sometimes you had to make the most of the cards you’d been dealt—and told her that the experience had made me think of my family and the rift between us. Apparently I’d sold it, because I’d wound up with an invitation to the Kennedy Center fund-raiser.

We didn’t have a big reunion. There had been no mention of the nearly four years when I’d basically had little to no interaction with either one of my parents.

We’d seen each other over the years—at Blair’s aborted wedding and assorted bridal events, at my graduation from Georgetown even though I hadn’t invited them—but it had all been more for appearances than anything else. And even now, we didn’t talk about any of it. The Reynolds family didn’t discuss their feelings or air their dirty laundry—unless someone else aired it for them.

In a way, the whole thing felt fucking surreal. Like I was a kid again, being paraded around to impress everyone with how golden we all were. I didn’t have my sister’s elegance or poise, but I had graduated at the top of my Georgetown class and landed a job at the CIA, which pleased my father, even as I knew my mother cringed at me doing something so unfeminine.

Whatever. I was here for one reason and one reason only, and if that meant burying my pride and playing the game by their rules, then fine.

I needed to get into his office.

I’d thought about it a lot, and if he did keep any incriminating information, I figured he’d keep it at home. The security at my parents’ was insane, and since Blair and I had moved out, it was private. I just needed to figure out an excuse to get into the house and search.

I figured getting close to them was step one. I only hoped I could get to the endgame soon, because I was kind of a shitty actress, and I wasn’t sure how much more of this I could take.