But because—to my knowledge—science has not tested love’s power against ICE, I clutch Aiden’s hand, shivering under his arm.

His hold tightens around me and he tucks my face into his neck. “Hey, shh,” he murmurs in my hair. “We’re still fighting, love.”

Love always wins.

He runs his fingers through my tangles—I can’t even remember if I combed them. “Do you want me to recite the periodic table in Russian?”

I shake my head in his neck. I’ve tried it all morning, backward, forward, in Latin, Italian and Spanish. It didn’t work. “Just tell me something else…anything. I just want to hear your voice.”

His arms flex around me again and a hard swallow echoes from his throat. His body has turned to granite but I find the hard panes comforting. His lips brush over my hairline to my ear. “Do you want to hear a little story?” he whispers.

I nod.

“You have a birthday you don’t know about.” His whisper is almost a smile. I try to look at him but he keeps my face in his neck. “It’s April thirteenth, the night after the battle of Baghdad. At ten minutes past midnight. In a sand ditch. I was covered in mud, trying to get some sleep but the images in my head…well, you know. And there was Marshall next to me, flashlight in his mouth, scribbling a letter to Jasmine, this moronic smile on his face. I was pissed. What the fuck was he doing? He’d get us all killed with that damn flashlight. But then I realized I was just jealous. Marshall was going to make it through Iraq. He had something to live for and something to die for. He had Jasmine. I didn’t. Never wanted one. But I did that night. I wanted someone back home waiting for my letters. That’s when the fantasy of you started. You were perfect in my head, but you’re so much better in real life. And you kept me company all those nights. Now, what’s ICE going to do about that?”

Take you away from me.

I look up at him, tears dripping from my cheeks into his charcoal jacket. “Not a bloody thing,” I sniffle.

“Not a bloody thing.” He smiles and tucks me back in his neck. I focus only on his scent until Benson stops at the curb and gets out of the car, probably to give us a moment. Or escape.

Aiden wraps his hands around my wrists. “What are you going to remember when you walk in there?”

“That you love me.”

“That’s right.”

“And that I love you too.”

His grip on my wrists slackens. “Don’t, Elisa.”

“Why not?”

“You know why.”

“You don’t think you deserve to hear it, do you?”

He places his hand gently over my mouth. “Not now,” he says and, before I can protest, he opens the door and lifts me by the waist, and we climb out into another drizzly morning.

Aiden’s stride picks up speed as we charge through the automatic glass doors of Norman Reeves LLP and into the private elevator off the corner. We’re not late but the motion gives us both a sense of accomplishment—the body doing something even if the heart cannot.

I watch Aiden’s reflection on the polished door. He’s wearing a pinstriped charcoal suit and a slate-blue tie that matches his eyes. His sniper focus is similar to his determination the last time we came to this office.

How will this time end?

The moment we step into the twenty-sixth floor lobby, the same Adriana Lima look-alike receptionist springs to her feet. For a second, I think my red-rimmed eyes scared her, but her blush and drool at Aiden say plainly she has not even registered my presence. Her eyelash flutter is wasted.

“We know where we’re going, Miss Patterson.” Aiden raises his hand and marches straight to the conference room with opaque glass walls.

Bob is pacing by the window, a pen twirling in his fingers. The moment we enter, his eyes flit to our joined hands and he smiles.

“Options!” Aiden fires without any preamble. I sink into the closest chair I can find. He takes the seat to my right, still gripping my hand.

“Before that, we have an update.” Bob plops onto the chair across the marble table from us. “Just ten minutes ago, our contact at the DOJ called. Things got a little more complicated. They’ll want to question Elisa under oath. Probably before her deadline.”

“Why?” Aiden snarls and I gasp at the same time.

“Well, they’re very interested in your knowledge of Feign’s work. As they’ve seen repeated footage of you, they reasonably assume you’ve witnessed his affairs.”

“Yes, but she knows nothing about that fucker’s finances,” Aiden hisses. “She got paid peanut shells, and not from the asshole himself. Couldn’t even be in the fucking lobby. That sleazeball has a history with fraud. Cheated in college, defrauded his ex-wife in alimony. And now, he has concocted this scheme, taking advantage of people with no power.”

Bob assumes the expression of a pallbearer. “That may well be true but, given the fact that Elisa also shows up in his sketches, I suspect that she does know something about Feign and his paintings.”

“What sketches are these?” I whisper. “I never modeled my face at Feign’s.”

Bob flips through a tall stack of papers in front of him and hands me a thick envelope. Aiden leans over to look, his breath hot on my cheek. I open it with shaking hands, and we both gasp. The sketches are practice runs for Aiden’s painting. I set them facedown on the table, unable to look at Javier’s rendition of my eyes. He has given them a happiness I may only ever find in paintings.

Bob turns his full body to face me. “I think it’s time you tell me the truth, dear. So I can help you. And remember—it’s all attorney-client privileged, except as to Mr. Hale here. Whatever you say, it’s safe with me.”

I look at Aiden. He nods without hesitation and fills me a glass of water from a curvy pitcher on the table. But what about Javier’s secret?

“I’ll tell you what I know but I won’t give you any names,” I say.

Bob nods and I start explaining, taking a sip of water every time I skip over Javier’s name. In the end, Bob’s face is pale. Aiden’s is hard steel.

“My dear,” Bob sighs and straightens the stack of papers. “You have no choice but to tell the DOJ the truth. If you don’t cooperate, the green card denial is the least of your worries. They may charge you with aiding and abetting or perjury or obstructing justice. There’s jail time for that. And you haven’t done anything wrong. Why hide?”

The floor is shaking under my feet. “Because they’ll want to know my friend’s name!” I choke.

Bob nods gravely. “Yes, they will.”

“And what would happen to him then? To my family?”

A deep silence descends on the conference room. “He’d likely be deported and not able to return for at least ten years. They can also charge him with fraud too, and a jury would decide whether a fraudulent artist or an illegal immigrant is lying.”

“But he’s innocent! He didn’t participate in Feign’s fraud! He just paints so he can eat!”

Aiden’s arm tightens around my shoulders and he glares at Bob. “What about witness protection visas—S-5, S-6?” he hisses again. “Could they apply to him? Maybe he himself can testify and relieve her of the burden?”

Bob shakes his head. “The government reserves those visas for terrorist or organized crime witnesses. Not an isolated fraud case.”

“What about another witness? Can someone else come forward and render the need for her testimony irrelevant? The smoking gun if you will—so the investigation stops before they get to her.”

“Who else would know about this?” Bob asks, squinting his eyes.

“No one,” I say. “Feign would not have trusted anyone with this.”

“We’ll find someone.” Aiden arm flexes around my shoulders. “I’d do it myself but I’d only implicate her further.”

Bob shakes his head, squinting more at a vein in the black marble. The longer he is silent, the more my airways tighten.

“It’s a good thought,” he says at last. “But we can’t bank on it. Not with only days left. Besides, she has to explain about her modeling work. Otherwise, she’d still lose.”