Page 80 of Fractured Allegiance

She reaches into her pocket and pulls out cash, leaves it on the table beside her empty plate. Stands.

"Get it under control. Next check-in is in seventy-two hours. Don't make me track you down."

She walks past me toward the door, pausing only to call back over her shoulder, just loud enough for the waitress to hear: "Good seeing you, cousin. Tell your mom I said hi."

The bell chimes as she leaves.

I sit there for a long moment, staring at the plate in front of me. The eggs have gone cold at the edges, congealing into something unappetizing. The toast sits limp with butter that's hardened into waxy streaks.

But I force myself to eat anyway.

Not because I'm hungry, I'm not. But because walking out immediately after Naomi would look suspicious to anyone who might be watching. And because sitting here, chewing mechanically through breakfast I can't taste, is easier than going back out into the morning and facing what she just confirmed.

I'm compromised.

The eggs taste like cardboard. The coffee burns going down but doesn't wake me up. I eat half the plate, leave cashon the table—enough to cover both meals and a decent tip—and stand.

The waitress catches my eye as I head for the door. "Have a good one."

"You too," I manage.

The bell chimes again as I step outside.

The sun's starting to rise now, bleeding orange and pink across the skyline. The city's waking up—more cars on the street, a few early joggers passing by, someone hosing down the sidewalk in front of a bodega.

Normal people doing normal things.

And here I am, an undercover agent who just got read the riot act by his handler for caring too much about a woman who's supposed to be part of the case I'm building.

I shove my hands in my pockets and start walking.

No destination this time either. Just movement.

But no matter how far I go, I can't outrun the truth Naomi left sitting on that table between the coffee and the cold eggs:

If I don't get this under control, it's going to get one of us killed.

Maybe both.

When I finally return to my apartment, the halls are silent. The fluorescents buzz too loudly. My room smells like metal and old sweat. I shower with the lights off. Don’t bother drying off before I sit at the edge of the bed and stare at the wall like it owes me something.

My bruises from the warehouse are blooming now. Purple across my ribs. A scrape along my jaw.

The only part of me that doesn't hurt is the part that saw her.

I don't sleep.

I pull up the draft report instead. Read through it twice. Lydia's name is there, has to be, especially now after the meeting with Naomi. Leaving her out would raise more flags than including her. She was collateral. A bystander. Nothing in her actions suggests otherwise.

I type it clean: Lydia Carr, present as guest escort. No active participation. Evacuated without incident.

Three sentences that tell the truth without making her matter.

I hit send before I can second-guess it.

Then I head to the office—the one the Bureau built for me out of thin air, all clean glass and fabricated invoices. My name on the door means nothing, but it's good cover. I spend the whole day moving numbers that don't exist, approving shipments that will never arrive, pretending this is what normal looks like.

The day drags, a long stretch of edits and half-truths that all start to sound the same.