Page 47 of Free to Judge

Declan looks up. Unrestrained pain in his face shows how much he hides when he’s in full operational mode. “Yeah. She went through the classes at Quantico a few years before me. Right off the bat, she told me she didn’t do probie partners.”

My smile is tentative. “So how did she react to being partnered with you?”

His smile turned rueful. “About as well as you’d expect. She was brash, arrogant, made fun of my accent every time I spoke in a different language.”

Tears well up in my eyes at the filial fondness in his voice.

“She was lethal and vicious but had this calm way of watching people—seeing them without letting them know she was watching. She was supposed to be my partner. But she became more than that.”

“She became your family,” I whisper.

His eyes meet mine. “What amazes me about you and your family is you can see that yet people I worked with, people Ispent years with, people who knew us both whispered openly that I must have had her murdered to get in with the Byrnes.”

I don’t flinch at what Declan is saying. However, an overriding urge is compelling me to do something that, a week ago, I never would have imagined I could be capable of. Standing, I reach for his hand and tug him upright. Removing his glass from his hand, I give him a solemn look.

He frowns down at me. “What is it? Do you want me to leave?”

Without a word, I wrap my arms around his waist and hold on. I feel a tremor of shock run through him before he steadies himself and he clutches me tightly. He doesn’t release the storm of emotions I know are still locked inside him, but I can tell something settles within him.

“What do we do? What do you need from me?”

He pulls back. The same intensity is in his eyes but the storm is banked. For now. “I don’t make the same mistakes. This time, no one will get hurt.”

Stepping back, I pick up my glass and toast him. “That’s a plan I can drink to.”

Later that night, as I am getting ready for bed, I receive a text that cracks my heart wide open.

Declan:

You keep surprising me.

Declan:

Tonight…I have no words.

Kalie:

Whenever.

Declan:

Soon.

I crawl into my bed, feeling safe. Knowing that I’m protected.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

After spending so long undercover,I believed my emotions had been tampered with—hibernated before they could betray me. Yet tonight, after spending time with Kalie, the more I feel about everything.

Especially her.

I never could have imagined someone like her entering my life—so fierce, so full of fire.

So perfect.

Sinking back in my desk chair in my home office, I catch a glimpse of my face reflected back at me in the mirror on the opposite wall. I can’t help but wonder how Director Holder would react if he could see what I’ve become. Would he berate me for blurring the boundaries he demands his agents maintain—for feeling something for a woman who should never have been involved in the op to begin with?

Then again, I’ve been under for years. How long is a person expected to live without feeling something? Anything?