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“You said you had a bad relationship though,” he said, and she nodded letting out a deep breath to explain it to him.
“I met John during my last UC assignment. He wasn’t part of the group that I was investigating—trying to get close to, but he was friends with someone that was in it. I was working in a coffee shop that the guy I was trying to get information on went to regularly. John came in with him one day and started flirting with me, which was sickening because I was pretending to be sixteen, almost seventeen. I even told him I was sixteen and he still kept flirting with me. He had to be at least thirty so while not a scumbag trafficker, he was still gross, but getting close to him, got me close to my mark.
“I was on the job so it’s not really something you’re supposed to do anyway. Since he wasn’t technically my target, it’s a bit murky as to whether anyone would have had an issue with it if I had slept with him, but I never wanted to. He gave me a pass at first, but the last months he really started to push for it and when I said no still the final month, he turned mean. I was already dealing with having gotten in with the group we were after, trying to get the proof to take them down, and it was all arounda very ugly situation,” she admitted as his eyes softened further watching her.
“I’m sorry, babydoll. I can’t imagine the stress you were under with all of that. Is that why you were out on leave then? Did he hurt you forcing you to have to pull out?” Tyler asked and she wished she could just say yes and leave it at that, but if her true identity was ever discovered, he could be in danger being in the dark.
“He smacked me around, broke into my shitty apartment more than once trying something, which made me cautious about my sleeping space and why finding you in my bed that first morning spooked me. I woke up one morning to him crawling up over me so waking up with your arm around me, I reacted before I remembered where I was, but that’s not why I came out here,” she said with a sigh, and his hand tightened in hers comforting her enough to get the rest out. “The group we were after liked to use girls to lure new ones to them. That’s one of the goals I was given for the that op. To become one of their recruiters so I could find who and where the head of their organization was. Groups like that aren’t easy to break into but getting close to John let me get close to my mark, letting me get into it. It’s living hell seeing the things they do and not being able to help, having to do some really vile things in order to get deep enough to bring the beast down.
“One of my tasks was to lure in a girl they’d had their eyes on for months. No one else had been able to get close to her, and believe me, it’s the last thing I wanted to do, but this group was massive. They had people in most of the major cities up and down the east coast luring in girls to traffic. The deeper you get with them, the more real things become, the more life and death they become. I didn’t have a choice. I either brought the girl in or I would be out the door, and they’d find someone else to fill my spot. So I did it, brought her in even though I wanted thecomplete opposite in the moment. It got me closer to the group and when she was supposed to be on the way to the creep that ‘bought’ her, she was intercepted so it didn’t happen, but I still felt repulsed by all of it.”
“You did what you had to, what your job was. You can’t be angry with yourself for wanting to help more than just one girl, Just,” he said gently, and she smiled gratefully for that.
“That’s what I kept telling myself. Over and over the next six months. I was finally in a spot where they were listening to me, and I suggested they bring in one of my old ‘friends’ from New Jersey where I used to live. She was an agent like me, and we hoped that between the two of us, we’d be able to work faster. We went up to Jersey, met with her, and they liked her, which got me more bonus points, getting me more info on how they really were run, but not enough to stop them yet. The last two months before I came out here were the worst. John was following me, which made problems trying to keep my connection to the group quiet as well as keeping my check-ins with Luke from being uncovered.
“I finally had to get John arrested which didn’t please his friend, but I hoped it’d calm things on that side a bit. And it did,” she admitted, her face clouding over at what was coming, “at least until they sent out another agent to check in with me on things. They needed to do a review to ensure I was still capable of doing the assignment as well as to confirm I hadn’t been turned, that I was still loyal. I was, more than ever, and they saw that, so I thought everything was going to be fine. Except apparently someone in the group saw me with the agent, and even though he was dressed like a normal person and we’d met somewhere that should have been safe, the guy that saw us knew who he was because Agent Marks arrested his brother ten years earlier.”
“They thought you were what? Trying to double-cross them?” Tyler asked and she nodded.
“I was grabbed before I could make it back to my apartment, taken to a warehouse and questioned—intensely. I tried to play it off as if he was just some guy trying to pick me up, but they didn’t buy it. My initial mark sent the others to get proof that I wasn’t who I claimed to be and when it was just us, I managed to get out. I went straight to a pickup spot and was back in D.C. that night. We got in contact with the other agent immediately, pulling her out as well, hoping that would be the end of it.”
“But it wasn’t I take it?”
“No. I’d brought in a third person. Kate wasn’t an agent, wasn’t a new lure. She was one of the lured. I got worried when I didn’t hear from her after two days and reached out via a burner phone, getting a reply that she needed help getting out, that she didn’t feel safe any longer. We set a time for when she’d normally take her daily walk she was allowed, and I headed out to get her. Except I got delayed by the agent that ended up blowing my cover wanting to know what happened, denying that he was responsible for it, and I was late. When I got there, she wasn’t there, and I finally had Moe track her phone. She was in bad shape when I found her,” Justine forced out, tears slipping free at the memory of it. “We got her to the hospital but while they were trying to stabilize her, I was ordered back to D.C. to answer more questions. I finally was able to go home, to the townhouse I owned. I hadn’t heard anything about her condition so when my phone rang, the last thing I expected to hear was that she’d died…”
“Oh god, baby,” Tyler whispered, pulling her tighter against his chest, his hand running down her head gently as his lips kissed the tears away.
“She came around right before it happened. Told the agents there that they’d tortured her until she told them who I reallywas. She was so sorry that she betrayed me when she was the one in the hospital, beaten within an inch of her life. The doctor thought she was going to make it, but apparently a blood clot caused a pulmonary embolism. The last thing she told them was that she’d told the boss who I was…told Dynamite who I was. I was completely compromised. My home wasn’t safe but even worse than all of that, of her dying, is that Dynamite was my mark from the start. He was the boss and right under my nose, and I didn’t see it.”
“You weren’t the only one that didn’t see it, Justine. If the FBI had any clue that he was in charge, they would have said that when they sent you in. Would have given you some clue that he was the one to watch, wouldn’t they?” Tyler said cupping her cheek, brushing the last of the tears from her lashes.
“I just…I got away from him. He’d thrown me around, had hit me trying to get me to admit that I was feeding info to the feds on them, but none of it was anywhere close to what he’d done to Kate. I started to question it then, why didn’t he go that hard on me, but he had on her? The only thing that I could come up with was that maybe he didn’t really think I was betraying them, that until I disappeared he didn’t really buy it, but when I vanished it confirmed at least some of his suspicions, sending him after Kate because she was the closest of any of the girls I brought in, because she knew what was happening from the start. Me running got her killed.”
“No, it didn’t, Just. She died from a blood clot that not even the doctors could stop. I’m sure she knew what she was risking going in to start, that there was no guarantee she’d be safe, just as there wasn’t any guarantee you’d be safe working undercover. It’s tragic but you didn’t cause it,” Tyler said, making her fall harder for him at the sweetness of his tone. It was firm but full of empathy and care and she needed that more than anything now. “Is that why you were so scared the first few weeks?Waking up from nightmares as well I’m guessing? You were—still are—worried that they’ll come here to find you?”
“I came here because it’s the only place that I was sure I’d be safe. Because of all of the online stuff I was doing as a contractor, we’d set up a fake identity in case anyone came looking for me. That’s what I was using when I met Kate, and it seemed safest to continue using it for pretty much everything. It’s the name that was listed on my townhouse. The only place I have my real name listed is on my official documents with the FBI, everywhere else I go by Elena Jones, so while they knew I was an FBI agent, knew where I lived, they still don’t know who I really am or where to find me now. Which is important because…” She paused certain he’d freak out learning the truth of what happened to really bring her out here. “When I got the warning that I was completely compromised, that my identity as Elena had to be scraped, I knew I didn’t have long to get out of there. I grabbed what was most important, threw it in a bag, and slipped out the back. I had programmable lights in the house, so it’d look like someone was home, even if I wasn’t, and I turned them off, making it look like I was going to bed, while really, I slid through a hidden gate in fence and into the neighbors’ backyard. He was retired police and knew I was FBI, so he was fine with me having the escape route to his place.”
“And how old was this guy?” Tyler asked making a tiny smile tug at her lips.
“Sixty-seven,” she answered easily seeing him relax at that news. “He was still up so he saw the alert that came through that someone was detected outside his place, and he came out to see if I was okay. When I explained what was going on, he said he’d give me a ride to the office. We were in his garage when the sound of something exploding came to us. He told me to wait where I was, and he went out to see what was happening. Someone threw a Molotov cocktail through my front window.We all knew it was them, so we had them report that there was one fatality in what was being called an arson investigation. They pulled out an unclaimed body that was burnt beyond recognition but about my size and put the name Elena Jones on it even to make it seem real. As far we know, they bought that I was dead, but the group’s also disappeared. No one’s seen or heard from them since then.”
“How long before you got here did all of this happen?” he asked, rubbing her cheek with his knuckles again, calming her and the churning emotions surrounding her.
“About three weeks,” she admitted sending his brow upward. “I was stuck in a safehouse while they searched for them, detailing everything I possibly could, but it all was just so draining. I was on the verge of having panic attacks at the thought of walking outside, so I had to talk to a shrink, which I definitely didn’t want to do at the time. They said it was PTSD and put me on medical leave. I was still in the safehouse, but I was getting worse instead of better and I told them I had to get away from D.C. for a while. Everyone agreed it was likely for the best. From the bureau’s standpoint, me not needing the safehouse meant it costing them less. They didn’t have to keep someone on me, especially coming here. I flew to LA with a team that was headed out here, so I didn’t have to go through the airport and once in LA, I got the rental and drove the rest of the way here with the few possessions that I had left. They were things that were either in a storage shed or at the office and not in my house because everything there was destroyed.”
“Holy shit, Just. God baby, no wonder you were trying to push me…us away, were so…hesitant that first day. I hated how unlike my Justine the girl I knew and loved you were acting, at least until I had you in my arms,” he added putting a light flush in her cheeks. “I’m sorry I pushed when you weren’t ready. If I’d known…”
“You would have still pushed, just maybe in a different way,” she mused making his brow lift curiously. “It’s what you did in high school. I wanted nothing to do with you because you seemed to hate the very sight of me, but even before you kissed me that night part of me was drawn to you, wanted to be near you—without the being picked on at least.”
“What’s that little Just smile about, babydoll?” he questioned as it snaked across her face, brightening her eyes soothing part of the pain that filled him learning what she’d been through. What could have happened to her without him ever knowing the truth of what she’d done for Hailey—for him?
“Just remembering what Isabelle said to me while we waited for a chance to get away,” she answered sending his chin up a bit further. “I didn’t think admitting that we were together, then or now, was the best thing to do while we were there, but I’d assured her that I didn’t want anything to do with the feud. It had her questioning me since it seems people at church were talking about our little verbal volley at the reunion. So I might have said that you used to make my life hell during high school.”
“That’s why she told me I had to be nicer to you now at the hospital. I wondered where it came from,” he said, gathering her closer to him thanking god that she was here with him, safe, alive, able to have a future with him. “You enjoyed part of it though, you can’t deny that.”
“I only enjoyed sparing with you after I knew it wasn’t hatred being lobbed at me, but that you really loved me, which let me admit that I loved you just as much.”
“Then and now,” he said, stealing her words before stealing her lips in a sweet, lingering kiss.
