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“Did you miss me too?” Her voice shifts to a tone I can’t quite place. There’s still need, yes, but there’s something else.

Control.

She pulls something from my back pocket.

The cell phone set to record.

“And this,” she says, as she shifts her hips so her thigh is against the bulge of my gun, the one strapped to my leg. “How the hell are you expecting to get to that?”

“You weren’t planning on talking me out of my pants?” I ask, with as much confidence as I can muster. She’s right. It’s not an ideal place for a sidearm.

She presses pause on the cell and places it in my palm.

I slide it into my pocket. I reach for her instinctively. Stop myself, with my hands inches from her hips.

I hold my position.

She holds hers.

The room cackles with the energy between us. The things neither of us are saying.

How could you lie to me for two years straight?

How could you throw me in prison when I reached out.

Do you really expect me to believe that was a sincere attempt to win my favor? You should work on your suspension of disbelief.

Finally, she looks up at me and continues, “can we start with ‘I missed you, baby’?”

Baby. It’s what she called me when we were lovers.

With that same tone. The one that said I need you inside me. And not just in the carnal sense.

Her head and her heart too.

“Are you going to keep up the seduction routine or tell me why you invited me here?” I ask.

“They’re not mutually exclusive.” Her voice is all irony.

But when she offers her hand, and I take it, she bites her lip. No pretending. Only a desire to be close to me.

She takes me to the tiny kitchenette.

“Let me ask you something, Mattie,” she says, in that same ironic tone. “Why did you come here?”

“You left a calling card at a murder.”

“The Italian police could handle it,” she says.

“The Italian police would never catch you,” I say.

She smiles with pride.

It still makes my heart soar. My foolish body doesn’t get it. She’s a monster.

“You’re not here to fuck me. Not literally, anyway.” She looks me in the eyes. “And don’t give me shit about lying to you. The second you had a chance to turn in Jamie Moriarty, world-famous assassin, you did.”

That was after she betrayed me. That was different. Besides-- “You were there to kill me.”