Her eyes flickered to the small screen attached to the wall in the corner of the room. No one was talking about the assassination anymore. A scientist had conclusively—he said—proved that fracking will kill the planet’s infrastructure within fifty years. So that had been the main headline since she’d got to the hospital. Some people believed him, some didn’t. So she suspected after all the furor, things would go back to normal. But meantime, the 3D hologram of the collapse of the planet that he’d shown at his presentation was on every channel. She watched the implosion on the TV for about the tenth time.

“Is the world ending?” A hoarse voice came from the bed.

“David!”

“So that’s a yes?” he said, trying to reach for a glass of water.

“Stop! Don’t…pull anything. You have more stitches than the curtains there. Just let me bring it to you. She struggled with her wheelchair for a second, and smiled at her own attempts to get out without putting the brake on.

“Jesus. Why are you in that wheelchair? What happened?” He winced as he tried to move.

“Don’t do that either. Let me adjust the bed so you can see that I’m fine. They put me in it because of the drugs Victoria gave me. A lot, apparently.”

She sat on the bed and held the water to his lips. He sipped and cleared his throat.

“They didn’t take you out of the country?” he asked, concern etched across his face.

Molly looked down at the bed. “They wanted to, but I made a deal with them to stay.”

“And why would you have done that?” He frowned.

“I wanted to make sure you didn’t die. But now I know you’re okay, I’ll be off. Nice knowing you…” She got up to leave, brushing imaginary lint from her jeans.

“I don’t blame you, sweetheart. I let you down back there. I’m so…”

“What? Are you kidding me? You never let me down. Not once.” She was taken aback that he’d thought that for a moment.

He frowned again. “You left. I figured you’d had enough of me leading you into danger,” he half choked out, half whispered.

Her stomach contorted at the thought that he’d been carrying this. “Oh my God. I’m so sorry. It never occurred to me that you’d think that. I left because I hated myself that I’d got you involved in the mess I was in. I just wanted you to have…what do they call it? Plausible deniability? I didn’t want you to go to jail for helping me. I wanted you safe. You’d already been through so much…that was all it was.” Tears leaked out of her eyes as she stood up.

He grabbed her hand. “Not so fast, sweetheart. I’m not letting anyone debrief you except me. Last time you were debriefed we all ended up here. What happened to Peterson, by the way?”

“Being raked over the coals by the embassy staff, I heard,” Molly said. “Anyway, before I make up my mind to stay or go…what kind of debriefing did you have in mind? Because, I should tell you now. I’m not wearing any.”

“I’m planning on debriefing you for a long, long time. Just…as soon as I can move without morphine.”

Joy flooded her veins with such power that tears started falling. “I’m sorry, it’s not you, it’s the drug.” She swiped at her tears and held tissues to her nose. She wasn’t really sure that was true.

“It had better be me.” He pressed the button on his remote control, and slowly, very, very slowly, the bed slid upright, so his lips were inches away from hers.

“I guess…it was always you,” she breathed, as she leaned forward to claim her future.

EPILOGUE

David checked into the hotel again, this time under a fake name, getting an uncomfortable feeling of déjà vu. The receptionist handed him a key and a letter, sealed in an envelope. He extended the handle of his suitcase and headed toward the elevator. Once away from the desk, he opened the letter.

A grin spread across his face, and a tiny sliver of unease. He hoped she wasn’t going to do to him what he’d done to her the year before. He looked around the lobby and spotted her, ostensibly reading an Athens newspaper upside-down while waiting in line for the receptionist. He tried not to laugh. He leaned against the pillar where he had checked his email on his phone that morning after the cocktail party. Whatever happened to Mal? He couldn’t wait to find out what mess he’d gotten himself into. Bound to be a good story. All he knew was that Baston was furious with him. So that warmed the cockles.

“I simply must have the same room I was in before. I loved it so much. You understand. A girl wants what a girl wants. Can you see if it’s available? It was number 1214? I’m only staying for the one night.” He could hear Molly chatting up the receptionist from where he was. She played the demanding guest to a T.

She was also quite demanding with him too. Thinking about the unique physical therapy she’d been threatening him with had sped up his healing to no end. And today was the first day they’d been able to finish the mission. The leadership conference started in ten days, and the hotel was emptying out in preparation. They already knew that room 1214 was empty now.

“Thank you so much,” Molly said, as she pulled her suitcase toward the elevators. He joined her, and they stared at the elevator doors pretending not to know each other. They stepped back as other guests got off the elevator, and then got on. Just as the doors were about to close, a hand snaked around them, making them open again.

Sadie. “If you think I trust you two alone in a hotel room while I’m waiting patiently downstairs, you’re very mistaken.

David didn’t reply, but Molly giggled. He still couldn’t believe she’d kept this secret from him, and from Victoria. But he would exact his punishment. Again, and again.

They all got off on the twelfth floor, and Molly led the way to the room. She opened the door, and David and Sadie followed.

“Okay. Wait here,” Molly said. She went into the bathroom and stood on the side of the bath. David shook his head in disbelief as they both watched her through the doorway. How would an archaeologist come up with this shit?

She popped a ceiling tile and felt around. An expression of victory lit up her lovely face. “Got it!”

She handed it over with a solemn, “Use this only for good,” and Sadie took it, rolling her eyes. They all looked at it in her palm. It was a key with a website address scratched on its leather fob.

“Doubrov slipped it to me as soon as he saw me. I don’t think he had any idea that I was also trying to slip him something, which is why he froze. I guess we both did. I didn’t know what it was, so I hid it in the bathroom. I didn’t mention it, because I didn’t know who I could trust.” Molly looked at David. “I do now.”

“I’ll give it to the station director and see if he can figure out what it is.” Sadie said, tucking it into her pocket. “It was nice meeting you both, but remember what you signed. You can’t talk about what happened here to anyone. Not about Doubrov, the key, the note…and especially about me. Clear?”

“Absolutely,” Molly said.

“Crystal.” David replied. He’d signed so many of those documents during his time in the military that he barely even thought about it.

“Good luck to you,” Sadie said to David, as she opened the door. “You might need to handcuff her to something to keep her out of trouble. You know what to do now.” The door slammed and she was gone.

“She has good ideas, that woman,” David said taking out a cotton handkerchief.

“What? What do you know what to do?” Molly said, hand on hips.

“You in handcuffs.” He started to wipe down every surface they had touched. The bathroom door, the wall that Molly had braced herself against to climb up to the ceiling, and the ceiling tile itself, not that it held fingerprints well, but you couldn’t be too careful. “Now let’s go, and we can talk about how Doubrov gave you something that you failed to tell me about.” He basically knew what had happened, but he wanted her to admit that she’d done it to keep him safe. Crazy, stupid, amazing woman.