He felt briefly buffeted by her pain, as if a great gust of wind had slipped by him. What could he tell her that would mollify her? He considered the state she was in, the amount of time she’d had to work herself up.

This was a complicated woman, of that Bourne had no doubt; she had hidden in plain sight for a number of years, insinuated herself into Estevan Vegas’s life. More than that, however, she had made his life her own. She had lived and breathed, she had become what she seemed to be. She was no longer Swedish. She had been mauled by a margay; she was Achagua, from the serpent line.

“You should make that tattoo permanent,” he said. “That skytale was beautiful.”

His words seemed alchemical, working a change in her. Her hand came off his shoulder and she sat back, abruptly exhausted. The dark, ugly thing in her eyes vanished. She seemed to have gone to another place, and was now back with him in Don Fernando’s house in Cadiz.

“One afternoon I saw a skytale in the forest not far from Estevan’s house,” she said. “It is a beautiful creature; as beautiful, in its way, as the margay. I drew it myself, using the natural plant dyes of the Achagua.”

“It’s been a long journey,” he said. “You are no longer who you were.”

She looked at him, as if for the first time. “That’s true for both of us, isn’t it?”

She rose off him then and stepped back, watching him warily as he got up, took the nail file out of his side. Blood spread across his shirt, and he took it off. He turned on the hot water and soaped the wound. It wasn’t serious at all.

“It’s bleeding a lot,” she said, from her safe distance.

Does she think I’ll strike her now? Bourne wondered. Retaliate in some way?

“Unlock the door,” he said as he tended to the wound. “Don Fernando is worried about both of us.”

“Not until you tell me the truth.” She took one hesitant step toward him. “Was my mother a spy, as well?”

“Not to my knowledge,” Bourne said. He remembered now. The force of Kaja’s emotion had dislodged the shard of memory from the lost depths of his past. “Your father was sent to kill the man who was then my boss. He failed. I was sent in retaliation.”

Kaja made a noise. She seemed to be having trouble breathing. “Why wasn’t my father—?”

“My target?” he finished for her. “Your father was already dead.”

“And that wasn’t enough?”

There was no possible answer he could give that would satisfy her—or, he thought, himself.

There is no reason.

Viveka Norén had been right. There had been no reason for her death, save Conklin’s need for revenge. But who had Conklin been hurting? Norén’s daughters were innocents, they didn’t deserve to have their mother taken from them. Conklin’s vindictiveness sent a chill through him. He had been Conklin’s instrument, trained and sent out again and again to terminate lives.

He rubbed his hands over his eyes. Was there no end to the sins he had compiled in the past he couldn’t remember? For the first time, he wondered whether his amnesia was a blessing.

“This isn’t the answer I wanted,” Kaja said.

“Welcome to the real world,” he said wearily.

He thought she might cry then, but her eyes remained dry. Instead, she turned and unlocked the door.

Don Fernando, standing on the threshold, wrenched it open. He stepped in with an appalled expression as he took in Bourne’s wound.

“My house has now become a corrida? Kaja, what have you done?”

She was silent, but Bourne said, “Everything is fine, Don Fernando.”

“I should think not.” He frowned at Kaja, who refused to look at him. “You have abused my hospitality. You promised me—”

“She did what she had to do.” Bourne found a sterile gauze pad in the medicine cabinet and taped it over the wound. “It’s all right, Don Fernando.”

“On the contrary.” Don Fernando was furious. “I helped you out of the friendship I had with your mother. But it’s clear you’ve spent too long in the Colombian jungle. You’ve picked up some very nasty habits.”

Kaja collapsed onto the edge of the tub, her palms pressed together, as if in prayer. “It was not my intention to disappoint you, Don Hernando.”

“My dear, I’m not angry for myself—I’m angry for you.” The older man put his back against the door frame. “Imagine what your mother would think of your behavior. She raised you better than that.”

“My sister—”

“Don’t talk to me about your sister! If I suspected you were anything like her I wouldn’t have let you anywhere near Jason.”

“Apologies, Don Fernando.” Kaja stared down at her hands.

Bourne had never heard Don Fernando raise his voice before. Clearly, Kaja had hit a nerve.

Don Fernando sighed. “If only you meant it. We are all liars here, we are all pretending to be what we’re not.” He looked from Kaja to Bourne. “Don’t you find it interesting that we all have a problem with identity?”

At last, Kaja lifted her head. “We’re all ruled by secrets.”

“Well, yes.” Don Fernando nodded. “But it’s the secrets that cause the problem with identity. To keep secrets is to lie, to lie is to cause a change of identity. And then time goes by, the lies become the norm, then the truth—at least our truth, and then… who are we?” His eyes cut away from Bourne’s. “Do you know, Kaja?”

“Of course I do.” But she had answered too quickly, and now she paused, thinking. A frown invaded her face.

“Are you Swedish,” Bourne said gently, “or Achagua?”

“My blood is—”

“But blood has so little to do with it, Kaja!” Don Fernando cried. “Identity has no basis in reality. It’s pure perception. Not only how others see you and react to you, but also how you think of yourself, how you react.” He grunted in what seemed mock disgust. “I think Jason is right. You should make that snake tattoo permanent.”

Kaja jumped up. “You were listening through the door!”

Don Fernando held up a key. “How else would I know whether I needed to open it.”

“Jason hardly needed your help,” she said.

“I wasn’t thinking about him,” Don Fernando said.

She looked up. “Thank you.”

It was astonishing, Bourne thought, how far she had come from being Rosie, Estevan Vegas’s Colombian mistress.

Don Fernando gestured. “I think we all could use a drink.”

Kaja nodded and rose. As the three of them returned to the living room, she asked about Estevan.

“Sleeping off his fear, gathering his strength, which he will need.” Don Fernando shrugged. “It is unfortunate. He only knows one life, and it’s a far simpler one than the one in which he now finds himself.”

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Kaja bristled. “Do you think I’m going to leave him?”

“If you do,” Don Fernando said as he poured them some of his extraordinary sherry, “you are sure to break his heart.”

She accepted the glass he handed her. “Estevan’s heart was broken long before he met me.”

“That doesn’t mean it won’t be again.”

Bourne accepted the sherry and sipped it slowly. He sat on the sofa. The adrenaline was wearing off and his side burned as if Kaja had stuck him with a hot poker.

“Kaja—” Bourne broke off at the shake of her head.

She came over and sat beside him. “I know Estevan and I would never have made it here without you. For this I thank you. And…” She stared down into the golden depths of her sherry. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “So. The past is the past. I have buried it.” Her head turned, her eyes engaged with his. “And so should you.”

Bourne nodded and finished his sherry. He waved Don Hernando off when he offered a refill.

“It would help me,” he said, “if you could tell me about your father.”

Kaja gave a bitter laugh, then took a long sip of her sherry. Her eyes closed for a moment. “How I wish there was someone who could tell me about him. One day, he went away. He left us as if we were a bunch of playthings he’d outgrown. I was nine. Two years later, my mother…” She could have finished that thought; she took a small sip of sherry instead. Light winked off the rim of the glass as she tipped it to her mouth. She swallowed hard. “Thirteen years ago. It feels like a lifetime.” Her shoulders slumped. “Sometimes several lifetimes.”