Outside the Law

by Michelle Karl

  “Or maybe they don’t blame you at all. Maybe someone got to him? Paid him off when we evaded them, to avoid us going back to him for help?”

  Noel’s stomach sank toward his shoes. “I guess that’s possible. Plausible, even.” He ran a hand down the side of his face again, wishing not for the first time that he had more experience. An FBI agent with a long history might have a better chance at outsmarting bad guys, but him? He was so green it was all he could do to keep his cool. Having Yasmine around seemed to be helping. In fact, he’d begun to wonder how he’d managed all these years without her.

  So much about her had changed, yes—but in even more ways, she was still the same girl he’d had a crush on all those years ago. Only now, he felt something much deeper when he looked at her...and yet, they still had a massive wall of lost years between them.

  He glanced at Yasmine, wondering if he should ask again about her time in Amar, but she’d turned to gaze out the window at the passing landscape as the sun sank the rest of the way below the horizon. He swallowed his curiosity and focused on the road. They had a long way to go and would need to form a solid plan before reaching the Pentagon. Getting inside wouldn’t be easy—Noel was well aware of that—but his status as an FBI agent meant it might not be impossible.

  They fell into a comfortable silence, and soon he heard the slow, steady rhythm of Yasmine’s breathing. She’d taken the painkillers and fallen asleep with her head lolled against the window, one hand tucked underneath her cheek. How could she sleep like that? She’d wake with an awful cramp if she slept that way for long.

  She looked so beautiful with her eyelids closed and her lips slightly parted. Her mouth was so soft, so inviting. If only they weren’t running for their lives.

  “Eyes on the road, Fed,” Yasmine mumbled.

  He flushed and stared straight ahead. He should have known better than to sneak so many looks her way. “Sorry. How’s the pain?”

  “Okay. I’ll need to take more medicine before we reach DC.”

  “Got it.” She sat upright and shifted in the seat, and from the corner of his eye he saw her turn toward him but then settle back in place as though she’d changed her mind about something.

  After much time and many miles, Yasmine finally spoke. “Noel... I haven’t told you the whole story about why I stayed away.”

  He swallowed the lump that immediately formed in his throat. This was what he’d been waiting to hear, but the strain in her voice made him wonder if he wanted to hear it, after all. “It’s okay, Mina. You don’t have to tell me.”

  “No, I want to.” She sighed deeply and turned slightly toward him again. “I met someone in Amar.”

  Noel’s stomach tightened. He remained silent, not wanting to spook her, because something in her tone told him that this was the thing she’d held back from him since they’d reunited. She’d been so evasive when he’d asked about Amar. He pressed his lips together to keep from blurting out his questions.

  “His name was Marc. He loved computers and worked as an information technology specialist at the American University of Amar. We met while I was in school, long before I signed up for military service. It was only because of him that I enrolled. He hadn’t yet done his year of compulsory service, and the only way for me to be able to remain in Amar was to obtain dual citizenship, which required completion of the compulsory service.”

  Noel wanted to ask why she’d wanted to become a dual citizen, but he had a feeling he knew what she’d say. His suspicions were confirmed by her next words.

  “We were engaged. Immigration laws in Amar are very strict, so if I wanted to take the job offer I had, get married and stay there, dual citizenship was the only option. Turned out it was all for nothing.”

  Noel clenched his jaw, getting an even worse feeling about where the story was going. “What happened?”

  Yasmine’s tone shifted from sad to matter-of-fact. “Simply put? He cheated on me, and I only found out about it when I caught him. I thought he loved me, but it turned out I was wrong.”

  “Yasmine, I’m so sorry.” The tension in Noel’s stomach turned quickly to anger. “That’s horrible. To have seen that, to have endured that kind of betrayal... I can’t even imagine.”

  “He was an excellent liar,” she said, her voice lowered to nearly a whisper. “He had me fooled, Noel. We were together for nearly five years. How many other times had he done that behind my back? I still don’t know, and I don’t want to. I moved back to the United States partially to escape that memory, that pain of being in the same country as him. I just couldn’t be there anymore. I wanted to come home. Plus, Daniel was here, and Dad’s side of the family is spread out across the East Coast. And Mom’s sister is here, Auntie Zee—she came back when we didn’t. Still, I’m... I’m not sure I did the right thing, sometimes. Moving back here.”

  Instinctively, Noel reached across the seats and took Yasmine’s hand where it rested in her lap. “You did what you had to do to move on. Marc was an idiot. Anyone who would do something like that...well...obviously never deserved you in the first place.”

  She sniffed as though trying to fend off tears. “I know that. In my head, I know that. But still I wonder, was there something I could have done? Was I lacking in some way? Maybe it’s my fault he fell into another woman’s arms. Maybe—Look, I’m sorry,” she said, pulling her hand free from his. “I didn’t mean to make a big deal about it. I just thought you deserved to know the whole story.”

  He cleared his throat, wishing not for the first time that he knew what to say. If Marc was anywhere in the near vicinity, he’d teach the man a thing or two about keeping promises. Yasmine deserved to be with someone who made her his world. He felt a strong urge to tell her, to erase that sadness from where it had settled across her features.

  Noel maneuvered onto the side of the road, turned off the lights and cut the engine. “No, stop apologizing. Right now.” In the moonlit darkness, he saw tears glisten on her cheeks. He had a sudden urge to kiss away each and every one of them.

  He wanted her to know that what Marc did wasn’t her fault, could never be her fault.

  He wanted to make her whole again.

  “You can’t blame yourself,” he said. “And I think you know that. It hurts—of course it does—but in the end, he made a choice to walk away from the promises you made to each other.”

  She shook her head. “Maybe I was wrong to make those promises to anyone in the first place. Maybe I’m just not worth it.”

  How could he explain it to her so she’d understand? Of course she was worth it. She was strong, capable, interesting. Unique. Beautiful. Driven. Everything that a man might want in a woman.

  Everything he wanted in a woman.

  Like a lightbulb illuminating the darkness, he realized a stark truth that he’d been trying to deny since the moment this woman had leaped across the hood of his car and plunged inside to escape an onslaught of bullets.

  He might have spent ten years apart from Yasmine Browder, but she had never been far from his heart or mind. And that childhood crush? It had reblossomed in a short time into a deep, unconditional love.

  Without thinking, he reached his hand behind her head and pulled her toward him. She pushed back, hesitant, for only a moment. Then she allowed him to draw her close.

  “Worth it?” He whispered, his lips hovering a breath away from hers. “You, Yasmine Browder, are priceless.”

  And then, after more than a decade of waiting and dreaming about the possibility of this moment, he kissed her.

  THIRTEEN

  They breathed through the moment together, lips parted, as Yasmine’s mind dashed from sensation to sensation. The gentleness of his touch and the comfort of his fingers entwined in her hair. The rough skin of his lips that spoke to weeks spent in training, in learning how to seek justice and protect others in the very way he protected he
r right now. She felt none of the urgency behind his kiss that she’d sensed every time she and Marc had shared a tender moment. It was as though Noel wanted to show her that things could be different—that love didn’t make demands, that it wasn’t self-seeking.

  Wait, love? No, that couldn’t be it. Not yet. Maybe not at all, not with Noel. But then his nose gently brushed against her cheek as they drew apart, and she realized she didn’t want the moment to end.

  How had this happened?

  Hadn’t she wanted it to?

  His demeanor shifted as he sat back in his seat. Had he ended it? Had she? She wanted him to pull her back to him, but the sudden frown on his face shattered any illusion that he could have possibly felt the same. Her heart felt heavy as he started the vehicle, refusing to look at her.

  “Noel? What’s wrong?”

  He cleared his throat and steered onto the road. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

  It felt like he’d punched a hole clear through her chest. “What are you talking about? If you weren’t driving, I’d pull you right back over here so you could do it again.”

  He sighed and glanced at her. “I’m not the right guy for you, Mina. You deserve better. Someone who can always be there for you. Who won’t break any more promises.”

  “And you’re saying you would break promises?” The image of Marc’s smirking face sprang to mind, mocking her. Telling her that she’d never do better than him.

  Noel slumped in his seat. “Not on purpose. Never on purpose. But right now, I don’t even know if I have a job after this. If I do, but Crais has actually turned on us, I could very well end up working in an FBI office clear across the country. You have your bakery, and you’ve made a life for yourself in Newherst. I mean, even if I am able to stay at the Buffalo office, the life of an FBI special agent is highly unpredictable. I can’t promise that I wouldn’t break any promises.”

  “You’d never be unfaithful.” She posed it as a statement, not a question. She felt the truth of it in their kiss, how much he cared for her. Despite his words, that kiss had revealed how much he wanted to be with her, and until that moment, she hadn’t been willing to admit to herself how much she wanted to be with him, too. Life had given them this second chance, and Noel was going to throw it away? “So, you’re worried you might miss out on a few date nights? Noel, I can handle unpredictable. I was in the military, remember? I’m not a fragile flower. And as long as business keeps up, I’m sure I can hire someone at the bakery to run it when I can’t be there.”

  He shook his head, and each movement felt like another spike driven into her heart. “You deserve better. You’re an amazing woman, Mina. You’ll find the right man or he’ll find you, and it’ll be the best thing that ever happened to him.” She saw him swallow, blinking too rapidly for the facade of calm displayed on the rest of his face. “I only hope he realizes it before it’s too late.”

  The finality of his tone made her wish she could find someplace to hide by herself for a little while. She closed her eyes, trying to think of anything but the pain, which had worsened at Noel’s declaration and had started to creep back through her limbs and her ribcage. At least the graze on her knee from the apartment shooting seemed like a tiny scratch compared to everything else.

  They drove in silence with nothing but the hum of the SUV to keep them company. At one point, Noel turned on the radio to listen to the news, only to slam the off button the moment the news reporter started to mention the FBI alert out for “person of interest Yasmine Browder.”

  She blinked back the tears that stung her eyes. She’d lost everything. She truly had. The man she’d thought she loved, her brother, her apartment and many of her belongings. Noel had rejected her and she’d become a wanted woman.

  If they didn’t pull this off, if Noel’s plan went south—the plan she hoped was currently taking up his thoughts, hence his pervasive silence—she’d be arrested, charged for assaulting an FBI agent and who knew what else. She’d go to jail. Her bakery would fail, and then she really, truly would have nothing.

  She closed her eyes and pressed her fingers against her temples to ease the mounting pressure.

  “I think we can do this,” Noel murmured, rousing Yasmine. Her eyelids fluttered open. Had she fallen asleep? She blinked at the bright light that filtered into the vehicle, rays of morning sunlight glinting off the road signs they passed by.

  She yawned, but the movement sent a fresh flood of pain to her injuries. She didn’t feel as bad as the day before, but it’d still be difficult to manage without the prescription painkillers. She opened the glove box and pulled out the container of ibuprofen.

  “Here.” Noel picked up a bottle of water from in between their seats and handed it to her. “I got it at the last quick stop for gas. There’s a plastic-wrapped muffin in a bag on the backseat if you’re hungry. I grabbed it from a basket at the register while paying cash. Mine was a little stale, and you’ll probably declare it a travesty of modern baking, but at this point I don’t want to risk stopping until we’ve reached our destination. We’re almost there.”

  She took the water and mumbled her thanks as he took one hand off the wheel and reached between the seats, still keeping his eyes on the road. His fingers hooked the plastic bag, and he dropped it in her lap.

  “I could have gotten it,” she said.

  “You’re injured and must still hurt. Otherwise you wouldn’t have gone for the ibuprofen as soon as you opened your eyes. Take it, but eat so the medicine doesn’t upset your stomach. Let’s not add a stomachache to everything you’re dealing with.”

  She wanted to snap at him and tell him she could handle herself—they were adults now, after all—but everything hurt too much and her head felt too fuzzy to do anything other than take the pills and eat, just like he’d suggested. She didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of having been right, but what else could she do? His words to her last night echoed between her ears, pounding on the insides of her skull. They’d kissed, actually kissed. After all these years!

  And he’d rejected her.

  It had to be her fault. Something she’d done. Had Marc seen or felt the same thing? Was that why he’d sought love in the arms of another woman?

  She couldn’t seem to shake the feeling that Noel had been lying and that there really was something wrong with her.

  “So, what’s the plan?” She finished the last bite of dry, barely palatable blueberry muffin and washed it down with the rest of the water. “Are we storming the castle?”

  Noel chuckled. “More or less. I’ve decided that either Crais really did betray us, or he’s done us a massive favor and this was part of his plan all along.”

  “That’s a pretty big difference.”

  “I know. And either way, having you on the wanted list is going to get us into the Pentagon to speak with someone from the Department of Defense.”

  Yasmine gaped at him. “You’re kidding, right? You think they’re just going to let us waltz into the Pentagon with me as a federal person of interest?”

  He tapped the steering wheel. “No, I don’t. I think they’re going to just let me waltz into the Pentagon, having captured a person of interest on the FBI’s watch list while she was en route to one of the most secure buildings in North America.”

  There was no question about it. He’d gone crazy. “And how are you going to do that without someone shooting me?”

  “I take you in as a detainee. Cuffed.”

  “You’re going to arrest me?”

  “Temporarily.”

  Yasmine sputtered, completely at a loss for words. Arrest her? Bring her into the Pentagon in handcuffs? That sounded like a massive risk. “Won’t they grab me and put me in a cell? Or drag me off to prison? Shouldn’t we go in as equals so you can explain how I’m under your protection?”

  “No. You need to understand that ninety percent of
the time, guests are not allowed inside the Pentagon, and those who are go through an extensive, rigorous approval process.”

  “Even FBI agents?”

  “Even special agents from the FBI. Not to the same extent, of course, but we can’t just pop in and out, unannounced.”

  It felt like a vise had clamped onto her insides and begun to squeeze. “But can’t you get permission? You said ninety percent of the time. What about the other ten percent?”

  “That’s what I’m hoping to take advantage of. And we’re not going to appear without warning, because there’s literally no way we’d get inside the Pentagon without advance notice. I called ahead and mentioned I’m FBI and told them that I was pursuing Yasmine Browder as she made her way to DC but that I had the situation under control. Put a call in to Captain Simcoe, too, to get any local cops off our tail. He agreed to pass information down the chain of districts to leave our vehicle alone.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Pursuing me on my way to DC? I thought you were doing your best to do the opposite of that.”

  He winced and his eyes narrowed as he sighed. “It wasn’t a lie, Yasmine, believe me. I understand why Crais refused to lie, and I agree with him. As an FBI agent, I can’t lie to the people who’re doing their best to protect this country, just like I am.”

  Yasmine wanted to push him further, to ask what he meant by that, but the road sign overhead told them that they were only about ten miles away from the Pentagon. Ten miles? Already? Her heart began to pound, and the squeezing in her stomach tightened. The muffin roiled as Noel told her the rest of the plan.