When he’d found out that he was being transferred back to Chicago, he’d vowed to put everything behind him. Unfortunately, he hadn’t counted on running into Cameron Lynde within his first week of being back. Being around her brought back a lot of old memories.

For starters, he still couldn’t forget the way she had refused to look at him the day she told him about the Martino case.

Late that Friday afternoon, three years ago, Cameron had called to say she was coming to his office to speak with him and his partner at the time, Joe Dobbs. When he had heard the knock and seen her standing in his doorway, he’d smiled. Jack distinctly remembered that, probably because of how rare it was that he smiled back in those days—there hadn’t been a lot to be chipper about during the two years he’d worked for Martino. He was still, to put it bluntly, pretty fucked-up from being undercover for so long and having trouble getting back into the routine of normal life. He also wasn’t sleeping at night, and that certainly didn’t help matters.

But as much as he had been finding it difficult to transition back to an office job, there was one part of it he didn’t mind: working with Cameron Lynde. He’d begun to worry, in fact, that he was starting to not mind it a little too much. They’d only ever talked business—the Martino case—yet the couple of times they’d been alone together, he felt some sort of undercurrent between them. He didn’t know how to describe it, except to say that whatever the undercurrent was, it was enough to make him wish he wasn’t still so screwed up.

“Come on in,” Jack had told her.

When Cameron stepped into his office that Friday afternoon, for once she didn’t return his smile.

“Will Agent Dobbs be joining us?” she asked.

“He’s on his way. Why don’t you have a seat while you wait?” Jack gestured to the chairs in front of his desk.

Cameron shook her head. “I’m fine, thanks.”

Over the course of the last month, Jack had gotten to know her well enough to know that she was not fine right then. Something was wrong—she had skipped over the tough-as-nails-but-not-really sarcastic/semi-flirtatious pleasantries he had come to expect and enjoy as part of their usual discourse. Not to mention, she seemed skittish.

He had a bad feeling about this.

“You said you wanted to talk about Martino—is there a problem with the case?” He watched as she hesitated.

Bingo.

Cameron’s eyes shifted to the door. “I think we should wait until Agent Dobbs gets here.” She bit her bottom lip worriedly, and Jack couldn’t decide what was more troubling—her sudden display of vulnerability or the fact that he now couldn’t take his eyes off her lips.

He got up from his desk, walked over, and shut his office door. He stood before her. “Something’s got you upset.”

“Agent Pallas, I think—”

He cut her off. “It’s Jack, okay? I think it’s probably time for us to be on a first-name basis.” When her gaze darted again to his office door, he did something that surprised them both—he reached out and touched her chin gently.

He turned her face to his. “Talk to me, Cameron. Tell me what’s wrong.”

When her incredible aquamarine eyes met his, he felt it—something akin to the jolts of electricity Martino’s men had hit him with during his two days of captivity. Only infinitely more enjoyable.

“Jack,” she whispered. “I’m so sor—”

A knock at the door interrupted them.

Jack and Cameron sprang away from each other as the door to his office opened. Joe walked in, surprised to find them both standing there.

“Oh, hey—sorry I’m late.” He took a seat in one of the chairs in front of Jack’s desk—they had been partners for four years and were comfortable in each other’s offices. He crossed his leg and looked up at Cameron. “Jack said you wanted to talk to us about Martino?”

“I do,” Cameron said. She sounded stiff and nervous again, and oddly focused her attention on Joe. “I wanted to let you know that we’ve made a decision. We won’t be filing charges against Roberto Martino. Or anyone else in his organization, for that matter.”

There was a silence in the room.

Jack broke it. “You can’t be serious.”

Cameron still didn’t look at him. “I realize this isn’t the result either of you expected.”

“What do you mean, you’re not going to file any charges?” Joe asked. He had been the liaison between Jack and the Bureau during the two years Jack had been undercover and knew all the dirt they’d dug up on Martino.

“Our office has decided there isn’t enough evidence to take the case to trial,” Cameron said.

Jack was struggling—hard—to keep his anger in check. “Bullshit. Who made this decision? Was it Briggs?”

Joe stood up from his chair and paced. “That fucking guy. All he cares about is his own reputation,” he said disgustedly.

“I want to talk to him,” Jack demanded.

Cameron finally turned to face him. “There’s no need for that. This . . . is my case. It was my call.”

“Screw that—I don’t believe you.”

Joe glanced over, a cautionary note in his voice. “Jack.”

Cameron remained cool. “I realize how frustrating this—”

Jack took a step toward her. “Frustrating? Frustration doesn’t begin to cover what I’m feeling right now. You’ve read the files—at least I assumed you had until about a minute ago—now I’m not so sure what you or anyone else in the U.S. attorney’s office has been doing. You know who Martino is and the things he’s done. What the hell are you guys thinking?”

“I’m sorry,” she said woodenly. “I know how much you put into this investigation. Unfortunately, there’s nothing more I can tell you.”

“Sure there is. You can tell me who the hell Martino paid off in the U.S. attorney’s office to make this miracle happen. If Briggs didn’t make this decision, then . . .” Jack paused to give Cameron a scrutinizing once-over. “What do you think, Joe, should we do a little digging into Ms. Lynde’s accounts? See if she’s had any unusually large deposits lately?”

Cameron walked over and stared him dead in the eyes. “You are way out of line with that, Agent Pallas.”

Joe moved between them. “Okay, I think we all need to take a step back for a moment and cool down.”

Jack ignored him. “I want an explanation,” he said again to Cameron.

She stood her ground, holding his gaze angrily. “Fine. You blew your cover too early. I hope that explanation satisfies you, because it’s the only one I can give you.”

A wave of fury washed over him. And guilt. Her words struck a nerve—although he’d had no choice, he still blamed himself every day for the fact that his cover had been blown.

Jack’s voice was ice-cold. “Get out of my office.”

“I was just leaving,” Cameron said. “But one last thing—if you ever have any concerns about where my loyalties lie, or regarding my dedication to my job, you can just ask me yourself, Agent Pallas. But if you poke around in my bank accounts, you better have either a court order or one hell of a defense attorney.” She nodded at Joe in good-bye. “Agent Dobbs.” Then she turned and left without further word.

Joe watched her go. “I know you’re angry, Jack, and I’m mad as hell, too, but be careful. Cameron Lynde might be new to the office, but she’s still an assistant U.S. attorney. Probably not such a good idea to accuse her of corruption.”

Barely listening, Jack said nothing. All he could think about was one thing.

Two years of his life down the fucking drain.

Joe sprang into action. “All right—I’m going to talk to Davis,” he said, referring to their boss, the special agent in charge. “I’ll see if I can find out what’s really going on.” He walked over and put his hand on Jack’s shoulder. “In the meantime, you need to calm the hell down. Go home, go get drunk, whatever—just get out of this office before you say anything else you’ll regret.”

Jack nodded.

Two years.

In the elevator on his way out, he stared numbly at the doors, wondering if Cameron Lynde had any clue what he’d gone through to get all that evidence that she had just rendered meaningless. Yes, his cover had been blown, but only because—in a move that was two parts plain stupid and one part a piss-fight over jurisdiction—the DEA had sent in their own undercover agent to make contact with Martino. Jack had figured out who the guy was in all of about five seconds. It took Martino ten.

He’d ordered Jack to kill him.

Now Jack had done a lot of not-so-nice things in order to maintain his cover while working for Martino, but up to that point he’d always managed to avoid actually killing anyone. But this time Martino wanted the agent’s body brought back to him—he planned to send a message to the DEA—and no amount of craftiness could get Jack out of having to produce an actual corpse. So he stalled. He was on his way to meet the DEA agent, warn him, and get them both the hell out of Dodge, when Martino’s men grabbed them.

They killed the DEA agent immediately. Martino stuck to his plan and had his men dump the body on the Chicago DEA office’s doorstep that night.

With Jack, he was less forgiving.

Enough said.

On the second day of Jack’s captivity, however, Martino’s men made a fatal mistake.

Actually, it was one man in particular who made the mistake: Vincent, one of Martino’s interrogators, wanted to take his questioning up a notch and decided to untie Jack’s hands. Sure, he immediately re-disabled one of those hands by ramming a nine-inch carving knife all the way through Jack’s forearm, pinning it to the chair. But he momentarily left his other hand free.