“I had to. You have to know that.” And she had. Just not for the reasons he thought and damn if her stomach didn’t knot with the half-lie. How could she feel guilty for lying to a man who’d kill her if he knew the truth? Or at least hand her over to someone who would?

“Yes,” he said after an eternal silence. “You had to.”

Relief washed over her that she told herself was about gaining his trust, avoiding danger, but it was more than that. When she’d looked in his eyes in Denver, she’d felt a connection she couldn’t seem to shake.

“You shouldn’t have been there at all,” Blake continued. “You helped Richter gain leverage over both of us. He’ll wait for the right time and blackmail us both because he knows what we both know. Mendez won’t be happy about you helping Richter or me letting myself get drugged. ”

But she hadn’t been working for Richter at all, and Blake was too smart not to figure that out if she didn’t distract him and fast. “Then we have to stop these theft issues. That has to help us with Mendez.”

“Don’t kid yourself. No matter what good you do for him, if Mendez finds out you undermined him, it won’t matter. We need a plan if he tries. I’ll have my team work on something we can use as leverage on him but if he contacts you, I have to know right away.”

“I’ll get your briefcase,” Blake said, heading to the hallway where he’d left his bag.

Kara pressed her hand to her knotted stomach, feeling like she was swimming in the quicksand of her lies and she had this wild, ridiculous urge to tell him everything. She barely contained a nearly hysterical laugh at how deadly a mistake that would be.

Blake returned and set her case on the bed between them. “Show me what you’ve found.”