There was a short silence. “And afterward?”

“Afterward?” The moving lights made Kisten’s face unreadable. “Nothing. We tried working together. It didn’t work out. You get an extension on finding a new partner.”

There was a long silence. “That’s it?”

“That’s it.” I clicked my pen closed and threw it and my datebook into my bag. Why did I even try to be organized?

“Okay,” he finally said. “I’ll bark down the hole and see what comes up.”

“Fantastic,” I said, genuinely glad, though he seemed less than pleased. “Hey, in a few hours I’m going to have died in that explosion, so don’t worry about it, okay?”

A tired sound escaped him. “Fine. I’ll call you tomorrow when the claim comes in.”

“Great. I’ll see you then.” David’s lack of excitement was depressing. The phone clicked off without him saying good-bye, and I closed it and handed it back to Kisten. “Thanks,” I said, feeling very awkward.

“I thought you were turning me in,” Kisten said softly.

Mouth falling open, I stared, only now understanding his previous tension. “No,” I whispered, feeling afraid for some reason. He had sat there and done nothing as he thought I was turning him in?

Shoulders stiff and eyes on the road, he said, “Rachel, I didn’t know he was going to let those people die.”

My breath caught. I forced it out, then took another. “Talk to me,” I said, feeling light-headed. I stared out the window, hands in my lap and my stomach clenched. Please, let me be wrong this time?

I looked across the car, and after his eyes flicked to the rearview mirror, he pulled off to the side of the road. My gut clenched. Damn it, why did I have to like him? Why couldn’t I like nice men? Why did the power and personal strength that attracted me always seem to translate into callous disregard for other people’s lives?

My body shifted forward and back when he came to a sudden halt. The car shook as traffic continued to pass us at eighty miles an hour, but here it was still. Kisten shifted in his seat to face me, reaching over the gearshift to cradle my hands in my lap. His day-old stubble glinted in the lights from the oncoming traffic across the median, and his blue eyes were pinched.

“Rachel,” he said, and I held my breath hoping he was going to tell me it had all been a mistake. “I arranged to have that bomb strapped to the boiler.”

I closed my eyes.

“I didn’t intend for those people to die. I called Saladan,” he continued, and I opened my eyes when a passing truck shook us. “I told Candice there was a bomb on his boat. Hell, I told her where it was and that if they touched it, it would detonate. I gave them plenty of time to get everyone off. I wasn’t trying to kill people, I was trying to make a media circus and sink his business. It never occurred to me he would walk away and leave them to die. I misjudged him,” he said, a bitter recrimination in his voice, “and they paid for my shortsightedness with their lives. God, Rachel, if I even guessed he would do that, I’d have found another way. That you were on that boat …” He took a breath. “I almost killed you… .”