Chapter 4

After hours of negotiation, Lisa was surprised by the calm she felt within. Jackson had gone on and on about what would be expected of her, and she had simply listened, nodded, and sometimes voiced an objection. She was strangely at peace. Words—they were just words coming out of his mouth. They meant nothing to her.

This must be what it's like to be tortured, she decided. You say anything to make it stop.

To Lisa, these words would only matter when the time came for action, and some small part of her believed she would be able to get out of it.

Add delusional to the list of mental disorders I'm developing, she thought wryly. "So do we understand each other?" Jackson interrupted.

"Yes," she said dully. "I'm to be your faithful puppet and do whatever necessary to get the job done."

"And if you don't?"

"Then I'll be killed at the hands of your employer."

He nodded. "I think you're ready. Come on, you probably need to eat."

Lisa followed him into the kitchen, a stainless steel affair accented in sultry reds and black trim, and watched him rummage around the refrigerator.

"Are you actually cooking something?" she asked in surprise.

"In a manner of speaking," he replied as he sat rice vinegar and yellowfin tuna onto the glossy countertop.

"You're making sushi?"

"Clearly."

"But when did you find the time to learn this? I can barely scramble eggs."

"I spent some time in Kyoto," he said.

"Doing what?" she pressed. "Or do I want to know?"

"Why do you ask questions that you already know the answers to?"

He gave her a pointed look and scooped out a rice cooker, dumping the sticky grains into a bowl. She bit her tongue. Never had she seen Jackson look so relaxed, save for the time she "made the call," but this was something different. He had rolled his sleeves up to the elbow, and his hair fell over his eyes as he poured vinegar over the rice.

"Pretty elaborate," she finally said. "It would have been easier to order a pizza."

"You know, Leese, you really need to work on your eating habits."

Watching him delicately roll sushi, a thought caused Lisa to furrow her brow.

"Nachos."

Jackson glanced up from a sheet of nori. "I'm sorry?"

"You said the bar had the best nachos in the airport."

"And?"

"What was that about?" she asked exasperated. "You obviously don't eat Tex Mex on a regular basis." She watched Jackson slice the tuna with deft hands.

"Can't a guy share a drink with a pretty girl before he ruins her life?" He wiped the blade carefully and sat it out of her reach. Lisa scoffed at the gesture.

"Don't look at me like that," he said. "I have to be careful around you, Reisert."

"You knew," she said. "You knew I would eat up that whole girl-meets-boy scenario."

"I didn't know," he objected. "I figured you would shoot me down like you did every other guy who crossed your path."

"Then why even bother? Was it part of your plan?"

"No," he admitted. "Establishing contact with you early on was a risky move."

"So it just happened to play out like a romantic comedy."

"Pretty much," he said. Lisa fell silent as he carefully cut the rolls into pieces and plated them with a flourish of ginger and wasabi. She accepted a serving, and they ate in companionable silence standing at the counter. Lisa swirled a knob of the spicy horseradish into a dish of soy sauce and dredged a piece of sushi into the concoction. Jackson watched the proceedings with disapproval. From looks alone, they easily could have been any couple sharing lunch. A normal couple who would go on to do normal things—things that didn't involve assassination. Lisa felt the familiar pang of confusion and unease roil through her body. She flicked a piece of rice off her plate in annoyance.

"Problem?" Jackson asked.

"You mean besides you screwing with my head all of the time?"

He chewed a piece of sushi thoughtfully as if he were truly assessing the question.

"Seriously, Jackson. What are you doing? Because if I didn't know any better, I'd say you were trying to impress me with this whole making sushi bit."

"Maybe I was," he shrugged. "You have such a skewed perception of me. Why wouldn't I want to change that?"

"If my perception is skewed it's because 'Jackson Rippner' has been a lie from the moment I've met him."

"Like I told you on the plane," he said impatiently "I've never lied to you."

"No, not blatant lies," she admitted grudgingly. "But you misled me into thinking you were a decent person. That time we shared at the airport bar was the closest thing I've had to a date in years, and you ruined it."

He looked abashed and hesitatingly placed a hand on her arm.

"I'm sorry about that," he said. "I didn't realize it would lead you on the way it did."

Lisa jerked her arm away from his touch.

"Lead me on? More like devastate me."

"Come on, Leese—"

"No! I'm not being hyperbolic, Jackson. You had to know the shock would be greater once I found out this guy, who Ithought I liked, turned out to be a ruthless asshole who would threaten me to get what he wanted."

Jackson's eyes grew cold, and he looked as though he wanted to strike her.

"I already told you," he said through gritted teeth. "This was my last job. I had to pull it off, or they were going to kill me. I couldn't let personal feeling get in the way."

"Maybe that would have been the decent thing to do. Let them kill you instead."

"You honestly wish that happened?"

Lisa couldn't bring herself to speak.

"I didn't think so," he said. "I must have really done a number on you. And for the record, I enjoyed every moment we shared before things got rocky. Even when I knew you were lying to me. It was the first time, in a long time, I felt normal."

"So I was just a casualty. Someone you used to escape your current situation." "Maybe, but I didn't look it at that way," he said. "I was compelled to talk to you before you found out the truth about my intentions. I had gotten to know you over those eight weeks, and I genuinely liked you as a person. You represented normalcy and decency to me. Two things I was missing and desperately craved."

"Do you ever wonder," she asked haltingly. "What would have happened if the situation had been normal?"

"No, and you shouldn't either," he said. "There's no point in thinking 'what if."

"Maybe that's my problem. I can't let go of the hypothetical."

"You eventually will," Jackson promised her, and he finished his sentence in silence.

Because by the end of this, you may hate me more than you ever thought possible.