“Consider it done.” Blake flips to another screen on the iPad and hands it to me. “Sara’s wedding.”
Tears instantly form in my eyes at the sight of Sara in a gorgeous rose lace dress, next to a man in a tux. “She looks gorgeous and he’s hot.” I swipe at tears, and Kayden squeezes my leg. I hold his hand and ask Blake, “Who is the man? Is he a good man? Does he love her?”
“Chris Merit is his name, and he’s a world-famous artist who’s passionately in love with her.”
“Artist.” A memory comes back to me. “Did I . . . Was there a storage unit?”
“Yes,” he says. “You bought it during summer break to make extra money, and it had artwork and several journals in it. Sara took it over when you eloped, and it led her to Chris.”
“Summer break. You’re saying I was a teacher?”
“Yes.”
Memories ebb and flow. “I was teaching. . . . But that isn’t me. Something doesn’t add up.” A thought hits me. “Do you have photos of my parents?”
“I do,” he says, taking the iPad and showing me a shot of my mother.
I smile and show it to Kayden. “My mom.”
“Swipe,” Blake says. “The next one is your father.”
The fifty-something, balding man in the photo is the one I remember being in my mother’s hospital room, long after my father died. “That’s my bastard, drunk, asshole stepfather. Not my father.”
“Sorry about that,” Blake says. “Swipe again.”
I swipe and inhale at the sight of a red-haired man with strong features. “That’s him.” I show it to Kayden.
“Mr. Badass h
imself,” Kayden says. “I wish I could have met him.”
“Interesting that you call him a badass,” Blake says. “He was CIA and at such a high level that I can’t get to him—not by hacking, or with my contacts. And that’s saying a lot.”
My gaze jerks to his. “CIA? Not military?”
“No, not military.”
“I’m not a schoolteacher,” I say, certain of it.
“You were one.” Blake reaches for his iPad. “I snagged your records before they were deleted.”
“I know I was teaching when I left for Paris—but it’s not who I really was.” I consider that for a moment. “I think I was CIA. I took a time-out, or was suspended.” I glance at Kayden, suddenly afraid of what that means for us. Then I turn back to Blake. “Can you find out?”
“There’s no record of you being CIA,” he says. “None. Nothing that indicated a hiccup in your record.” He pulls a thumb drive from his pocket and slides it over to me. “That contains everything I have, but I’ll dig further.”
“Be careful,” Kayden warns. “Garner Neuville is a problem that we can’t have erupt.”
“I’m always careful.”
“The Jackals,” Kayden replies. “That’s all I’m going to say.”
“I’m handling them.” Blake sets a phone on the table. “This is a disposable phone that we can destroy after we use it. I’d like to call Sara and put her on with you.”
I glance at Kayden. “Is it safe?”
“If we destroy the phone, yes.”
“But I don’t know if I can ever see her again. Neuville will never stop coming, and—”