Dallas sat beside me at the rickety old table in his German safe house, which was more like a tiny apartment than anything else. Everything was confined to three rooms. In the main living area were the sad excuse for a kitchen, a card table, a broken down loveseat, and a small bed in the corner. Like Alana's London safe house, there was a thick layer of dust on everything and cobwebs in the corners near the ceiling. I half expected to see a cockroach scurry by. The safe house was filthy, though it was ideal for an agent on the run needing a temporary home.

It was mid-morning. We'd been looking over the file that A.R.T. had provided me on Agent Lindsey's disappearance, as well as the notes I'd made to myself since my investigation began, while we tried to devise a plan of action.

"How long have you had this place?" I asked him when he took a quick break to make some more coffee and toast.

Still shirtless, Dallas was what every woman dreamt of waking up to in the morning. He stood at the counter in just his jeans, refilling my mug and stirring in granulated creamer. His tousled sex hair was sexy in all the best ways, and the sun shining through the window over the sink bathed his frame in a warm golden glow that practically made him look like a Greek god.

I realized I was zoned out, staring, admiring his features when he snapped his fingers at me, startling me out of my trance.

"You ever think of taking a picture?" Dallas teased, handing me my coffee and going back to fetch the toast that had just popped up.

His joke reminded me that we'd actually never taken a photo together, having been hell bent on keeping our relationship a secret. There'd been many occasions over the last four years that I'd wished so much for the ability to just look at a picture where we were together, me in his arms, and hold it close to my heart. I made a mental note to take a photo together before my time with him had a chance to be up again, though I fully intended to prevent that from happening.

"Back when I'd lived here, I had a friend who was a former intel agent for Germany. I partnered with him on a job in Hamburg once," Dallas explained, bringing a small plate of toast to the table. "He was a genius in terms of avoiding the enemy. We got along like brothers. Long story short, this was one of his safe houses. He said I could stay here whenever I needed."

"That's nice of him," I said, munching on a slice of toast.

"Yeah. If we go to Munich, there's another one there. So at least we've got that covered."

Dallas and I had been discussing my intended journey across Germany, following Agent Lindsey's cell tower pings. We were studying the notes I'd made the day before with regards to Lindsey's possible destinations near each ping.

There were several pings, which would make our job extremely frustrating if we were to investigate each one. Besides, with A.R.T. and my unknown enemies chasing me, and likely I.D.A. on the hunt for Dallas, too, we didn't have the time to devote to such a detailed endeavor; and we were sure that not every cell tower ping meant something. Just because her phone made contact with a cell tower didn't mean she was in that particular area to meet someone or conduct any suspicious activity. She may have simply been getting lunch or a latte. Not every ping equaled a stop to do something connected to her solo mission. Therefore, we'd decided to go ahead and rule out numerous locations in which the surroundings didn't fit what we assumed to be her agenda.

After another hour had passed and we'd checked off every location that we seriously doubted was pertinent, Dallas and I ended up with a map that had a trail leading from Berlin to the outskirts of Munich, a suburb called Dachau, where Agent Lindsey was thought to have been kidnapped. We'd marked red X's over each ping that we planned to investigate. There were five that stood out to us and we intended to get started before the day ended.

"Here's what I don't understand," Dallas said, clasping his hands together with a puzzled frown. "You said Lancaster told you Agent Lindsey went missing on her way back to Munich from Berlin. There's no trail from Munich to begin with, and the trail from Berlin goes cold before she makes it to Munich. So when the hell was Lindsey in Munich?"

I looked at the map with a groan. The headache I had finally started getting rid of was quickly making a reappearance with my frustration.

"I don't know, Dall. Maybe he got 'em backwards and misspoke."

But it was obvious Dallas wasn't buying that idea. He pursed his lips, pondering other possibilities and tapping his boot on the floor erratically. He shuffled through the papers on the table and retrieved the airline records that stated when Agent Lindsey had flown into Berlin. Those were the only airline records Lancaster had given me. Had he simply misspoken? Or maybe this was part of the reason he'd been acting peculiar. Maybe this was why I'd gotten the feeling he was hiding something...

"I'm familiar with Lancaster," Dallas said, eyes scanning over the record, scrutinizing every detail. "He doesn't misspeak like that. He's too detail-oriented. I could be wrong, Tali, but I'm seeing a red flag here."

"You could be right, but regardless, I'm not sure how that little detail makes a difference in our case. At least not yet," I shrugged. "Maybe there is more to the story than what I was told, but if she had landed in Munich initially, there should be cell tower pings from Munich to Berlin the same way there are from Berlin to Munich. But there's no travel records showing her going to or being in Munich in the first place. It says she flew into Berlin from Paris after leaving London."

Dallas didn't respond, but continued staring a hole through the airline records in his hand. I recognized that look in his eyes. He was onto something, picking up the trail like a bloodhound. Maybe he was seeing something that I wasn't. I was a damn good agent and I knew it, but Dallas had always seemed to be a half step ahead of me on seemingly minute details that ended up becoming big deals.

"What if Lancaster just didn't give you another airline record – one that shows Lindsey flying into Munich?" Dallas suggested.

"I suppose that's possible, but I still don't see where you're going with this," I groaned and combed my fingers through my hair. "We can agree that Lancaster was acting pretty weird about the situation, but this is all I have to go on, and it's probably not going to help me any to speculate about another flight that may or may not have happened. Even if it did happen, we don't have anything to go on in terms of determining why she went to Munich or what she could've been doing there. Besides, why would she make two trips to Germany?"

"Alright." Dallas held up his hands in surrender. "I give up – for now. We'll just see where this trail leads us."

I nodded and started stacking all the papers back together to stuff the file back in my bag. I peripherally eyed Dallas while he pulled on a fresh T-shirt and his vest and went to retrieve his own bag, a black backpack with few necessities and a lot of extra ammo.

Watching him prepare to leave the safe house evoked memories of years before, back when we used to sneak away from our teams to see each other for just a couple hours. He'd always have a small backpack with him with spare clothes and a handful of condoms. That was back before I'd began my relationship with the lovely Mirena.

Watching Dallas put his sidearm back on was what flooded the most recollections to my mind, though. I hadn't realized how much I'd missed going on missions with him. Both of us had been assigned several solo missions years before, and A.R.T. and I.D.A. had had no idea that many of those assignments we'd actually tackled together, like the one in Atlanta.

Chills swept through my body at the memories of how tenacious and intrepid Dallas had always been. Nothing had ever seemed to faze the man, no matter how many times he'd been targeted by the enemies. He'd always looked death in the face and laughed. He was cocky and confident in his abilities to outrun or overwhelm his adversaries, but at the same time, he was practical and always managed to carefully design a plan in his head in record time. I'd been in awe the first time I'd seen him take down a combatant – and he'd worn that devilishly sexy smirk of confidence the whole time.

"Ready?" Dallas asked me as he slung his backpack over his shoulder.

He looked ready to take on the world, just like he always had before. Observing him, it felt like my heart was mimicking the Grinch's and growing three sizes, a happiness settling somewhere deep inside me over not only getting to be with the love of my life again, but also getting to work side by side with him again. Although I now knew it was real, being with Dallas again still felt like a dream. A wonderful, impossible, unbelievable dream come true. And I didn't want to waste a single second of my time with him.

"As I'll ever be." I put on a somewhat artificial smile at the idea of facing my wannabe captors or killers again.

I started to pull the shoulder strap of my ridiculously heavy black bag over my head, but Dallas reached out and claimed it from me, effortlessly slinging it over his shoulder as if it didn't weigh more than a feather. I assumed he likely lifted weights the same effortless way now.

"You know I can handle that, right?" I cocked a brow at him. "But thank you, though."

"I know you can. You're stubborn and strong," he said with a knee-weakening smile, pulling me against his chest and kissing my head. "But you also have an arm injury that we don't want to agitate any more than is absolutely necessary. Besides, this is the gentlemanly thing for me to do. So I'll be in charge of this monstrosity for the time being. Okay?"

I rolled my eyes and burrowed into his embrace, reveling in the comfort of his body heat. "There's no point in arguing with you."

I wasn't looking up at him, but I knew he was sporting that sexy, cocky grin.

"That's cause I'm so hot," he chuckled. "So I always win."

A few minutes and sarcastic jokes later, we were out the door and on the way to our first stop, the Brandenburg-Görden prison – the most unusual location on the map of Agent Lindsey's travels.