“I’ll endorse her, just like I had planned,” Wyatt said.
“Damien Gustov works for the Bratva,” York said. “At least that’s the working theory. Why would the Bratva want Wyatt dead? Or the information silenced.”
“That is, if it was Gustov pulling the trigger,” Tate said. “We still haven’t found the shooter.”
“I know how we might be able to find Gustov,” Coco said quietly.
Silence.
She looked at York. “I snooped around the dating files.”
“What dating files?” RJ said.
“Gustov has emails from a dating site he’s active on. Maybe we post something, act like we’re interested—”
“No. No way,” Wyatt said. “The last thing we need is to be on the run from Gustov here in America.”
“We already are,” York said. He gestured to Coco, then RJ. “He hasn’t tied up all his loose threads—”
“What if he’s not here for us?” RJ said suddenly.
All eyes turned to her.
“What if he’s here because the Bratva sent him? What if he’s here because there’s another agenda?”
“Like?” Tate asked.
“Like derailing this election? Or putting someone else in power? Or, I don’t know—I mean, why, out of all places, was he in a position to shoot at Wyatt today? What if his real target was Jackson?”
“Then why take out Wyatt? Just warming up?” York said.
“He doesn’t have to kill anyone to cause fear,” Knox said. “It’s enough to suggest that someone is after Jackson.”
“Which would only galvanize her base,” Tate said.
“Or scare people away from voting for her,” York said. “People might think she’s too controversial.”
“She’s a moderate! She wants world peace, for cryin’ in the sink,” Glo said.
“We need to dig into those emails, Coco,” RJ said, glancing at Glo. “See if we can find a pattern. I find it hard to believe that an assassin is looking for a date.”
“Everybody needs a friend,” Knox said.
And it was so crazy coming from Knox, of all people, that Coco let out a laugh.
Then groaned. “Oh—”
“See, we shouldn’t be talking about this here. Now.” Wyatt leaned up. “Sorry. I’ll get them out of here.”
“No, it’s okay.” Coco looked at RJ. “I copied all the emails onto my personal online story before I put it on the jump drive.”
“Good. I’ll start digging into Kobie and Graham Plunkett. And, I’ll start looking for clues in the emails.”
A knock came at the door and a second later it opened.
“Mamichka!” Mikka barreled into the room, dressed in pajamas, dragging Gerri behind him.
He made for her bed, got a knee up, and just about landed on her before Wyatt caught him, his arm around his body.
“Hold up there, little man,” Wyatt said, grabbing his legs and pulling the boy to himself. “Your mama just had surgery.”
RJ translated for him as Wyatt set him down on the bed beside her.
Coco touched his face.
Mikka leaned forward to kiss her.
“Gently,” Wyatt said, then looked at RJ. “Tell him to be gentle.”
She did, then Mikka gave Coco a sweet peck on the cheek.
“You’ll have to learn to speak Russian, Wyatt,” RJ said.
“Da,” he said and winked.
And despite the ache in her stomach, the pain coursing down her arm, Coco’s entire body soared. Seeing Wyatt, his arms around his son, and Mikka’s face lit up, caught in that embrace. Yes, maybe he was right.
Everything would be okay.
“I thought I would find him in here.” Sarai came into the room. “So this is where the party is.”
“Hey, Sarai,” Coco said as the doctor came over to tousle Mikka’s hair.
Sarai looked at Coco. “You’re a little old for the Children’s Hospital, but you were an emergency, and I told them that Mikka was here, so they’re making an exception.”
“I’m sorry I ran out on you,” Wyatt said to Sarai. “I’m ready to take that blood test.”
“No need, actually.” Sarai smiled, her gaze tracking to Gerri. “Your mother is a perfect match.”
Wyatt’s mouth opened. “But—”
“Son. If I can get my blood into my grandson, I’m going to do it,” Gerri said. “Besides, you have a hockey season to prepare for.”
He made a face. “Yeah, actually, I need to take some time off. I have a—”
“Labral tear?” Knox said.
Wyatt looked at his brother. “How’d—”
“Bull riders get them too. All that torsion on the bull. You were walking like a ninety-year-old man.”
“Not so old I couldn’t take out a terrorist,” Wyatt said.
Knox rolled his eyes.
But Coco didn’t. She reached out and touched Wyatt’s cheek. “I always knew you were the real hero of the family.”
“Hey—” Tate.
“C’mon—” Knox.
RJ laughed.
But Wyatt just stared down at her, meeting her eyes. “Does that mean you’ll marry me, Katya Stanislova?”
“You have to ask first, Number One.”
And then, in front of his entire family, York, and even their son, Wyatt got on his knee.
“Really, right now?”
“Right now. Before you do something crazy and run away again.”
“Never,” she whispered.
So he asked, those beautiful whiskey-brown eyes holding hers.
And she said yes.
And then her crazy, romantic superhero kissed her, right in front of his family.
“I knew it,” Knox said. “I always said Wyatt had a crush on her.”
“You did not,” Tate said. “That was Ford. He was the one who caught them making out.”
“No, seriously, it was me,” Knox said.
“It was me.” RJ met Coco’s eyes.
Wyatt stood up, looked at his family. “No, it was me. Now everybody get out of here and leave me and my fiancée alone.”
“I don’t see a haymow,” Tate said.
Wyatt raised an eyebrow.
“It’s about time you became an official Marshall,” Knox said, wiggling her toe, then winking on his way out with Kelsey.
“Gigi is babysitting,” Gerri said and came over to take Mikka in her arms. “I’m learning Russian too. Like, das vedanya.”
Coco laughed.
RJ took York’s hand and pulled him into the hallway.
Tate lingered, coming over to her bed with Glo. His smile had vanished. “You were really brave, Coco. And not just today. Having Mikka, helping RJ get out of Russia…you’re the Marshall in the room.” He leaned down and kissed her cheek. “I’d say welcome to the family, but it’s too late.”
He looked at Wyatt, grinning. “Try not to screw this up.”
“Get out,” Wyatt growled.
But Coco laughed, even as Wyatt took her hand, leaned over her. “I think we could find some hay…”
She sank into the sweetness of his kiss, so familiar, so dangerous, so perfect.
She was home.
What happens next
She might not be Sydney Bristow, but she still wouldn’t let evil win.
“We’ll get York back, RJ.” Tate came up behind her. Put his arm around her.
She stared out the window at the end of the fourth-floor hospital lobby, her arms around her waist, just trying to breathe. From here, the river to the east sparkled a deep blue, the sky clear, and she spotted Mt. Rainer to the southeast poking through the clouds, brilliant, bold, streaked with white against the granite.
Truth would win.
It had to.
“Did Senator Jackson find out anything?”
“Nothing so far. Swamp said he’d call with any updates. You?”
“I’m still shut out of the system.” But she had an inside source.
Coco.
She still couldn’t believe her foster sister had nearly died. Couldn’t believe that Wyatt had walked through flames to rescue her.
But that was Wyatt. The one who never gave up.
And God had protected him, thanks to his still sodden clothing, the dunking into the ocean.
Please, God, be with York.
She closed her eyes. And for a moment, trailed back through the last two hours to figure out how it had all gone south.
We’re going to find Gustov and end this.
York had cupped his hands over her shoulders as she’d stood outside Coco’s room, staring down the hallway, not sure what to do next. Her mother had taken Mikka down the hall to play, Glo and Kelsey with them.
Knox had been on the phone, maybe to Ford, giving him an update, or perhaps leaving a voice mail. Ford had been deployed shortly after she’d returned to Montana and she hadn’t talked to him since, although she’d heard that his girlfriend, Scarlett was moving to Minneapolis.
Tate had been talking to the dark-haired cop, Vicktor, whom he’d reached out to via York to investigate Sophia Randall’s murder.
She’d turned and pressed her hand to York’s chest, his heart beating warm and real under hers. “The nightmare continues.”
“We will figure this out, Bristow.”
“Do you really think Gustov was the sniper?”
York lifted a shoulder. “I just know that I didn’t have the right angle. Ballistics will come back with an analysis of the bullet, and then we’ll see. One of the security agents went down also—he’s going to live, but they can compare the bullets.” He wove his fingers through hers. “I don’t get it. If he’s working for the Bratva, then the Russian mob wants both General Stanislov and Senator Jackson dead. Why?”
“Do you think there’s any truth to what Wyatt said—about her being in collusion with the Bratva? Maybe she betrayed them. I need to get my access back, do some digging. And I can only do that in DC.”
He touched her face. “I’m going with you.”
Oh, it was dangerous, the way her heart jumped at his words. But, “What about the CIA, I mean…are you in danger here?”
“I don’t know. Claire’s father told me never to step foot in America again, but that was nearly seven years ago. He’s probably forgotten me.”
“What was his name?”
“Tom Crowley.”
She had stilled, the name dropping through her like a stone. “Crowley is the head of our counterterrorism analysis directorate. His team analyzes emerging threats worldwide.”
“Is that your department?”
“No, I’m a targeting analyst. We work with assets.” We. Sophia, what did you get yourself into? She gripped her stomach—what if Sophia had died because of her connection with RJ?
Maybe York read her mind because he put his strong hands on her shoulders again. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”
She believed him, especially the way his blue eyes could find her bones, steel them. “So, that means you’re staying in America?”
His mouth formed a smile. “If you are.”
He was leaning in to kiss her when Tate walked up.
Neither Tate nor Wyatt had been especially warm with York, and now Tate wore the slightest frown, glancing at York’s hand on her shoulders.
York dropped it. Looked at the other man standing beside Tate. “What did you find out, Vicktor?”
Deeply handsome, with a strong jaw, his dark hair trimmed, no hint of a beard, his blue eyes solemn, Vicktor was former FSB, and she saw it all over his demeanor.
Funny, she sort of felt if anyone could find a Russian assassin in America, it might be this man, Vicktor Shubnikov.
“I got the initial forensic report back on Randall, the woman we found in the hotel. She has deep ligature marks on her wrists and ankles, suggesting she’d been in captivity for some time. She’d been dead for maybe six to eight hours before you found her.”
“How’d she get in the room?”
“We’re still figuring that out. My men are talking with the hotel staff. It’s possible a master key was stolen.”
“Any prints?” York asked. He’d taken RJ’s hand, weaving his fingers through hers.
“None yet.”
“And ballistics on the bullets from today’s shooting?” York looked at Tate.
“Still waiting.”
Behind Tate, the elevator opened, and two dark-suited men walked out, down the hall. RJ stiffened. “I think we’re about to find out.” She wasn’t sure why the gait, the set of their expressions made her tighten her hand in York’s, but even he had the weirdest response—he stepped in front of her.
And then she realized why.
“Martin,” York said quietly to the taller man. Early forties, medium build, dark, almost black hair, he wore a communication wire in his ear. “What are you doing here?”
“Funny, I’m here to ask you the same thing. Turn around, York. We need to take you into custody.”
Everyone stilled.
“What?” York said appropriately.
“For the attempted murder of Senator Reba Jackson.”
“That’s crazy!” Tate said.
York’s hard squeeze of RJ’s hand kept her from shouting the same thing. He turned, met her eyes. “We’re going to get this straightened out.” Something in his gaze…
He kissed her forehead. “I will find you.”
Then he stepped away from her, put his hands up.
Martin put a hand between his shoulder blades and shoved him against the wall.
“Hey! Is that necessary?” Vicktor said. “He’s not a fugitive.”
“You have no idea who this man is and what he’s done,” Martin said. He pulled York’s hands behind him to cuff him and growled his statement in his ear.
A chill lifted along RJ’s spine.
York met her eyes then, and something in his expression only added to it.
York, what’s going on?
They pulled him away from the wall.
“Where are you taking him?” This, she couldn’t stop herself from asking. Or walking down the hallway with him.
Martin and his blond crony ignored her. Even when they pushed York into the open elevator.
He’d held her gaze as the door closed. I will find you.
Tate had stood beside her in the hallway, in silence. “I’ll call Reba, see if she can find out what’s going on.”
RJ had turned to her brother. “Ask her to reinstate my access. This isn’t over. In fact, I think it’s just starting. And I have work to do.”
Now, two hours later, she still hadn’t gotten any deeper into the CIA web. “This must have something to do with Tom Crowley and his anger against York.”
“Who is Tom Crowley?” Tate asked.
She didn’t know where to start with the answer.
Tate’s phone rang. “It’s Vicktor.”
She turned to face him as he answered. Watched as he frowned, then looked at her and turned away. “When?”
No way. She moved to intercept him, and he looked up at her, pain on his face.
“Are you sure?”
It was those words that sent ice through her, to her bones.
He swallowed. “Thanks. Keep in touch.”
He ended the call and looked at her.
And the fact that her brother’s eyes glistened, the wrecked expression on his face told her to reach out for the wall.
To lower herself onto the sill of the window.
“It’s bad,” Tate said quietly. He tightened his jaw and looked away. Blinked.
“Tell me.”
A beat, then he took a shaky breath. “So, there was an accident. It was outside town, somewhere in the mountains, so I’m not sure where they were taking him, but the SUV was hit by a semi. It rolled off the road and…” He winced, closed his eyes.
“Tate!”
He met her eyes. “It exploded, RJ.”
Nothing.
She went numb.
“It rolled down an embankment, hit a tree, and the entire thing exploded. There were…” He swallowed again. “There were no survivors.”
“What…”
“Three bodies. They found them. Vicktor says they’re going to the morgue to confirm, but…” He reached out for her. “I’m so sorry.”
Tate was holding her, but she couldn’t feel it. Couldn’t even breathe.
No. This couldn’t be right.
She closed her eyes, unwilling to let herself believe anything but his words. I will find you.
York couldn’t be dead.
Because she refused to let evil win.
About RJ
Book 5: Montana Marshalls series
The man she loves is dead…right?
* * *
Former CIA Analyst Ruby Jane Marshall refuses to believe that man she loves died in a terrible car crash in the Cascade Mountains. York Newgate is just too tough for that. And the remains were burned beyond identification of the former CIA officer. She believes he’s been kidnapped by the Russian mafia and she’ll stop at nothing to find him.
* * *
He wants no memory of his past.
* * *
Mack Jones has no memory beyond the moment he woke up on the side of the highway, wounded, with the dark sense that he has a past he doesn’t want to confront. Especially since he’s rebuilt his life in a small tourist town, tucked away beyond the mountains. Mack likes his life tending bar for a local craft brewery and has no desire to dig around in the gray areas of his memory to find out why his body is scarred and he possesses eerie defense skills.
* * *
She holds the answers that will unlock his memory, but will it unlock his heart?
* * *
When the brewery catches fire and Mack rescues the owner, he makes the news, and Ruby Jane can’t help but believe the man on the screen is her York Newgate. But when she arrives to the small town of Shelly, Washington, Mack doesn’t recognize her. Is his undercover…or has he wiped her, and their relationship from his memory? And if he has, should she just leave him to restart his life? After all, his greatest desire was to start over, and now he has what he longs for. But what about the danger that stalks him?
Wyatt Page 28