by L. T. Ryan
“Drawing a blank?” Clive asked.
Jack nodded.
“Too bad, could’ve used your input.”
“You really don’t know?”
“Shadows, my good man. We’re all just shadows in this world.”
“How would you have handed me over?” He shook his head. “Stupid question.”
“I disregarded it the moment you asked it.” Clive laughed.
“Who’d you work for? MI5?”
Clive shrugged and dismissed the question. “Don’t think that matters.”
“It might.” Jack angled his body toward Clive to look him in the eye. “I’ve met a lot of people the past twenty years. What are the chances this person or group knows both of us, and that’s why they contracted with you?”
“I don’t play what-if games, Jack. They are an exercise in futility, and one that I simply do not have the time or patience for.”
“There’s something here. I feel it.” Jack set his beer on the table between them. “Were you in the field?”
“Briefly.”
“Out of country?”
“At times.”
“Ever killed a man.”
“Yes.”
“Enjoy it?”
“Yes.”
“Ever gone against orders to do what’s right?”
“Yes.”
“And what’s wrong?”
“Yes.”
“We’re not so different, Clive.” He extended his beer in a momentary toast. “You’re smarter, taller, more handsome, and have that whole British vibe going on, but other than that, we might be the same person.”
Laughter from behind caught them both off guard.
“That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard all month.” Sadie laughed again as she walked around Jack and found a seat. She had on jeans, a t-shirt, and hiking boots. Her hair was back in a messy ponytail. She had no makeup on. Didn’t need it.
“Thought you were a few hours out,” Clive said.
“You know I like keeping you guessing.” She shifted to Jack. “How’re you feeling?”
“A little bruised, mostly in the ego department.”
“She got away again. Might be time to stop chasing her.”
“You’re probably right.” Jack stretched his arms out and folded them behind his head. “How’s Bear?”
Sadie shook her head. “That guy.”
Chapter 36
The girl in front of him looked more like a woman than a child. When did that happen? He didn’t get all the moments with her a typical father would. Didn’t change her diapers, read her stories, try and fail to put her hair in braids. They never took daddy-daughter trips. Never attended a father-daughter Valentine dance.
But she was his daughter. From the moment he met her, took her in, swore to be her protector. The bond was there and would never be broken. Not even death would keep him from unleashing a fury few had ever witnessed should someone hurt Mandy.
“Why are you staring at me like that, weirdo?” She tucked a stray strand of dirty blond hair behind her ear. Her knit eyebrows shaded her hazel gold eyes.
“What?”
Mandy leaned forward, those same eyebrows arching into her forehead. “Is that… are you crying? Oh my God, you big baby.”
“Shut up.” The girl had inherited one trait from her time with Noble, or Mr. Jack, as she called him. Her jokes were laced with enough sarcasm it could make a hardened criminal feel like swallowing themselves until they were nothing but a ball to shield themselves from her cutdowns.
“I worry about you, Bear.” She giggled as she made her next move. It was a good one. She now had control of the center. “I’ll have you checkmated in four moves.” She loved counting down like that to get inside Bear’s head. For a thirteen-year-old, she was surprisingly good at it.
“I worry about what we’re all teaching you.”
“You don’t teach me anything anymore, dude. It’s all Sasha.” She had picked up calling him dude from Sasha. The rest was Sasha molding the girl into her personal intel assistant. “Have you talked to her yet?”
Bear made his next move. “I’ll have you checkmated in three moves.”
“No, you won’t.” Mandy cut her timetable down. “Check.”
Bear cursed under his breath and contemplated his plan of attack. “No, I haven’t heard from her, but I think that’s just a temporary glitch. No reason we can’t get to England and move on with our lives.”
Mandy had eased back in her chair. Her gaze drifted over Bear. He worried for her. Worried about PTSD. Any person in that hospital should have it. This girl in front of him might be affected the rest of her life from the attack, let alone everything else that had happened to her.
“You with me, kiddo?” He slid his Queen across the board and mocked pushing her King off the board.
“Better knock that off, or I’m gonna call you loser all night after I beat you.” Her smile was forced, but Bear obliged it and laughed. It seemed to relax Mandy.
“Why don’t I see if they’ll get us some hamburgers for dinner?”
“OK, but first—” she made her next move, beamed a smile at him as she knocked his King over. “Check mate, loser.”
Bear waved her off as he stood and went to find one of the guards stationed at the house. He located the man in the next room and inquired about dinner. The guard placed a call, presumably to someone in a car parked outside, and said dinner would be there within thirty minutes.
Back in the kitchen, Mandy was setting the board up for another match. “Ready for round two?”
“Think I’ll pass. Need a few minutes.” He opened the cabinet and rummaged through the liquor selection, settling on a Scotch he’d never heard of. He poured three normal fingers worth into a glass and returned to the table.
Mandy had already resorted to occupying herself with the iPad they had provided for her.
Bear sighed. “And she’s gone.”
“And I’m still listening.”
“And that’s too bad.” He let loose a belch that might’ve shaken the house on its foundation.
Mandy laughed, the same as she always had when he burped, ever since she was a little girl. A stupid thing, but sharing in the immature moment was one of the lighter ways they bonded.
They played another match. Mandy pulled off another win. Bear pulled down another bottle. They sat at the table talking while waiting on dinner. The words were effortless, and both meaningless and meaningful. The sense of levity that filled Bear told him the mission in Croatia had been his last.
A beaming smile formed on Mandy’s lips.
“What are you smiling at?” Bear asked.
From behind him, a woman said, “Someone order some hamburgers for delivery?”
Bear twisted in his seat, a smile of his own forming, and winked at Sasha. She rushed to him, knocking him back in his chair, tossing the two bags of food on the table. He pulled her onto his lap and kissed her.
Sasha pulled back after ten seconds. “In front of Mandy, really?” So proper. So British.
“I don’t care,” the girl said.
“Well, if you don’t care.” Sasha snaked her fingers through Bear’s thick mane and pulled him closer. She overemphasized the kissing sounds, and they all three burst into laughter.
“Didn’t know if I was gonna get to see you anytime soon,” Bear said.
“One of the most highly frustrating experiences I’ve had.” She hopped off his lap and began distributing food around the table. “After we were separated, I got a contact on the phone, someone with a fancier version of Google Earth, so to speak. We had you located, then, poof. You vanished.”
Bear shoved half a burger in his mouth and swallowed it down. “You saw us at the train station?”
“Was on my way there.”
“Didn’t see the team that took us?”
“You stepped inside, and nothing happened. Boring footage. By the time we got there, witnesses explained you had been detain
ed.”
Bear nodded, realizing Clive had tapped into the satellite and looped the transmission Sasha’s contact had been monitoring.
“Who are these people?” she asked. “Why all the destruction at the hospital to then apprehend you? And why would you go down without a fight?”
Bear’s gaze flitted to Mandy for a moment. He locked in on Sasha’s eyes. “They were different groups. The choice between A and B was pretty obvious.”
“Who was behind it?”
Bear glanced away before shaking his head. “I don’t—”
“I know you’re lying to me.”
He couldn’t look at her. “I can’t say.”
“Why?” She released her grip on his shoulder. “You were almost killed.”
“Kidney bruise from a baseball bat. I’ve had worse.”
“You were clearly incapable of serving in any type of agency capacity. Why were they forcing you to be out there?”
Bear wiggled his leg to shift Sasha and get some feeling back to his foot. The pins and needles eased. “Things had to be done, Sasha. That’s all I can say.”
“Why are you protecting them?” She stood and huffed as she walked to the refrigerator. Bottles clanked as she searched through the mess of milk, water, and beer. She settled on a Belgian Trappist beer.
Bear scarfed down the remaining chunk of burger. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. Sasha rolled her eyes. She tossed a roll of paper towels at him.
“This is all you’re going to tell me, then? You’d rather protect whoever abducted you than fill me in here so we can actually help someone?”
“I’m not protecting them.” Bear’s voice rose to a level that caused Mandy to straighten up.
“I think I should go,” Mandy said, knocking the chess pieces off the board so she could flip it over and store them inside.
“No, stay right here,” Bear said. “I want you to hear this. There’s no greater trait than loyalty. It might get you beat up, knocked down, even killed at some point. But when you’re brothers with someone, you’re always brothers.”
“It’s Noble.”
Bear clenched his teeth, biting down on his tongue in the process. His pursed lips hid the pain as he looked down, away from Sasha.
“Is there more?” Sasha crouched and angled her head so she could look Bear in the eye.
He stared back at her, nostrils flaring, feeling the burn in his cheeks and ears.
“Oh my God.” Sasha rocked back on her heels and almost lost her balance. She reached up and grabbed the table to steady herself. “You found her.”
“Who?” An exercise in futility. He knew Sasha had figured it out.
“You found Clarissa.”
Before Bear could answer, the front door crashed open and an armed guard stormed in. “We’ve got to move everyone. Now.”
Stunned, Bear rose and ushered Mandy forward. The guard met them at the kitchen entrance.
“Not here,” he said. “Through the back.”
“The hell is going on?” One hand was on Mandy’s back. The other grasping Sasha’s hand.
“We don’t have time,” the guard said. “Let’s go.”
Chapter 37
The sun hovered over the Adriatic, the last sliver of deep red fighting for its final breath before succumbing to the tranquil sea. The sky remained a mix of pink and purple for the next several minutes until the dark blues of night eroded the peaceful facade and nothing remained.
The earbud’s cord snaked down Clarissa’s tank top to the iPhone in her pocket. It had no cellular service and only a few hundred songs. John Mayer’s ironic lyrics about gravity reflected the whirlwind that had been the past few days.
She continued down the narrow path stretching the length of the small town situated along the coast. The area had been one of her favorite places to sneak off to.
Across the street, the door to a used clothing shop stood open. The breeze carried the smell of mothballs which reminded her of Mrs. Calabase. She had to get back and thank the woman for her troubles and repay her for the Vespa the old lady would never reclaim.
The men that had arrived must’ve known about Clarissa because of the scooter. She’d triggered a license plate reader somewhere. Or a cop had run the plates while the Vespa sat in the lot. Whatever had happened, she knew who to blame.
And before she checked on Mrs. Calabase, before she made good with the man who took her away from Croatia and placed her on the vessel that carried her the rest of the way to Italy, Clarissa had to deal with the turncoat.
Up to this point, she had done everything he asked. But the past seventy-two hours had eroded his All-American Boy facade to the point she didn’t think she would recognize Beck if he were standing in front of her.
Not the Beck she knew and had at one point loved. Maybe.
Love was a stretch, and she knew it. He had said it first. She went along with it. Their romance was brief, and not that intense, if she was honest about it. But he was a good man and he wanted to take care of her. Clarissa didn’t need that. But she appreciated the gesture, and decided he deserved a shot.
The relationship, their friendship, and their partnership went downhill from there.
The weeks spent tracking those behind the theft had placed a strain on the two of them. Long hours were put in. Sometimes together. Often apart. The latter Beck’s doing.
Clarissa believed she had hampered the investigation, and that was his reason for pushing her away. The way things went down after that, well, she believed he was setting her up to take the fall.
But it didn’t end that way. She got to leave with a clear name and a new identity she could use if she chose. Her bank accounts under additional aliases would always be full. Of course, she knew that could go away at any time, and probably would.
She stepped off the path and hiked down a rocky hill. From here she could see her rental cottage and its one entrance and three windows. Soft light shone through all, illuminating the sandy ground outside.
Clarissa remained in the shadows, watching for movement in and around the structure. A slight breeze blew in off the water. The air felt cool on her damp skin. Tall grasses growing out of the rock and sand danced in the pale moonlight.
The lull felt meditative. Tranquil. Serene. And everything in between.
Satisfied the cottage remained unoccupied, Clarissa covered the distance swiftly and entered. She checked her traps: a strand of hair, a clothespin, and candy wrapper. None were disturbed.
Earlier that day she had picked up fresh-caught sea bass and left it marinating in lemon juice and herbs. She preheated the oven, set a thirty-minute timer, and placed the fish inside. Afterward, she grabbed the largest glass in the cabinet and filled it to the brim with a Pinot Noir she had purchased earlier. With everything prepared, she took the wine out onto the beach.
Wise?
Probably not. True, the alcohol would ease her mind, lessen her worries, reduce her anxiety. It would also dull her awareness, lessen her reaction time, and reduce her ability to defend herself.
“Just chill,” she muttered as she lifted the glass to her lips. The Pinot was fruity, light, sweet in the front and nothing in the back. She could drink the entire bottle.
She stretched her legs out in the sand, crossing them at the ankles. One hand reached behind to support her as she leaned back and stared up at thousands of tiny holes in the sky. Her eyes drifted from familiar constellations to the stars she had grown accustomed to seeing on clear nights in Italy. Probably the same ones back home, but how often was she in a place where light pollution was so minimal?
She savored every minute she sat there, aware the opportunity might not arise again for quite some time. After this, she had to set things straight. She had to get to the evidence that would clear her name.
Would it implicate someone else?
Probably.
And she didn’t care.
Chapter 38
The van’s middle row was cramped,
with Sasha and Bear bookending Mandy. The girl fought to get her elbows to her side. Bear pressed his head against the glass. Sasha worked her cell phone, despite the two men in the front seat telling her to put it away. Bear agreed with their assessment someone was likely tracking her. Who? Anyone’s guess was as good as Bear’s. Apparently, the whole bloody world was watching now.
“Where are we going?” Sasha asked.
There was no answer.
“Do you know who I’m with?” she said.
“Do you know where we are?” Bear said.
She shot daggers at him.
Bear feigned retreat. “I’m being serious. I don’t even know what country we’re in.”
Her laugh cut the tension for a few moments. “You really don’t know you’re in France?”
He shook his head. “What happened to Sadie? No one’s told me anything. She make it out OK?”
Sasha hesitated before answering. “She’s OK.”
Bear adjusted in his seat so his back leaned against the door. He eased into it, allowing the tension in his shoulders to dissipate like a fizzy tablet in water. His head felt light, his heart a little less clenched.
“What is this smile?” Sasha said, a playful grin on her lips. “You still have a crush on Sadie?”
Mandy giggled.
“Who said anything about a crush?” Bear combed his fingers through his beard. “I practically raised that woman.”
Sasha giggled this time. “I’ll be sure to tell her that. I’m pretty sure I know what her reaction will be.”
“Me too,” Mandy said. “Gonna put a foot up his ass.”
“Dude,” Bear said, nudging her shoulder.
Mandy rolled her eyes, opened her mouth, but the situation changed, and they all directed their attention forward at the cacophony of strobing blue lights.
“What’s going on?” Bear asked.
The driver said nothing. The passenger, who had escorted them out of the kitchen, held up a finger as he punched the screen of his cell phone.