Unchained

by Roze, Robyn

  Sean remained quiet, mulling over his old friend’s unsolicited, cautionary advice.

  “We are on track. I’m just opening another lane.”

  Mick tamped out the cigar on his boot tread, and asked, “The people paying the big bucks for this operation approved the new lane?”

  Sean stood and snatched the lantern off the post. “It’s time to head to the mainland.”

  “Did you get approval,” Mick repeated, now on his feet beside Sean.

  “I don’t need anyone’s approval.” The commander had spoken loud and clear, the shift in power palpable. “I’m not giving them a choice. Grab the gear and let’s go. It’s time to meet up with Reece.” Sean headed down the steps and into the blackness toward the camouflaged boat, lantern bobbing and Mick in tow.

  “Oh, fuck. You’re goin’ solo, aren’t you?” he called out from behind.

  Sean didn’t answer, only continued his strident march. When he reached the inconspicuous spot, he gripped the tarp, scrub scattered on top, and ripped it off in one clean jerk, exposing the upturned boat underneath.

  “You need to rethink it,” Mick said, with the heavy thud of tactical bags at his feet.

  To Sean’s ears, the bold statement skated perilously close to the edge of what sounded like an order. Still bent over the craft, he took his time reaching his full height, lids narrowed, chin tipped up, chest inflated with authority. Mick had never crossed this boundary before, but he was walking a dangerous line right now.

  “Hear me out,” Mick said, palms raised, his stance deferential. “You call the shots on this; I respect that. But,” he cocked his head as if bracing for impact, “you have more than yourself to think about this time, brother.”

  Without warning, a chunk of Sean’s indignation deflated from the sting of sharp truth.

  “I made a promise. And we’re both getting out of this alive,” Mick said with the resounding ring of conviction.

  Curiosity tweaked with irritation, Sean stepped around the boat and in front of Mick. “A promise? Who to?” He narrowed the gap between them when he didn’t get the answer he suspected.

  Mick remained silent, holding Sean’s hard, level stare.

  “Teams. Solo. I’ve done it all. And I’m still standing.” Sean’s finger jabbed at Mick’s chest. “I don’t need you putting any fucking doubts in her head about my abilities.”

  Mick held his ground and seemed to gauge which fork in the road to choose.

  “You’re the toughest son-of-a-bitch I know. And you know I would never give anyone, especially your wife, any other idea.” He leaned in. “But this time is different, and we both know it. This isn’t like any of the other jobs. This is personal.”

  There was no arguing with Mick on that point. This mission was deeply personal, at a time in his life when he had the most to lose. This undertaking would either mean he sealed the door shut for good on his past, or that he nailed his own coffin shut.

  “This’ll be the last time,” Mick continued, his face a nostalgic canvas of their history. “I say we do it right, brother. I say we do it together. All of it.”

  Mick’s words hit him like a blindside. So much so, he stepped away to regroup, looking out over the water scraped with cloudy moonlight and lapping at the nearby shore.

  He could still see the boys they had been: troublemakers, sneaking food at Gaetano’s and getting chased from the kitchen, his mother shouting at them in Italian with the snap of her towel at their backsides, their laughter echoing down the alleyway as they ran…His lips curved up at the cascade of old memories. The pointless brawls they started with others out of boredom, the run-ins with the Mt. Pleasant P.D., the drag racing; the wrecked cars. You name it, and their fingerprints would have likely been all over it. They had been royal pains in the ass, lucky to have survived their testosterone-fueled teens.

  His parents should have been sainted. To him, they were.

  The way he saw it, the men they had become were not all that different from the boys they had been. The difference now was that they were bigger, stronger, and a lot smarter. They had lethal skills and men and weapons at their command. Make no mistake, they were still troublemakers. Because time had burdened them, hardened them, with a jaded view of the realities of the world, and their warped place in it. With their countless daring missions, they had seen it all. Done it all. Survived it all.

  Together.

  He shelved the collection of powerful memories with abiding appreciation and indebtedness for the friend who had always had his back, in all matters.

  Mick Torres was proof that the measure of family extended beyond mere bloodline.

  “I’ll consider your—request.”

  Mick’s jaw and body slackened in visible relief at the wisecrack, and he moved to Sean’s side, shoulder to shoulder, both men watching the ships chugging along in the strait.

  “I swear, I don’t know what she sees in you. You’re grouchy. Bullheaded. No fucking sense of humor. And you’re handsome like a baboon’s ass.” His side-eye caught the slant of Sean’s grin. “I guess that’s her type. I got a strong hunch she wants to rip your ass good about something. I’d hate like hell to disappoint her. So, we gonna do this?”

  “If you’re done sticking your nose in my business,” Sean aimed a thumb over his shoulder, “get that boat flipped over and into the water so we can get this show on the road.”

  Mick saluted, his smile shrewd. “You got it, chief.”

  He made quick work of righting the small craft, then tossed their gear inside. Sean stowed the outboard in the boat’s belly. Then they each hoisted an end and hiked the short distance to the shoreline, weaving through the trees and dipping into the chilly late-night waters of the Johor Straits. The past pressing at their backs, destiny pulling them forward.

  Chapter 15

  Once the jet descended below the thick band of clouds, Shayna recognized the famed landmarks and pulsing sprawl expanding in her view. A deep, familiar pang of unresolved emotions from the past crowded into the present.

  At night, the twelve legendary avenues radiating from the triumphal arch below glimmered in red and golden ribbons of light from the stream of traffic. The slight lift of her lashes brought the Eiffel Tower into view, as she knew, all too well, it would.

  Her mind wandered off script, turning back the frayed pages of her story. There, in those old, crumpled chapters, she could still hear their laughter. Still feel his caress. Still see a couple in love, as they had once been…

  A luxurious, month-long honeymoon spent entwined in a private, beautiful Paris duplex, with a husband who had loved her, then. A man with whom she had explored not only the tangle of sheets, but the crisscross of streets and monuments now gliding by her cabin window. They made dozens of return trips during their marriage, many of them to celebrate wedding anniversaries.

  Another life.

  Another love.

  She could never have imagined then that their story would end any other way than happy; together. It all seemed like someone else’s story now. A life she had only read about, not lived. The young woman in those stories felt as much a stranger to her as did the older handsome man in them, coaxing smiles and kisses from his young bride.

  A series of taps at her knee scattered the conflicting memories and brought her full circle.

  “You don’t feel sick, do you?”

  She followed Scotty’s eyes to her stomach clutched in one hand, the armrest white knuckled in the other.

  Shayna released her hands, clasping them in her lap. “No. I feel fine.” His worried expression shifted to a candid moment of understanding for the place where her mind had just traveled.

  Then his features turned sly. “I guess the jig is up. You know why we’re here.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  Sean had sent her where he had intended all along, against her wishes. Even after she had confessed why it was so important to her to stay near him.

>   “Am I a surprise? Or will Dani be expecting me?”

  “You’ll knock her socks off. She thinks her favorite uncle is paying a visit on a business stop. She doesn’t have a clue about you.”

  “Great.” She smiled away his worried expression and patted his hand. “I’ll be fine. I am fine,” she clarified. “Seeing Dani is just what I need.”

  “That’s what he said.”

  He, who thought others were equivalent placeholders in his absence. He, who believed she could be shuttled like cargo and then claimed when he was ready.

  Yes, he wanted her safe; yes, she loved him for that. And, yes, she was angry as hell that he had banished her, without the decency of even one phone call, one note, one bit of anything to give her the sense of connection to him she so desperately needed.

  She caressed the strand of gems encircled at the base of her throat, remembering the secluded beach where he had presented them to her. Then her focus returned to the nightscape, the seatbelt sign pinging overhead.

  Her attention remained fixed out the window, fingers still fiddling with the gemstones. “Do you talk to him, Scotty?”

  Silence.

  She turned a hard-nosed look on him. “You just said, ‘that’s what he said.’ So, do you talk to him? Have you talked to him since I’ve been on this plane?”

  “No. Yes. I mean, no! Not directly, okay?”

  “What does that mean?”

  The sound of exasperation blew past his fluttering lips. “Jesus, I could use a drink.”

  She gripped his bicep. “We have a deal. And you’re going to hold up your end.”

  “Oh, yeah? And what about you holding up your end, huh?”

  “I only agreed not to ask about your work—Mr. Facilitator—not whether you’re currently in contact with my husband.”

  “Still a stickler,” he mumbled, glancing around the interior, empty except for them. “Look, we have channels we can use when we need to be discreet. Ways of communicating without raising suspicion. So, yes, he knows that you’re good and everything’s on schedule and running smooth on this end.” He patted her hand. “You don’t need to worry about him, either. He’s fine too.”

  “Wow. That’s a load off my mind.”

  The fire in her eyes clamped his mouth shut.

  “Do you two use a secret code in the classifieds or something?”

  His confusion looked genuine.

  “When you’re sending these cryptic messages, instead of picking up a damn phone.”

  His eyes rolled back as he chuckled. “Stop reading spy novels, sis.”

  She waved away his irritating comment. “You’re hopeless.” She paused from the startling weight of a sinking realization. She had lost Wes first, then Frank. Would Sean be the third?

  If so, he would be the last.

  “It’s all hopeless in the end,” she said, her thoughts mired in past tragedies and burdened with the real possibility of the next.

  A few moments passed with only the rumble of turbines filling the cabin.

  Scotty scooted closer, grasped her hand, and whispered words from their past, “You can’t lose hope, or you’ll lose your way.”

  Her breath held on a quiet gasp at the unexpected echo of the words she had spoken to him in their youth.

  “Keep putting one foot in front of the other until you find hope again. And you will. I promise.” His thumb stroked the back of her hand. “You may think I don’t listen to what you say. Now you know better.”

  Their heads closed the narrow gap between them and pressed together, her eyes shutting tight on the restatement of her old declaration to him, and on the heart-rending memories from that time.

  Scotty had always been the clown in the family. Everybody, including her oldest brother Jack and their dad, had mistaken his humor and easygoing personality to mean nothing bothered him. She had known otherwise. She heard his tears in his room at night, next to hers, after their mother had run away. Late nights spent huddled under the tent of his Superman bedsheets, flashlight in hand, consoling each other through tearstained whispers. Then as teenagers, his walls plastered with posters of bikini models and heavy metal bands, she would sit burrowed in his bean bag chair listening to him, scared of the troubling road he was heading down. It was during one of those talks when she offered the promise of hope to him that he now returned to her.

  “You were right back then, you know. There are still days I have to remind myself to keep putting one foot in front of the other.” She nodded against him. “You can be a real pain in the ass, sis, but you are still the best woman I know. I know he feels the same. Please, do this thing his way. We both just want you safe, and happy.”

  The pair pulled back, eyes focused on each other, their deep bond stretched like an invisible, unbreakable tether between them.

  “He thinks I’m a real pain in the ass, does he?” she said, deciding to lighten the moment, for both of them.

  He squeezed her hand tighter, an appreciative look in his eyes.

  “That’s all you heard?” He shook his head. “Women. I swear.”

  “Yeah, real pains in the ass, aren’t we,” she teased, with a knowing smile. “God, I love it when you’re sober.”

  He scrubbed both hands over his face. “Don’t remind me.”

  The sound of landing gear engaging reoriented their thoughts with the snap of buckles at their hips.

  “Do you know how long we’ll be here?”

  “I really don’t.”

  “You’re going to hang out with me indefinitely? Don’t you have facilitating to do?” She bit her lips together, but the smile still spread across her face.

  “Listen, smart aleck—”

  She interrupted him. “What exactly are we telling my daughter about why I’m here—without Sean?”

  “Ah, that’s simple. He has business to take care of, and he’ll meet up with us later if he can. See how easy that was? It’s not even a lie.” Pride in his voice, he brushed his hands clean, as if ridding them of crumbs.

  “And if she asks what kind of ‘business’?”

  “She won’t. My sweet little niece isn’t nearly as nosey or nit-picky as her mother.”

  “Only because she hasn’t suffered the burns I have.”

  His head dipped in agreement. “Touché.”

  They braced in their seats as the wheels grazed the tarmac, then touched down for a smooth landing on the strip that minutes later led to a slow taxi toward a designated hangar. All the time in the world for Scotty’s words to burrow deeper in her psyche and torment her.

  He’ll meet up with us.

  If he can.

  Chapter 16

  After a late check-in at the Shangri-La Hotel, the siblings said goodnight and retired to their adjoining suites on the sixth floor. Shayna had resisted the pull of the iconic view signaling across the Seine, casting its towering radiance throughout her suite. The spectacle of the Eiffel Tower from her private terrace would have been magnificent; she remembered it well. Instead, she had drawn the drapes shut on the upsetting reminder.

  When the staccato beat of raindrops pelted against the panes in the morning as she tossed in bed struggling between the fog of wake and sleep, it gave her an excuse not to pull back the curtain on the clash of memories waiting on the other side.

  It was too soon for this city and the badgering memory of the man whose shadow lurked in every museum, at every monument and sidewalk café—and even in the hallways of this hotel. His presence weighed heavier in this city than anywhere she had traveled since his death. He skulked around every corner, judgment in the air, his memories refusing to be dismissed.

  The irony that it was their only child who brought her back to this maudlin place, at this precise moment, was not lost on Shayna.

  Truth and consequence.

  Lies and reconciliation.

  Her choices and those of others were twisted in a knot so tight she doubted it could
ever be unraveled.

  At brunch, she picked at the same scraps on her plate, her mood sour and agitated by the night’s restless sleep and inward slideshow of unwelcome memories. She brushed off Scotty’s complaints about her glum attitude, claiming jet lag and insisting his pestering about it stop. He relented and called a driver to take them to Danielle and Harper’s flat.

  The newlyweds had agreed to a generous Paris relocation package meant to fast-track Harper’s career. Shayna had been thrilled to learn in phone calls with Dani that The City of Light had reawakened her daughter’s passion for photography. Dani now had her own website showcasing her artistic talent for revealing people, historic architecture, and rolling landscapes through her unique lens.

  As they made their way down the narrow hall to Danielle’s apartment, the growing excitement pushed away Shayna’s malaise. This would be good for her mental health. This would help her regain perspective, and, in some small measure, settle her jumbled nerves—for now, at least.

  Scotty knocked on the door and hollered, “Hey, it’s your favorite uncle. I just sweated up four flights of stairs for you. You’d better have something cold for me to drink.” He chuckled and glanced back at Shayna, concealed behind him.

  They heard a squeal of delight followed by the click of heels on a hard surface hotfooting toward them on the other side of the door. When the entry flew open, Danielle launched herself at Scotty, arms wrapped around his neck, her eyes shut tight.

  “Sorry about all the stairs; it’s an old building. I’m glad—” Her excited chatter stopped, the whites of her blue eyes widening at the person standing in her sights. “Mom! Oh, my God!” She smacked her uncle’s shoulder. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me,” she scolded, then planted a loving kiss on his cheek before pushing past him to hug her mother.