by Margaret Kay
“What are you waiting for? Go do it!” She pointed at the closed bathroom door.
“Yes, ma’am,” Garcia replied. He stood and then leaned back down and pressed a kiss to her cheek. “Thanks.” Then he stepped over to the bathroom door.
Sienna gripped the small sink counter to keep her hands from shaking. She wasn’t even sure what had just happened or why. She concentrated on just breathing, trying unsuccessfully to block all thoughts from her brain. The fact that Madison had heard that conversation was mortifying. No, breathe, think nothing, breathe, she repeated in her head.
Suddenly the door opened, and Anthony crowded into the tiny room, closing the door behind himself. His body pressed against hers as there was no space for him to stand anywhere else. She was too stunned to react, let alone speak. Without a word, he cupped both sides of her face with his large hands and his lips engulfed hers.
She was even more shocked when their lips separated. She stared at him dazed and confused for a moment until she recovered her voice. “Can we start over and forget about all that out there?”
He shook his head no, much to her surprise. “You need to know,” he whispered. “That first night, it was about keeping my cover. But after that first kiss, how it felt for me, and when I saw the expression on your face and how you reacted, it changed for me. I knew you hadn’t kissed anyone like that in a really long time.”
“No one ever kissed me like that before,” she admitted.
“There was a connection, and it wasn’t just sexual. As I held you, I knew you were caught up in something really bad and I wanted to help you, protect you.” He paused and tucked a stray lock of her hair behind her ear. Then he ran his finger along her jaw before he cupped her face with his hand. “I won’t lie to you. The sex was really good. Being with you again was all I could think about. And that had nothing to do with the job or expected behavior. It was personal.”
She wasn’t sure why he was telling her this, or what he expected her to say, so she said nothing even though her thoughts were bouncing all over, processing his words.
“I wanted it to be as good for you as it was for me, sensed you needed it as much as I did,” he continued, breaking in on her thoughts.
“It was,” she assured him in a barely audible voice, all she could muster.
“I made love to you, Sienna, and that’s not a term I use lightly,” he admitted. “I’m sorry for what I said out there. I was a jackass. I’d say I was transitioning from the biker persona, but I have no excuse.”
“And I’m sorry I said you were despicable. You didn’t make me do anything. I wanted to be with you each time.” She paused and chuckled softly. “Even in the bathroom at that truck stop. God, I’ve never had sex in a public bathroom before. I’m not even sure who this person is that I am with you.”
Garcia smiled. “I like this person, very much. And back to what I think you were really asking before our conversation went so badly awry, no, during my six months undercover I didn’t sleep with a bunch of women to keep my cover like I did you. It was never the same as what we shared.”
Sienna thought about that. She wasn’t sure exactly what he was saying. She hated that she felt so insecure and that she even started this conversation. And she hated that she had reacted the way she did. “I’m sorry. Whatever you did or didn’t do before I met you is none of my business. I wasn’t judging you.”
“It’s okay,” he said. A chime sounded. He kissed her again, a brief brush of his lips over hers. “We’re on final approach. We better take our seats.”
The aircraft landed and taxied directly to the large Shepherd Security hanger. Sienna took Anthony’s hand as she descended the stairs. She looked around expecting to see something that looked familiar, unsure what airport they would have flown into. She doubted this small plane would have landed at Dulles or Ronald Regan Airport. The plane was within a hanger. The door was closed. “What airport is this?”
“Chicago Executive,” Anthony replied.
“I thought we were going home? To my house?” Tears filled her eyes.
“Easy, sweetheart, it’s just a stopover.”
Sienna couldn’t stop the tears. She sobbed into her hands. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
Madison draped an arm around Sienna’s shuddering shoulders. “It’s okay. I get it. You were mentally prepared to go home, right?”
Sienna nodded, her hands still cupping her face.
“Listen, you need to shift to marathon mode. There is a long way to go yet before this is over,” Madison added.
Sienna nodded again and grunted a shaky, “okay.”
“Breathe, come on, deep breaths in,” Madison coached. She nodded both Garcia and Doc off. She had this.
After several deep breaths Siena raised her bloodshot eyes to Madison’s. “Thank you.”
Madison nodded. “Come on, let’s get going.” She nodded to the two black SUV’s with tinted windows that were parked nearby. Jackson and Angel were buckling the baby’s car seat into the backseat of one of them. Cooper and Doc had the backs of them open and were loading their bags in.
Anthony opened the back door to the vehicle that Angel and Jackson were not at. He motioned her in and then he slid in beside her. “Are you okay, sweetheart?”
“Yes. I’m sorry I broke down.”
“No apology is needed.”
“Where are we going?” She asked as Madison climbed into the front passenger seat.
“Headquarters,” Anthony said as he helped her to fasten her seatbelt.
“Angel’s aunt is a hairstylist. She’s going to dye yours back to your real color and see if she can cut it to look somewhat like it used to,” Madison added. “She has an office in our building. She doesn’t know exactly what we do, knows it’s some kind of special operation stuff. We trust her to keep everything she sees or knows in relation to us confidential.”
“And we need to debrief and touch bases with the team that was at your house. And I want to do a little more digging into digital records. We’ll probably head to your house tomorrow morning,” Anthony said.
Sienna nodded. She suddenly felt exhausted. Anthony took her hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze as Cooper eased behind the wheel.
After a short drive, the vehicles entered the parking garage next to the secure Shepherd Security building. They descended to subbasement two, went through a secured gate and through two security garage doors that only opened when the other was closed. As the elevator rose, so did Sienna’s anxiety level. She clutched Anthony’s hand more tightly. Sienna kept her eyes on the lit number five.
All stepped off at five. Sienna looked around at the normal-looking hallway. This could be the hallway in any office building. She had been expecting a military-looking building. Voices came from an open door to the left, tucked behind a staircase. Cooper led the way to the door. Anthony pulled her in that direction. Entering the room, she saw five men already within and a new panic assaulted her.
Shepherd rolled his wheelchair from the conference room table and outstretched a hand to Garcia. Gripping it, he pulled him in for a shoulder bump and an embrace. “Welcome back, Garcia. Good work.”
“Thank you.” A genuine smile came to his lips. “It’s good to be back.”
Lambchop pulled him into a bone crushing hug next. Then his strong hands gripped both sides of Garcia’s head. He kissed Garcia’s forehead and then bowed his head. “Dear Father, thank you for keeping your son, Anthony, safe while he did your work fulfilling his mission. We are relieved that he is returned to his team safely. We sing your praises, dear Lord, for the work he did in your name. Amen.” And then he turned his attention to a very stunned Sienna while the three other members of Delta Team greeted Garcia. “Sienna, I am glad to meet you. I am known as Lambchop, the Reverend, or Johnson around here. Angel is the only one who calls me by my first name, Landon. Please do as well.”
She shook his hand. “Thank you. It is nice to meet you too.”
“I was with the team that went to your home. By the time you get there, it should be cleaned up some. It was bad. I won’t lie to you about that. I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.” Sienna was surprised by this big man’s gentle manner. He was a medium-skinned black man with a kind smile. His massive biceps swelled from beneath the black t-shirt he wore, which clung to his muscled chest. It was tucked into camo pants at his narrow waist. He was an attractive man, with a calm demeanor which instantly put her at ease.
She was then introduced to Shepherd. He was the solid-looking, older man with black hair and wrinkles bracketing his eyes in the wheel chair. He wore a sport coat over his broad chest. “Hello, Mrs. Andrews. I am glad you crashed our Op. We can protect you and sort this out. We need your help though.”
Sienna nodded. “Thank you. I’ll do whatever you need me to.”
Then she was introduced to the other men in the room. Danny ‘Mother’ Trio was Hispanic with serious, dark eyes, Brian ‘the Birdman’ Sherman and Gary ‘the Undertaker’ Sloan had similar features, but the Undertaker was clean shaven. The Birdman was not. They all took their seats at the conference room table. She noticed then, that Angel and the baby were not in the room. The others were, Doc, Jackson, Cooper and Madison, and of course Anthony. She felt a renewed anxiety come over her.
Shepherd started the meeting. “Mrs. Andrews, may we call you Sienna?”
“Yes, please,” she replied.
“Sienna, we have all read your statement. You are aware now that your husband was a CIA agent?”
She nodded. “Yes, I know now. I didn’t know before. He never told me.”
Shepherd nodded. “I had a call with the Deputy Director of the CIA, my contact. He confirmed that Dearborne Energy Solutions is a CIA cover organization and he confirmed that your late husband was an agent. I haven’t spoken with anyone from Dearborne specifically about him or you, because I’m not one-hundred percent sure we can trust them yet. Anyone associated with that organization is suspect, as far as I’m concerned. Who from your husband’s office have you met?”
“Only one person. Greg claimed he was the sales software engineer that he worked with the most. He introduced him as Collin Lowry.”
“We’ll run photos by you. We need you to try to pick him out for us.”
She nodded to Shepherd. Certainly, they knew by now that she’d help any way she could.
“Sienna, now that you know who your husband really was, is there anything that jumps out to you as more than you would have thought it was, before?” Shepherd asked.
“I’m not sure I understand what you mean. I thought we had a normal life, that he was just a normal guy.”
Garcia took hold of her hand on the conference room table. “What he means is, sometimes things that don’t seem suspicious at all can shed new light on things once you know the person is an agent. For instance, did he ever disappear for periods of time that you let go as nothing, that could have been something, long after dinner walks, or phone calls he had to step away from you to take?”
Sienna gazed at everyone around the table with an almost guilty look on her face.
“What is it Sienna?” Shepherd asked.
“That was the normal with him, always had been. I don’t remember a time when he didn’t step into a different room to take phone calls.” Sienna felt stupid to admit it.
“What about recently, say the last six months or so? Anything remarkably different?” Shepherd pressed.
Sienna nodded. “Now that you mention it, he worked from home a lot more the last five months than in the past. He only went into the office once a week, said it was a new work at home policy.”
“And how was his mood?” Shepherd asked.
Sienna shrugged. “Look, I loved him, but we had grown apart and he had become increasingly more private about everything. He didn’t even tell me he was seeing a doctor for prediabetes until that doctor called the house repeatedly. Greg had always been healthy, so it really shocked me.”
Doc’s ears perked up. “Prediabetes? Did he say what his A1C was or why he got tested to begin with?”
Sienna shook her head no. “He wouldn’t talk with me about it. He insisted he was handling it and it was okay.”
“What was the doctor’s name?” Doc asked. He made a note in his tablet to review Greg Andrews’ medical and autopsy records.
Sienna shook her head again. “I don’t remember his name. He had an accent, Indian or Pakistani I think.”
“Was it normal for your husband to give the home phone number to doctors?” Madison asked. No one she knew gave any phone number other than their cell numbers, especially if they were trying to keep things a secret.
“No, that’s what was weird. Greg never gave the home phone number out. It was unlisted and unpublished. He insisted on that because he didn’t potentially want any of the parents of the kids I taught, to be able to call and disturb me outside of school.”
“When exactly were these calls?” Doc asked.
“About a month before he was killed.”
“That’s right in line with the date on that email that mentioned New Mountain Enterprises,” Lambchop chimed in.
Shepherd’s eyes shifted to Garcia. “We’re going to send a team to surveil the New Mountain Enterprises building in Colorado. Delta, that’s yours. Razor, spend some time with them before they head out and relay anything that may not have been apparent in your reports on the facility.”
Garcia nodded and then his eyes shifted to Lambchop. “There is definitely something wonky with that facility. Did you get anything concrete about New Mountain from that email from Sienna’s safe?”
“Yes, Greg Andrews had his focus on that building as well, but it didn’t look like it was an official CIA investigation into New Mountain. I think Greg Andrews was free-lancing or running an off the books Op from what I can make out,” Lambchop said.
Shepherd nodded. “A lot of that email seemed to be in code, but we think he was noting shipment activity.”
Sienna didn’t understand what any of that meant. She wouldn’t ask now. She’d wait till later when she and Anthony were alone and ask him then.
“Shepherd, what about Saucedo?” Garcia asked.
Shepherd ran his hand through his short-clipped hair considering what to disclose in front of Sienna Andrews. “DEA reported that he is here, in Chicago.”
Energy and anticipation surged through Garcia’s body. Perfect timing. “We have to scoop him up. He’s the weak link, I’m sure. If we can get the intel on what errands he ran for Gomez and piece them in with what Gomez had me doing, that’s two-thirds of the puzzle. We just may be able to piece the rest together.”
Shepherd held his hand up. “I’m still in discussion with the DEA regarding that move. Scooping Saucedo up has catastrophic long-term ramifications. It’s not our call to make alone.”
“The intel we get from him could be enough to make long-term concerns unnecessary. I’m telling you, if he believes Gomez distrusts him and that Razor has been promoted, I can get everything we need out of him.”
“Garcia, this decision is above your paygrade. I will let you know when a decision is made,” Shepherd said authoritatively. “But if it is sanctioned, who do you need to pull it off?”
“Give me the Birdman, Mother and Lambchop on the inside. They look the part of Razor’s inner circle.”
Shepherd nodded. “Once Saucedo is scooped up, he’s out of play. We’ll have to tuck him away at the Silo until he can be shifted to the DEA as an official arrestee. We have to be sure we can get what we need from him before we dedicate resources to that.”
“That’s bullshit. We both know the DEA can find a hole to put him in. Let me talk to Manning. He’s the one who reached out to us and put me under in the first place. He owes me six months of my life and I don’t have a problem reminding him of it,” Garcia insisted.
Shepherd considered Garcia’s words.
“And the fact that the
CIA has a piece of this, I think that warrants the risk,” Cooper added. “Shep, I think it’s worth a try.”
Shepherd nodded. “Okay, the New Mountain Op is on hold until after Garcia has his conversation with Manning.” His eyes went to Madison. “Get her set up to view some photos of CIA agents. I’ve gotten you access to their database. Let’s see if we can’t identify this Collin Lowry, or whatever his real name is. Then escort her to Meredith’s hair salon on two and stay with her while Meredith works on her. Meredith is due in to work on her at fifteen-hundred.”
“Yes, sir,” Madison replied, coming to her feet. She and Sienna had just been dismissed. She nodded at Sienna, who then also stood. Madison shut the door behind them when they exited Shepherd’s office.
Shepherd focused his gaze on Garcia. “Tell me how you see this discussion with Saucedo going.”