Shades of Gray

by Vicki Hinze

  “Arrogance is his Achilles’ heel. Check his undoctored personnel records or his court-martial file. He’ll contaminate the water himself just to prove that he can.”

  “Prepare to stop him.” Connor glanced down at his watch. “The team’s convening in the briefing room in twenty minutes. You’ll need to be there. Right now, they’re alerting local authorities and their field agents. You’ll have assistance, Jake, including Captain Perry’s.”

  Connor finished scanning through the loose pages on his desk. “You all have blanket authorization to self-medicate. The flight surgeon will be at the briefing with appropriate antibiotics.”

  That got Jake’s adrenaline pumping. “Yes, sir.”

  Connor didn’t meet Jake’s eyes. “You can’t tell Laura you’re leaving headquarters. That’s a team decision, not mine.”

  Them and their damn doubt. “She’s innocent.”

  “I know that, and you know it. But her photo being found in the dead operative’s hand puts her in a gray area, Jake. It has the others nervous.”

  “Nothing is black and white.” Jake reiterated a phrase from Madeline’s answering machine message.

  Connor let out a sigh reeking of frustration. “Look, I agree with you. Doubt is a bitch, but the team’s weighed the possibilities, and the scales don’t balance. If they’re wrong, Laura’s no worse off for being detained. Hell, she’s probably better off. If they’re right, they’ve neutralized her.”

  “They’re not right,” Jake said. “Just answer one question for me. She’s my wife. I love her, and you know it. So why have you kept me assigned to this mission?”

  “You’re the best man for the job.”

  “And?” There was more; Jake sensed it.

  Connor looked away. His gaze slid to the portrait of Patton. “Because I asked your wife why she married you.”

  “And she said to help me keep custody of Timmy.”

  “Yes.” Connor slid a hand into his pocket and turned back to Jake. “But she also told me . . . other things. She admires you greatly, Jake, as a human being. And her respect for Special Ops . . . Well, that’s why I’ve kept you on this assignment.”

  “Because of Laura’s admiration for what we do?” This didn’t make sense.

  “Because she admires. You get to be a pretty good judge of character in this job, and you develop a nose for when someone’s paying you lip service. Laura wasn’t. She was speaking from her heart. There’s no way she could be guilty, Jake, and I know there’s no man alive who’ll work harder to prove her innocent than you. That’s why you haven’t been replaced.”

  Whatever she’d told Connor, it had to have been powerful to inspire him to put his stars on the line. That was the bottom line here. The team had claimed conflict of interest, and Connor had personally accepted responsibility for Jake. If Jake screwed up, and the team felt it was intentional, Connor would forfeit his stars, possibly his command, and perhaps even his pension. All because of what Laura had said to him.

  And Jake couldn’t even tell her he was leaving. Knowing he might never see her again, he could say nothing, not even goodbye.

  Connor cleared his throat. “Gear up, and meet the team in the briefing room in fifteen minutes.”

  “Yes, sir.” Jake turned for the office door.

  “Jake?” Connor called out.

  Looking back at him, Jake paused.

  Connor’s expression tensed and grew even more serious, tightening the corners of his mouth. “I don’t want to have to tell your wife you didn’t make it. Put me in that position, and I’m going to be pissed.”

  “No, sir,” Jake said, then left the office.

  He gathered his gear and changed into his combat uniform. Timmy often had said the camouflage BDUs looked like pajamas. Jake had told him the battle dress uniforms were fatigues—fighting clothes—and Timmy had warned Jake that fighting upset Laura. She would strongly suggest he not fight to settle his differences, and if he did it anyway and got caught, she’d put him on restriction. She might even cry.

  Remembering that jewel of an interchange with his son had Jake smiling all the way to the briefing room.

  Just before he entered the door, one of the vault guards approached him. “Major?” he said. “Mrs. Logan’s very upset, sir. She kept at me until I promised I’d come tell you something.”

  Very upset? How upset? Downing-raspberries-bythe-box upset or yelling upset? “Yes, Lieutenant?”

  “She says to tell you Timmy’s in trouble, sir. She . . . um . . .” His face flushed.

  “What?” Jake frowned, restraining himself from pulling the words out of the man’s throat.

  “She feels it, sir,” he said, definitely uncomfortable with reporting intuitive feelings.

  “She feels it, but there’ve been no messages, right?”

  “That’s correct, sir. She said to tell you and made me swear on my rank I’d tell you right away, no matter what you were doing.”

  “Did she say ‘mother’s intuition’?” Jake asked, praying she hadn’t and dreading that the man would answer she had.

  “Yes, sir. That’s exactly what she said.”

  A shiver shot up Jake’s spine. She’d been right too often for him not to pay attention to this warning, or for him to hope that this time she was wrong. When it came to Timmy, Laura had always had a built-in radar that signaled when he was in trouble. And she’d rarely, if ever, been wrong. “Thank you. Tell her I’ll take care of it.”

  Maybe it was stress and not intuition, Jake thought, watching the vault guard head back toward the bank of elevators. Timmy was safe with Bear. If there was trouble, he would’ve called, and he hadn’t.

  “Jake,” Captain Perry said. “The team’s waiting. Better get your backside in there.”

  Jake walked into the briefing room.

  Ten men and three women sat at the conference table. Some wore uniforms; some, street clothes. Some Jake knew—like Colonel Jim Mather, the Judge Advocate General, commonly referred to as the JAG, and Agent 27, the CIA representative—but the others he didn’t recognize. None of them wore BDUs, including Perry, and that absence gave Jake a sinking feeling that there’d already been an alteration in plans, and he’d be going it alone.

  Perry whispered something to Connor, who sat at the head of the table, then left the room.

  “Jake,” Connor said, pointing to a chair at his right. “Sit over here.”

  When Jake sat down, Connor addressed him.

  “I understand Laura’s got an intuitive feeling that something is wrong with Timmy.”

  Perry. “Yes, sir,” Jake said. “She’s done that numerous times over the years with him.”

  “Has she been accurate?”

  “Yes, sir.” A sliver of uneasiness widened inside Jake. “Often.”

  A lean-faced team member frowned. “Jake, do you think Laura could have claimed having this feeling to prepare the foundation, so to speak, in an attempt to get herself released?”

  “Maybe.” Jake looked at the man. “If she knew she was being detained, and she thought Timmy needed her, she’d move heaven and earth to get to him.”

  “But would helping him be her only motive?” a woman asked. Sitting at the end of the table, she looked a lot like a blonde Connie Selleca. “In your opinion.”

  “In my opinion, yes. Laura only agreed to protective custody for him. That’d be the only reason she’d attempt to break it.”

  Connor passed over a fax. Worry flooded his face, and seeing it had Jake’s skin crawling. “What’s this?”

  “A message, we presume, from ROFF,” Connor said. “It was sent directly to my office.”

  Jake looked down at the single, sheet of paper. The words on it had been composed from letters cut out of the newspaper.

  LOGAN
/>   EXCHANGE

  wife FOR son

  Everglade rendEZvous

  Tonight

  OR

  son DIES

  Sixteen

  They had Timmy?

  Jake couldn’t breathe.

  Connor softened his voice. “You’d better check this out.”

  Jake was nearly to the briefing room door when someone knocked. He yanked it open. Captain David Perry stood there, and Jake shoved past him.

  “Jake,” Perry yelled out. “I’ve got an emergency message for you from a Mrs. Barton.”

  Halfway down the hallway, running for a secure phone line, Jake stopped and then turned back.

  From inside the room, Connor called. “Bring it in here, Perry.”

  Ruddy-faced and frowning, he entered the briefing room.

  Jake followed him. “What is it?”

  “A team of six broke into the Barton residence. Heavily armed. Mr. Barton was shot twice in the chest. He’s alive, but in critical condition. Mrs. Barton’s given a fairly decent description of the men who weren’t masked. They took Timmy, Jake.”

  “Oh, God.”

  “Mrs. Barton says a woman was with them.” Perry’s grimace deepened. “Timmy called her Madeline.”

  Seventeen

  Madeline had kidnapped Timmy? She worked with ROFF? The fax wasn’t a hoax. Laura’s intuition wasn’t wrong. They had his son. Madeline had helped them kidnap his son. “Perry,” Jake said softly, feeling a storm of emotions, so many he couldn’t slot them all: anger, outrage, resentment, disbelief, and fear. So damn much fear. “Bring my wife up here. STAT.”

  Connor swept at the yellow pad with his pen. “What the hell would Madeline be doing with ROFF?”

  Stiff shouldered and tense, Jake stood with his hand stuffed fisted in his slacks’ pocket, afraid to so much as blink or he’d lose control. Chin dipped, he slid Connor a level look, his voice bitter-edged. “She’s Sean Drake’s daughter. Because of her drinking, I let myself forget that.” Now Timmy was paying the costs of Jake’s lapse in judgment.

  Connor blinked, frowned, and then blinked again, clearly seeing where Jake’s thoughts were going on this. “We all forgot that.”

  The blonde Connie Seneca lifted a finger. “Wasn’t Madeline connected to Intel at one time?”

  “Yes,” the CIA representative, Agent 27, said, kneading at the muscles in his neck with an impatient hand. “She was on staff, working for Colonel James, but only because of her father.”

  “Excuse me?” The blonde lifted her brows.

  “Sean Drake held one of the most powerful positions in the CIA. He worked closely with Colonel James, and James hired Madeline. We all know that type thing goes on. But even then she was an alcoholic. We couldn’t risk using her for anything. When the woman was sober, she was still incompetent.”

  Connor interceded. “What Agent twenty-seven is trying to be diplomatic about saying is, Madeline Drake has no common sense. Even sober, she was an indiscreet liability with an attitude.”

  “Hell, why play with words? The woman is an air-head.” Jake paced a short path alongside the table, then suddenly stopped. “Or she wanted to convince everyone she was an airhead.” A cold chill crept up his backbone. Was she really? Unsure anymore, Jake raked an impatient hand through his hair. “The only thing about her I’m sure of is that she appeared to want one thing in life: Sean Drake’s approval. She pursued it diligently, and she never got it. Recently, she’s physically and verbally attacked my wife and son, threatened to fight to overturn Laura’s adoption of Timmy, and now she’s kidnapped my son with a group of terrorists. There is a connection between Madeline, Hawkins, and ROFF, but I’m not sure of its purpose. I’m not even sure who the hell she is.”

  “I’m not tracking, Jake,” the JAG, Colonel Jim Mather, said.

  “Is she an airhead? Or is she very clever and following in Sean Drake’s footsteps, still trying to win his approval? Is she a drunk? Or is she using an alcoholic facade to operate under deeper cover than we ever fathomed her capable?”

  Connor expelled a grunt. “Colonel James.”

  Jake had drawn the same conclusion. “Funny how his name keeps turning up, isn’t it?”

  “What are you saying, Jake?” an unidentified male team member asked.

  Catching Connor’s silent message to withhold the information for the moment, Jake sighed. James was Air Force, and Connor wanted to clean house in-house. “I don’t know—not yet. But my instincts are telling me I shouldn’t have let myself forget she’s Sean Drake’s daughter.” Jake stopped pacing and looked back to Connor. “I’m wondering how she knew Timmy was with Bear Barton.”

  Connor grimaced. “He’s the Barton we’re discussing? Laura chose to take Timmy to Bad Ass Bear?”

  Jake nodded, not trusting himself to speak. It had to be James. Connor would have told him Timmy wouldn’t be coming to him for safekeeping. So James would have alerted Madeline, who most likely had someone tag Jake and Laura to find Timmy. Jake should have kept the boy with Laura. But at the time, they hadn’t known she’d be in protective custody, and they’d felt Timmy would be in greater danger with her than away from them both.

  “He was a good choice,” the JAG said, the line of notepads on the table reflecting in his glasses. “Don’t second-guess that decision. If it were my own son, I’d have chosen Bear Barton. No one on earth is more protective of children.”

  But because they had chosen him, and he’d agreed to help, Bear now lay in critical condition in the hospital, suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. He’d fought to protect Timmy. Now he was fighting to save his own life.

  Connor claimed Jake’s attention. “What are your feelings regarding the exchange?”

  Charles, who was about thirty and fair-skinned with a thin face and a broad nose, interceded. “FBI policy is not to negotiate with terrorists, General.”

  “This is an atypical situation, Charles,” Connor said, then looked at Jake. “What are you thinking?”

  Jake’s heart hurt; it felt as twisted as the lump of molten metal that once had been Laura’s Mustang. Looking from person to person around the table, he saw in their eyes that some felt Laura had planned this, that she’d arranged Timmy’s abduction to secure her own release, and anger boiled inside him. “Laura did not do this. She hasn’t been told that any of you doubt her, or that you consider her detained. She’s only been told she’s in protective custody.”

  Charles studied Jake. “Detained or in protective custody, the result is the same. Effect an exchange, and she’s no longer out of commission.”

  “Pardon me for saying so,” Jake said from between his teeth, “but you’re talking through your ass. Laura would die before jeopardizing Timmy. If you had read her damn file instead of condemning her on speculation and appearances, you’d know that.”

  “I read her file, Jake, and I agree with you,” Connor said. He then addressed the team. “Only an ass or an idiot would believe she’d set up Timmy’s abduction or Bear Barton. He granted her the adoption. If he’d refused it, then there’d be room for doubt, but he supported her—without Jake even being at the hearing. She took Timmy to Bear for protection. Dr. Laura Taylor Logan isn’t a suspect, people. She’s a victim.”

  Charles turned to Connor. “Are you willing to put your stars on that, General?”

  “I already have.” Connor turned a gaze on the man that had sent troops running for cover. “And unless I lose them, I expect the full support of everyone at this table on the issue.”

  No one refused him.

  Jake appreciated the general’s support, but held off saying so. If he voiced his gratitude, the team could interpret it as an in-house political maneuver that Connor’s support was a gift and not based on merit Laura had earned. Still, Jake felt grateful. Deeply grateful.
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  “These developments, especially as they bring Madeline into the situation, leave you with a dilemma, Jake,” Connor said. “Hawkins will kill Timmy. He’s a cold bastard, and we all know it. Laura is skilled. A trained intelligence professional. Her odds of survival would be better.”

  Charles frowned. “You’re suggesting the exchange?”

  “Perhaps,” Connor replied. “I see merit in considering it as an option.”

  Jake sat back down and rubbed a weary hand over his eyes. “I don’t need the bean counters to tell me the survival odds are zero for either one of them,” Jake said. Just speaking those words had his whole body rebelling. “I love them both. I can’t choose. What husband or father could choose?”

  “Only one person has the right to make this choice, Jake, and it isn’t you.” Connor sent him a look laced with empathy and resolve. “It’s Laura.”

  “I can’t ask her to do this. For Timmy, she would. She’s always been willing to do anything for Timmy. Don’t you see? I can’t put her in that position.”

  Connor dropped his voice, and in it, Jake heard echoes of his own pain. “I don’t think you have a choice, son.”

  Jake’s throat turned dust dry, his chest went tight, and he recalled her sitting in the kitchen under the light from the stove, eating Cheerios and peaches and hassling him about Traffic Safety School. For the record, I don’t do prisoner. Not even for you.

  And he didn’t know whether to rejoice or mourn.

  Laura entered the briefing room wary. These people doubted her integrity, and deep down inside she knew it. Regardless of what Connor had said about protective custody, only a moron couldn’t deduce she was being detained. They could tag it by whatever name they chose, but the result was the same. They’d taken her out of commission. Neutralized her. And she had a gut full of resentment because they had.

  Jake walked over to her, his face as white as death. “Sit down, honey.”

  Honey. Fear was pounding off Jake in waves. Oh, God. Oh, dear God. “It is Timmy.” Fear shot through her. “What’s wrong with him, Jake?”