by Imogen Wells
Once I’m in the stairwell, I jog down the stairs, pulling my phone from my bag. It’s only as I get outside that I realise my phone is dead.
“You!” I spin around at the voice, and Jake’s boyfriend reference becomes clear. “You. You’re JJ.”
Christian’s nickname for me coming from Rick feels like a knife straight to my heart. Panic, anger, pain and sorrow all slam into me at once. My throat closes, stopping any words I want to say from spilling from my lips. And there are plenty, but I can’t see past the image of Rick and my brother together, suffering, of Rick leaving him there to die. Leaving him behind.
All thoughts of Jake leave me, and my only focus is the man in front of me.
“Don’t you dare use that fucking name. You have no fucking right. That was his name for me.” My words are so sharp, they cut my throat on the way out. I take a step towards my car, and Rick matches it with one of his own toward me.
He steps forward again, only this time I can’t move away. His eyes hold me captive, and despite their beauty, it’s not enough to calm my anger.
“How long have you known, Sully?” I spit the name at him. “Did you know when you fucked me that first time that I was the little sister of the man you called a friend, a brother? Did you get some kind of perverse kick out of it?”
“Of course I didn’t fucking know. How could I, and Kuffs…” He pauses, as pain flashes over his face and behind his eyes. “He talked about you all the time.” The last part comes out strangled, and some of the heat and rage inside me dims. “Is this why you ran last night?”
I don’t answer. I can’t. Yes, it’s why I ran, but admitting it to him seems wrong. My emotions and feelings around this man are chaotic and confused. I watch as Rick looks down the street over my shoulder, and I can see this is hurting him as much as it is me. But I don’t understand it. The version of events I know and learned from my father, which obviously don’t mean much when it comes to the truth, don’t marry with what I know about the man in front of me.
A frown creases his brow, and as I turn to look at what has got his attention, a pop pierces the air. The shattering of glass follows, and I duck as people in the street flee amid a cacophony of shouts and screams.
When no more gunshots can be heard, I peer over the bonnet of my car. My eyes scour the street before moving to the buildings opposite us.
I turn to Rick to ask if he sees anything, but his focus is on the ground.
“We need to get the fuck out of here now! Run, Jess. Fucking run!” he shoves me to get me moving as I follow his line of sight to the ground and see a flash of red in the puddle beneath my car. Awareness blooms in my mind, and I run.
I run like my life depends on it.
Twenty-Four
Rick
Jessica Fisher is Jess Collins. She’s JJ, Kuff’s little sister. How the fuck did I not see this. When we first met, I knew there was something about her, something familiar. I never imagined this though.
I don’t even know where to begin with how fucked up this is.
My feelings for her are already a vortex of confusion layered with guilt over losing my wife and my men. Especially Kuffs. We were close, and I had plans to ask him to join Triple R when we finished one final mission.
I’m still looking at the picture from the article when Jess bursts out the door of the building right next to me and her car.
“You,” slips through my lips like a knife through butter. “You. You’re JJ.” Her face pinches at my words, and a dozen emotions pass through her eyes.
“Don’t you dare use that fucking name. You have no fucking right. That was his name for me.” Her words lash at me like the claws of the cat o nine tails, and I feel her pain fuelled rage through my whole body.
I follow her as she steps back, spitting more words at me.
I choke saying his name, unable to hide the hurt and the pain his loss caused me. I know she sees it too. This woman knows too much, sees too much and feels too much, just like me. We are the same, only she’s not afraid to show the world who she is. I am.
“Is that why you ran?”
No longer able to hold her gaze when she doesn’t answer me, I look over her shoulder. A man over the road is watching us. He may not be wearing his uniform anymore, but I know who he is. I recognise him as the waiter from the hotel last night.
What is he doing here and why is he watching us so intently?
He sees me watching him, and a cruel smile parts his lips seconds before he raises a gun and a pop pierces the morning air. Glass shatters somewhere as shouts and screams come from all those in the street.
Jess and I both duck behind her car, and as she scans the area, my eyes drift over the puddle beneath her car. At first, I don’t see it, but as the little red light flickers intermittently, I realise just what I’m looking at.
“We need to get the fuck out of here now! Run, Jess. Fucking run!” I shove at her to get her moving. Finally, she bolts, and not a minute too soon.
BOOM!
The ground goes out from beneath me as the force of the blast knocks me off my feet, throwing me several feet away. Metal and glass cut and scrape against my skin as debris rains down on me, and I cover my head with my hands.
Dust plumes in the air, making it impossible to see, and I call out to Jess.
“R-Rick.” Comes a stuttered groan somewhere to the left of me at the same time my mobile starts to ring. Everything sounds far away, like when you go on a plane and your ears pop. It’s not the first time I’ve experienced a car bomb, but I sure as hell thought I was done with them when I left the army. Ignoring the phone, I crawl towards where I think Jess is, calling out to her as I go.
As the dust begins to settle, sirens blare in the distance, and I can finally see Jess.
She’s on her side with her back to the building next door, and I pray to fucking God that she wasn’t thrown against it with the full force of the blast. I’ve seen the damage caused from tertiary injuries in the field, and it’s not good. Not good at all.
Scrambling over to her, I see her breaths are laboured, and she has a wound to her temple too.
“Shit, Jess,” I curse, reaching out to brush her hair from her face. Her eyes open at my touch, and she tries to push herself up. “Hey, hey, stay still. Help is on the way. I’m here, just hold on.”
Her eyes close on a wheezy groan, and I take hold of her hand, running my thumb over her knuckles in reassurance.
I dig my phone from my pocket and see the missed calls from Seb, Ryder and my dad. Once the paramedics arrive, I step back to allow them to work and call my dad back. When I get no answer, I call Seb.
“Rick, where the fuck you been, man? There’s been an accident.”
“Max?”
“He’s okay, but your mum… She’s not doing so well, man.” I hear the worry in his voice, and I hate to have to add to it.
“What kind of accident, Seb?” I already know what he’s going say before the words even leave his mouth.
“Some sort of explosion at the house, apparently.”
“Are you there?”
“What do you think? But you need to be too, Rick.”
“I will. But it might take a while.” I hear the paramedic working on Jess mention a possible pneumothorax.
“Where are you? What’s with all the sirens, Rick?”
“Someone just took pot-shots at us and blew Jess’ car up.” I hear him curse down the line. “I need you to stay with them. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“You know I will. You think they’re connected?”
“Maybe. Call Ryder, get him and Cam there too. We need to talk when I get there.” I end the call and climb into the ambulance with Jess.
It’s been just over twenty-four hours since someone blew up Jess’ car and the explosion at my parents’ house, and I haven’t left Jess’ side.
I called my dad and spoke to Max, and they’re both fine physically as they were out when the explosion happened. My m
um is in a stable condition in the ICU. She has some burns to her legs and arms and suffered a head injury as a result of being thrown by the blast. The doctors are confident that she’ll make a full recovery but are keeping her sedated to give her body time to heal. Thankfully, she wasn’t in the house but had gone out to the garden to hang her washing, and I’ve never been more grateful for my mum’s refusal to use a tumble dryer.
The door opens, and Scott walks in and hands me a coffee as he takes a seat next to me.
“Any news on Jake?” I ask him, before taking a sip of the bitter hospital slop that barely passes for coffee. In the ambulance, Jess kept saying the name Jake as she slipped in and out of consciousness. Unsure of what she was talking about, I called Scott and asked him to go to the scene and see if he could find this Jake guy.
“He ain’t going to be talking anytime soon, but the doctors think if he makes it through another night, then he’ll live.”
When Scott arrived, they were wheeling Jake out of the building Jess was in. He had a gunshot wound to his chest, which missed his heart by millimetres according to the doctor.
“That’s good news. Keep me posted. I’m going to need to have a word with him when he’s awake. Something tells me he’s involved in what went down outside that building.”
“Will do, boss. And Ms Fisher,” he asks, nodding in Jess’ direction.
“Oh, we’ll be having plenty of words when she stops pretending to be asleep.”
“Fuck you,” Jess croaks out, and I laugh. She finally opens her eyes as she attempts to sit up. I grab the remote for the bed, raising it for her.
“I think that’s my cue to leave. If there’s nothing else you need, Rick?”
“No, that’s all thanks, Scott.” He leaves, and I turn back to Jess. “How are you feeling?”
“Oh, I’m just fucking peachy. Can’t you tell?” she retorts, a hyperbolic grin on her face.
I chuckle. “Glad to see that the blast didn’t put too much of a dent in your quick-witted sarcasm. Can’t you ever just answer a question with a straight and honest answer?”
“Sure, I can. Before we almost got blown up, you asked me why I ran the other night. Well, yeah, I ran because I just discovered I’d been fucking the man who was with my brother before he died. The man who called himself a friend but left him there to die and never reached out, never even attended his funeral to honour him. How am I doing on the Rick Sullivan honesty scale?”
I don’t correct her assumptions. What would be the point? “I’d say that’s the most honest thing you’ve told me since we met.”
“That’s all you can say. Pfft! At least one of us is honest enough to mention the giant fucking elephant in the room. And what the fuck do you mean about the most honest I’ve been?”
“Why didn’t you tell me that someone tampered with your brakes?”
“Oh my fucking god, are you for real? That has absolutely nothing to do with you. Unless something has changed recently, fuck buddies don’t share personal information, they just fuck and leave.” She pauses briefly, then her eyes light with suspicion. “How do you know about that?”
“How I know is irrelevant. What matters, is you not telling me. And before you go into another rant about it being none of my business, I’m making it my business now because I almost got blown the fuck up yesterday.” I get to my feet, leaning my hands down on the bed beside her. “We were never just fuck buddies. It was always going to be more than that from the start, Jess. I’m honest enough to admit it. Are you?” I spin away from her, leaving my words to hang in the air.
I shove outside the hospital, needing some air. I must be out of my god damn mind telling her that. It wasn’t my intention to admit that to her, but it appears my mouth had other ideas. Every word was true of course, which makes me kind of an arsehole. I bit the bullet and had Dean do a deeper background check on her. Jess will throttle me when she finds out. And she will find out because I’m going to tell her.
Lost my fucking head I tell you.
Aside from the information I already knew about Christian and his family, most of which I learnt from him, the only thing of importance the check revealed was that part of her record has been sealed. It looks like it’s from her teen years, but Dean hasn’t been able to unseal it yet. Not a total surprise given who her father is.
From the conversation I overheard between her and her ex, Alistair, there’s no love lost between her and Archie. And again, no surprise there. Archie Collins is at the top of the tree when it comes to corrupt judges, along with Seb’s father Judge Charles Roberts.
I’m certain there are special seats reserved for them in Hell.
Am I surprised Jess blames me as much as I blame myself for Kuff’s death? No, of course not. I am surprised she thinks I left him there to die though. I don’t actually know what story the army spun to her family about how he died. Although, I know damn sure it wouldn’t have been anywhere close to the truth. A truth even I don’t know. It’s not that I didn’t want to know how my life got flipped on its head or who took the life of my friend and kept me from my wife and son, but more a case of ignorance is bliss and more important things took control of my life when I returned, like throwing myself into Triple R so I could block out the grief and learn to be a father and a mother all at once.
I couldn’t deal with my own grief let alone anyone else’s at that time. So, how was I meant to attend the funeral of a man who stood beside me, fought beside me and died because of me and face his family? Look them in the eyes and tell them how fucking sorry I was that it was their son who died when it should have been me instead.
I’ve never considered myself a coward but pain and grief changes a person.
The army hardens you, desensitises you, makes you a soldier built to endure pain and witness unimaginable things and still do your job. But grief is a whole other ball game.
Grief wraps around you, digging her claws deep into the very bones of you, and there is no way to desensitise you to the effect of grief on the normal human heart and mind.
Pain leaves you when who or what is causing it ceases, but grief never leaves. It always remains, and you either learn to live with it or you let it consume you.
I couldn’t afford to let mine consume me. I had a new mission, and one I refused to fail at after Sam lost her life giving it to me.
Twenty-Five
Jess
I can hear him talking to a guy, but I continue to lay here, pretending to be asleep because I don’t want to talk to him.
I’m pleased to hear that Jake is alive, and when Rick mentions wanting to have a word with him because he thinks he was involved, I give an internal nod, finally something we agree on, but he’ll have to get in line.
I struggle not to react when the guy he’s with mentions my name, but I instantly give up the pretence when Rick calls me out about pretending to sleep with a well-placed ‘fuck you’ that might be lacking bite but is still as effective.
I don’t hold back when he accuses me of not being honest. Where does this man get off talking about honesty? Then he gets a little too honest.
“We were never just fuck buddies. It was always going to be more than that from the start, Jess. I’m honest enough to admit it. Are you?” he says before walking away and leaving me stunned into silence.
How can he just drop that on me and walk the fuck away?
I thump the mattress at my side and wince as pain radiates through me from the force. My head throbs, and I can’t decide if it’s from the concussion or the way my mind is spinning from his words that has my head thumping.
I’ve no idea how he thinks we could possibly be more given who he is. I try not to think about how he makes my body sing with just a single touch. Instead, I focus on how I’m going to make him tell me everything that happened to him and Christian on that last mission. I know it was a special ops gig, and I know the army and the government will deny it ever happened, but for my own peace of mind, I need answers.
> The beeping from the pulse oximeter machine measuring my oxygen levels is pissing me off, so I yank it from my finger just as a nurse walks in.
“Ah, you’re awake, Ms Fisher. How are you feeling?”
“Ugh! Why does everyone keep asking that damn question?” I say with an exasperated sigh and a roll of my eyes, dropping my head back to the pillow.
“Perhaps it’s because you are in hospital after nearly being blown up, Ms Fisher,” she replies with equal sarcasm.
“I’m sorry. It’s not your fault. And to answer your question, I’m feeling good. I have a slight headache and am a little sore, but otherwise, I’m okay.” I feel bad for snapping at her when it’s Rick whose head I should be biting off.
“Your delightful mood wouldn’t have anything to do with the broody gentleman that just left, would it?”
“What gave it away?”
“Possibly the fact that he hasn’t left your side since you were brought in and has scrutinised every little thing we’ve done too.”
“Huh,” I muse, as the nurse, Rachel, according to her name badge, carries out her observations.
“Everything looks good this morning,” she announces, removing the blood pressure cuff from my arm and scribbling on my chart. “I’ll get an orderly to take you for a final x-ray shortly, and providing it comes back clear, my guess is the doctor will discharge you later.”
“Thank god. No offense, but I’m not keen on hospital stays.”
“None taken,” she says with a smile. “You’re lucky to only have bruised ribs and not a collapsed lung as first thought, otherwise you could have been here for several weeks. Is there anything I can get you before I go? Tea, toast?”
“I’d lo—”
The door opens and in walks Jamie carrying a bag and drinks tray.
“Breakfast delivery,” she says, walking over and dumping the bag on the bed table.