A nice bit of doublespeak. Looked as if the man had said the phrase so often he now believed it. “Then get angry with the agency and the people who gave us the money. They’re the ones who cut you out of the process. They owe you the explanation.”
“Then there’s the problem with how you operate. It’s about all of you working outside the law.”
“Give me an example.”
“Hacking into private computer systems.” Bram glanced at the space that used to house his safe. “Breaking into offices.”
There was no mistaking those references. The Congressman knew who was coming after him.
Good.
“You don’t like that we catch criminals?” Holden asked. “I’d be careful with that sentiment at election time. The way I hear it, voters don’t much like bureaucrats who are soft on crime.”
The other man never ruffled. Holden kept poking, jabbing at his ego. Everyone had a soft spot. Holden knew Walters wouldn’t be any different.
“I’m referring to the Samson debacle,” Walters said.
The case that blew their cover. Holden wouldn’t change anything because they saved Claire and the horrors of those days bound Luke and Claire together, but the ramifications kept cropping up. Luke suffered a debilitating shoulder injury. Even now he didn’t have full use of his arm. The team lost its office and privacy and its leader.
“I think we see that one differently.”
“How so?”
“Your rich friends committed fraud and murder. Phil set up his ex-wife, Claire, and then tried to kill her.” Just listing the sins of the Samson brothers brought a new flush of fury over Holden. “Now you’re covering for his brother, Steve, who was in on it the entire time.”
“I am investigating tactics.”
“Don’t you worry you’re hitching your reputation to the wrong star?”
Bram’s blank stare faltered. “Your team blew up a house and left a trail of bodies across my congressional district.”
“We caught an embezzler and killer.”
“We’ll see what happens at trial.”
“Is that what this is about? You want to discredit us to mitigate the impact of the testimony against Steve.”
“Of course not.”
“How much of a campaign contribution did Steve Samson give you?” Holden traced the lettering on the Congressman’s embossed nameplate at the edge of the desk.
“My campaign finances are a matter of public record.”
“What about the nonmoney contributions?”
“Such as?”
“Admittedly you’re not hiding behind your mother’s skirt, but you are hiding behind your brother’s company. Using his men to fight your battles.” Holden straightened the nameplate as he made a tsk-tsking sound calculated to drive the other man nuts. “I’m not aware of any sort of congressional immunity that will protect you from murder charges.”
“Those are serious accusations.” Bram dug his fingers into the smooth leather of the armrests.
“You started this fight. Did you honestly think you could push my team without us shoving back?”
“We’re done here.” The other man stood up.
Holden refused to stand up. Not when sitting down would tweak a man like Bram Walters. “Did you get my message from Ned Zimmer?”
A dull red appeared on Bram’s cheeks. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Mia is off-limits.”
His expression changed then. It was unreadable, but the mere mention of her name touched a nerve. “If you’re referring to my employee, I’m very concerned about her well-being.”
“Then stop trying to kill her.”
“I’m a member of the House of Representatives.”
“That only means you have the most to lose.”
Bram’s hand inched toward his phone. “Are you threatening me, Mr. Price?”
This time Holden stood up. “Merely pointing out that if we found the information on the Samson brothers and used it to take them down, we’ll find something on you.”
“You have five seconds to leave or I’ll call security.”
“No, you won’t, but I’m going.” Holden took a few steps and then slowly turned around, drawing out the tension as much as possible. “You know, it’s funny, but I swear I’ve been in here before.”
Bram fumed. “Never again.”
“We’ll see.”
Chapter Seventeen
Bram called his brother the second Holden Price left his office. In the hour it took for Trevor to pull away from his meeting and get to the office, Bram’s rage had morphed into an unruly beast.
He started down this road because Steve Samson asked for a favor. Then Bram received inside information on the Recovery Project’s operating strategy and he saw an opening—establish his position in the intelligence community and help Steve. But the inside source turned to blackmail and Trevor stepped in. Everything blew up right after.
Between poking around in WitSec and fighting off the Recovery members, Bram had sunk deep. Commandos staging home raids in the suburbs and people breaking into his office. A simple favor had spun out of control. Instead of earning political capital, Bram now stood on the brink of losing everything.
Trevor walked into the office without bothering to knock. “I do not appreciate being summoned to your office.”
“Holden Price was here.”
“You told me that much already in your message.” Trevor stopped in front of the desk. “So?”
“He knows everything.”
“I doubt that.”
“He made it quite clear I’m his target.” And Bram didn’t like having a bull’s-eye on his chest. He’d always done everything the party wanted. Voted the right way. Kept his public persona clean. Even had a good relationship with his ex-wife to prevent any scandal.
He still didn’t understand how he’d gone from that place to an accomplice to murder. He hadn’t made the call or asked for the help, but all the death unfolding around him came from Trevor looking to get rid of his ex and ending up dragging them into a WitSec cover-up. That made it Bram’s responsibility.
“It would appear it’s time we got rid of Mia Landers and her boyfriend.” Trevor spelled out his newest violent plan with the same emotion he used to order breakfast.
“I told you no more killing. I never signed up for that.” Bram struggled to reconcile the man Trevor had become with the one he used to be. Power and money corrupted. Bram knew that, but this time they went one step further and destroyed a conscience.
“Don’t be naive,” Trevor said.
Bram despised the way his brother talked down to him. No other person in the world dared to do that. “Excuse me?”
“What did you think would happen when you drove Mia out into the woods? Even if she’d admitted working behind your back, what would you have done?”
“The goal was to scare her.”
“No.” Trevor shook his head. “You knew that eventually I would step in and take care of her.”
Bram refused to believe that was true. He never wanted death. Never. “I didn’t think it would come to this.”
“There is only one way for this to end. You’ve laid the groundwork for discrediting the Recovery Project. Now we need to take care of the individual members before they uncover the WitSec issue.”
“That’s a bit obvious, don’t you think?”
“I would think it’s preferable to losing your office and being indicted.”
Something inside Bram shriveled. Sitting there, staring into his brother’s cold eyes, Bram knew the truth. If this all became public, Trevor would be fine. He had a backup plan of some sort. He’d come through without losing a thing.
And he’d make sure Bram didn’t.
MIA STORMED AROUND the Hathaway family room. She’d never been this angry. And not for her. This wasn’t about Holden leaving the bed before dawn or not sharing his plans. A little after-sex talking would have been nice, but she was
a big girl.
She understood Holden’s intimacy meter was out of whack. She could deal with that. It was the other that had her shaking with fury. This was about his disregard for his own safety. About his idiocy in picking a fight with her boss.
She stopped pacing in front of the fireplace and aimed her finger at Holden’s chest. “You made yourself a target.”
The man didn’t even flinch. He acted as if it was perfectly normal to walk into a congressional office and issue threats. “We have to bring this thing to a close.”
“That’s your excuse?”
“It’s the truth.”
“Walters could have had you arrested.”
Holden shot her a you’ve-lost-your-mind glare. “For what?”
This was on purpose. He understood the significance of his actions but pretended otherwise. She couldn’t find any other explanation for his cluelessness. “You’re impossible.”
“You’re no prize today either.”
Holden acted so sure of himself when he came home a half hour earlier. He practically vibrated with excitement over the situation he had created. The lack of self-preservation scared her. She’d seen it before with trauma victims. They rushed in and took foolish risks because they just didn’t care about the consequences anymore. They functioned as machines.
She needed for him to stay human, with all the feelings and fears of any normal person. For him. For her. For them.
Maybe he thrived on action and always would. That wasn’t unusual for a man in his profession. She could learn to handle that. Claire had. But courting death, begging for it, was a different thing.
Thinking about Holden rushing to his death scraped Mia’s stomach raw. Not seeing him, not being with him. Those options took away every ounce of strength she’d regained since leaving Ned.
She loved Holden. Somewhere, somehow, she’d started believing in a man again. Not just any man. In Holden. Watching him throw all that away without even a second thought crushed her.
“Why are you so angry?” Holden asked with a stunned little-boy look that suggested he really didn’t know.
Yeah, he wasn’t ready to hear about her feelings. Rather than send him running into more danger as he tried to get away from her, she tamped down on her needs, burying them deep, and focused on common sense. “You are forcing the issue by daring Bram Walters to kill you.”
“Rod is missing.” Clearly Holden thought that explained everything.
“I get that.”
“He could be running out of time.”
An excuse. Rescuing Rod was only part of the plan here. She felt that with a rock-solid surety inside. “That is not what this argument is about and you know it.”
The confusion cleared from Holden’s face. Every muscle stiffened and his mouth pulled tight. “Don’t do that therapist crap and try to read my mind.”
“I’m not.”
“Sure as hell feels like it.”
She refused to get sucked into his insecurities on this issue. One of them needed to stay rational and on topic.
“You’re acting as if your life doesn’t matter.”
“I’m doing my job.”
“You are risking your life. That is guilt talking. Guilt and despair and post-traumatic stress disorder.”
The tension building around them exploded. The quiet turned heated as the air pulsed.
“Do not diagnose me.” His fury grew and flailed around unleashed. If he talked any louder, the entire household would come running.
She was surprised they didn’t have an audience already, but she knew the others could hear. His voice boomed to the rafters.
“I am trying to talk some sense into you,” she said in the calmest voice she could muster.
“You are trying to control me.”
The oxygen sucked right out of the room. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“You know.”
“Hey.” Luke picked that minute to poke his head in the doorway, knocked on the wall. “Sorry to interrupt.”
Holden didn’t even spare him a glance. “Not now.”
“Yeah, the timing isn’t great, but we have an emergency.” Luke glanced around as if trying to figure out if they’d broken any furniture during the fight.
That quick, the tension snapped. All the anger swirling around them evaporated as they focused on the third party in the room.
“What’s the problem at this hour?” They’d been in a constant state of readiness since she arrived. She guessed this was an escalation of some sort.
Luke looked back and forth between Mia and Holden. “Someone is trying to hack into our security system again. Thanks to Adam’s tinkering, everything is holding, but it looks like we might get a second wave of intruders this evening.”
Holden did this. He went to the Congressman and now his brother was sending in the troops.
She rounded on him. “Are you happy?”
Holden blinked a few times. “Actually, yes.”
“It’s okay. We’ll be prepared for them this time,” Luke said.
Boys and their war games. The fighting and disregard for danger made her head pound. It made her shaky with fear. “You are not in a war zone. This is a house in the middle of a neighborhood. A place with kids across the street.”
“We know,” Holden said.
“Then you understand that you just dragged danger right to Luke’s door.”
“We’ll be ready,” Holden said, repeating Luke’s empty promise.
Nothing she said broke through. If Holden wouldn’t listen to her, maybe he’d listen to a friend. Someone he did trust, because she clearly was not that person. No matter how much she wanted to be.
She glanced at Luke. “You deal with his death wish. I’m done.”
LUKE AND HOLDEN WATCHED her stalk out of the room. The banging of her feet against the stairs highlighted her anger.
As if Holden needed another reminder.
“You okay?” Luke asked.
“Obviously, I’m doing great. Totally in control of my life at the moment.” Holden leaned back on the sofa and balanced his head against the cushion.
“Is she right?”
He closed his eyes. Maybe if he blocked them all out the discussion would go away. “Not you, too.”
“She’s concerned. Some guys would take that as a good sign. It means she cares.”
Holden refused to deal with that. He could barely take care of himself. He couldn’t take her on, as well. Opening up meant dealing with the good and the bad, letting her dissect and try to fix. He wasn’t ready.
“She’s trying to diagnose and cure me. I’ve had more than enough of that over the past few years.”
“You lived through hell. I’d worry if you didn’t get some help.”
“I can do my work and get through the day. That’s enough.”
Holden didn’t open his eyes, but he felt Luke’s stare. Heard the footsteps and crunch of paper as he sat down on the magazines on the coffee table.
“I know what it’s like to feel like there’s nothing left.” All the heat had left Luke’s voice. “Don’t.”
“When Claire walked out on me and married someone else, I went a little crazy.”
Holden opened his eyes. “You got her back.”
“Not before a lot of self-destructive behavior.” Luke stared at his hands before looking back up. “I’m just saying you can play this thing another way.”
“How so?”
“You have a reason to look to the future now.”
The only thing that interested Holden less than a life talk with Mia was one with Luke. “What are you talking about?”
“Mia.”
He wasn’t ready to go there. Holden wondered if he ever would be. “No.”
“Think about it.”
Mia was all Holden thought about. He had no idea when she started to matter that much, when he began planning his life around her, but the promise and potential for failure paralyzed him.
Luke exhaled. “In the meantime, you need to get out of here.”
“Why?”
“We’re ready for whatever comes through the door, but I want everyone downstairs as a precaution tonight.”
Holden heard what Luke didn’t say—underground in the windowless room. The claustrophobia. “I’ll be okay.”
“Adam says the chatter is just about this house. You should go to your condo and wait it out.”
Running away from a fight. Holden had never operated that way and didn’t intend to start. “I’m not leaving you guys to battle without me. Besides, it could be a trick.”
“Maybe, but nothing is going to happen here if I can help it, and there’s no reason to put your head through the pressures of being trapped downstairs.”
“I don’t like it.”
“Me either.” Luke cleared his throat. “You could have told us about the spaces thing, you know.”
All of a sudden everyone was a therapist. “I’m handling it.”
“You sure?”
“Definitely.”
Luke started to say something and then stopped. “Okay.”
“I still don’t like the plan for tonight.”
“Think positively. You can take Mia out of the potential firing line.”
“But strand the rest of you?” Holden shook his head. “No, thanks.”
“For once, think about what you need. From what I can see, that means Mia.”
Chapter Eighteen
Mia’s anger still burned bright later that evening. She’d been given a thin protective vest, rushed out of the house and dragged into town by Holden. He’d said as few words as possible. She only knew they were going to the condo when they pulled into the underground garage.
Watching him now, she questioned the intelligence of taking him away from his team. He paced around in front of the kitchenette like a rabid animal. His shoulders were rigid and his mind far away from here.
She understood the anxiety. He hated being left behind. To a man like Holden that meant weakness.
And he was driving her crazy. The constant movement and mumbling to himself. The lack of conversation and deadly quiet. Her nerves jumped every time he turned a corner and started walking back to the door again.
Guns and the Girl Next Door Page 13