“Daniel?”
“Yes.”
“Tell you…what?”
“Everything,” her father said.
Olivia hesitated. She had never had the sort of relationship with her father that girls she had gone to school with seemed to have with their fathers. She didn’t get to tell her father her secrets and wishes. She didn’t sit on his knees or get to dance with him at the father-daughter ball.
He had never once disapproved of her boyfriends. Instead, he had ordered the Secret Service to bar a boy he didn’t like from the house and block his calls to her cellphone. There had been no discussion and no negotiations.
Telling her father her innermost thoughts and feelings about Daniel was weird and uncomfortable.
Callan Davenport grimaced. “Okay. Tell me how you met. That’s safe enough, isn’t it?”
It was certainly more comfortable. Olivia shifted on the hard plastic chair. “He was a hostage in the Whitesands, like me. Everyone thought he was English. He’s got blue eyes and pale skin for a Vistarian—I guess you’ve seen a picture of him, so you know that already. He speaks idiomatic English, with a British accent when he needs to, so I didn’t question his nationality, either. I thought he was an asshole.”
Her father smiled. “Why?”
She realized she was smiling, too. “Because he was all over any woman who moved, as long as she was at least ten years younger than him and every woman melted when he got near.”
“Sounds like someone I know,” Callan said gruffly.
“Jerry?” Olivia guessed. “I hadn’t thought of it that way. Seducing women was only how Daniel spent his spare time. At night, he would sneak out of the hotel and onto the grounds. I thought he was doing it to thumb his nose at the guards. It turns out he had an agenda all along.”
“Something in military intelligence, I’m guessing,” her father said, his voice soft. He sounded sleepy.
“Something like that,” Olivia said lightly. Daniel’s profession wasn’t her secret to share, especially not with the Chief of Staff to the President of the United States, even if he was her father.
“And how did he get past that iron shield of yours?” her father asked.
Olivia sighed. “He didn’t want to. He wasn’t interested.” Softly, she related the tale of how she and Daniel had drawn closer together. It was highly edited and whitewashed.
By the time she got to the hasty wedding Minnie had arranged for her, her father’s eyes had closed. Olivia finished describing the wedding and her dash to Washington with Nick, then paused.
Her father didn’t move. He was asleep.
Quietly, she got to her feet and moved out to the nurses’ station. “Is my father’s doctor still here? I would like to speak to him.”
The nurse in the green scrubs who had hurried in when her father spoke nodded and reached for a phone. “Dr. Martin wanted to speak to you, too.” There was no cheeriness or humor in her voice now.
Olivia’s heart gave a little creak. She waited at the station until Dr. Martin, who had changed into street clothes, came hurrying up to the counter. He shepherded her away with a hand on her back, into a small room with dim lighting and lounge chairs.
Her heart beat even harder. Olivia didn’t sit when Martin told her to. “He’s not recovering at all, is he?” she said.
Dr. Martin sighed. His eyes met her. “No,” he said. “There was too much damage to the heart. We’ve done what we can. Now there’s nothing we can do but make him comfortable. I’m so sorry.”
Olivia thought of the wistful note in her father’s voice. “He knows,” she whispered.
“We haven’t told him yet,” Martin said sharply. “That is why I wanted to talk to you. I thought you might want to. Sometimes, family members rather the news come from a loved one.”
Olivia shook her head. “He knows,” she repeated firmly. “Your bedside manner wasn’t good enough, Dr. Martin. Something you said or did gave you away.”
Martin didn’t look surprised. “Sometimes, patients do guess. Toward the end, everyone recognizes it. It is a small miracle he regained consciousness. It gives you time you would not have ordinarily got. I’m so sorry, Miss Davenport.”
Olivia didn’t correct him. “How long?” she asked, her heart limping along with a painful shuffle. “Weeks? Days?”
Martin hesitated.
“Hours…” she breathed, twisting her hands together. She yearned to be back in Acapulco, in Daniel’s arms and safely away from this bewildering agony.
* * * * *
Parris woke from a light doze when Adán stretched out his arm and felt around the sand near his discarded clothes.
She traced the soft edges of his muscles, under his olive skin, as they moved.
He brought his arm back, holding his watch. “Careful. I’m ticklish.”
“You are not!” She sat up, delighted. “That’s…adorable.”
Adán rolled his eyes and turned the watch around to look at it. “Hit the wrong spot, I’ll squirm so hard you’ll get dumped on the sand.” His gaze shifted from the watch face to hers. “If you tell anyone that, I’ll have to kill you.”
She giggled and slapped her hand over her mouth, her eyes wide. She had never made that sound before.
Adán’s smile was full of wickedness. “Of course, I’m most ticklish right after a certain moment. Trail your fingers up my back just afterward and I’m likely to cause massive internal damage.”
Parris dropped her head to his chest and smothered her face against his flesh as her laughter made her shake.
Adán’s arm came around her. He kissed her forehead. “As much as I don’t want this afternoon to end, I have to point out it is nearly five. Everyone will wake soon, if they haven’t already. I can’t figure out how I’m supposed to sneak back to my sleeping bag without them figuring out their boss has been indulging herself.”
“They’ll figure it out, anyway,” Parris told him, sitting up and reaching for the sports bra she wore under the combat gear. “When the sentries swapped out, they would have seen you weren’t there. I had to tell Locke, too.”
Adán didn’t move.
She pulled her hair out from under the bra straps and looked at him. “None of them are stupid. If I’m not flaunting it in front of them, though, they won’t comment.”
Adán sat up and rested his arms on his knees. “You’re okay with them knowing? I thought it would undermine your authority.”
“Ten years ago, it might have. Now, though, they all know me. They know I won’t get distracted by my hormones.” She didn’t voice the tiny kernel of worry she held. This was the first time she had ever stepped out in this way. They didn’t know for certain there would be no fallout. All she could do was return to duty and not miss a beat and prove this afternoon had not melted her brain.
As she finished dressing, Adán pulled his pile of clothes closer and shook the sand out of them, then put them on.
“You’re not asking questions.”
He thrust his legs into his jeans and pulled them up. His movement made the gold masks bounce against his chest. “I told you I wouldn’t. No demands, no questions, not until you decide you’re ready.”
“You can live with that? Go back to following us around? After this?”
Adán buttoned his jeans and turned to face her. “Are the brakes still off, Parris? Are you on duty yet?”
She bit her lip. “In about five minutes, I have to be. Until then, no. No brakes.”
He took her face in his hands and turned it up to his. His eyes were stormy, rich with emotion. “Do you remember what I told you about Vistarian men?”
“You mean, about your need to rescue women, to help them?” Parris frowned. “You’re the most undemanding man I’ve ever met,” she admitted. “You’ve never tried to help me. Well, you’ve held my chair for me once or twice.”
“Which only means you deserve the courtesy,” he said. “Never when it counted, when it meant I didn’t think you couldn
’t take care of yourself. That’s what you told me, the first day at the station—that you can take care of yourself. I could see how important it was to you that you get to do that, so I…” He frowned. “I’ve held back and made myself not help. Not even when it killed me to sit on my hands and let you figure it out. I left you alone when Stuart and you broke up, even though I wanted to help, even as a friend and a shoulder to cry on.”
Parris shivered.
“Of course I want to ask you what happens next,” Adán said, his voice low. “Every cell in my body wants answers. I want more than an afternoon. I want…” He drew in a breath that shuddered. “I won’t get in your way. I won’t trip you up. Meeting you here in Vistaria has given me a privileged glimpse into your working life. If that glimpse and this afternoon is all I get, then…” He shook his head. “I won’t pretend it won’t hurt. I will live with it, though, because this is who you are.”
“Oh, Adán…” she breathed, her chest aching. “I’m not being fair to you.”
“You’re being you,” he said. “When you go back on duty in three minutes, I will go back to being the actor friend of yours who is slowing down your team and trying to compensate with local knowledge.”
Parris swallowed. “Kiss me. Before the brakes kick in.”
He kissed her and it was deep and filled with unspoken words.
Someone cleared their throat, nearby.
Adán straightened up with a jerk, his hand dropping away from her.
Locke stood ten yards away, staring down the length of the valley, carefully not looking at them.
“Shift change, Lieutenant?” Parris said.
Adán pulled on his shirt and picked up the jacket. He didn’t look at her either.
“There’s a mug of stone stew with your name on it, Captain,” Locke said.
Parris grimaced. Stone stew was what they called a mash of rehydrated rations, poured into one pot and heated. Every mouthful was an adventure. It would be hot and filling, though. “Thanks. I’ll pack up and head back. You wanna walk Adán back to the group?”
“Yes sir.” Locke glanced at Adán. “This way.”
Adán didn’t glance at her or linger to say one last thing. He moved over to where Locke was waiting and the two of them headed back along the gulley, disappearing around the mild bend.
This is who you are. Adán’s voice echoed in her mind.
She packed her backpack, ramming the contents down with little regard. Yeah, this was who she was.
Only now, her life seemed unbalanced, as if a hole gaped in one side of it that she had never noticed before.
Chapter Twenty-One
Donaldson held out a mug of the detestable stone stew for her as Parris dropped her pack at the head of the circle and sat on it. She nodded her thanks and glanced around the circle. Everyone was eating. No one shot her sideways, speculative glances. Adán sat on the edge of the circle, eating a portion of the stew. Even he did not let his gaze linger upon her.
It was a perfectly normal moment, only it felt different.
She cleared her throat. “I need to read you in on the next phase of our orders.”
Everyone looked up, then. She had their attention.
“You eat, I’ll talk,” she said.
They returned their attention to their mugs.
“There is a radioactive device hidden somewhere near this location. How it got here, why it is here, isn’t something you need to know. We’ve been tasked to find the thing. Ramirez, Donaldson, the scanners you were given at Los Alamitos also work as Geiger counters. You’ll quarter the area. Lieutenant Locke gets a break for five hours, so he’ll stay here and coordinate if necessary. Everyone else will split into pairs and use eyeballs.”
“Can I ask, sir, what the device’s core is?” Odesky asked. “It would be useful to know from a medical point of view. I was handed a package of potassium iodide as we lifted.”
Parris nodded. “Cobalt 60.”
“Medical grade?” he asked, his tone sharp.
“Yes.”
Odesky flexed his jaw and scratched it. “Nasty stuff.”
Everyone else looked nervous. They were among the toughest men on the planet, only the idea of getting close to radioactive materials tended to undermine anyone’s courage.
Parris gripped her hands together. “Okay, eyes on me,” she said, her voice firm.
They turned their heads obediently.
“I didn’t tell you this. You hear?”
Nods.
“The Insurrectos plan to use the cobalt to build a dirty bomb they have threatened to detonate in one of the larger American cities.”
Silence.
Bernstein grimaced. He was from New York.
“We find this stuff and we take it from the Insurrectos if we need to, so our families and kids and wives all stay safe. No one’s folks get to live through losing their hair and having their teeth fall out and their skin flake away.” She paused. “If you feel the need, talk to Odesky and get a prophylactic dose of the potassium. Know that we’ll all be treated when we get back home, though.”
A few of them shifted uneasily. Most kept their gaze on her.
Parris smiled at them. “Hey, this is why we signed up, right? To save the world and conquer the women.”
“And men,” Rockman added, which earned him a friendly punch in the arm. His homosexuality had stopped being an issue after he had saved asses and bled for the unit.
“We move out in fifteen.” Parris got to her feet and hefted the mug. “I think this is the worst batch yet.”
The laughter was as free and easy as always and she relaxed—as much as she ever relaxed while on active status. She put on her armor and checked her rifle and other weapons. The small, last minute gear-up processes helped her reach the mindset she needed to do her work.
Therefore, it wasn’t until she was ready to go that she noticed no one was speaking to Adán, not even the polite directions they had been giving him to keep him in line and out of the way.
Parris cast her mind back over the last twenty minutes, her heart sinking.
No one had even looked at Adán since the three of them had returned from the far end of the gulley.
They all knew, then, she had spent the afternoon with Adán. They knew and had judged Adán in this new light.
They had judged him and found him wanting.
* * * * *
“Carmen, get in here!” Garrett yelled.
Carmen bolted upright, her shoulder protesting at the jolting. She slithered off the makeshift pallet and shoved her feet into her boots. She clomped through to the kitchen, the boots shifting around on her bare feet, the laces slapping the floor, and halted just inside the door.
Daniel was sitting with his back against the corner, his ass on the floor, his knees up and the phone to his ear. His eyes were sparkling in a way that made Carmen think he was on the verge of crying.
Yet he had lifted his chin to look at Garrett, who stood at the chipped concrete sink, his hands held under running water, while he scrubbed furiously at his skin with a piece of steel wool.
“I must get back to you, mi amor,” Daniel said softly. “Something’s up…Yes, as soon as I can.”
He put the phone in his shirt pocket and dug his thumb into his eyes.
“What’s going on?” Carmen asked, her heart thumping.
Garrett glanced at her. “Don’t go into the front room. Daniel, close the door. Carmen, get my clothes off me. We’ll have to burn them.”
Daniel pushed himself off the floor and moved over to shut the door into the front room. He put his back to it.
Carmen skirted around him and tugged at the back of Garrett’s shirt collar. He slid his arms out. “Everything.”
“Here?” she asked softly, for Garrett was acutely self-conscious about anyone seeing his scars.
“Here,” he affirmed. “I didn’t touch him with anything but my hands and I wore gloves, only that doesn’t halt the shit. It settles. I
f I scrub my skin, every inch…. Daniel, your contact at the medical center. You must talk to him about potassium.”
“Potassium?” Daniel said sharply.
As Garrett muttered, he helped Carmen strip him of everything. “Handle them as little as possible,” he added.
Carmen dropped everything into a pile, as he kicked off his boots.
“Socks, too,” he said, still scrubbing hard at his hands. His fingers were red.
She bent to peel his socks from his feet. “What’s on them? Bubonic plague?”
“Radiation,” he said.
Carman reared away from the pile of clothes, horror bursting through her.
Daniel sucked in a deep breath. “The guy out there? I thought he had the flu….” He pushed away from the door, coming closer.
Garrett shook his head. “Carmen, sweep everything onto the end of a stick then carry it up onto the roof and burn it. Use powder from a bullet to get it going, it’ll make the fire hotter and everything will burn to ash.” He bent and took off his socks and dropped them on the pile. Completely naked, he straightened and thrust his hands back under the water.
Carmen swallowed and picked up the twig broom from the corner and flipped it over. She shoved the end under the pile of clothes and lifted.
Daniel took the broom from her. “I’ll see to it,” he said. “Help Garrett. Wash him from top to bottom. Use the degreasing powder in the tin under the sink.”
Carmen nodded, her heart fluttering. She went back to the sink and bent to grab the ancient tin of degreaser and pried it open. The gray mud in the tin was an industrial strength exfoliant, gritty and rough. She remembered her father using it to wash motor oil and grease from his hands after working on his beloved Harley.
She scooped a big handful from the tin and swiped it under the water to moisten and soften it, then turned to slather it all over Garrett’s chest.
He shivered, despite the heat of the day.
“Tell me about the patient,” she said, keeping her voice quiet and steady.
“He’s from the north,” Garrett said. “I told him if he loves his family, he’ll go back there and hide out in the bush and stay away from everyone. I…” His eyes closed. “There’s nothing I can do for him. I have no potassium, no Diethylenetriamine pentaacetate, barely any pain killers…”
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