Could she have fought harder? Had she suffered enough for letting him go? Did she deserve this bit of joy on seeing Tyler?
Stop, Gracie. These questions have no answers.
She might not deserve these glimpses, but since losing her brother Tony in Mexico, Gracie was in too much pain to deny herself this joy.
The image of Tony’s body lying on the floor of Walid’s villa, with Justice crying over him, snapped into her brain as lethal and piercing as a gunshot. God.
What kind of life had Tony had? One with unrequited love and devotion. She didn’t want to die like that.
Or like her biological mother, who’d reached out to her only after she’d gotten terminal cancer. They’d connected but had had so little time together.
She wanted a different life. She wanted to find a way to get back into Tyler’s life. Not as a mother, that was Ellen’s role, but in some small way. Problem. John would never allow any contact if he knew she still did operations for the League.
Putting aside his guitar, Tyler stood and rested his elbows on the railing. His gaze fell directly on her. She paused with the spoon to her mouth. Her shoulders drew down. Her adrenaline spiked.
He wasn’t looking at her.
He couldn’t be.
She was just some stranger on the street. She never wore the same thing here. She never uncovered her hair. Heck, sometimes she took a page from Momma and wore a niqab, the Muslim veil that covered hair and face.
But he was. Tyler was staring at her. He waved. Her heart ballooned like it had been filled with helium. It rose and rose and popped, then dropped into her acid-thick stomach.
Danger.
Danger.
Danger.
She turned away, flicked down her visor, tossed her cup into the closest can, and walked back toward her bike.
What had she done? Selfish. The League’s rules were firm. What would Momma say if she knew Gracie had broken her side of the deal? The deal where Momma promised never to hurt John or take his memory as long as Gracie could assure his silence. The deal that kept John quiet. Gracie agreed not to fight for custody of Tyler, to stay away, if John never spoke a word about the League.
The deal that let everyone continue with their lives—everyone but her.
She peeked again as she mounted her bike. Tyler was still watching her. Why had she parked here? Stupid. John came out and stood on the balcony next to Tyler.
Tyler pointed her out to him. He pointed her out.
A log of fear dammed her throat, blocking her breath. She’d gotten careless. Desperate and careless. John knew she rode low, customized bikes—sucked to be short—knew her petite frame.
Her heart accelerated as she drove off, adjusted and checked her rearview. John’s wife had come onto the balcony.
Ellen, El, with the blond hair, who sang like a lark and worked at a popular satellite radio station. John put his arm around her waist, whispered something into her ear. She nodded.
Gracie’s chest ached with a longing so sharp and hot she swore blood poured from the wound.
God, she was tired of the tension in her shoulders and the walls around her heart. She wanted a life with kittens and saucers, and sweet moments, and hot moments. Yes. That.
Taking the corner, she looked one last time. And saw the man she loved, the one she’d let go in order to save his life, and the woman he now loved, turn and go back into their home.
Chapter 7
Standing on a crowded street in Manayunk, Dusty wasn’t sure what he’d just witnessed. Something was up.
The usually unflappable Gracie Parish had just spooked.
Hell, he’d seen less reaction from her in the middle of a firefight in Mexico. Why had she torn out of here after the weird exchange with balcony boy?
Lifting his cell, he checked the photo he’d taken of the kid, expanded it. A little blurry, but did the kid have green eyes like Gracie’s? Could they be related?
Maybe. But in what way? Her file said she’d never given birth. Still, that kid meant something to her. And what of the guy, the one who looked to be the kid’s father?
Dusty wished he’d seen more. Parking being what it was here, he’d only caught the ending. The kid had waved to Gracie. In response, she’d hightailed it out of there.
If that hadn’t been enough to raise his suspicions, the indirect way she’d come here would’ve been. After she’d dropped her car off at a garage, she’d walked two blocks to another garage, then had come out dressed in leather and riding a bike.
He’d nearly missed her. Might have, if he hadn’t recognized the boots. She’d been wearing the knee-high, lace-up black leather boots with a sun dress when she’d gotten in her car at the club. He’d thought that was odd. Hot but odd.
Fact was, she’d gone out of her way to make sure she wasn’t followed here.
She did have a decent surveillance-detection route, proving she had training and had come here more than once. She had situational awareness but had probably grown a little complacent in her life as a club owner. She was good. He was FBI.
All that effort, she sure hadn’t come for the sweet ice. Or what he’d thought would be some secret meeting.
She’d come to see the kid.
Striding through the crosswalk, Dusty went to the brownstone. It had a list of names. Pressing the button on his sunglasses, he snapped a photo.
A moment later, a girl passed him and hit the buzzer that read “John, Ellen, Henry, Tyler True.”
A soft woman’s voice answered. “Come on up, Lil. Ty is waiting.”
The girl pulled the door open, hung far back, gazed upward, and blew balcony boy a kiss.
Huh. The boy, Ty, caught it, sat back down. Chances were the girl would join him on the balcony.
Dusty took out his listening device. He hooked it over his ear, angled it upward. It was already paired to his phone. He pretended to talk to someone while he listened.
No one could do a fake conversation like him. Every so often he’d “Yeah, honey, but…” Pause, and then “Describe where you are again…”
The door to the balcony slid open. The girl and boy embraced. She sat on his lap. They talked. A lot. Kid stuff.
This might be a waste of time. He reached for the disconnect and heard the kid say, “She came back again. That woman who keeps showing up.”
Dusty lowered his hand.
“You sure it’s the same woman, Ty?”
“Yeah, I told you. She’s really short.”
“Short,” the girl huffed. “You’re, like, six foot. You think I’m short.”
“It’s her. Seen her at least twice before.”
He had? Bet he’d missed her a lot more times, but Dusty was surprised the kid was so observant. And smart enough not to take the bait on that short line.
“My dad’s freaked. Finally convinced my mom we need security. He’s putting up cameras.”
“So, what, she’s a stalker? Am I going to have to take her down?”
He laughed and snuggled her neck. They began to make out. Loudly. Well, loudly to the perv holding the microphone up to them. He lowered the volume until he heard the boy come up for air.
“Want to go to my room?”
“Your parents.”
“They don’t care.”
She paused. “Are you sure?”
Okay, no way this conversation was going back to Gracie. He turned the device off and maneuvered through the sidewalk of people and back toward his car.
So the kid had recognized Gracie, but not who she was. That didn’t rule out a family connection. Gracie had been adopted, so maybe she’d discovered a relation here and had blown it up in her mind.
Or this could have something to do with her family’s vigilantism. Could she be after the father? Could she be following the kid to get a bead on the dad?
He’d find out.
* * *
At his car, Dusty’s phone rang. He unhooked it from the bat-belt. Thing had near everything. A good knife, folding lock pick, mace, an EMF jammer, zip ties, but not his gun. That was inside a sheath holster concealed in the waistband of his jeans.
He took out his gun, slid into his black Malibu, and placed the weapon on the passenger seat, then put the call on speaker.
“Tell me you have something, Dusty.”
His SAC, Special Agent in Charge. And he wasn’t leading with patience. “Hey, Mack. I take it the Bureau hasn’t reopened the Parish investigation.”
“No. Officially, Parish is a dead end. Mukta Parish has a lot of fans. Doesn’t hurt that that exclusive boarding school she runs is filled with VIPs.”
Money folk lived by their own rules. He started the car, put the turn signal on, and pulled onto the busy street. “Even after that drone strike?”
Drones had dropped small explosive devices on the school a few months back. They’d hit targets devoid of people, doing little damage, but scared the bejeezus out of everyone.
Mack made a can-you-believe-that sound. “Yeah, even after. But a team combed every inch of the campus—even scanned the place via satellite and thermal spectral analysis. Reviewed the scans myself, and got to say, if there’d been a secret underground chamber, it would’ve shown up. There’s bupkes.”
“Come on, there’s something there. We know the Parish family is running their own vigilante covert ops. They have to have a secure facility to gather intel and train. The school is the perfect cover.” Dusty drummed his thumbs on the steering wheel.
“Don’t need to convince me. Those Parish sisters are out of control. They’ve got to be shut down. But where’s your proof?”
“In Mexico I saw the Parish siblings in action with my own eyes—they are highly trained, lethal operatives.”
“And you went undercover for months, but your prelim went nowhere. The principal was never implicated, your contact poisoned himself while poisoning the sex-slaver, and you backed off from bringing in the sisters.”
Dusty rolled his stiff neck, right-lane passed a stopped car. “Backing off” wasn’t how he’d seen it. Gracie and Justice had just lost their brother. Plus the email from the insider claimed the girls were adopted, trained, molded, and made into vigilantes. If that was the case, then Gracie and her siblings were victims. “These people are as loyal as Labs. I’m not going to bully them into turning on Mukta.”
“I get it. That’s why I’m giving you this time. If you bring me something, anything we can use, this will go from a drawer to a full-out investigation. Just ring that bell.”
“Appreciate that.” Dusty turned a corner. The wheel brushed against his palms as he straightened out the car. “The key is getting an invite into the family and locating the headquarters of the Parish covert ops. If it’s not on campus, it’s somewhere else. When I find it—that will do more than ring a bell, it will blow this thing wide open.”
“Agreed. Then that’s your plan.” Mack paused, and it felt like there was more there. Sure enough, after a couple of beats he said, “I have word on your dad.”
Shit. His stomach did that thing that reminded him he’d once been seven years old and terrified of the man. It dropped, shrank to the size of a pea, and exploded into a ball of rage. “Yeah.”
“Got something wrong with his kidneys.”
His father, who’d been calling himself a faith healer for decades, was now sick. This could be interesting. Dusty jerked to a stop at the red light. A woman crossed and gave him the pay-attention glare. He tipped his baseball cap to let her know he was suitably chastised.
“What’s going on there?” he asked.
“Has his whole ministry praying for him, out there earning extra money. Says a healer can’t heal himself. Looks like he’s been seeing a doctor on the side. I believe he’s going to get himself some modern medical care.”
Fucker. “If you continue to have eyes on that little part of the world, keep me updated.”
“Will do.”
Dusty hung up. The cold air from the vents pushed into his face. He accelerated through the green.
He couldn’t believe it. His father, the faith healer who’d let so many sick people suffer—because if God didn’t heal you, you didn’t deserve to be healed—was seeing a doctor. And he had his followers paying for it—and praying for him.
Sure, a lot of people would say, “Those followers get what they deserve.” He wasn’t one. He knew what it was to be brainwashed. To be dying from a simple bladder infection and believe God had deemed you unworthy, that you got what you deserved.
It’s why he was doggedly investigating the Parish family. Following up on an email from someone who also knew, understood what happened when family cut you off from the wider world and gave you a narrow, dogmatic view of it.
It’s why he’d risk everything to bust Mukta Parish, the woman who brainwashed young girls and turned them into her own personal army of vigilantes. It’s why he’d agreed to go undercover for Tony Parish to begin with and had worked for that scumbag sex-trafficker in Mexico. But when Tony had died, Dusty still hadn’t had enough evidence or an invite into the family. And that had led him here to good ol’ Bucks County, Pennsylvania.
Where he intended to step from the shadows and reacquaint himself with one Ms. Gracie Parish.
Chapter 8
As the gate swung open, Porter Jefferson Rush pulled into the driveway of the elegant stone colonial. From the back of the Navigator, his father groaned.
He eyed his father through the rearview mirror. The afternoon sun highlighted faint lines in his fair skin, showed silver in the tufts of red hair escaping the compression bandage. His green eyes were tensed in pain, shadowed under thick auburn eyebrows. The next few days were going to be rough.
“You okay, Dad?”
“Don’t park in the driveway, Porter. The sun.”
“Dad, you had a mini-facelift three days ago, it didn’t make you a vampire.”
His father’s laughter cut off with a curse. He rubbed his bandaged jaw. “Don’t make me laugh. Park in the garage.”
Porter clicked the garage door opener and pulled into the first bay. His father wasn’t really concerned about the sun. He didn’t want the pariah media to spot him.
Truthfully, Porter didn’t want him seen. No reason to give the media something else to mock about the Pennsylvania senator. Bastards thought anyone with six kids was a religious nut or an idiot.
The garage door slid closed behind them. Porter stepped to the back of the car and helped his father out.
Though he had his keys in hand, on a hunch he turned the knob. Unlocked.
“Dad, I told you to lock the door. Someone running for president could get himself killed this way.”
His father’s brows slid into a puzzled V. “I thought I had.”
Sure he did. His father was a great man, a brilliant man, but he was careless in ways that annoyed Porter no end. They walked into the usually bright kitchen and stopped. The shades were drawn so his sister Layla, who sat at the table with a set of laptops open in front of her, could better see the screens.
Of the six kids in his family, Layla resembled Mother most, blond hair and fair skin. She was the swan among the ginger ducklings. And as the only girl, they all doted on her.
Porter leaned forward and kissed her cheek. “Layla-bug. How’s iRobot?”
She exhaled a long breath. “My lady-in-red robot isn’t working. She’s frigid. All I want is to bring happiness to lonely California businessmen. Is that too much to ask?”
He laughed. Then thought about it. “You’re joking, right?”
She stood, stretched. “Definitely not.” With a wink she moved past him to hug their father, careful of his bandages.
Father instantly took her under his arm, a bit of comfort but also some support as he was a little unsteady from the pain medication.
Layla smiled at Porter. “I’ll take this charming young man from here.”
Porter glanced at her laptop screens. Looked like complicated stuff. “You sure, Layla? I can do it.”
She shook her head. “I was going up to change for a swim anyway.”
Layla guided their woozy father along, even as the man tossed back his insane list of things to take care of.
Agitation tightened Porter’s shoulders. “I’m on it, Dad. Go on upstairs with Layla and relax. I’ll be up in thirty minutes or so to check on you.”
An hour later, Porter was still working in his father’s office, making lists of campaign donors to reach out to. It was looking good. They had a real shot at the presidency. A real shot. He’d worked hard, destroyed his own marriage to get to this place, and now it seemed nothing could stop them. The phone rang.
He picked up it on the third ring. “Yeah.”
“Andrew, I’m surprised you answered. Especially knowing I’m gunning for you.”
Mukta Parish? He instantly recognized her voice. One would have to live on another planet not to. She was very political. And made appearances all over the world on women’s rights issues.
How did she have his father’s private number? Normally Porter would point out her honest mistake. He and his youth-conscious dad not only looked like brothers, they sounded alike. But he was curious about that “gunning for you” comment.
And this wouldn’t be the first call where he’d impersonated his father. That would’ve been when he was sixteen.
“To what do I owe the pleasure of this call, Mukta?”
There was a moment of silence. Had he overplayed his hand? Had he said something wrong? No. He’d been listening to his father’s phone calls since he was a boy playing with cars at his feet. He had the man down. So why the silence?
“Andrew.” The name was spoken as one calls a dog to heel. “Have you killed the bill currently being circulated?”
What the hell was going on? Was she trying to dictate his father’s policy decisions?
The Price of Grace Page 3