by Mary Alford
He chose his words carefully “That’s just it, he’s disappeared into thin air. He’s a vapor. No one’s heard from him or seen him since before that night.”
“Oh, no.” Her hand flew to her mouth. She struggled to take it all in. “His family, they must be going out of their mind with worry.”
“Maybe.”
She watched him for a second and then it clicked. “He’s not involved in this.” When he didn’t say a word, she guessed the truth. “He wouldn’t do it. He left that life behind. He was trying to make a better life for his family and himself. You’re wrong. The Agency’s wrong. He wouldn’t do that to … Kate.”
“Then where’s he been all these weeks? Why hasn’t he come forward and cleared his name?”
“Maybe he can’t.”
“There are safe houses all over Afghanistan. He knew the drill. Where to go. There’s been no contact. None. Not even with the family you claim he adores.”
It didn’t add up to what she knew about the man Kate trusted unconditionally.
“Maybe he’s being held against his will. There could be any number of reasons why he’s unable to make contact.” She scraped her chair back and stood. “He’s not the involved in Kate’s death. I told you, someone from the Agency is responsible. I don’t care if you don’t want to believe it, The Foreigner didn’t do this.”
She grabbed her jacket, and walked out of the house. He didn’t follow her. Maybe he needed time. She certainly needed to be alone, because what he’d said scared the hell out of her.
She walked out of the cabin and into a snow-white wonderland. The ground beneath her feet grew muted. A couple inches of new snow had fallen during the night and the air was fresh and clean, filled with the scent of spruce trees.
Hannah continued past the back of the cabin to the woods close by. Her emotions were all over the board. Her feelings and her thoughts torn between Kate’s and her own. She needed to stay focused. Lives were at stake. She owed it to Kate to figure out who did this to her.
She didn’t stop until she’d made it to the spot. This was their spot: Jase and Kate’s. A clearing in the woods, almost circular in layout where several spruce trees had been struck by lightning years earlier. Their charred trunks scattered on the ground. This was the halfway mark in their walks. They’d stop here to sit and think. Sometimes talk.
She sat down on one of the trunks, her breathing coming hard and unsteady. She’d rest a moment.
Why had she been so determined to defend The Foreigner? Maybe Jase and the Agency were right. Maybe he’d been behind the sale of the weapons since the beginning. It made sense.
Kate had certainly broken the cardinal rule when it came to working ops. She’d gotten far too close to The Foreigner. Yet she knew him. In her heart, she knew he wouldn’t do this.
“I need your help, Kate. Help me remember what happened to you. To The Foreigner.”
Hannah closed her eyes, trying to picture that night in her mind once more. There’d been so many of them, they’d surrounded her. But that one … he’d known her, called her by her name. And she’d known him. She clinched her hand against her forehead. Why couldn’t she see his face? There had to be a way. She’d find a way. Maybe then, they’d have some hope at a future once Kate was able to rest in peace.
Chapter Twelve
He’d begun worrying after the second she left the cabin. Imagining all sorts of things, none of them good. When forty minutes passed, he grabbed his jacket and went after her. She wasn’t hard to find. He and Kate had been to this same spot a dozen or more times.
She hadn’t heard him coming. When he stopped next to her, she’d been holding her head in her hands. When she glanced up, he saw it. She didn’t look well.
He didn’t say a word. He simply scooped her up in his arms. She laid her head on his shoulder as he carried her back to the cabin. Inside, he put her down on the sofa close to the fire and found blanket to cover her. She was shivering from the cold.
Jase added more logs to the fire. When he was satisfied with its warmth, he came back to her and removed her shoes.
“Rest,” he whispered and brushed her hair away from her face.
She reached for his hand. “There’s a way”
He stopped. “A way for what? What do you mean?”
“To know what happened that night. To Kate. There’s a way.”
He looked down at her dreading her answer. “How?”
“Hypnosis. I can be regressed back to that night.”
He dismissed it without consideration. Physically as well as emotionally, she couldn’t handle the procedure. “No.”
“They’re there, Jase. The memories are in there somewhere. I know it. I need help in getting them out.”
Jase gently untangled his hand from hers. “Impossible. You’re not strong enough. There’s no way I’m letting you go through that. It’s too risky.”
She struggled to sit up, further proof of the seriousness of her condition. “I’m not asking for your permission. If you and your precious Agency won’t okay it, I’ll find a way to do it myself. I owe it to Kate. And I don’t need your permission.”
“Good, because you’re not doing it. It’s—it’s preposterous. Forget it. You need to rest. And I have work to do. If you know what’s good for you, don’t think about moving.”
She ignored his orders, swung her legs off the couch, and got to her feet. “What are you so afraid of?”
The challenge wasn’t what he expected. He turned back to her. “Excuse me?”
“Why don’t you want me to remember what happened that night? Are you afraid it might prove someone from the Agency is responsible? Or are you afraid it might show that you froze when Kate needed you most?”
He took a couple of steps closer. “What are you talking about? I did everything I could to save her. I tried to talk her out of going out there. Something didn’t feel right from the beginning. I begged her to let someone else handle the mission for once. She refused.”
Hannah closed the space between them. Her hand rested against his heart, her gaze locked with his. “That’s not what I meant. I mean you froze when she needed you the most. She needed to hear you tell her how you felt about her for once. Jase, she was dying. She needed to know you at least cared about her. Instead, you froze.”
He closed his eyes. What she said cut like a knife. Slicing through to the heart of matter. When Kate needed him he’d let her down. Even now, with this woman who had nothing to do with Kate, when he had the chance to assuage his conscience, right the wrongs they’d both committed, he couldn’t say the words.
He shook his head and stepped back away from her. “I have work to do. You should rest.”
Jase left her alone, went to the guest bedroom, and closed the door. He needed to think. Everything about Hannah Sandoval got under his skin. He didn’t know what to think about her anymore. He knew she was serious about the hypnosis and there was nothing he could do to stop her from doing it. He wouldn’t be able to watch out for her forever. Once the case closed, the Agency’s protection would end. She’d be on her own, and she wouldn’t rest until she’d filled in the missing pieces of Kate’s memory. Even if the procedure or what she found out ended up killing her.
His cell phone rang interrupting those troubled thoughts. He recognized the number right away. It was Travis. “McCoy.”
“There’s been a development I think you should know about.” Travis said in a strained tone.
Jase sank down onto the bed. What now? “What it is?”
“It’s about Kate’s contact.”
“The Foreigner?”
“Yes. One of our agents is reporting that the body of someone fitting his description was found in the desert outside of Farah.”
Farah.
Farah was the stronghold of one of the largest arms dealers known to the CIA. The Agency had been trying to nail him for years. For a time, Kate had been trying to connect Al-Aljazaha to the case that got her killed. She’
d finally dismissed his involvement. Had she been wrong?
“This is not good,” Jase said in a weary voice.
“Yeah, I know. This doesn’t look good.”
Jase had to agree. If Kate had been wrong about Al-Aljazaha’s involvement, then she’d made a major mistake that went way beyond getting herself killed. She might have tipped his hand that they were on to his latest arms deal. If that were so, then they might never know all the other players involved.
“Has the cause of death been determined?” Jase asked.
“No. We don’t know anything yet. We don’t even know if it’s our guy. We have people on the way there now, though. We should know something soon.”
“Good. Let me know the minute you have confirmation one way or another.” He rubbed his hand across his eyes. This kept getting worse by the minute, and he didn’t know what to do.
“I’ll try…”
“What do you mean, you’ll try?” Something was off in Travis’ answer. Had something new come from the botched raid?
Travis hesitated. Jase could almost picture him glancing around the office, perhaps closing the door even.
Jase felt the hair on the back of his neck raise to full attention. “What happened?”
“I’m being put on desk duty.”
Jase blew out a breath. It was standard procedure, but with everything else Travis had told him, well, it didn’t sit well. He tried to reassure his friend. “That’s standard. You know that.”
“Maybe. That’s what Aaron says anyway, and maybe I’m being paranoid. With the senate breathing down everyone’s neck we’re all a little on the edge, but I don’t think so. Something’s going on. Aaron’s pulled me off the chatter monitoring entirely. He has me answering cold calls. I’ve been taken off of Kate’s case entirely, Jase.”
None of what Travis said made sense. He was one of the best at decrypting chatter, hands down, and Aaron knew this. “I don’t understand.”
“Me either. As I told you before, I have a bad feeling. I haven’t heard a word about what they discussed at the debriefing, and the people who would normally confide details to me aren’t talking. I’m getting strange looks as well. I don’t know where I stand. I’m thinking about getting an attorney. Anyways, I didn’t call to cry on your shoulder. I’ll try to keep you updated as best I can, but it’s out of my hands now.”
Jase remembered Travis suggesting he might be the one to take the fall for it when Jase had returned from New Zealand. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear someone was setting Travis up. Which made him wonder who was really involved in Kate’s death and how high up the command chain did it go?
“Do what you gotta do to protect yourself. Get that attorney. Don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine.”
“I did a quick check on some of the chatter sites before I was put on desk duty. There hasn’t been a peep. It’s weird. Ever since you took the Sandoval woman undercover, it’s been quiet. I’m telling you, this isn’t true to form. It doesn’t make sense.”
“What about this case does make sense.”
“Nothing. But if they can come after to me, who’s to say you’re not next. Someone didn’t like what happened out there in the desert that night. Watch your back, Jase. And I mean that.”
* * * *
Every single time she tried to tell him about Kate’s feeling, he walked out on her. She couldn’t believe it meant nothing to him, yet she didn’t understand Jase’s reaction.
She could hear him talking in the bedroom, but she couldn’t make out what he was saying. No doubt, he was checking in with the powers that be to see when he could be done with her.
Hannah went into the kitchen. It was almost midday. She couldn’t stand around and do nothing. Let someone else call all the shots from Langley. The only choice she had was to do something with her hands. She peeked inside the pantry and found bread. There were eggs and milk in the fridge. It looked like the only things Jase had picked up at the store were breakfast items. But then, she remembered his fondness for the meal.
She sat about the task of making coffee and French toast. With the toasts stacking up on a plate, she turned off the stove and carried the pan over to the sink.
Outside, the mild snowstorm from the day before had passed. An untouched layer of snow clung to everything.
“I’m trying Kate,” she whispered mostly to herself. She closed her eyes. “I can’t see his face. Father, help me find out who did this to Kate.”
It was like having a name you couldn’t remember on the tip of your tongue. Just one more little memory, one more insight, and she knew she could see his face. Kate knew her killer. That much Hannah would swear by and it wasn’t The Foreigner.
Remember the last place you were when you had it. Wasn’t that what she always told her students? When was the last time Kate had talked to The Foreigner? That was easy enough. It had been the call that changed everything. The meet with the man in charge of brokering weaponry, including nuclear and WOMDs had been moved up again, shocking everything, including The Foreigner. He’d worked hard to gain access to the man they’d come to call The Ghost. It was The Foreigner who first alerted her to the possibility of someone high up in the CIA being involved.
Kate had worked with The Foreigner for years. She trusted him. They knew each other’s signals. Knew how to read even the slightest enunciation change. She’d known with that call something wasn’t right. When he’d mentioned the part about the boss not being happy, she’d known, but the mission had been too important, and she couldn’t let it go.
They didn’t have enough time to secure the location which had everyone spooked. Jase had wanted her to walk away. She told him it might jeopardize the work they’d done so far. He’d told her he had a bad feeling about it. So had she. They’d both been proven right in the end.
The Agency wouldn’t approve of digressing her through hypnosis, especially if what she suspected were true and someone in charge was involved. They’d find a way to shut her down. She hadn’t convinced Jase of anything, and she hadn’t proven her worth to the Agency. They were laying the groundwork for the official ruling on Kate’s death. They’d lay it at the hands of The Foreigner and sweep all of the dark secrets into a hidden file somewhere.
It was up to her to do whatever it took to bring Kate’s true killer to justice. Even if it meant playing nice with Jase and the Agency until she had the opportunity to do something about it.
“Something smells good.” Startled, she whirled around and found him watching her in the doorway. She hadn’t heard him come in. It took her a minute to reclaim her equilibrium. He had an unstabling effect on her.
“French toast. I didn’t see many options in there.” So they were going to pretend the argument didn’t happen. Kate and Jase had certainly done that enough in the past. Along with ignoring what they felt for each other.
He came over to where she stood next to the sink, snatching one of the toasts. “Mmm, this is good.”
She nodded, pretending to accept his answer while putting some distance between them. This was hard enough to do without him being too close and too much of a temptation.
Hannah poured herself some coffee then sat. “Anything new?”
She watched as he instinctively tensed at the question. He was on guard, expecting something. Not willing to tell her anything. “No, nothing.”
That was a lie. “Still no word of when we can leave?”
“You that anxious to be rid of me?” The corner of his mouth lifted into a makeshift grin that made every fiber in her body aware of him.
Cat and mouse she couldn’t do. She was never any good at it. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what you want me to say.”
Jase tossed the toast aside and came to her. Her body went into automatic freeze mode.
He sat next to her and took her hand. “I know this is hard. None of this makes sense, including you. And for the record, I don’t know what to say either.”
She looked at their clasped hand
s and wanted to cry again. For herself and all the things that couldn’t be. For Kate and what might have been if she’d lived. Yet she couldn’t cry. Couldn’t show that weakness. She couldn’t let Kate down.
“What say we call a truce, or a standoff, or whatever you want to name it? I for one am hungry, and I don’t think we should let French toast go uneaten under any circumstance.”
Chapter Thirteen
“What do you remember about Kabul?” Jase asked. Another snowstorm was raging outside. They’d spent most of the day sitting in front of a fire. She’d found a Bible left by the owner and had been reading it. Now, more than ever, she needed God’s strength.
She glanced up from reading her favorite scripture. The look she gave him appeared about as vulnerable as he’d ever seen. There was also hope there in her eyes. She thought he believed her. He couldn’t let himself go there.
“What do you want to know?” she asked hesitantly.
“The night Kate and I spent it Kabul, before the meet,” he added and instantly the curtain closed. She didn’t like his answer. “Do you remember anything in particular that stands out about that time?” He pressed on. He wasn’t sure why he needed to hear her answer. Maybe because that night had cemented his feelings about getting out. He’d been living on borrowed time. He had to leave.
Hannah laid the book down. “I remember you and Travis almost got us killed.” She shot him a look that was reminiscent of one of Kate’s.
“You remember Travis?” He barely forced the words out. “Why didn’t you recognize him at the hospital?”
She shook her head. “I know I didn’t. Maybe it was too soon. The memories weren’t as strong back then.” She looked up at him and lifted her shoulders in a shrug. “I don’t know.”
Why did she remember his partner now? He wasn’t sure he could handle hearing Travis was the one responsible for ending Kate’s life.