“I’ll go with you,” Jake told him. “Or Chris or Dad, or even Kaylee. You shouldn’t do this alone.”
“You and I both know that alone is the only way I can do this. It’s finally time.” With that, Nick walked out of the house and got into his car and made the long drive to New York.
The Winfield’s house was grand—grand and stifling. Nick tried to think if there were any good memories here, even one that would soften the blow. But then he remembered that he’d been allowed in the house very few times, that for the most part his home had been the Manhattan brownstone, with the various nurses and sitters who’d been paid to watch him.
“Mr. Winfield will see you now.” The large security man attempted to pat him down. Shit like that did not sit well with Nick—never had—and the touch to his shoulder immediately had him putting the man to his knees with his arm twisted behind his back.
“Josh, leave him. He’s fine.” Walter stood in the doorway of his office. Nick vaguely remembered him doing that, when they were both younger, when Walter had cut an imposing figure standing in that doorway. When Nick had wanted nothing more than to gain access to that room, to his father and his family.
Now Nick was granted that right, stepped into the room—and by doing so, even by stepping into this house, he was entering what would’ve been his life.
The thing was, if he’d continued down the same path he’d been on before he left the Winfields, stealing cars and getting into trouble, he’d have no doubt received the same treatment his uncle Billy had at the time he’d been pressed into military service. Nick would’ve ended up in the same exact place he was now, though he’d be a much different man.
Fucking synchronicity.
Nick waited until Walter shut the door and then he turned to face his biological father. “I want you to set me free.”
Walter looked pained. “I did that a long time ago. I hurt you more than a father should ever hurt a son.”
“I want you to declare me dead, in public, once and for all. I don’t care how you do it—you can say I was killed in Iraq, or that you found my body years ago and never said anything. Whatever it takes.”
“I can’t do it.”
“You owe me that.” His voice rose angrily for a second until he tamped it down. “Please. Do this for both of us. You know it’s the only way. There’s no going back for us, so let’s just move forward. Make it so I don’t have to look over my shoulder all the time for the press. Even your other children think I’m dead. Now’s the time to let it all go. I can’t give you the forgiveness you’re looking for—but with this, I can move on. That’s got to be enough for you.”
Walter turned away from him, stared out the window. Nick watched the broad shoulders crumple for just a second and then looked away, because he didn’t want to feel this, not any of it.
“I’ll do it,” Walter said finally, without turning around. “First thing in the morning, I’ll call a press conference. I’ll tell them Deidre wanted me to wait until after she’d passed to make the announcement. I’ll make sure the press believe me. Now please, just go.”
Nick opened his mouth to say something, to thank Walter, but he couldn’t. Relief flooded him as he turned and left the room and then the house, closing the door behind him.
The path out had been different this time—the back exit and not down the trellis and across the side lawns—but the feeling was as familiar to him as the other path had been all those years ago. But the freedom was even more of a rush this time, because the fear was finally gone.
And when he walked out of the gate to the street where he’d parked, he stopped short. Because just like all those years ago, Jake was there waiting for him. Had followed his ass all the way to New York without Nick noticing.
Jake wasn’t alone either. There were Chris and Kenny. And Kaylee. All waiting to bring him home.
Kaylee waited while he hugged Dad first, and then Jake and Chris. And then the men moved to the side, and finally, he put his arms around Kaylee.
“He’s going to do it—hold a press conference and declare me dead.”
Kaylee had tears in her eyes. “I know how hard this was for you. How hard it’s all been.”
“It’s done now. I can move on… with you.”
Now she smiled. “I can keep a secret, Nick. This secret. All of your secrets. I want to keep them.” She pressed her lips to the side of his neck.
“There’s going to come a time when what I do compromises your job. And vice versa.” Nick moved away, pressed his fists to his temples for a second. “You became a journalist because of your mother—I’m not going to let you leave that behind. I know what it’s like to love your job.”
“You’re notletting me do anything.” Her eyes blazed. “I make my own choices. I chose to call you that first time. And the second time. So if I tell you that, for me, finding love trumps my career ambitions, you have no right to tell me otherwise. I can opt out of stories that concern the military—I can make it work. And if I can’t, I can’t.”
Nick could swear he felt tears rise up behind his eyes at her words. The last time he cried was at Maggie’s funeral. Since then, the walls were up high enough that no one had breached them.
Kaylee had definitely climbed those walls.
“I know you thought that you weren’t capable of love—that you wouldn’t be able to share your full life with someone. But you did share it with me. And I’m not letting you take it back,” she told him. “I love you.”
“Come here.” He heard the gruffness in his own voice, barely trusted it. And when she walked back into his arms and looked up at him, he told her, “I do love you, Kaylee Smith. Probably from the second you stole my damned car.”
“Our car now.”
He nodded. “Yeah, our car now.”
Nick helped Kaylee into their car, and then he started it up, and together they followed Jake’s Blazer and the rest of his family toward the best kept secret of all—home.
HOLD on TIGHT
Coming January 2010
Read on for a sneak peek inside …
CHAPTER
1
So I may be tainted in my truth
When I claim I’m bullet-proof
But every half-assed assault
Has been a death by default
—Abby Ahmad, “Tri-Me”
Chief Petty Officer Chris Waldron knew he looked like hell and he felt a hell of a lot worse.
He didn’t know how long he’d spent strapped to a bed staring up at a plaster ceiling in some kind of drug-induced haze while his body healed and his mind remained numb.
He floated in and out of consciousness, mainly because the doctors kept waking him up, which was really starting to get on his last fucking nerve.
He’d been a SEAL for eight years, long enough to know that complaining never did anyone much good. But inside his head—man, he was bitching up a storm and a half.
Someone had shoved his iPod earbuds in, and until the battery died he’d been slightly contented listening to AC/DC’sBack in Black album in a continuous loop.
He woke himself up singing the chorus of Creedence’s “Green River” out loud. The nurse was staring at him as if he was crazy and normally he’d be allOh honey, I could give you some of this crazy if you’d just lay yourself down here .
But not today.
Because even though she was pretty, with kind eyes, he realized on some level that his mind could take longer to heal than his body if he didn’t start dealing with what had happened. Sex wasn’t the answer.
Still, the nurse was so intent on staring at his eyes—the two different colors tended to do that to people—she’d forgotten about the needle she was supposed to inject into his IV tubing. Now the drug that had kept him foggy hovered in his periphery.
He was slower than normal, but still pretty damned fast. The nurse called for the doctor, but it was too late. He’d yanked the needle out and held the IV pole like a weapon, since they’d confiscat
ed all of his.
“Son, it’s all right—you’re in a U.S. military-base infirmary in Djibouti. The nurse was trying to give you your pain meds, but we can talk about it first.” The doctor spoke slowly while Chris stared at him, willing himself to believe that, but his body was still reacting—his hand held tight to the IV pole in a fight-or-flight response, and since flight wasn’t an option, he was going to bash whoever came near him with the damn pole.
“Chris, come on, man—put that down before you fuck someone up.”
It was his CO’s drawl, heavy like thick syrup, which meant Saint was as tired as Chris felt.
“No more drugs,” Chris told the doctor while he continued to retain possession of theI won’t take any more drugs pole.
The doctor looked at Saint, who said, “If he needs them, he’ll ask.”
The doc relented, motioned to Chris for his arm, which was bleeding all over the place, and Chris reluctantly let go of the metal pole.
“Sorry, Ma’am,” he told the nurse as she put a bandage on his arm.
“You’ve got a great singing voice, Chief,” she said with a smile. Saint rolled his eyes because normally one comment like that could make Chris a one-man concert. But even though the music was still playing in his head, all he did this time was say, “Thanks.”
He remained seated at the edge of the bed once he and Saint were left alone, struggling to get his equilibrium back. He stared down at his bare feet and felt a sudden urge to rip the hospital gown off his body. Which he did promptly, threw it on the ground, asking, “How long have I been here?”
“Twenty-four hours. You made it to the helo on your own steam.”
He didn’t remember that fully. The memories were there, the edges blurred, bleeding into the bigger, slow-moving picture like he was attempting to see clearly underwater.
Cam. His teammate’s face was the last thing he remembered seeing before he surrendered to the safety of unconsciousness. “Where’s Cam?”
“Already in Germany—he stopped by to see you before he left.”
“I remember. Thought I was hallucinating.”
“You’re getting transported there yourself at 0500 for evaluation before they’ll take you home.”
Chris took stock of the various bruises and contusions on his body—a few stitches here and there, but nothing major. His head, however, was a different story. There was a definite aching throb behind what was left of the narcotics. “Concussion?”
Saint nodded. “No fractures. You’re pretty banged up, but you should’ve been hurt a hell of a lot worse. They kept you here so they could run some tests.”
Chris closed his eyes for a second and said a silent prayer to his momma, who he was sure was responsible for that one. “Do Jake and Nick know about this?”
“It’s been all I could do to hold them back. They’re calling every hour on the hour. They weren’t going to tell your father but—”
“He knows.” His dad always knew when things went wrong—it was next to impossible to hide anything from a parent with second sight. His brothers would’ve found out by the more traditional routes and were, no doubt, freaking. Not that he would’ve been any different had one of them been in his position.
“Are you awake enough to answer some questions for me?” Saint asked.
It wasn’t really a question, since Saint had already pulled up a chair. His CO was remarkably patient, but Chris could tell it was wearing thin.
He didn’t relish this conversation one bit, thought about Jake and Nick and wished his brothers were here with him now.
He wondered if he’d make it through this without throwing up.
It wasn’t everyday that you had to tell a man how his best friend had died. Their team was close, for sure, with so much history tying all of them together. This was the first tear in the fabric. “Yeah, I’m awake enough.”
“What’s the last thing you remember about what happened with Mark—what did he say?” Saint stared at him steadily, searching for some kind of answer before Chris even began speaking.
“He told me he was going in, against Josiah’s orders. He told me to stay put. I tried to talk him out of it, but he pulled rank. I don’t remember him going in, Saint. I remember every other fucking thing… but all I remember is Mark’s hand on my shoulder and then…”
Andthen Josiah, the FBI member of the Joint Task Force team and the man in charge of the Op, was arguing with them, angry that Mark had gone in against Josiah’s direct order to stand down. Chris and Cam insisted on going into the embassy—which was already taking heavy fire—but they were at least fifteen minutes behind Mark for the hostages. Inside was chaos—they both heard Mark yelling down the hall but they couldn’t get that far without leaving the ambassador in greater jeopardy.
“We made a decision to get the ambassador and his wife out and then go back in for Mark,” Chris said. “Everything was happening at once and we had a split second.”
“Don’t second-guess it.”
Chris nodded, swallowed hard. “I was just outside the building—Cam was maybe twenty feet ahead of me, with the ambassador and his wife and their kids close behind. I was backing him up.”
“Were you alone?”
Chris thought hard. “No, Josiah was with me.”
Chris and Josiah were providing cover, with Chris ready to go back in for Mark, when the explosion rocked the building. He’d been thrown hard, woke up maybe half an hour later, ears ringing and still looking for Josiah and then for Mark.
“And then they killed him,” Saint spoke quietly, his voice tight with anger. “The rebels killed Mark and took him away from there so they could have an American trophy rather than leave him in the building to die in the explosion. There are already reports that have the rebels claiming they killed a U.S. Navy SEAL after they’d gotten him to give them some classified information about anti-terrorism initiatives.”
“There’s no way Mark would’ve given intel.” The rebel soldiers might have killed him in the most inhumane way imaginable, but they’d never have broken him. Chris was sure of that.
“His body still hasn’t been found.” Saint spoke quietly, stared at the white wall of the hospital room, a tinge of disbelief in his voice that this was really happening. His jungle greens were fresh, his blond hair damp, as if he’d just showered, but there were circles under his normally bright blue eyes, his mouth pulled into a tight, grim line.
Saint and Mark had come up through BUD/S together, had served in Coronado and had come to Virginia to take charge of Team Twelve.
To leave Mark behind in this country left a knot in Chris’s stomach that no amount of IV drugs could take care of. No body meant no closure, signified a failure. “I’m sorry, Saint.”
“Don’t give me thatsorry bullshit, Chris. Mark died doing what he loved. You did everything you could, so fuck the guilt. He’d kill you for it.” Saint’s words were more than ironic, and more than true, and still Chris knew it would be a long time before he was able to let any of this go.
“They’ll keep looking?”
“If they don’t, I will. I already told the admiral that.” Saint stood, looked toward the small open window, jaw clenched for a second before getting back to business. “You should put some clothes on. There’s an FBI agent who needs to hear what you’ve got to say in more detail.”
FBI.Jamie .
And he didn’t bother to ask Saint if it was her coming to question him, because he could sense her, in the hall, maybe right outside the door.
He caught himself rubbing the fingertips on his left hand together lightly.
“Yeah, it’s her,” Saint said, catching the familiar, pensive sign that meant Chris was processing something important.
For as far back as he could remember, he’d been different, stood apart from everyone but his momma and dad, because he knew things.
Over the years, he’d attempted to convince himself that he was only dealing with a sharper, more refined instinct, that he’d
merely honed something others never took the trouble to do. His brothers called itpsychic Cajun bullshit even though they knew, the way Chris himself did, that there was much more to it than that. More than he wanted to think about right now, and so he forced his palm flat against the sheet as Saint asked, “Are you ready?”
Chris wondered how long Jamie had been here, if she’d questioned Cam before he left. She hadn’t come in to see him before this—he’d have to be dead not to remember that. “You can let her in.”
The Joint Task Force Chris had been a part of on this mission had consisted of himself and Mark; Josiah Miller, a hostage negotiator for the FBI; a Force Recon Marine named Rocco Martin whose specialty was languages; and a Delta operative named Cameron Moore who had extensive knowledge of the kidnappers as well as the area.
It was a relatively straightforward mission: rescue the four kidnapped UN peacekeepers, the American ambassador and his movie-star wife, who worked as an ambassador of peace in many war-torn countries, and their two adopted children. Africa was her newest project—hence, the massive publicity when she and the ambassador arrived in the Sudan.
That was never a good thing in a country like this.
As of today, the ambassador and his family were safe, the UN peacekeepers had been assassinated and all of the men on the Joint Task Force were dead except for Chris and Cam.
Chris reluctantly pulled on a pair of sweats that Saint had brought him, the pain coming on stronger now. But the pain was good—he needed to feel that after days and days of numbness. The burning hot grief was as fresh as if time had stood still while he was out cold.
Nothing was ever going to be the same, especially not when Special Agent Jamie Michaels walked into his hospital room. Her stride was confident, more than necessary, as if trying to hide her hesitancy in seeing him again.
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