by Amy Gamet
“Watch out for the third rail,” said Logan. “If a train comes, we need to get up on that walkway on your side.”
“Got it.”
“There still won’t be a lot of room, but if we flatten our bodies—”
“Logan, shut up.”
They walked in silence for a hundred yards, the beating of Matteo’s heart in his ears the only sound he could hear. He stopped walking and turned to Logan. “We’ve got this all wrong. Think this through with me. They’re not going to walk along the tracks like we are. They’re going to blow up the station. They’ve already been here.”
“Most likely, yes. They would have set the charges hours, days, or even weeks before now.”
“So why even be here?”
“Because they can’t leave a baby in the middle of the park alone. If they’re really going to try to kill Nico, they want the world to see it.”
“Without the world seeing them.” Matteo shined his flashlight along the sides of the tunnel. “What’s so special about this tunnel that would allow them to do that?”
Logan jerked his head back. “I know what it is. This tunnel was built before the other two, before the technology to burrow so far underground without destabilizing the earth was perfected.” He moved to the wall, shining his own light on it. “This tunnel isn’t a tunnel at all. This was built on ground level and covered over with steel and concrete.”
“What does it mean, Logan? What are they going to do?”
The other man turned toward him, his lips parted and his eyes far away. “If I were a madman who wanted everyone to see what I was about to do? I’d blow up the park with enough of a bang to clear the roof off the tracks. Send the park flying.”
“Leaving only the tracks below.”
“They’d be ruined. Any train that tried to ride those tracks would derail.” Logan shook his head. “It would take a hell of a lot of explosives to send the park flying. More than you could hide in a subway station.”
“Then how would they get them here?” asked Matteo.
A hot breeze blew down the tunnel toward them, followed by the squeal of metal on metal and the gleam of a train’s headlight. Logan hopped up on the maintenance walkway and Matteo followed him, flattening himself against the wall. The train passed by like a moving picture, loud and rumbling.
They hopped back down onto the tracks and looked at each other with complete understanding.
“Run!” they both yelled.
37
Grace rode with Talia to the park, anxiety making her palms sweat and her head pound. They pulled into a train station parking lot.
“This is the wrong station,” she said. “You said South Street Station. This is Wall Street Station.”
“The next closest one. It will be safer for you to get out here. Come now, we must hurry.”
She followed him down the steps to the station below. A train sat waiting.
“Get on the train,” he said.
“What? No. Where is Matteo?”
Talia pulled a gun out of his jacket. “Get on the train if you ever want to see your baby again.”
She held her breath, suddenly shaking. “Please. Tell me where he is. I’ll give you anything you want.”
“I want you to get on that goddamn train!”
She turned and got on. Talia stood in the doorway, the weapon trained on her.
“Where is Nico?”
He ignored her.
“I’ll give you safe passage out of the country. Money. Anything.”
Talia laughed. “I don’t want anything from you.”
A loud boom resonated through the underground tunnel and she put a hand on either side of her seat, bracing herself against the vibrations. “What was that?”
“That, my dear, is my cue.” He stepped back and the door to the subway car closed.
She shot out of her seat and banged on the glass. “Wait! What’s going on? What’s happening?” She continued to bang on the glass as the car kept moving.
The train pulled out of the station, leaving Talia behind and Grace’s train car hurtling forward. She ran car by car to the engine. There had to be a conductor, someone who could let her off this thing, but when she reached the front car, she found it completely empty.
She was alone.
A light up ahead on the tracks, and she squinted to make it out. What was so bright? It almost looked like… daylight.
Her eyes widened as her mind made sense out of what she was seeing. The tunnel was open to the outdoors, the tracks blocked and obstructed.
38
Cowboy shined his light back toward South Street Station. “That was a bomb. A big fucking bomb.”
They’d heard the train coming, felt the wind as it moved down the tunnel, then the explosion. They were only a quarter mile or so out of the station when it happened and it felt like the earth was splitting in two.
“That was more than a few blocks of C4,” said Austin.
“You’re right,” said Cowboy. “More like a train full of dynamite.”
“So that’s it, then,” said Hawk. “Bomb detonated, party over.”
Cowboy scratched his head. “I guess so, but we’re not going to get out that way, so let’s keep walking to the next station. I hope Grace’s kid is okay.”
Hawk stopped walking. “Wait. Do you feel that?”
Wind, coming toward them. “There’s a train coming this way.”
“It’s going to run right into the rubble at South Street Station.”
“Fuck. How do we stop a train?” asked Cowboy.
“The third rail gives it electricity,” said Austin. “You have to find some way to short it out.”
“That giant fucking explosion didn’t short it out?” yelled Cowboy.
“It couldn’t have, or the train wouldn’t be moving. Quick. We look around for metal. If we can connect the third rail to the running rail, the electricity will stop,” said Austin. “But we have to hurry.”
Cowboy shined his flashlight up and down the sides of the tunnel. “There! On the next track. There are pieces of metal.” He ran over there and tried to pick one up. It didn’t budge.
The wind was getting stronger.
The other men each grabbed on. “Lift on one, two, three,” said Austin. Together they were able to just get it off the ground. “We need to drop it on the track on my count. As soon as you let go, get the fuck out of the way.” The train’s metal wheels squealed on the bend in the track, the rumble of the locomotive getting louder. “Ready? Just a few more feet. Good. On three. One, two, three!”
The men dropped the steel onto the tracks and scattered in the opposite direction, pressing their bodies against the side of the tunnel. Sparks flew as the train rounded the bend, then everything went dark, including the lights on the train. Its engine was quiet.
“Woot!” yelled Cowboy. “We did it!” They’d stopped the train from crashing into the debris. It was only in the silence that followed their congratulations that he heard the cries of a baby coming from inside.
39
Grace was curled into a ball beneath the covers, her body like a shield around her son. Their train cars were perfectly coordinated to crash into the rubble at the South Street Station at the same time.
Both were saved by the men of HERO Force.
Matteo watched them sleeping with a heavy, grateful heart.
He moved to the bed and climbed in beside her, opening his arms for her and the baby to cuddle against his side.
“I thought you were sleeping,” he said, kissing the top of her head.
“I thought I lost you both,” she whispered.
He could feel her tears, wet on her face and dripping onto his chest. Every emotion he had held in check throughout this day gathered in his throat, constricting his airway and choking his ability to keep it in check any longer.
He squeezed his eyes tightly shut, tears escaping at the corners, and pulled her more against his side. She was fitted tightly against
him, her leg tucked over his leg, her arm around his waist, and he knew he’d never held another woman with such intensity of emotion before in his life.
“I want to make love to you, Grace.”
“What about the annulment?”
“I don’t want it.” He touched her face. “I want you.”
It was as natural as dusk following sunset, and he knew there would be no more considering. He needed to be with her just as much as she needed to be with him.
She was his wife.
He turned toward her and kissed the top of her head, then her head turned up to his and he kissed her on the mouth. This was when the marriage would become real, and every move of his hands and his body showed her how much he loved her.
40
Matteo reclined on his side, baby Nico babbling on the bed next to him. He touched the baby’s feet, with his super-soft skin, pudgy rounded tops, and tiny perfect toenails.
His eyes went to the TV on the dresser. Grace looked beautiful in a bright blue suit, the flag waving behind her in the sunshine as she announced her candidacy for president.
“That’s your mama,” he said to the baby. “She’s going to be in charge of the whole country. You should be very proud of her.”
Nico babbled his agreement.
“I’m proud of her, too.” He truly was. These last three months he’d seen her go from a woman who was unsure of herself and looking for approval to someone who could stand up and lead as she clearly was meant to all along. As his father-in-law predicted, the people loved her even more than her predecessor, and Lutsia’s future looked promising and great.
He turned back to the baby, rubbing his belly, making him laugh.
Grace entered the room, a wide smile on her face as she began unbuttoning her jacket. “How’d I do?”
Matteo stood up and wrapped his arms around her waist. “You were amazing.”
The baby grabbed his feet, his noises now higher and happier still. He showed no ill effects from his ordeal, quickly slipping back into his routine with his mother and Matteo.
A knock at the door and Vasile walked in, smiling and scooping up his grandson. “There’s my little man.” Before the door could close behind him, Cowboy and Hawk walked in.
“You about ready to go?” asked Cowboy.
“Yeah. I am. Just let me get my things.”
He stood up, his stare set on Grace. “Guess I’ll be seeing you around.”
“I guess so.”
He walked out of the room with the men of HERO Force by his side. It could be no other way.
“I still think I should have been your best man,” said Cowboy.
“You are. You both are.”
“Hawk doesn’t love you the way I do, Red.”
Matteo put his arm around Cowboy. “I’m going to miss you guys.”
An hour later, he was standing beneath a white arbor in the sand, staring at Grace as they renewed their vows.
“When you first came to this country,” she said, “I thought you were only interested in the money. That I was just another job to you. But then I got to know you, and spend time with you, and then I got to like you. And I realized you didn’t take this job for the money at all, that you did it to help the people of Lutsia, because that’s just the kind of man you are.” She took a breath, her bottom lip trembling. “And then I realized I loved you.”
“I promise to take care of you, Grace. As much as any world leader needs taking care of. I promise to be a good father to Nico and to any more children we have along the way. You’re the only person I ever wanted to spend my life with.”
The priest leaned heavily on a cane, but his smile was wide and true. “Aren’t you glad we didn’t skip the vows that time?” he asked. “By the power invested in me by the holy Church and the People’s Republic of Lutsia, I now pronounce you husband and wife.”
41
Cowboy sat at his desk staring into space as he listened to the hubbub around him. A large manila envelope was opened, a stack of papers beside it, and nothing would ever be the same again.
He could hear a couple of the new guys laughing with Hawk. They were just getting their feet on the ground, about to take HERO Force to the next level, and now they were going down. Crashing and burning like the goddamn Hindenburg.
He’d lived an interesting life and made more than his share of enemies over the years, but he never expected anything like this.
His cell phone rang.
Jax.
“You get one, too?” Cowboy asked.
“Yep. What are we going to do?”
Cowboy blew out air. “What the hell are our choices? We’re guilty as fuck.”
“Doesn’t matter. We fight it, Leo. We fight it with everything we’ve got.”
“As soon as the facts come out, HERO Force is done for anyway.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
Cowboy shook his head. “I love to agree with you, man, but you are living in a dream world if you think this is anything other than impending doom. If you and me were back in that shit storm again tomorrow, I’d do the same goddamn thing. But that doesn’t make it right, and there ain’t a court in the world that’s going to let us get away with it.”
“You might be right, but I’m not willing to let HERO Force and everything we’ve worked for get flushed down the shitter because of one misstep.”
“This could go bad, Jax.”
“It went bad a long time ago. Go home. Get some sleep. Kiss Charlotte for me.”
“Yeah. And you kiss Jessa and that baby.”
“It’s going to be all right, Cowboy.”
Cowboy hung up the phone. He wasn’t so sure.
Justice for the SEAL
1
Logan O’Malley worked for a bunch of assholes.
He picked up his tequila and swirled it in a circle, staring into the liquid like it had the power to turn back time, to make him forget the things he’d heard that had knocked his world off its motherfucking axis.
Jax and Cowboy had killed a Navy SEAL. One of their own employees. An original member of HERO Force named Garrison Cole.
Allegedly.
He downed the rest of his drink in one gulp.
He could see now how stupid he was for looking up to them. How childish.
Naive.
Jax and Cowboy had sat him down in Cowboy’s office, shutting the door even though the rest of the team was on a mission in Dubai. There was a lawsuit, Jax said. A civil case against the two of them for wrongful death.
But it was his face that fucked with Logan’s brain.
Jax registered no emotion while he recounted the story of Cole’s death. None at all. The leader of HERO Force was nothing if not pragmatic, but he could have been talking about a broken fax machine or running out of copy paper.
He was downright icy, and Logan had been filled with unease. No.
Suspicion.
The bartender poured him another drink.
Logan wasn’t usually a guy to go with his gut. Analytics and proof, rational thought and logic. Science. But sitting in that room listening to Jax had his inner empath screaming.
They did it.
Jax and Cowboy fucking killed one of their own guys.
Logan probably wouldn’t have found out about it at all, except now they needed his help.
Well, they didn’t need it, exactly.
State Justice Anthony Royce did.
The crack of a cue ball was followed by the thud of balls dropping into pockets and Logan’s eyes focused on the liquor bottles on the shelf in front of him. The bar smelled like cigarettes from a time when smoking had been allowed. It was stale and foul, just like his meeting an hour ago, the air conditioning barely cooling the humid air.
After the mind fuck of a meeting with Jax and Cowboy, they’d brought him into the conference room to meet Justice Royce. He looked so goddamn respectable sitting in the HERO Force conference room, he could have been on a commercial for a law firm.
> That’s when the dirty laundry really got pulled out from under the bed.
Jax and Cowboy explained Royce was the judge who’d dismissed the criminal charges against them, and now he was getting death threats.
That’s when Logan started thinking of quitting his job. His bosses were no better than the dirtbags HERO Force was always fighting back against.
You can go back to the NSA.
Hell, there were a hundred and one jobs he was qualified for. That wasn’t the issue. The problem was he still wanted to work for the company he’d thought he was working for—where the men had integrity and fought for justice.
He hated himself in that moment. Hated the blind faith he’d allowed himself to have in these men. No wonder the other guys treated him like he was ten. He acted like a goddamn child.
Sure, he’d been working hard with Hawk, qualifying on weapons one by one, training in military strategy. But while he told himself it was just curiosity, the truth was he’d been trying to close the gap between him and the guys he looked up to. Especially Jax.
Jax, who was across the street at HERO Force headquarters with Justice Royce right now, probably getting their stories straight in case Royce was called to testify in the civil case. What a fucking joke.
You have a choice to make.
He could go to work on the Royce case like it was business as usual, or he could hand in his resignation. He took another sip of tequila.
I want out. Right. Fucking. Now.
No more HERO Force, no more Jax and no more trying to emulate people who weren’t even worthy of his attention.
The street noise got louder and Logan turned to see Jax walk into the bar. He sat down next to Logan and ordered a whiskey. “You okay?” he asked.
“Now that I know you killed a man?”
“I told you how it happened.”
“Yes, you did. Total accident. Could have happened to anybody.”
“This isn’t about me or Cowboy. This is about Royce. Someone related to the case wants him dead. That’s where your attention needs to be focused, not on something that happened years before your time that doesn’t affect you at all.”