by Gabby Grant
“She loves you, son. She said so, only recently.”
“Recently?” Mark asked, unable to wipe the biting doubt from his voice.
“And, even if she hadn’t said it,” Albert continued. “I would have known. The two of you were meant for each other. Preordained, if you will. Just as surely as Isabel and I-”
Mark turned and Albert’s hand slipped from his shoulder. Mark steadied his grip on Albert’s opposite upper arm. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do...”
The old man grimaced and pulled away. “Not trying to do any damn thing but tell you the truth! Now, you know and I know that Ana is safe. At least, that is both our instincts. And, we’ve honed those pretty well over the years.
Mark stopped him cold with his best dissecting look. “Albert,” he asked, suddenly realizing what had been bothering him. It was his arm. Albert had been favoring his right arm, and using only his left. “What happened to your-”
Albert gave him a bulldog growl. “Some slimy bastards came after me at Haines Point.”
“You were out at the Point alone?” Mark asked, incredulous. Incredulous, though he didn’t know why. Despite his age and waning stamina, octogenarian Albert Kane still thought himself invincible.
“Just a graze, God dammit,” Albert barked back. “Not a fricking hole in my head.”
Mark held his tongue, knowing very well that’s what it could have been. And, despite his snarling, Mark figured that Albert knew it, too.
“Sir, given the call for our resignations I don’t think either of us should go taking any--”
“For Chrissake, son!” Albert shot back. “I may be old, but I’m not an old fool. Won’t be making the same mistake twice! Besides,” Albert said turning toward the door, “seems to me you’d be better off taking some God damned action of your own rather than handing out advice.”
Mark flinched at the words that resonated with a biting chord all the way down to his soul.
Just who the hell was he supposed to take action against? Other than one fricking, sorry-assed cowboy, who was likely at this moment putting his greedy hands all over his wife?
“What I’d suggest,” Albert snarled from the threshold, “is that you get down to Virginia and take care of that baby girl of yours, then get back here post haste and help me straighten all this bullcrap out!”
Mark nodded as Albert disappeared behind the thick glass door. Then gave into his volcanic ambition and smashed the hell out of the bag.
CHAPTER 20
Ana took another sip of coffee. “So, it was the watch, then? A tracking device?”
Joe nodded, and carried his own mug over to the sofa where Ana sat. “Unfortunately, one Hay Long could use, too. Only, I was banking I’d get to you first.”
“Well, you didn’t,” Ana said, forcing a scowl, knowing all the while Joe had done his best- better than his best- to find her. Once again, she owed Joe her life. “But, in your case, coming in second still wins you high honors. I would have died of exposure out there.”
Joe took a seat beside her. “Or something worse.”
Ana shivered, then pointed to the timepiece on Joe’s wrist. “Aren’t we in danger of being found?”
“I disabled it,” Joe assured her, not half as sure of their safety himself. While it was true, he hadn’t exactly had the time or the tools to disassemble the tracker until they’d reached the cabin. And he wasn’t about to destroy the damn watch. It was one-of-a-kind; it had been given to him in Thailand, another lifetime ago- by someone very special.
“Just what is this place?” Ana asked, tugging the bottom of Joe’s long flannel shirt over her thighs.
“Call it a retreat,” Joe answered. “Nice little get-away.”
“A safe house?”
Joe nodded and set down his mug. “Owned by your father.”
“My father?”
Ana tucked up her knees under the shirt and rested her bare feet on the sofa cushion, heated by the warmth of the nearby fire. “Since when?”
“Since, I don’t know,” Joe said, stretching denim legs long in front of her and settling his heels on the coffee table. “Must have had it for years, though. I know my Uncle Tom came here back in the eighties.”
“Tom...? As in, Mooney?” Ana asked, trying to keep her eye off Joe’s grizzly bear chest. A chest that, thanks to her use of his shirt, was now covered by nothing but a v-necked undershirt that revealed a rough smattering of reddish-brown hair.
“As in Mooney and his wife, my Aunt Peggy. Your Dad apparently lent them this place years ago after their son, Charles, died...”
But the rest of the story was lost in the fire’s glow and the swirl of Ana’s imagination that circled not around goings on in this cabin, but at a particular beach house more than four years ago. A beach house in Costa Negra that had belonged then to Joe’s same Uncle Tom. A place that had served as Joe and Ana’s refuge from the ravages of civil war.
“Ana?” Joe stood beside her, extending her empty mug. “Man,” he said with a chuckle, “better make yours a double.”
Ana smiled her thanks and then watched him walk away with an unwelcome sense of melancholy. In all this time, he’d scarcely changed a bit. Not nearly as lean or fit as Mark, he still had something about him. Something very uniquely male and startlingly unnerving, Ana thought, swallowing that observation as he returned and handed her a steaming mug.
“You doing alright?” he asked with a look of concern, settling down on the sofa beside her.
Ana had no clue how she was doing when Joe looked at her with that hint of yesterday in his honey brown eyes. It had long been over between them, by the time Ana had taken up with Mark. What had been between them, in actuality hadn’t ever been much at all. Nothing more that a suggestion of what they could have become.
“I was just wondering,” she lied, unbending her legs and crossing them over, one foot positioned on the floor. “How it is that you know about this place- a cabin belonging to my father- and I don’t?”
Joe scratched the back of his neck and lifted, with great difficulty it seemed, his gaze from her calf. “I, uh... What was the question?” he asked, looking up, his eyes crinkling slightly at the corners.
“The cabin?” she asked, lowering the mug from her lips.
“Oh, yeah.” Joe righted himself on the sofa beside her. “Well, like I was telling you, your Dad lent this place to my aunt and uncle some time ago. Uncle Tom mentioned it to me in passing.”
Ana raised her eyebrows.
“Alright, not in passing. Could be that it was a specific comment.”
Ana set down her mug on the coffee table.
“OK, he told me very specifically about this particular cabin...”
Ana crossed her arms and cleared her throat.
“...back when I joined the Company. There,” he said, “you satisfied?”
“My father’s cabin. How generous of your uncle.” Ana narrowed her eyes. “Just in case you ever got into trouble... Something you didn’t quite know how to get yourself out of?”
“Well...” Joe slapped his knee and stood. “Say, were you this bad at the DIPAC?”
“Oh, much worse,” Ana assured him.
Joe laughed, but backed up a step.
“And you don’t have to run away, you know. I’m not going to tie you down and interrogate you.”
Joe coughed and shifted on his feet. “Look, I...”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Ana said, springing off the sofa. But suddenly she was inches from his chin and had forgotten why his nervousness had looked so ridiculous a moment ago. None of this was supposed to be happening. None of it at all. Ana was a married woman- and a mother, for God’s sake.
And, she reminded herself with a swift mental kick, a woman who was very much in love with her husband. A husband who thought she was a lunatic, a nagging voice chimed in- a man who’d begun to doubt her, until after a period of so many doubts, Ana’d even started doubting herself.
Joe’s brow
was swept in amber-red, his temples and ears streaking crimson. Somewhere in his eyes was a question, a question that Ana felt herself wanting to answer...
Ana’s heart catapulted against her chest wall as she found herself struggling for the strength to walk away, groping for the voice that would say something- anything- that would give her the power to leave yesterday behind.
“There a shower in this place?” she asked through the heat weeping its way up her skin.
“Sure.” Joe’s said in a croaky whisper. “Back through the bedroom.”
“Joe,” Ana said, “I don’t know the whole story...”
Joe raised a single suspicious eyebrow.
“...yet. But I did want to thank you. Thank you for whatever it was you had to go through to bring me here.”
“Ana, you don’t have to...”
He laid his hands on her shoulders and a current ricocheted through her. And, in an instant, it was him and her and Costa Negra all over again. But Ana couldn’t have that over again. Not now, not here. Not ever, she reminded herself, breaking away. “Back through the bedroom?”
Joe nodded and let out a small breath of air, but not so small she didn’t notice. “That away,” he said, with a toss of his chin.
Ana headed for the bedroom, then stopped suddenly, whirling on her heels, wanting to tell him- let him know- how much he mattered still, despite what could never go on between them.
But he’d already disappeared, just as cleanly as a puff of smoke above an extinguished flame.
***
Tom Mooney shut the file on his desk then reopened it, thinking that would make things look clearer. But he still didn’t understand what all this information meant. A blueprint of the Neal house? Detailed information about their baby’s whereabouts? File numbers for surveillance tapes recording the baby’s move from the Kane house to DIPAC headquarters in Central Virginia?
Tom slapped shut the file and slid it to the corner of his desk, exposing the brown and beige map of the Rub Al Khali Desert that had lain open underneath. He knew his nephew Joe was on assignment in Saudi. But what was the fricking map for? And why the hell couldn’t Mooney remember?
Tom pushed back from his chair and stood, shaking his head. He was probably dreaming this. It was all too surreal. Absurd, really. Like someone had turned his goddamned life on a dime.
Too much had been happening lately that Tom didn’t understand. And then, some days, he’d wake up and it’d all make perfect sense. He’d been on his mission, fulfilling his god-given purpose to secure democracy. Just at the moment, Tom couldn’t recall specifically what the hell that mission was.
Didn’t matter, Tom told himself. Didn’t fricking matter. Tomorrow, he’d remember for sure. Tomorrow would be a new day, a fresh start. And the nightmare of this blackout would be over.
Tom walked to the back of his office and lifted the small picture frame off the filing cabinet, wondering who the spiffy Marine was. And why did Tom have the gut-wrenching sensation that the young redhead was in danger?
***
Joe brought down the hatchet with earsplitting force.
Damn fool, he cursed himself, setting up another hapless log for assault. Three years of waiting- for what?
Another thrust against the cutting stump sent wood chips flying.
A woman who’d proven her love to another man?
A third log splintered in shards.
A man who’d been stupid enough to let her get abducted...
Joe stopped himself, realizing the absurdity of the thought. Unless she was unconscious, nobody could stop Ana Kane from doing anything.
Joe laid the hatchet against the stump and pulled a kerchief from his jeans to wipe his brow.
Damn hot for December. Damn hot, indeed.
But the scorching sunlight reaching its fingers through morning branches had nothing on Ana’s dark eyes. Dark and filled with spirited fire, Joe thought, tucking his sweaty rag back into his jeans. Just the sort of hypnotic gaze that made a guy want to surrender state secrets.
All around, pine trees whistled and fluttered with the morning breeze, small birds nesting on wavering branches. To Joe’s left, at the back of the cabin, sparkled a glistening pond. A pond that was probably barely thirty degrees and which Joe longed to throw himself into still.
Joe didn’t know what it was about his past relationship with Ana that had prevented him from moving forward. But he sensed in his gut it had something to do with emotion. Most notably the fact that for the first time in his life Joe had told a woman he loved her- and actually meant it.
And then, she’d shot him down.
Joe’s neck hairs prickled the low rim of his t-shirt collar a split-second before he heard the footfall behind him.
Joe bent forward and reached for the axe just as a black shadow fell across the log and a bruising weight crushed into his back.
Joe hit the ground in a sprawl then rolled to greet his attacker, axe held skyward.
An oily-haired Oriental leveled a pistol at McFadden’s head. “Say, bye, bye,” the bastard cooed.
Joe waggled the fingers of his left hand in a partial wave, then slugged the axe’s hammer head into the man’s groin.
The man yelped like a wildcat and doubled forward, a bullet tearing into the dust between McFadden’s left leg and the stump.
Joe sprung off the earth and grabbed the crippled man by shoulders, toppling him easily to the ground.
The man moaned and tried to buckle his legs against his pain.
Joe grabbed the pistol-wielding hand and slamming it into the earth until the man’s grasp broke free.
“Say, bye-bye,” Joe said, pressing the pistol to the whimpering man’s temple.
It was then Joe saw the man was crying. Jesus Christ, real terrified tears. And, he couldn’t have been more than twenty.
Joe pulled back the pistol, knowing it was a mistake. Knowing the only way to completely ensure their safety was to take this asshole out. But Christ, it was the fricking holidays. At least, in America.
“Tell you what,” Joe said, pushing himself to his feet while keeping the pistol trained on the man’s forehead. “Because I’m such a nice guy, I’m going to give you one more chance.”
Joe pumped the trigger and the man recoiled with a yelp as his right knee cap shattered.
No,” Joe said, rubbing his chin, “make that two.”
A second sure-fire shot did away with his offender’s second knee. “Now then,” Joe said with a pleasant smile, “didn’t that make the family jewels feel much better?”
The man moaned as blood spilled from his mouth and he rolled sideways, expecting the worst.
“Oh, hell no,” Joe assured him. “I’m not going to kill you. Just gonna tuck you in the boat house over there, so you can’t make any more trouble until I can call 911.”
But first, Joe decided, gripping the pistol barrel in his hand and whipping its butt swiftly across the back of the man’s head, I’m going to put you out of your stinking misery for a little while so you’re feeling no pain.
Christ, Joe thought, hefting the man’s limp form over his shoulder and hauling it around to the other side of the pond like a heavy sack, CIA man Joe McFadden was becoming fricking Santa Claus.
CHAPTER 21
Mark picked up his car phone and pressed auto dial.
“Major Walker.”
“Carolyn,” Mark said, “just wanted to give you a heads up I’m on my way to the DIPAC.”
“Now, sir?”
“On my way generally means imminent, Major,” Mark said, unable to resist the impulse to be smart-mouthed. Ever since his encounter with that punching bag, he’d been itching to pound something further. Something like a six foot tall Marine, to be specific.
“Yes, sir,” Carolyn answered, masking emotion like the good solider that she was.
“Oh, and, Major,” Mark said. “Get packing.”
“For both of you, you and Isabel,” Mark added when Carolyn didn’t re
spond.
“ASAP, sir?” Carolyn asked, apparently finally finding her voice.
Mark checked his watch against the dash clock. “I’ll be there in roughly forty minutes. You’ve got twenty to get home and back.”
Mark paused a moment for effect. But also to collect himself. It wasn’t easy to mask his own emotion where baby Isabel was concerned. Though he didn’t like to think about it, she was in just as much danger as any other analyst’s child out there. Maybe more. “And Carolyn, I don’t have to tell you how important it is to ensure things are taken care of while you’re gone.”
Mark dropped his phone onto the car seat and steadied his hands on the wheel, trusting Albert had gotten through to the DIPAC team and set up the briefing. Mark wanted to be filled in on every clue, every single detail of what had happened thus far while he’d been distracted in Washington. Although they’d been getting regular reports, there was something to seeing the information first hand. The farther removed you got from a situation, sometimes the harder it was to analyze. And as the top information system process center for Defense, the DIPAC was getting all key information first.
Though, to Mark, his own family’s well-being was of utmost importance, as a trained specialist Mark knew the problems with Ana and Isabel were diversions. Mere symptoms of the main disease. Unless the DOS could find a way to attack the root of the problem, more people’s families than just Mark’s would be in danger.
As soon as they’d suspected the scare, the DOS had made rapid moves to try to protect as many analysts as possible. Families had been taken en masse to safe house locations around the globe. And the skeleton crew of analysts that had remained on duty were ordered to stay there and leave their stations only long enough to eat and sleep on a rotated schedule in their own secured facilities.
The new measures had helped, but were implemented too late to dissuade the initial desertion by the work force. Some analysts, particularly the civilians, weren’t up to the task of endangering their families. Their spouses were spooked, their children were crying. And home computers were getting e-mail messages reporting the terrorists had gathered facts on where and when every DOS analysts’ child went to school. That little tidbit had been the straw that broke the camel’s back for the last wave of deserters. And, as a father, Mark could certainly understand that.