“Good, because I’m not looking for an apology.”
He risked a glance at her. She sat turned toward him in her seat, shadows splashed across her face, rushing and retreating through the windshield, making her expression hard to read. He felt it again, that nearly desperate need to put space between them. To push her away. Keep her safe. “How you liking the new job?” He hadn’t meant to say it—hell, he hadn’t even meant to admit that he knew she was working for Shaw, but there it was, a ticking time bomb between them that had suddenly detonated.
“Oh, am I supposed to apologize now?” she said, shaking her head. “There’s a lot of shit I’m sorry for, a lot of shit I regret, but calling Shaw isn’t one of them.”
“Give it some time,” he said as he angled the car against the curb outside her house and cut the engine. “He won’t play nice forever.”
She stared straight ahead for a few moments, her attention focused on something other than him. “That day, when David told me I couldn’t save you both, I was confused. I didn’t understand—I didn’t know you were there,” she said, turning toward him, meeting his gaze head-on. “Then I realized what he was saying. You came to rescue me. Again. And I’d have to choose between you and Val. I couldn’t. Don’t ask me to be sorry about that.”
“I’m not worth saving,” he said quietly.
She popped her door open and dropped a foot onto the curb before looking at him again. He could read her expression plainly now; it was a mixture of sadness and the kind of resolve he knew he’d never be able to break, no matter how hard and far he pushed her away.
“That’s not something you get to decide.” She stepped out of the car and levered the seat, motioning for Avasa to follow her. She stopped on the sidewalk, looking down at him through the open window. “I love you.” She said it plainly, and he could see just how much it cost her to lay herself bare like that.
He looked away, unable to take the full weight of her gaze. “You shouldn’t.”
“You don’t get to decide that either,” she said before she turned and led the dog across the yard and into the house.
Forty-Three
Cofre del Tesoro, Colombia
April 2010
Michael drew heavy velvet drapes the color of Pepto-Bismol across windows, careful to sidestep the Victorian dollhouse that hugged the wall. Looking down, he had to laugh at the ridiculous picture his black lace-ups made next to the delicate structure. Like a giant, ready to conquer and destroy.
“Michael.”
He turned to see Christina in a nest of pink satin and lace. “No talking. It’s late.” He resettled the drapes and stepped away from the window, heading for the door.
As usual, the little girl ignored his brusque tone and curt words. “Can I see her?”
He looked at his watch. It was nearly ten o’clock. Way past her bedtime. He shook his head, started to deny her, even though he knew he’d give in in the end.
“Please.” She looked at him, her dark hair plaited into a braid, the thick rope of it hung over her shoulder, her eyes too desperate to belong to a child. She was her father’s princess, locked away in a tower. In the two years he’d been her guard, Christina had never so much as spoken to another child. Her best friend lived on a scrap of paper he carried around in his pocket.
Caving, he pulled the picture out of his pocket and handed it to her. She took it, held it with both hands, smoothing her small fingers over the wrinkled paper. She smiled and looked up at him, expectantly. He sank into the pink brocade chair next to the bed and returned her smile. “Which one?”
She wanted him to tell her a story about Frankie when she was a little girl. Her smile deepened, her eyes drifting down to the picture in her hands. “The one about the bicycle.”
He should’ve known—it was her favorite. Settling in to the chair, he told the story about how when Frankie was eight, she’d ridden her bike off the roof of their house on a dare. He could still see her, black hair a wild tangle around her tanned face, sailing through the air. She’d landed horribly, banged up beneath her BMX racer, the neighbor boy who’d done the daring left standing on the porch, mouth hanging wide open.
“She was brave,” Christina said, her eyes eating up the sight of his baby sister trapped on paper.
“She was hard-headed. Never could walk away from a dare.” He felt the familiar tightening in his chest whenever he talked about his sister. He hadn’t seen her face to face in five years. Not since she was twelve. She was about to graduate high school, would be starting college in the fall. Starting a life he would never be a part of.
“Do you think she would’ve liked me?” Christina said, reluctantly handing the picture over.
He took it and stood, slipping it into his pocket. “I think the two of you would’ve been inseparable.”
She looked away from him, down at the hands resting quietly in her lap, chewing on her bottom lip for a moment before she spoke. “I wish—”
“Good night, Christina.” He wouldn’t let her finish the sentence. Never did. He knew what she wished; he wished the same thing.
Christina snuggled down into her nest of satin and smiled again but despite the lift of her mouth, she looked sad. “Good night, Michael.”
“Night,” he said, clicking off her lamp and closing the door.
He retrieved his satellite phone from his room and slipped outside, carrying it across the courtyard to an open field of grass surrounded by high walls. He dialed the number and listened to it ring, praying she had it set to vibrate like he’d instructed. There was only an hour difference between Colombia and Texas so it wasn’t so late that he’d wake her, but that meant that his aunt and uncle could still be awake. The official story—that he was presumed dead, rotting away in the Colombian jungle after his entire team, along with a small cadre of local police, had been ambushed by the Moreno cartel—was what they’d told what little family he had left. Frankie, grief stricken and unwilling to believe that he was dead, called the emergency number he’d given her before being deployed. Unable to let her go, he’d answered.
“Hold on,” she said by way of greeting. He heard her doing as he’d told her. Going into the bathroom, turning on the shower as cover noise to muffle their conversation. A few moments later, the soft hiss of running water droned out of the earpiece, then she was back. “Hi.”
She knew it was him. The number he’d called belonged to a prepaid cell only he had the number to. As soon as they finished talking, Frankie would destroy the phone and he’d use an anonymous courier to send her another via a PO box. She thought he was still in the military. That his death was faked for the sake of national security and these cloak-and-dagger maneuvers were to keep his location a secret from insurgents. She had no idea what he really was. That he killed people for money. That his likeness was splashed across wanted posters hung in countless agencies in over a half a dozen countries, or that there were entire task forces dedicated to hunting him down. She’d never even heard the words El Cartero. To her he was just Michael, her big brother.
“Hey, how’s my baby sister?” he said, hearing the smile in his voice as they settled into a familiar rhythm.
“Good. I got a job,” she said.
“A job?” For some reason the idea bothered him.
“I’ve been waitressing at the Wander Inn after school and on weekends. If I’m lucky, Mr. Onewolf will hire me full-time for the summer and keep me on for weekend shifts once I start MU in the fall.”
She was moving on. Growing up. He couldn’t help but feel like he was being left behind.
Michael frowned. “You don’t need a job.”
“Yes, I do. College isn’t cheap.”
“I told you I wanted to pay—”
“I’m not taking your money, Mikey,” she said, that hardheaded streak of hers coming out in full force. “No way is my brother risking life and
limb to keep me in nail polish and fashion magazines.”
Michael thought of the thick bricks of cash he’d traded for bullets over the years. Millions. He had millions tucked away in off-shore accounts, and the only person he had to spend it on refused to take it. “You don’t read fashion magazines.”
She laughed; the sound of it so much like their mother’s that it cut him to the bone. “Maybe I do. I’m all grown up now—last time you saw me, I had scabby knees and braces.”
“You were beautiful.”
“And you were so obviously blind,” she said, the laughter dying in her voice. “You’re not coming to my graduation, are you? I’d really hoped you’d be there.”
“I can’t … ” It was an old conversation, one that never changed.
“I know, but I thought maybe … Stupid, huh?” She sounded hurt.
“Frankie—”
“I love them, you know? Aunt Gina and Uncle Tony. I’ll always be grateful for the way they took me in and raised me after mom and dad … ” She let her words trail off, unable to say it, like saying the word died was the same as killing them all over again. “But they aren’t my family—not the way you are. I miss my brother.”
He closed his eyes, picturing his petrified fourteen-year-old self holding baby Frankie when Sophia and Sean, his adoptive parents, first brought her home from the hospital so many years ago. He’d been so angry, so scared. But she just looked at him with complete trust in her dark-blue eyes. And now she was going to college. Jesus.
“I miss you too.”
“So come home.”
He wished things were that simple. Instead of saying what he always said—I can’t—he looked up. “Go to your window,” he said and listened to her comply.
“Okay,” she said.
“Do you see the moon?”
“Yes,” she said.
“So do I,” he said. “I see the same moon. We aren’t so far apart. I’m always with you.”
Her voice was wistful and sad. “I wish that were true.”
So did he. “Good night, Frankie. I love you.”
“I love you too,” she said, and then she was gone.
Forty-Four
Let her go.
That was what Michael’s brain was telling him to do. Just let Sabrina go. It was better this way. Easier. Every time he managed to put some distance between them, he caved. Ended up pulling her closer. Let her sink in just a little bit deeper.
He got out of the car, allowing himself the satisfaction of slamming the door behind him. She didn’t look back, just kept walking, her dog hugging her left flank, watchful of the shadows.
Let her go.
He made sure to lock her car before pocketing her keys. He wasn’t dumb enough to think that keeping her car keys would stop her from following him if she wanted to; he was just hoping her impulsive nature didn’t get the better of her. He dropped the wad of metal into his jacket pocket and headed back to Miss Ettie’s.
She knew what he really was, what he was capable of. But despite her false bravado, he knew the truth: Sabrina had no desire to see him go to work.
That made two of them.
He rounded the corner quietly, giving the exterior of the house a sweeping glance from the shadows, letting his instincts take over. No cartel thugs or sleeper agents lurking in the shadows. All was quiet … which made him very nervous.
He let himself in through the back, pressing his thumb against the small blinking touchpad mounted next to the door. Like he knew it would, the pad read his thumbprint and stopped blinking a few seconds before the auto-locks engaged.
“To tell the truth, I miss my keys.”
Michael turned toward the kitchen table to find Miss Ettie sitting, a cup of tea in front of her. He leaned across the counter to take a look in the Blue Willow bowl she kept on its surface. It was empty.
His shoulders slumped a bit as the weight of one more regret settled in place. “I’m sorry.”
Miss Ettie gave him a smile before raising her cup to her curved mouth. “For what?”
“For this. All of it.” He waved a hand around. “Bio-scanners and bulletproof glass. For not staying away when I should have.”
She lowered her cup, a slight frown multiplying the soft winkles on her face. “Then you’re sorry for the wrong thing, Michael,” she said as she stood, her chair making a faint scraping noise across the hardwood floor. “What you should be apologizing for is staying away as long as you did.”
She traveled the short length of space between the table and the sink with her empty cup before she spoke again. “I heard you leave a while ago and had hoped I wouldn’t see you until morning,” she said, running water into her cup before setting it in the dish drainer.
“Sabrina’s better off without me,” he said, not even bothering to pretend he didn’t know what or who she was talking about.
“Says who? You?” She chuckled softly on her way to her room, the sound telling him what a fool she thought he was. “One thing I know for sure, Michael, is that happiness in this world is a fleeting thing,” she said, reaching out to pat his cheek. “It’s selfish and cruel to deny it. To yourself or to others.” She stood on tiptoes and planted a kiss on his jaw. “Good night,” she whispered against his lowered cheek before continuing down the hall to her room.
He stood there for a moment, trying to digest her words. Trying to deny the sense they made. The Felix the Cat clock above the sink, with its swishing tail and ping-pong ball eyes, let out a single meow. Eleven p.m.—time to go to work.
Michael took himself upstairs, quietly checking on Alex before letting himself into his room. There he shed his track pants and running shoes, trading them for cargo pants and heavy boots before pulling out his case and setting it on the bed. Thirty seconds later there was a soft-knuckled rap against his closed bedroom door, moments before it swung open.
“Going somewhere?” Ben said, watching him slip knives and guns into various compartments and holsters.
“Got a lead on where Reyes might’ve set up shop,” he said, mulling over the merits of a few concussion grenades.
“Am I invited?”
Deciding against the grenades, he tossed them back into the case before shutting the lid to look up at his partner. “Nope.”
Ben sighed, shouldering himself off the frame to stand up straight. “Maybe you should wait. I got a couple of local guys I trust—I can send them in to gather some intel before you go all Lone Ranger.” Ben knew better than to try and push his way in. The kid was a lot of things, but stupid wasn’t one of them.
Michael smirked in spite of himself but shook his head. “As soon as it gets back to your father that the body Sabrina found isn’t Leo Maddox, he’s going to yank my ass back to Spain. Waiting isn’t an option.”
Ben shook his head. “At least let me send a couple of—”
“What’s going on between Sabrina and Phillip Song?” The question came out of nowhere, etching a frown onto Ben’s face. But as much as he wanted to take it back, Michael wanted answers more.
Ben shrugged, seemed a little reluctant to answer. “I don’t know. She goes and sees him at his restaurant every couple of weeks—usually late, after everyone’s gone to bed. She hangs out for an hour or so and she comes home,” he said. “Why? Is that where the two of you went tonight?”
He nodded. “He gave her something before we left—a red silk pouch. Asked her how she’d been sleeping.” Called her sweetheart.
“Like shit,” Ben muttered, seemingly unaware that his knowing that revealed just how close he’d become to Sabrina over the past year. “Wait, is he where you got your intel? I hate to say it, but I’m not sure Song has your best interests at heart. Now I really think you should wait.”
Michael reopened the case and pulled out a pair of binocs before he stooped to shove it back under the bed.
“Like I said—not an option.”
“Nothing.”
Michael looked up. Ben was watching him carefully, shoulder leaned against the mantle. “Nothing what?”
“That’s the answer to the question you’re kicking around that thick skull of yours. Nothing.” Ben quirked his mouth into a smile that looked almost wistful. “Nothing is going on between Sabrina and me. She’s my friend—just like you’re my friend. I don’t have many.”
Michael didn’t know what to say, so he didn’t say anything, just kept heading for the door. He stopped in front of his partner, slapping the field glasses into his open palm. “Keep an eye on her. If she leaves, text me.”
Forty-Five
The warehouse was exactly were Phillip Song said it would be, crammed into to the middle of an industrial park on Bayshore, just south of Loomis. Michael drove past the deserted-looking building before circling back and parking a few blocks away. The place may have looked abandoned, but he knew a front when he saw one. Discreet security cameras, wire mesh embedded in high-set windows, a single door set off the street and partially hidden by a Dumpster, what looked like a bay door big enough for a box truck around back.
With its lack of entry points and hidden security cameras, a stealth approach was going to be nearly impossible. Good thing he came prepared.
Without the soft rumble of the car engine, Michael could hear the distant thump of music coming from the nightclub across the street, the line to get in wrapped around the building. It made him think of the night he’d spent with Pia Cordova. What he’d done to her father. What he’d done to her.
He could still see her standing at the top of the stairs, open blouse clutched against her exposed breasts, staring down at him with a mixture of fear and confusion that quickly bled into something else …
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