“What?” Annabelle asked, rubbing her eyes and blushing furiously. “We fell asleep, okay?” She insisted. From the puffiness around her eyes, it was clear she was telling the truth, but everyone in the room knew that sleeping wasn’t all the two had been doing.
“Give me a break,” Annabelle muttered. But their eyes didn’t un-widen, and so far, no one had said anything. “It’s my birthday! I’m entitled to a little… sleep.” Annabelle blushed some more and looked from one of them to the other, until she met Cassie’s eyes. Cassie’s expression was incredibly meaningful as she gave a very slight jerk of her head to the right.
“Happy birthday, Miss Drake.”
Annabelle’s gaze flew across the room to the red-haired woman standing beside the fire place. Jack’s grip on her arms tightened.
“Oh, holy fuck…” Annabelle’s voice trailed off, just as the blood drained from her face and the world dropped out from under her feet. Married…
Omigod… How could she have forgotten that Jack was married?
Married…
She stared at Sherry Thane as if the woman were wearing a black holocaust cloak and carrying a scythe. And maybe sprouting gazelle horns and muttering dark incantations in Homer Simpson’s voice.
“They always say ‘doh’…”
“Sh-Sherry…” Annabelle found herself stumbling over her speech. But, strangely enough, as she stood there watching the incredibly built woman, she noticed that Sherry was smiling. And it wasn’t a cruel, “I caught you red-handed” smile. It was friendly. Sympathetic, even.
Was Annabelle dreaming? Maybe she’d already fainted.
“Miss Drake, please. Sit down. It’s high time you learned what’s going on here.”
“Wh-what?” Annabelle muttered some more. Jack’s grip on her arms hadn’t let up. And now she felt his breath across her ear as he spoke to her softly.
“Bella, sit down. We do need to talk.”
In the corner, Sam smiled away, clearly enjoying the exchange he’d been so looking forward to observing.
“I’m ashamed of you, Jackie. This is uncalled for.” Beatrice was glaring at Jack, her arms crossed over her chest where she sat beside Clara, who was looking from her father to Annabelle to Sherry, an air of distinct discomfort about her. This situation was a little too personal – and a little too adult for her tastes.
“Really, Thane.” Sherry came forward from where she was standing, and shook her head reprimandingly. “You’ve behaved unforgivably,” she said softly.
Annabelle’s eyes widened further as she watched the Homer holocaust demon come closer. What had she just said? Had she just called her own husband by his last name?
But Jack didn’t say anything and, when Sherry gently took Annabelle’s arm out of his grip, he grudgingly let go.
No. Don’t let her get me…
“Come on, sweetie. Let’s go talk.”
But Annabelle couldn’t move. Her new riding boots were glued to the floor beneath her.
She just managed to shake her head when Beatrice stood up and walked over to them as well, taking Annabelle’s other arm. Annabelle glanced over her shoulder at Jack. His expression was helpless.
At last, she found her feet moving and the four of them left the room together to walk down the hall toward another of the mansion’s many renovated rooms. All she could think about was the way Sherry’s hand felt on her arm. It was strong. The woman was a brute. She was going to rip Annabelle’s head completely off of her shoulders.
And Jack was just following along, not doing anything to protect her!
Some birthday.
When they’d shut the door behind them, Sherry and Beatrice let go of Annabelle and Sherry moved away from her to take a seat on the bed. Beatrice leaned up against the dresser by the wall, once more crossing her arms over her chest and glaring at Jack, who, for his part, remained standing beside Annabelle.
As if he was afraid she would run at any second.
Which she just might.
“Annabelle, relax,” Sherry sighed from where she sat on the bed, crossing one leg over the other. “Jesus, Thane, you could have at least given her a drink or something. Soften the blow a little.”
“I didn’t know you were going to be here this afternoon, Sherry,” Jack replied, grinding the words out through clenched teeth. “Would have softened the bloody blow a little had you warned me of that fact.”
Sherry shrugged. “Sam said to come along. Besides, I wondered whether you were all right when you didn’t show up at the condo. The Colonel’s men get to you?” She asked, nodding toward his waist and leg.
Annabelle’s brow furrowed as she followed the exchange. How did Sherry know Jack had been shot? And in the side and leg? She must have been talking to Sam. Of course, he would tell her that her husband had been hurt.
“I don’t know,” Jack sighed, running a hand through his hair. Annabelle turned a surprised expression on him. Despite everything, he was being calm about this situation? But he ignored her look and continued. “Maybe Osborne’s direct hires. Whoever they were, though, they were able to find us when they shouldn’t have been.”
“You’re being tracked somehow,” Sherry nodded sagely.
“Yes, but I can’t bloody figure out how.”
“Oh my God.” Annabelle finally spoke. The words just came out. Because, in that moment, she realized that Sherry knew what was going on. She knew everything that was going on. How was that possible? And, wasn’t she supposed to be in Rome or something?
Everyone in the room stopped talking and looked at her.
Sherry’s gaze shot to Jack, as did Beatrice’s. Jack sighed and walked around Annabelle so that she was facing him.
“Bella, it’s time you knew the truth,” he began. “Sherry isn’t my wife because we love each other. She’s a hired gun.” He paused a moment, allowing the information to sink in. Annabelle’s gaze flitted to Sherry, who smiled, and then back to Jack.
He went on. “Maria was in the Business as well,” he told her, referring to the woman he’d been married to before Sherry. “They’re covers,” he said softly, cupping her face in his hands. “Nothing more.”
Annabelle stared up at him for a long time.
Too long.
Jack swallowed, his blue eyes pleading. “Bella, I didn’t tell you because-”
“Let me go, Jack.” Annabelle spoke the words very, very softly. Jack almost shivered. But he slowly removed his hands and let them fall to his sides. And then Annabelle turned around, opened the door, and quietly left the room.
Jack put his face in his hands.
“Sucks to be you, Thane,” Sherry said as she stood from the bed and moved up alongside him. “But I’ll tell you this much. The longer you let it go, the worse it’ll get.” Then she brushed past him and left the room after Annabelle.
When they were alone, Jack put his hands down and turned to his ex-wife. “What do I do, Bee?”
Beatrice’s expression softened, going from angry to sympathetic in the space of seconds. She stood and made her way to her ex-husband, taking his hands in hers. “You go to her, Jack. You make her understand, tha’ even if what you did was wrong, you did it all for the right reasons.” She stared up at him for several long moments.
He pulled her into a hug and placed a kiss on her head. “Thank you,” he whispered, and then let her go.
She smiled warmly and gave his hands one last squeeze. “’S all ri’, Jack.” She let him go and moved around him, turning the door knob and cracking it open. But before she stepped out, she turned to him one last time. “And, for God’s sake, Jack, don’t lie to her any longer.”
When Jack left the room a few minutes later, it was to find that the group had split up, each going their own way. It gave him only a moment’s pause to find that Clara and Dylan were together in the entertainment room, which had once been the servant’s quarters. It had since been outfitted with a large flat-screen TV and one of his men had obviously dropped off a Wi
i during their stay there. The two teenagers were battling it out with boat loads of zombies in dark forests in the Wii version of Resident Evil IV. Jack watched them for a moment and then sighed. As long as they were busy being unnecessarily grisly and violent instead of having sex on the couch, he was letting it slide.
He moved on, coming to the kitchen. Sam was popping open the fridge as Jack walked in.
“Wanna beer?” the Texan asked, without even looking up.
“No, thanks.” Jack leaned up against the counter. Sam knew he didn’t drink, but he still always offered. “Where’s Sherry?”
“Took off. Had a job to do. Says you owe her a drink, by the way. She hated scaring the bejeesus out of Annabelle.” Sam turned around, a grin on his handsome face. “She says you made her out to be the ogre.”
Jack blew out a long sigh and ran his hand through his thick hair. It was definitely becoming a nervous gesture.
“Where’s Annabelle?”
“She went into that room the two of you were occupying earlier.” Sam screwed the top off of a distinctly dark beer and took a swig. “How’d she take the news?”
“You have to ask?”
“Nah,” Sam shook his head once, his smile broadening. “Not really. Just wanna hear you say it.”
“You’re a right bastard, Sam,” Jack told him, shaking his head. “I don’t know if she’ll ever forgive me for this one.”
Sam whistled. “Sure hope she does, ‘cuz it’s the lesser of your particular evils, my friend.”
Jack shot him a look and then gazed back at the floor. Sam was right. Jack was so screwed. But he didn’t have a whole lot of time to contemplate his level of screwdness, since it was at that time that gunfire erupted and glass imploded all around them.
On instinct, Jack and Sam immediately hit the deck. But then Jack was up and running, hunched over, toward the entertainment room in the next instant. It was with little surprise but a whole hell of a lot of relief that he saw Clara had already hit the floor as well, taking her would-be boy friend with her. She spared him a glance as he ran by, but wisely didn’t move.
Jack didn’t stop either. He ducked beneath more shards of splintering wood and flying glass as the gunfire continued.
Finally, he made it to the room where Annabelle had gone and he slammed through the door and hit the floor, rolling over to look around. Annabelle wasn’t in the room.
“Jack!”
Jack turned his head to the right to find Annabelle beneath the bed, clutching something protectively to her chest. All around them, the explosions continued. The air was filled with dust and particles and floating feathers from the mattresses and pillows.
“Bella, take my hand!”
Annabelle reached her left arm out and took hold of Jack’s hand, allowing him to slide her across the floor toward him. As he did so, something heavy and round shot through the window and landed on the ground beside them, bouncing once and then rolling to a stop.
They both turned to look at it. Annabelle’s eyes locked on the small green form. Recognition registered even as horror immobilized her.
But her hand was still in Jack’s, and he used the connection to yank her to him, pulling her to her feet and against him in the next swift action.
He took Annabelle out the door with him once more, diving for the leather couches that graced the adjoining study. He’d just managed to get himself and Annabelle behind the nearest one when the grenade went off and the room they’d been in a split second before burst outward like an over-inflated vacuum.
Annabelle screamed as her ears popped painfully and the world around her bellowed in agony. The noise of the blast was tremendous. It wasn’t like anything you hear in the movies. It was deeper, more like a thumping, in-your-bones feeling than a sound. It shook the very earth.
A few seconds after the blast, Jack shoved himself away from her and took a second to look her over. When he saw no major injuries on her, and no embedded shards of shrapnel, he pulled both of his weapons from the shoulder holster he wore and got his booted feet under him once more.
“How the fucking, bloody hell do they keep finding us?” He hissed under his breath, to no one in particular.
From his vantage point, he could just see into the walkway leading into the kitchen. Sam was on his haunches as well, and had also drawn his gun.
“That was a warning, Thane!” Came a voice from outside. Through the ringing numbness in their ears, it sounded as if the man were yelling through a cone of cotton, but his words were still clear. Omigod, is that actually Sean Bean out there? Annabelle thought, ludicrously. It sounded even more like the actor than Jack did. And that was a warning? She didn’t recognize the source of the voice, not knowing any men with that particular accent other than Jack.
But Jack swung around to face the direction the voice came from, and his eyes had gone wide.
Annabelle watched him. His expression had changed from pissed and frustrated to surprised and apprehensive. He recognized the voice?
“Give us Brandt and the vial and we’ll let everyone else live, Jack,” the voice continued, taking on a more personal tone, “including Clara and Annabelle!”
Whoever the guy was, he knew his stuff. He had enough information under his belt to be able to hit Jack where it really hurt. He’d called the girls by their first names and also somehow knew that Jack, Clara, and Annabelle were still alive, inside the house.
“Oh, fuck me,” Jack muttered, under his breath, and shot a glance at Sam. Sam shook his head, once. He wore the same pale, uneasy expression.
Jack closed his eyes for a moment, rubbing the grit out of them. Then he opened them again and re-focused on Sam. They exchanged a meaningful look and Sam nodded.
Jack turned back to Annabelle. He knelt and put his lips beside her ear to be sure she would hear him. “Bella, we’re heading underground again. Get on your hands and knees and slide them across the floor to keep from getting cut. Don’t lift them, understand?”
Annabelle nodded.
“Move in front of me and follow Sam.”
Again, she nodded and got on her hands and knees. She was still clutching something in her right hand, but Jack couldn’t tell what it was.
“We’re counting to ten, Jack!” There was a pause from outside and then the voice added, in cruel jest, “Maybe!”
Ahead of them, Sam had made it to the doorway of the entertainment room, where he signaled to Clara. Clara nodded and tugged on Dylan’s sleeve, who followed behind her, keeping his body pressed as close to the ground as possible. At one point, however, he lifted his left hand and placed it back down atop a shard of glass.
He inhaled sharply and bit back a curse.
“Slide along the ground, Dylan,” Clara instructed him. “Don’t lift your hands or legs.”
“Got that,” Dylan shot back.
Clara ignored his irritated tone and continued to lead him after Sam.
In a few seconds, the five of them joined up in the hall, protected on both sides from windows and the glass they’d shed. Here, a few shots had made it through the old plaster of the hallway, but it hadn’t sustained as much damage as the rest of the house.
“Where is Cassie?” Annabelle asked, keeping her voice low. Outside, she could hear men shouting to one another and she knew the house was being surrounded. Middlesex was a small town and the mansion was set back into more than thirty acres of un-cultivated land. No one in New York was going to help them right now.
“I’m here,” came the reply. Annabelle looked up toward a door at the end of the hall as Cassie came around the corner, followed by Virginia and Craig, all of them sliding on their hands and knees across the hard wood floor.
At the same time, the door to the hall bathroom popped open and Beatrice came crawling out quickly, moving like a spider across the floor. “Bloody ‘ell, when do you think the next time’ll be that I can use the loo withou’ being nearly blown to bits!”
Annabelle couldn’t believe their fortu
ne that no one had been severely injured in either the gunfire or the grenade blast. What were the chances of that? Was it even possible?
And that’s when it hit her that the men who had shot up the mansion and thrown the grenade had known very well what they were doing. They’d kept from hurting anyone on purpose.
Only the best hit men knew such tactics. These guys were not the amateurs who had botched Max’s suicide. So, who were they?
Just then, there was another blasting sound and Annabelle knew that the door to the back porch had been blown off of its hinges.
“Everyone move back!” Jack waved everyone out of the way, fanning them out in a circle around a space in the floor.
Annabelle muttered under her breath. “Another trap door?” According to Clara and Beatrice, there’d been one in the mansion in Forest Hills as well, and that had been how they’d escaped when Reese blew the house up. Jack had a thing for trap doors. Which was brave, considering he hated dark, damp and enclosed spaces.
Jack didn’t waste time answering her, but he did shoot her an exasperated glance just before Sam handed him a Buck knife and Jack used it to pry the first board up from the floor. Beneath it was indeed the o-ring metal loop to a trap door.
They all helped pull the remaining slats of wood up, and in the space of a few short seconds, the door was uncovered.
At that moment, the back door to the kitchen, which was connected to the back porch, rocked in its frame. Someone was slamming into it from the other side.
Jack jerked the metal loop upward, revealing the dark space below. Annabelle wasted no time in leading the rest of the team down the connected metal ladder into the darkness. She took the rungs quickly, holding on to the sturdy sides even as she still held on to something in her right hand.
“There’s a light switch on the left,” Jack told her as her head disappeared below and Cassie was the next to descend.
Annabelle felt along the dark wall for the switch, found it, and flicked it on. It worked like a charm, lighting up the underground chamber. A connecting tunnel lit up as well, portions buzzing to life one after another.
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