Renegade

by Susan Sheehey

  Her eyes widened. This man knew Reed? Or at least had clearly spoken to Jace. To make sure they captured everything they needed. Only Jace knew about that paper, aside from Reed himself. She went to the kitchen and pulled out the paper from the bottom of a junk drawer. “I tried to keep it safe.”

  He thanked her again without a smile and handed it to another collector, who put it on top of the last box, closing the lid.

  “Last thing.” He reached inside his suit pocket and pulled out a legal-sized envelope and handed it to her. “A reimbursement for your personal resources in assisting in this case, as well as the reward money for Emilio Cortez.”

  “Reward?” She glanced at the check. And nearly swallowed her tongue.

  “Have a nice day.” He turned and left, climbing into the lead sedan. All drove off in a dramatic procession.

  Back inside, Lynée stared at the piece of paper, the words and numbers blurring together. The space felt so empty. So lonely. This was her home, the place she was the happiest, aside from the library, but she couldn’t contain the grief consuming her insides.

  He didn’t even bother to come back himself. To gather the evidence they had worked so hard to decipher, had poured over together side-by-side. Had risked both their lives over. Because he didn’t love her. Because he didn’t want to lift her hopes that they had a chance together. There was no chance. He was only here for the case. She was just a fun time in the sack, an entertaining side-job.

  That kiss outside her house was a goodbye kiss.

  Somehow, this was worse than Todd leaving her. With him, it was just bruised pride. This time she actually had a piece of her soul missing.

  With two hands on the paper, she nearly ripped the check in half. She stopped herself and let out an audible sigh. Lord, how she wanted to. She didn’t want his money. She wanted him. That didn’t seem to work into his plans.

  “Keep it, Lynnie. The church could use this.” She glanced down through blurry vision. Sure, maybe something good could come out of a broken heart.

  Jace had timed this operation at precisely the same moment as the Cabello raid. He and five other DEA agents merged from various doors on the sixth floor of DEA Headquarters in Springfield, Virginia. They didn’t want to alert anyone to the upcoming arrest and give the target a chance to escape.

  Three days before, he’d raced from Lynée’s house straight to the airport to take the first flight back to his office in Detroit. He even left his beloved bike sitting in a garage at SeaTac. There was far too much for him to track down based on the newest evidence. He hadn’t even had the time to call Lynée and tell her what was going on.

  Or he should say he hadn’t made the time. He was far too angry to make that call.

  Several people poked their heads over the cubicle walls, watching the intimidating group march down the final hallway. The other agents stayed just outside the last office door and let Jace enter on his own, as planned.

  Phil sat at his expansive desk, looking at his computer screen. From his shitty shave job and dark circles under his eyes, he clearly hadn’t slept much. Several opened cans of diet soda sat off to the side. The tall window behind him displayed a decent view of the dark gray Potomac River snaking by the building.

  Jace tightened his grip on the file in his hand and knocked on the open door.

  His mentor looked over and grinned. Then he instantly lost his smile the second he saw Jace’s scowl. “Jace? What’s wrong?” He stood but didn’t move around the desk.

  “You set me up.”

  “What happened?” The blindsided look Phil gave looked genuine.

  He’d never realized how great of an actor his mentor really was. Jace took one step forward. “You let them send me out there to cover up your dirty work. So you could keep your cushy little perch here at your desk. To pin your dirty shit on another agent. What’s worse, you led that assassin right to me. You betrayed me.”

  For a split second, recognition dawned in Phil’s eyes. In half a blink, he switched from figuring out how Jace found out to figuring out how he could save himself. He recovered quickly. Had anyone else approached him with this accusation, he probably would’ve succeeded at convincing them. “I have no idea what happened out there or what you heard. But son, listen to me. I would never—”

  “I’m not your son.” He slammed the file on the desk. “I’m not your slugger anymore, either.”

  The facade slipped a little, a small line of sweat appearing at his balding hairline. He grabbed the file and looked at the first page.

  A copy of Joe Padilla’s report.

  “Does that look familiar?” Jace asked. “You’re the only other person who ever saw it. You are on a very short list of people who have the access to make an official report disappear from the system. You made sure any file that could potentially reveal your alias was removed. The same fucking nickname you used with me in Little League. You sick son of a bitch.”

  His face paled. “This is not what you think it was.”

  “That report only got me started. It didn’t take me long to connect all the off-shore accounts the cartel sent payments to over the last fifteen years…your accounts.”

  “That has to be a mistake, Jace. I would never—”

  “I should’ve known.” He moved another step, to corner him behind the desk. “When you bought that boat. And that luxury Mercedes for your wife. Was my college tuition paid for by Cabello payoffs too, Phil? Do you remember the look on my mother’s face when you gave me that check? The relief…her tears of grief that my father wasn’t there to see it.”

  Phil tossed the file back on his desk, his expression turning dismissive with a tinge of anger behind it. Damn, he must’ve practiced this moment. “Back off, Ivy. All the intel you have is wrong. These are planted. To throw us off the scent of the real mole.”

  He shook his head, forcing himself to control his breathing. It was the only way he could get out of this room without strangling this bastard to death. “Then you actually had the audacity to ask where I’d hidden Monroe. Only hours after we released the picture of the cartel assassin, Emilio Cortez. Cabello called you, didn’t he? Threatening you to find Monroe. I was too blind to see it. To even consider the possibility. But it was you. You are responsible for the death of two seasoned agents, and framing a third.”

  His gaze turned cold. “Two?”

  Gotcha. “Joe Padilla.” He stepped closer. They were only a foot apart.

  Phil didn’t step back. Just lifted his chin. Daring Jace to punch it.

  “And my father.” Jace growled the last few words.

  Finally, the actor broke. Into a cold, calculating man he barely recognized. “You have no idea what we faced. Other agents caught, tortured to death, and their families threatened. I didn’t have a choice. I chose to save your life.”

  “You chose to save your own.”

  “They were going to kill my wife, and you and your mother. If I didn’t start helping them. They knew where you lived. They had your picture, Jace. You were only eleven years old.”

  “So, you gave up my father—your own fucking partner—to save your ass.” He closed the distance, and Phil actually stepped back. “Fifteen years later, you give me up. Cabello threatens you because the DEA is getting too close to him again, and you hand Padilla and Monroe over on a platter. Only Monroe escaped. Pissing off the cartel more. You scramble to save your ass and use me to find him for you.”

  Jace lunged forward, grabbed Phil’s shoulders, and threw him against the window. His mentor fought back, trying to shake him off. But the man was out of shape and not nearly as full of rage as Jace. He yanked the man’s arms behind him, keeping his face pinned against the glass. After the handcuffs were secure and Jace removed Phil’s service pistol from the holster at his hip, he leaned forward and muttered in the man’s ear. “And you were going to let them kill me.”

  “You were the one who put Monroe in hiding,” he groaned. “You should have just brought him in. You l
eft me no choice. They were going to kill me if I didn’t turn you over. I had to give them someone.”

  “Yeah. Anyone but you.” He yanked Phil off the window and shoved him hard into the arms of the waiting agents who entered at the sound of a struggle. Two of them seized Phil’s computer and the files on his desk.

  They made the man stand there as they ripped through his entire office. What Phil didn’t know was a whole other team was ransacking his home right then.

  “Don’t do this, Jace. I helped you make something of your life. After your father died, I stepped in. I took care of you and your mother. I gave you your college degree. I made you a DEA agent. You owe your whole damn life to me.”

  His knuckles whitened, the urge to knock this guy out so damn strong. “You took my life from me when you murdered my father. Fuck you, Phil.”

  The agents holding him moved him toward the door, pulling him backward by the cuffs.

  “No, wait!” the old man yelled.

  They stopped.

  The bastard’s face changed again, this time to a defeated, desperate plea. Almost like he was about to cry. “You might as well just kill me now. Cabello will find a way to get to me in prison.”

  “You have no idea how tempted I am to do that.” His voice shook with rage. He decided not to let his former mentor know the Cabello compound was being raided. The man deserved to sweat in terror for a while.

  Finally, Phil was dragged from the room.

  Jace watched the steel waters of the Potomac swirl by the window. Not nearly as turbulent as the storm raging inside him. The flight from Seattle had been full of this frenzy, a rampage against those he’d trusted.

  Lynée had been included in that mental rampage. An irrational feeling, since none of this was her fault. But she’d been the one to uncover the connection to his surrogate father. To the one who’d looked after him and pulled him off the troubled path in his youth. If she hadn’t found that file, Phil would still be his mentor. His life not upturned, his career not over, and his reputation not forever tarnished.

  “You can’t trust anyone,” he muttered. As if the river could actually hear him. If Phil fooled him this well for this long, Lynée could fool him just as easily. He was right to keep people at a distance. It was the only way to make sure he’d never be duped again.

  “She’s better off without me.”

  Suddenly, the conversation they shared about power flooded his mind. How real power was in mercy and forgiveness. But at this moment, in this fucked-up situation of betrayal and duplicity, mercy was a weakness. Mercy was something scumbags like Cabello and Phil used to exploit to their own advantage. To use their boot heels to keep others down, while they were soaking themselves in their forgiveness desperate to regain power. Which was hopeless. How much power did those sorry suckers have when they offered mercy?

  Jace leaned his forehead against the cool glass. When had his face gotten so damn hot? This world was unforgiving. Full of disappointment and desperation. He was doing Lynée a favor by keeping her as far from this twisted reality as possible. She deserved her life full of mercy. Happiness. Innocence.

  That’s how she would always remain in his mind. Innocent. The epitome of what was good in the world. A good that was rare and had to be protected. And free from being tainted. Tainted by his own inability to see mercy as power.

  Two days later

  Skye and Reed sat across from Lynée at the dining room table. Her best friend had cooked an amazing Thanksgiving meal for the three of them, to celebrate their return home. The lovebirds were all cuddly and cozy beside each other, filling each other’s plates with food. They’d spent so much time alone together while in hiding, and Skye had clearly loved it. But she loved being home more, that much was obvious. In her own home, with Reed.

  Lynée might have been tempted to throw up at their displays of affection. But in all honesty, it made her heart crack.

  How much she’d wanted that with Jace…

  Two days before and only a few hours after the Cabello compound was raided and the cartel boss killed, Skye and Reed had been escorted down from the lake cabin back home by a DEA agent, not Jace. Their protective custody was over. The threat was neutralized. Along with an official letter from headquarters, Reed Monroe was no longer a suspect in the murder of his partner, Joe Padilla, and his arrest warrant rescinded. His superiors requested his return to the El Paso office for a final debrief before reinstatement. After Thanksgiving.

  Reed had already promised Skye he would submit his resignation the second he walked in that office.

  “You still haven’t heard from him?” Skye asked her, with a face like an injured kitten.

  Lynée shook her head and finished off her glass of white wine. Her appetite had been next to non-existent since the day Jace had left. But there was no way she was missing this monumental moment with Skye. Her return home. She’d missed her so much.

  “The amount of paperwork he’s buried under right now might take weeks for him to sort through.” Reed refilled her glass without asking. “That kind of operation against the cartel is no small feat. The red tape is insane. Give him some time.”

  She smiled back, a small fake one. His attempts at trying to make her feel better weren’t working. Mainly because she knew better. But that was the kind of guy Reed was. Kind, thoughtful, and hated seeing others in pain. He was perfect for Skye. The flame between them would burn brightly for years to come, she was sure of it.

  “So,” Lynée cleared her throat. “Is Reed Monroe going to return to the diner as a short-order cook? Or do we still need to call you Guy Hancock?”

  The lovebirds shared an adoring look.

  “I think Guy Hancock is gone,” he replied. “But Ralph will have to find a different chef.”

  Skye held his hand on the table cloth. “Reed’s going to open his own cybersecurity consulting firm.”

  Lynée smiled, a real one this time. “Wow. Are you allowed to touch electronics now?”

  He laughed.

  “I’m happy for you. Let me know when you’re ready. I’d love to invest in your startup.”

  “I appreciate that, Lynée. I’m very honored by your faith in me. But I have some money saved I’d like to use.”

  She shrugged, lifted her glass in another toast. “To a new beginning.”

  They raised their own wines and drank to that.

  With the delicious meal over and the dishes cleared, Reed offered to clean up in the kitchen. Giving the two best friends a chance to chat in private in the living room.

  Skye’s house had been cleaned up only a few days after the break-in, and the locks changed. The back door still had a plywood cover over the window but was scheduled to be replaced next week. Skye still insisted on having Thanksgiving dinner at her house. Which Lynée welcomed. Her own house reminded her too much of Jace. Of their amazing love sessions and their hours of research. Everywhere she looked was a reminder of him. She did everything she could to stay out of her own home, going back only to shower and sleep.

  “What’s your next step?” Skye asked, curling up on the sofa. A cozy fire flickered and crackled in the fireplace. A light snowfall fell outside the window behind her head. Winter had arrived in more ways than one.

  She wiped a piece of fuzz off the sofa cushion. Mainly just to keep her hands busy. “When I’m not at work, I’ve been helping the church with their upcoming children’s Christmas play. Several of the costumes needed repair, and I’m making a new set of wings for Archangel Gabriel, who managed to allow his dog to get a hold of the last pair.”

  “It’s in three weeks?”

  “Ten days.”

  “I’d love to be there. Let me know if you need help.”

  She nodded and stared into the fire.

  “You’ve been wearing more makeup,” her friend announced.

  “Just eyeliner and mascara.”

  Skye’s smile widened. “And you’re wearing the blouse I gave you for your birthday last year. Not
one of those oversized sweaters you love so much.”

  “It’s Thanksgiving. Aren’t we supposed to dress up a little?”

  “Not just today. The day we came home, too. You were in a push-up bra and form-fitting tunic. He really did have an effect on you.”

  Lynée lost her smile. Yeah, he really did. In so many ways.

  “Does this mean you’re willing to consider dating again?”

  “No.” She rubbed her eyebrow, needing the pressure to distract her. To keep her eyes from welling with tears. The very idea of dating other guys right now made her want to crawl under a rock in the woods.

  “What if Jace returned? Would you—”

  “He’s not coming back,” she cut her off. “Please, can we just drop it?”

  Skye bit her lip and set her glass on the coffee table. She scooted closer to her friend on the couch. “Don’t shut yourself off, Lynnie. And don’t give up. You were the one who told me to fight for what I loved.”

  “I did. I fought to bring you home. All that time you were in hiding, I never stopped looking through all Reed’s evidence. So you could come home. Because I love you.”

  “I know you do. And I can never thank you enough for that. Jace said you were incredible, and he’d never seen someone so dedicated and determined. All your timelines and strings and photos connecting everything together…you’re the one who solved this. You’re the one who brought us home.”

  Lynée stared at her friend, stunned. “You talked to him?”

  Skye’s lips parted. “Shit. I’m sorry. I wasn’t supposed to say anything.”

  “What the hell?” Lynée muttered. “When?”

  She gasped. “Lynnie, you cursed.”

  “When did you talk to him, Skye?!”

  She sighed and cast Reed a sideways glance when he entered the living room. “The day before we came back. Told us everything would be over in twenty-four hours, and we needed to be ready to go the next morning.”

  “He called you?” It was impossible to keep her voice down. “Why wouldn’t he call me? He didn’t think I deserved the courtesy of an update? With his evidence all over my house?”