Fearless: Complicated Creatures Part Three

by Lawless, Alexi

  Chris gently took the urn from her. Sam looked down at her dog tags, rubbing her finger over the metal plates, feeling the raised letters that identified her in her youth. Back when she was his.

  Sam lifted them to her lips, pressing a kiss to the memory. Telling him in her heart that she loved him… would always love him, even if it was just in some parallel universe.

  She threw the glinting necklace into the air, letting him go.

  *

  May—Late Afternoon

  Wrigley Field, Chicago, Illinois

  R O X A N N E

  She watched her brother wash down his second hot dog with a cold beer, sun glinting off his sunglasses as he grinned, staring down at the field from the good seats. The Cubs were leading the Dodgers 5-4, with two outs in the ninth. The sun was warm but not too warm, and it was a beautiful day to be winning.

  “Thanks, manita. This might be the best day ever,” he told her, hooking a long arm around her neck. He kissed the top of her baseball cap before he released her. Her smile felt bright and too big for her face under her sunglasses, but she loved it. She felt happy and carefree and light for the first time in ages.

  Nothing to do; nowhere to be.

  Just a day at the ballpark, her and her big brother.

  “Sure you have to go back to Delta Force next week?” Rox asked, nudging him with her shoulder. “We could take in another game. Maybe even go down to Mexico.”

  “Gotta head back,” Alejo replied, taking another sip of beer. “I only have a year left of service. It’ll be done in no time. Then maybe, I don’t know.” He shrugged one shoulder.

  “What?” she asked, nudging him once again. “You finally going to take me up on my offer of early retirement? I’ve got a few mil in the bank. You could go anywhere you want. Do whatever you want.”

  “That ain’t me, manita.” Alejo shrugged. “What would I do sitting on my ass all day? I’d go out of my fucking mind.”

  Rox considered him. “You’ve got something going on. Want to tell me?”

  “Sam offered me a gig,” he admitted after a moment, looking out at the field. “She wants me to come on board at Lennox Chase. Based here. Says I could run a division.”

  Rox grinned. “No shit?”

  He shrugged lightly, like it was nothing. “Maybe I’ll take it.”

  “Don’t be a dumbass, mano—you know you want to.”

  His smile glinted in the sun, there one moment, gone the next. “It’s good pay.”

  She had no doubt. She knew first hand Sam treated her people well.

  “What about you?”

  Rox smirked up at him, leaning back against the seat. “What about me?”

  “You still doing your, ah…” he seemed at a momentary loss. Alejandro didn’t really know how to categorize what she did. Sometimes she didn’t either. But it was always intriguing, she had to admit. Her life was definitely never boring.

  “Don’t worry about me. I’m good.” She patted his leg. “I’m gonna hit the ladies before the line gets ridiculous. You want anything from the vendors?”

  “Nah.” He shook his head. “I’m set.”

  Rox moved through the cheering crowd, buzzing with excitement as they ate glorious ballpark junk food covered in salt, downing froth-topped beer from plastic cups. She smiled when she heard the thick, satisfying crack of a bat meeting the ball. She turned to watch as Pedro Strop slid into home plate.

  “Yes!” She pumped her fist in the air, grinning.

  “I had no idea you enjoyed baseball so much, neshama.”

  She spun, shocked to hear Avi’s deep baritone right behind her. He looked so damn good standing there in jeans and a dark sweater, his chestnut hair tousled from the breeze.

  He took in her Cubs cap, sunglasses, the Arrieta jersey, his hazel eyes bright with amusement.

  “I like this disguise best of all, neshama,” he said to her, smiling. “You look like a young girl, a little sister,” he added, glancing over her shoulder at where she’d left Alejandro.

  He knew. She’d been careful around her brother in Houston. No one used her last name. Not even Sam. And they didn’t look like siblings anymore.

  Rox slid off her sunglasses. “How’d you find me?”

  “Simple.” Avi shrugged. “I wanted to.”

  She cocked her head. “Neither of us got the bounty,” she pointed out, though she’d been more than handsomely compensated by Sam for her part.

  “It was never about the money, neshama,” he chided, his voice lowering as he stepped closer. She caught notes of sandalwood and something spicy. Holy fuck, this man would be her undoing.

  Avi slowly pulled off her baseball cap, giving her time to push back, but she didn’t. She wasn’t wearing any makeup today. And her hair—her real hair—slipped from the confines of the cap in a silky swirl.

  “You’re beautiful, Roxanne de Soto,” he told her, a hitch in his breath as he stared at her, really looking, really seeing her as she was for the first time.

  His fingers trailed down her face, the tender skin, soft and bare under his calloused fingertips. Up close, the scarring was more visible, fine lines, like the cracked Celadon porcelain of the Song Dynasty, forged in fire, the kiln of her past. She let him touch her, with his fingers and his eyes. He didn’t want to hurt her—she could see it in his eyes. Avi just wanted to know her, and she suspected he wanted her to know him.

  How do two people who live a life of secrecy and shrouds stand in front of each other as they are?

  Maybe like this. In a public place, a safe place, intimate strangers in a crowd of people flowing around them, moving like a current.

  “I leave for New York in a few hours,” Avi murmured, a flash of regret crossing his face. “Then back to Israel.”

  “You going to see your daughter?” she asked.

  He laughed softly, cradling her cheek in his palm. “You know everything.”

  Rox pressed a kiss into his palm. “Not everything. Just the important things.” She met his warm gaze. “What do you know?”

  “Not everything. Just the important things,” he mimicked, eyes lit with humor.

  She nodded, stepped back.

  He let her.

  “I never really figured it out. Do you work for Sam or Mossad?” she asked quizzically.

  Avi smiled, pushing his ruffled hair back. God, she loved that move. “Do you work for Sam or yourself?”

  She laughed at that. They were more alike than he probably realized. “We live somewhere in between, don’t we?”

  “I’ll see you again, neshama,” Avi promised, reaching out to run his thumb across her bottom lip.

  “I sure hope so.” Rox nipped the tip, making him laugh before she turned, walking away. A few yards in, she couldn’t resist a glimpse back.

  He was already gone.

  “Slick bastard.” She shook her head, grinning.

  Chapter 34

  May—Afternoon

  The Loop, Chicago

  J A C K

  Like deja vu, Jack found himself staring moodily out the window of Dr. Carmichael’s office in the Loop, watching the “L” train sway its way around downtown.

  “So Samantha asked you to trust her—but do you?” Dr. Carmichael asked from his arm chair.

  “Would it be strange to admit I trust her with my life, but I’m still working on everything else?” Jack asked candidly. “I see how much she loves her family, how well she takes care of her people—but I still don’t feel all-the-way-safe with her, you know?”

  “Probably because you’re not,” Carmichael told him astutely. “None of us are one-hundred-percent safe with the ones we love. We just have to make the best choices we can, put in the effort, and trust others to do the same.”

  He thought about the letter. Jack had to believe she’d come back to him. He couldn’t begin to imagine an alternative.

  “I’ve got another question,” Carmichael said, interrupting his reverie.

  Jack smirked. “Of
course you do.”

  Carmichael leaned back in his chair. “Can she trust you?”

  Jack shot him a dark look. “You know she can.”

  “I do?” Carmichael raised a brow. “Prove it.”

  A retort popped up to his lips but never made it out. How could he prove it?

  “It takes time, Jack. That’s my point.” Carmichael told him. “My prescription for you is to do all the normal things you two never really got to do together for any meaningful amount of time. Get to know each other. Go on dates. Take the afternoon off for no other reason than to just enjoy some time together where no one is trying to kill you or rob you blind.”

  “I don’t think we’d even know where to begin that,” Jack responded with a crooked grin.

  “Start first with just being kind to her,” Carmichael recommended. “Take care of her with the little things. Not everything needs to feel like high drama. That’s unsustainable anyway. It can’t all be kidnappings and shoot-outs all the time.” He smiled ruefully. “If you want to have a healthy relationship with her, then start by having a normal one. Just do the work. Take it day by day.”

  “She has to come back first.”

  “She said she will, Jack.” Carmichael shrugged. “Give her time to figure it out.”

  “What if—” he paused, uncertain. Carmichael waited patiently for him to go on. “What if she can’t forgive herself? For her past, Wes, all of it? She carries this unbelievably heavy burden. I’ve never met anyone so hard on themselves. It’s—exhausting,” he admitted.

  “That also takes time,” Carmichael replied frankly.

  Jack sighed, rubbing his brow.

  “Maybe as the person who loves her, you can begin to show her how.”

  Jack frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “Show her how you see her,” Carmichael suggested. “Maybe if Samantha learns to look at herself from other people’s eyes, she’ll be a little less hard on herself for the flaws she’s magnified. It’s not unusual for us to be our own harshest critics. That said, telling her to do something won’t help fix the problem. She has to see herself differently—from another perspective.”

  An idea sparked. Jack grabbed his jacket and stood. “Doc, I’ve got to cut our time short.”

  Carmichael nodded. “We’ll recoup it next week.”

  “You’re on.”

  Jack called Hannah in the lobby of Dr. Carmichael’s office.

  “Jack, what a nice surprise!” she told him warmly. “Thanks for emailing me that lasagna recipe. Grant will be thrilled.”

  “Anything you need, Hannah. Just ask and it’s yours.” Jack replied. “Listen, I was wondering—did Wes’s photographs ever get auctioned?”

  Hannah sighed. “Sadly, no. We hadn’t made it to that lot yet when the bomb threat happened. It’s such a shame too. I know they would have brought in a pretty penny for the Foundation.”

  “How much are you short?”

  “You mean from what we were projecting?” Hannah clarified.

  “Sure. Ballpark.”

  “Around seven million. We’ll cover it though—it’s just we were hoping to match the final amount to give to the Texas Children’s Hospital and the VA—”

  “How about I buy Wes’s photographs for ten million?” Jack offered.

  “What?!” she cried. “Jack—oh my—that’s just too much,” she stammered, aghast.

  “No, it’s not,” Jack assured her. “I set aside that amount as a bounty for Lightner anyway. Just give me the photos in exchange, and we’ll call it a fair trade.”

  “Jack, honey, I’m not trying to look a gift horse in the mouth, but are you sure?” Hannah asked, half-thrilled, half-trepidatious.

  “Of course, Hannah. Can you ship them to me at The Whitney?”

  “I’ll do you one better: I’ll send them up with Carey when he’s back in a couple days. He needs to handle things up at Lennox Chase while Sam sorts this mess out down here.”

  Jack fingered the palm frond of a nearby office plant. “How is she?” he asked softly.

  Hannah paused. “She’s… she’s as well as can be expected, I suppose. She went down to Austin after she spread Wes’s ashes. He left her the rights to all his photographs in his will. It’s thousands of pictures. The Met and the Getty have already reached out, asking to host exhibitions of his work. TIME is doing a spread of all his most famous war photos. She’s working with his partner, Chris, to get it all sorted into a trust, but I think she just went back to Houston to meet with the board.”

  Jack pinched the bridge of his nose. It didn’t sound like she was coming back to him anytime soon.

  “Tell her I love her?”

  “Of course, I will,” Hannah said kindly. “You’re welcome back here anytime, but I reckon she’ll be coming up to Chicago sooner than you think. In the meantime, I’ll send Carey back up with your ten-million-dollar photos,” she told him, a smile in her voice.

  “Thank you, Hannah. Just send me the account transfer details, and I’ll make sure you get the money. Put the name of the donor under Wes’s name, would you? He saved all our lives that night.”

  Jack could almost see Hannah smile. “Thank you, honey. You’re a good man.”

  “Trying to be,” he answered truthfully. “Oh, and one more thing? Don’t tell Samantha. I’d like it to be a surprise.”

  *

  May—Late Afternoon

  Wyatt Towers, Houston, Texas

  S A M A N T H A

  Samantha stood at the window of her office at Wyatt Petroleum, staring down at the city, lost in thought. Carey came up behind her, pulling her into a strong hug.

  “You mad at me for helping Wes?” he asked, rocking her gently, side-to-side.

  “No,” she answered honestly. “It was the one promise he made to me that he ever followed through on. Perhaps the most important one.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  Sam closed her eyes, leaning back into his strength, feeling the aching hurt in her heart starting to unravel and slide down, like a ribbon. Carey had shared the recording of Mack’s confession a couple days after Wes died, along with all the research that he and Wes had done together. It had been bitterly painful to learn, especially while she was still heart-torn and raw from his death. That Mack hadn’t kept his word and told her what had really happened, proved the man he was. He’d hoped Wes had taken the truth to the grave with him, and that kind of cowardice sealed Mack’s fate with her, even if she sort of understood it. Hell, she might have killed her long-lost Uncle Toma herself, but it hadn’t been Mack’s justice to serve. In some very real ways, his heart might have been in the right place, but it was obvious as the week went by and Mack remained quiet, that he had no intention of honoring her or her family’s memory with the truth.

  “What would Dad have done, Bear?” she asked, holding Carey’s arms around her waist, glad for the comfort.

  “Drawn and quartered him,” he answered honestly. “He’d have put the hurt on him so bad, McDevitts for generations would have felt the effects of the blow back.”

  She smiled at that bit of truth. Her father had been a bit of an unforgiving bastard. “And what would Ry do, if he were here?”

  Carey squeezed her gently before turning her around. He looked at her with his blue eyes—so like his mother’s. “Ry would have forgiven him. He would have let bygones be bygones, but he would never trust him again.”

  Sam nodded. She hugged Carey long and hard, grateful for the love he’d given her over the years, for his unending patience and loyalty, no matter what she asked, no matter what she needed.

  “Have I told you you’re the best brother and best friend a girl could ever ask for?”

  Carey smiled down at her. “That mean you gonna finally let me win at poker?”

  “Oh, hell no.” Sam shook her head, laughing. “You’ve got to earn that.”

  “How can I earn it if you won’t give me a hint what my tell is?”

  Sam rolled her e
yes, pushing him back before she went to her desk, touching the intercom. “Marv—get Mack in here. Tell him I’ve got a question about the production quantities on one of our rigs. Then I want you to call up our corporate attorney and have him listen to the conversation along with you. Got it?”

  “You got it,” Marvin’s disembodied voice returned. She’d have to give him a big damn promotion soon. He’d be doing two jobs before he knew it.

  “You want me to stay?” Carey asked.

  “You can bear witness,” she told him, taking a seat behind her desk. “That or make sure I don’t strangle him with my belt.”

  Carey eyed her. “God help that bastard, ’cause no one else will.”

  Marvin knocked once before escorting Mack in. He gave her a sympathetic smile as he strode toward her, his silver-black hair glinting in the bright sunlight filtering in from her windows.

  “How’ve you been, Sammy girl?” he asked her.

  She held up her hand in acknowledgment before offering him a seat across from her. “Pardon me for not standing, Mack. My back’s been killing me,” she lied, preferring he not get close to her.

  His expression turned immediately trite. “Course it is. How’re you healing?”

  “As well as can be expected,” she replied, playing it off.

  “So you wanted to talk production quotas?” Mack asked, glancing uncertainly at Carey as he sat down opposite him in the other guest chair. Carey could give a shit about oil and everyone knew it, but his posture was so relaxed, his presence came off harmless enough.

  “I have something else in mind to discuss, Mack.”

  “Sure thing,” he said with an amiable shrug. “What is it?”

  Sam looked him in the eye. “When I had you out to the ranch a couple months back and asked you to tell me if my daddy had any enemies who’d have wanted him dead, did you think about coming clean then?” she asked, her voice soft but her meaning razor fine.

  Mack tensed. He glanced at Carey, who remained still and calm, though his expression had hardened into the don’t-fucking-think-about-it face he’d honed in the SEALs.

  “What are you getting at, Sammy?” he asked carefully, shifting in his seat.

  “I asked you a question point-blank, Mack. What I decide to do with you will be largely dependent on my satisfaction with your answer,” she responded, sitting back and waiting for him to hang himself.