Conspiracy (Alex and Cassidy Book 4)

by Nancy Ann Healy

  “I know. I do too, but not for my sake.”

  “Alex?”

  “At least, Cassidy believes that man in there loves her. I’m not sure Alexis will ever believe that about Nicolaus. And, that is really his fault. He pushed her so far away for so long. If he only knew how much she wanted him to pull her closer. How much she needed that. They don’t think. They do what they were taught…try to control a situation.”

  “Is that what this is? What he did? Jim…He was always affectionate with Cassidy. I can’t believe he would put her through what he did only to come back and…It’s beyond forgiveness,” Rose said. Helen smiled. “Why are you smiling?”

  “Cassidy told me she could forgive him for herself. She wasn’t sure she could ever forgive him for hurting you.”

  Rose closed her eyes and shook her head. “I don’t know where she gets that from. She…”

  “I do. She gets it from you,” Helen said. “Don’t try to feel anything,” she advised Rose. “Just feel it. He deserves whatever he gets, and that is your choice to give,” Helen said. She opened her door. “Edmond and I will be in the bedroom. We have some things we need to discuss.”

  “Helen?” Rose stopped her friend.

  “Would you? Forgive him?”

  “I don’t know,” Helen answered honestly. “I just know I would still love him.”

  ***

  “I can’t get her,” Hawk said. “Wherever they are, she must not have a signal.”

  “What about Brady? Fallon? Fallon can go there. She’ll listen to him.”

  “Claire,” Hawk tried to calm Claire. Claire was so agitated, Hawk felt she had to comply. She still did not know what exactly had convinced Claire that Dylan was in danger. Hawk did know that Claire was adamant she talk to Alex. Alex was out of the loop at the moment. She was about to try and pump Claire for more information. The expression of utter desperation on Claire’s face stopped her and she sighed. “I’ll try,” she promised.

  Claire nodded her thanks.

  ***

  “Fallon, come on! Let’s go. Leave it. We need to go—now,” Brady ordered. Fallon grabbed a piece of paper and started writing something down. “Christ, Fallon! We need to go.”

  Fallon grabbed the paper and nodded. “I can’t believe we never saw it. We need to get to Alex. If Brackett or…”

  “We don’t even know if it means anything,” Brady said.

  “Yeah, neither does anyone else who might have seen it,” Fallon said.

  “She’s kept them safe this long, Fallon. I pity the person who goes after one of her kids.”

  “I’d prefer not to test that theory.”

  “Well, then move it. The faster we get out of here, the sooner we find Alex,” Brady reminded Fallon.

  Fallon followed Brady swiftly toward the door and stopped suddenly. “Do you hear that?”

  “What?” Brady asked. “Don’t get spooked. Come on.”

  “Listen!” Fallon demanded. Brady fell silent and tried to tune into whatever Fallon was hearing. “What is that?” Fallon asked. He looked back at the lab.

  Brady’s eyes widened. He watched as the computer screen they had just been studying went suddenly black. “Run! Now!”

  ***

  “You’re sure?” Ambassador Paul Daniels asked the man standing before him.

  “I am. The General was clear. They are vulnerable.”

  Daniels nodded. “Fine. I will get this to The Admiral. You’re sure that the objective was not met?”

  “No, I can only tell you what the records referenced. It’s there.”

  “And the records?” Daniels asked.

  “They were moved as you requested weeks ago. Those are the hard copies of Petrov’s files.”

  Eleana whispered in Krause’s ear. “What would Anton Petrov have to do with MyoGen? He’s ASA’s guru?”

  Krause shook his head, intent on listening to the conversation a few feet away.

  “And, O’Brien’s?” Daniels inquired.

  “Only what you have here. Unless Petrov kept logs somewhere else.”

  “Understood,” Daniels said. “The General is expecting your report.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Don’t call me sir,” Daniels demanded. “Your flight leaves in an hour to Boston. Don’t miss it.”

  Krause felt the tension in his forehead like a vice grip. He watched as Daniels retrieved a phone from his pocket.

  “Jonathan, we need whatever that officer gave him,” Eleana whispered.

  “I know. Not yet,” Krause replied. He wanted to keep listening. Krause had no idea if what Paul Daniels held in his hand would be of any use at all. The conversations the ambassador was engaging in might turn out to be the best information Krause would get. He would bide his time.

  Eleana felt her hip vibrate. She pulled out her phone. “What the hell?” she lowered her voice so that even Krause could barely hear her. “Claire?” she asked. Krause looked back at her. “Are you okay? What?”

  Eleana tapped Krause and pointed back to the van they had been behind moments earlier. He nodded his understanding and mouthed the words “be careful” to her. Eleana smiled reassuringly. Krause watched her move quickly to their previous location and pulled his focus back to Daniels. “What the hell are you up to, Paul?”

  ***

  Helen glanced back and smiled as a show of support to Rose before she disappeared from sight. Rose held her breath and waited. It seemed to her is if hours had passed, but she was certain it had only been seconds before he appeared. She watched him walk into the room and stop a few feet in front of her.

  “Rose,” James McCollum spoke her name as if he were worshiping it.

  Rose’s expression was unreadable as she closed the distance between them. She stopped less than an arm’s length away and looked directly into his eyes. Without warning, her hand flew to his face, smacking him so intensely that his jaw moved.

  “You son-of-a-bitch,” she said venomously.

  McCollum did not reply. He turned back to fully face her and was stunned when he felt her fingertips tenderly brush across the red splotch on his cheek. She seemed to be studying the outline of his face as her hand traced it. It was as if she were trying to convince herself that he was real, that he was truly the man that she had once loved. It was James McCollum’s turn to hold his breath and wait.

  “Do you know how much I missed you?” she whispered. “All those years. Every year. Every time Cassie did something. When Dylan came and then Mackenzie. When I watched her standing there with Alex, so in love. You were supposed to be there,” she said without giving him the courtesy of looking into his eyes.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “Why are you here now?” she asked him.

  “There are a lot of reasons,” he said, surprised that her question had not been directed to why he had left.

  “Tell me,” she directed him. “I deserve that much.”

  “The truth?” he asked.

  “Even if I don’t believe it,” she replied.

  McCollum swallowed hard. “I’ve thought about that a lot today. I told myself it was for Cassie, for Dylan. That it was to keep them safe, to protect them,” he told her.

  Rose finally looked into his eyes. His hand cupped her cheek and she closed her eyes. Twenty-five years had not changed the familiarity of his touch. Standing before him, anger rolling through her veins like thunder, confusion clouding her thoughts, the only clarity at all was in his touch. Once she had fallen in love with James McCollum, she had accepted that she would never love again—not like she had with the man before her. He had made her laugh. He had allowed her to cry. He had challenged her ideas and inspired her to think for herself. He listened to her as if she were the most interesting person he had ever known. And, he had given her the greatest gift of her life—Cassidy.

  “Maybe it was,” he said. “To keep them safe. She’s an amazing woman now. A woman,” he shook his head slightly. “With all your fire and comp
assion,” he said.

  “And your eyes,” Rose whispered emotionally.

  “I missed you,” he admitted. “All these years, hearing stories, seeing photos, watching your lives from a distance. Maybe it was more for me than it was for any of you,” he confessed.

  “I don’t…”

  “You don’t have to say anything,” he said. “I don’t expect you to forgive me, and I don’t expect you to…”

  “Love you?” she guessed. McCollum looked at her, his heart plummeting and then beating wildly. “I don’t know you,” Rose said honestly. “I don’t know if I ever did. My Jim would never have left me. He would never have devastated his daughter knowingly. He would have protected her from that pain.”

  “I….”

  “I can’t promise you anything,” she said honestly. “Only that I have always loved the man I married. It didn’t change when he drank himself into a stupor and pushed me away. It didn’t end when I mourned an empty casket,” she said. “And, it never faded in all these years. There was only one person for me in this life. I married him and I mourned him long ago.”

  McCollum nodded. “If I could…”

  “Don’t say it. I could scream. Most of me wants to, but I won’t. I can’t. That’s not what Cassie needs from me.”

  “She would understand,” he said.

  Rose smiled earnestly. “Yes, she would. She forgets I am her mother sometimes, now that she is one. It’s not her job to protect me. It’s mine to keep her safe, any way I can, from anything I can.”

  “She’s lucky to have you.”

  Rose shook her head. “You see? That is where you and my Jim differ. He would have understood,” she said. “It’s always been me who was lucky to have her.” Rose smiled sadly at the man before her and went in search of Helen.

  McCollum stood frozen in place. “You’re right,” he whispered. “He always loved you too.”

  ***

  “I don’t know, Claire. Tate doesn’t know where Brady and Fallon are” Hawk said. “Can’t you just tell me?”

  “Give me your phone.”

  “Why?” Hawk asked.

  “Hawk, please?” Claire asked urgently. Charlie handed Claire her cell phone and sighed. “Eleana? It’s me. No…I’m okay. We can’t get Alex. No one knows where Fallon is. Just listen. I had a dream, but it wasn’t a dream. It was a memory. You know? Like, all of a sudden I can remember all these things. Conversations, places....Things about people. Alex has to know...”

  ***

  “Claire? Wait. Slow down. Slow down.” Eleana said. “Why do you need Alex?”

  “El, remember I told you I kept O’Brien close for a reason?”

  “Claire, I don’t…”

  “Just listen. I remembered something. I don’t know how I never saw it before. It’s like all the pieces were jumbled for so long, you know? Like, I just kept going because nothing made sense anyway. Now it’s….It’s like I can see it. Like a fog lifting or something.”

  Eleana tried to steady her nerves. Claire was rambling and Eleana needed her to focus. “Claire, did you take…”

  “I’m not stoned, El!”

  “Okay, I’m sorry. Slow down and talk to me. What is it you didn’t see?”

  “It wasn’t Cassidy they wanted.”

  “What?”

  “O’Brien, my father…They didn’t put Fisher on Cassidy to find her father, El. At least, I don’t think so anymore. It makes sense.”

  “Claire, what are you talking about?”

  “O’Brien. I heard him talking to Dmitri once. I was half asleep, just tuned it out. He could be such an asshole.”

  “Claire! Focus!”

  “Sorry, I feel like….Anyway, Kargen was dressing him down, you know. He told O’Brien that he failed in his objective. O’Brien said something about it not being his fault. It was Cassidy’s call and it made sense with the directive The Admiral gave him.”

  “What directive?”

  “Congress, I think. The election—all that shit. My father works to place lots of people in office. Anyway, Dmitri said that no directive superseded the objective. O’Brien said there were plenty of assets. They didn’t need him anyway. But then O’Brien said he was useful in unexpected ways.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Dylan, El. He was talking about Dylan.”

  “Claire…”

  “I’m telling you. Then I remembered what he said once. He said he wasn’t the pawn I thought he was. He had what my father really wanted and he had hidden it someplace my father would never think to look.”

  “You think he meant Dylan?”

  “Yeah, I do. I didn’t put it together then. But, if Cassidy was out of the way, and if anyone knew about John…”

  “John Merrow? What about him?”

  “That he’s Dylan’s dad.”

  “What are you talking about?” Eleana asked.

  “You didn’t know? I figured Krause would have told you.”

  “How do you know that?” Eleana challenged Claire.

  “Oh, something he said once. I figured it out. Plus, Dylan looks like him. He’s way too cute to be O’Brien’s. Surprised no one sees it.”

  “Who did you tell?” Eleana asked.

  “No one,” Claire said. “Not my business. Besides, I liked John.”

  “Jesus, Claire. It’s a stretch. I’m not sure that Alex is…”

  “Listen, I’m telling you it makes sense. My father? Even if I’m wrong about O’Brien, my father will see it the way I do.”

  “Even if you are right, why would they all of a sudden move on it?”

  Claire groaned “El! All of a sudden? Not all of a sudden. Now? Think about who is back. The mastermind himself, my father’s ghost?”

  “Your father doesn’t know McCollum is back,” Eleana reminded her.

  “Grow up, El. I love you but open your eyes. My father knows. I guarantee you he knows. He probably knew before you and me that McCollum was on his way back.”

  “Okay. You think he wants McCollum.”

  “Bonus round. If he thinks Dylan knows something, who better to uncover it?” Claire posed her question.

  “Shit. Okay, I’ll call you back.”

  “Eleana! Did you hear me?”

  “I heard you! Just sit tight. I promise I will call you back.”

  ***

  “Well, he seems sure,” Daniels said.

  “I will confirm it,” Admiral Brackett said.

  “You really think the boy knows something?” Daniels asked doubtfully.

  “It’s possible. That was, after all, O’Brien’s objective.”

  “Yes, but that objective failed according to what I have.”

  Admiral Brackett laughed. “Viktor wanted Lynx, Paul. You know that as well as I do. He would have done anything to flush him out. And, he is hell bent on objectives. Meet them at any cost. He did not appreciate the deviation. Dylan should have been with your boys in school, Paul. That was not a negotiable item for Viktor. A great deal was invested in O’Brien, and not just money. You think Viktor Ivanov wanted to hear O’Brien’s excuse that Cassidy made that decision?” Brackett laughed. “He told Viktor that her decision to keep the boy in public schooling was best for his congressional career. Congress was not his objective. It was my directive. Viktor does not like to lose, and never to me,” Brackett gloated.

  “Perhaps, but his role was beneficial for Ivanov as well. So, why take risks over a missed objective? Pride?”

  “Partly, yes. In Viktor’s mind the boy is his—his right.”

  “And, you? What’s your interest? To take from Viktor? To what end?” Daniels asked.

  “O’Brien was not known for his caution. He was known for his boastfulness and his bumbling,” Brackett said.

  “I agree, but Christopher O’Brien was not a fool either, Bill. He played the game more expertly than most give him credit for. You know that as well as I do. No one suspected he was a seed. No one.”

  “Not n
o one,” Brackett replied firmly.

  “John Merrow’s thin suspicions are hardly cause for action now. He’s been dead a while.”

  “Death is a funny thing sometimes.”

  “You think Merrow is alive?”

  “No,” Brackett scoffed with a chuckle. “He’s as dead as it gets. But, he took precautions.”

  “You don’t think he knew about Lynx?”

  “Of course, he knew. Or rather, my old friend told him. But, I suspect that only came after he told Nicolaus the truth. ”

  “The truth?” Daniels wondered.

  “That Dylan O’Brien was his son.”

  “What are you talking about? Did O’Brien know that Dylan was Merrow’s kid?” Daniels asked.

  “No.”

  “But, Merrow told you?” Daniels asked skeptically.

  “Of course not. I have other sources.”

  “The General,” Daniels guessed.

  “Of course. She tells him everything. How do you think I knew to look for Lynx?”

  “And, the boy?”

  “Oh, Paul, come now. We both know that people hear things they do not remember. Whether or not the boy was exposed to SEED is not the point. That certainly could have advantages, and that is why we wanted O’Brien to gain control. Alexis threw a wrench in that plan,” he muttered. Brackett chuckled. “Nicolaus was always throwing up roadblocks. Fool. Seems it runs in the family. If O’Brien had what he claimed, if he had actually managed to secure that information, that list—it is possible the boy knows something.”

  “That’s a stretch,” Daniels observed. “It’s a big risk for a long shot.”

  “Not really,” Brackett told him. “They are vulnerable. Lynx is there—in the open. Alexis will be reluctant to carry with the boy there. She’s softened. Worst case scenario, we secure Lynx and the boy. Best case scenario? We discover something we didn’t expect to find. Either way, we can eliminate the obstacles.”

  “You want to kill Alex?” Daniels asked.

  “Do you see another option?”

  Daniels sighed. “What about Cassidy? What about…”

  “War has its casualties, Paul.”

  “And, Claire? If what he says is true, she could compromise you.”

  “Ancient history. No one trusts Claire. I don’t even trust Claire. She’s no threat to us. Never has been a threat to anyone but herself.”