by Marie Force
“Please,” she whispered, her throat raw from being sick, “please let me out of here, Nick.”
“Only if I go with you.”
“Can you do that?”
“Give me a few minutes to figure it out with Brant, but you’re not going to face this by yourself. No fucking way, Samantha.”
Under normal circumstances, Sam might object to him telling her what she was and wasn’t going to do, but she wanted him with her right now too badly to object.
She nodded in agreement. “Will you... Angela and Tracy...”
“I’ll get them, baby.” He kissed her forehead. “Whatever you need. You just tell me, and I’ll get it for you.”
Sam reached for him and he drew her up from her chair and into his fierce embrace. “After everything he put me through, why do I feel so shattered?”
“Because you’re a compassionate person, and at one time you loved the guy. As much as you wanted him to go away and leave you alone, you’d never have wanted this for him.”
“No. Never.” She shuddered imagining what he’d endured and immediately felt sick again.
Nick anticipated that and had the bucket ready when a second wave of vomiting hit her, leaving her feeling weak and shaky. He kept his arm around her and whispered soft words of comfort.
Sam allowed herself to lean on him as she absorbed this latest blow. Her emotions were all over the place—sadness and anger and grief mixed in with a tiny bit of relief that she’d never have to deal with him again. Of course, that made her feel even worse after hearing how he’d died.
“Let me get your sisters,” Nick said after waiting for her to catch her breath. “I’ll be right back.” He took the trash can with him. Sam hoped she wouldn’t need it again while he was gone.
Sitting alone in the brightly lit conference room, Sam forced herself to breathe through the nausea that burned her throat. She wiped her mouth and discovered her cheeks were wet with tears. She had to get it together so she could help her team figure out what’d happened to Peter and who was threatening her family. They also had a floater to identify. There were things to be done, and focusing on them would keep her from totally losing it.
Angela came rushing in, wearing pajamas, her hair standing on end and her eyes red from exhaustion. Tracy was right behind her.
“What’s wrong?” Angela asked. “Nick said something happened to Peter.”
Tracy took the seat on the other side of Sam.
“He was found dead in his apartment.”
“Oh my God,” Angela whispered.
“They said...” Sam took a deep breath. “They said he’d been tortured.”
Tracy gasped. “Oh no. Oh, Sam.”
“After everything he put me through, I should probably be glad he’s dead, but I can’t... Not like this...”
“Of course you wouldn’t want that,” Tracy said.
“What if...”
“What, honey?” Angela asked.
“What if they tortured him because of me?”
“Is that what the FBI thinks?” Tracy asked.
“They didn’t say that, but what if that’s why he was killed?”
“Take it one step at a time, Sam,” Tracy said, stroking Sam’s hair. “Anyone who went after him would know you haven’t had anything to do with him in ages. Who knows what else he was into lately? It could’ve been for a hundred different reasons.”
Sam clung to Tracy’s reassurances, but she had a sick feeling that his homicide would lead directly back to her. And if it did, how would she live with that information?
CHAPTER NINE
IT TOOK AN HOUR to make arrangements, but Nick was able to get the two of them out of the bunker to go to HQ, where Lindsey would perform Peter’s autopsy. For some reason, Sam needed to see him with her own eyes before she could begin to believe he was actually dead.
Double the usual number of SUVs that escorted Nick on a regular day surrounded the vehicle they were riding in. In addition to the extra cars, the agents were armed with automatic weapons Sam wasn’t able to identify on sight, and she couldn’t make herself care enough to figure out what they were.
Peter was dead. He’d been tortured. If she kept telling herself that over and over, maybe she would begin to believe it had actually happened. And why, after the hell he’d put her through for years now, did she continue to feel so devastated by the news of his agonizing death?
She should be dancing in the streets, celebrating the fact that he was dead and out of her life forever. But celebrating was the last thing on her mind.
Nick took hold of her hand and trapped it between both of his. That’s when she realized how cold her hands were. She tucked the other one in between his too.
“You’re freezing, babe. You want me to ask them to turn down the AC?”
Sam shook her head. After days of craving her freedom, she couldn’t be bothered to take in the sights aboveground. Her entire focus was on not getting sick again as they made their way to HQ.
“What’re you thinking?”
“I... My mind is all over the place. I want to believe this has nothing to do with me or us, but the timing, in light of the threat, is...curious. I want to feel nothing that he’s gone, but I...”
“It’s okay, Samantha.” He brought her hands to his lips. “Of course you feel devastated that someone you once loved died this way. Right now, today, it doesn’t matter that he wasn’t necessarily a good person. Today isn’t the day to think about how he disappointed you or attacked us.”
She leaned her head on his shoulder. “Thank you for understanding.”
“I do understand, and you don’t need to worry about upsetting me by being upset that this happened to him.”
It was such a relief that he got it. He always got it. “How’d I get so lucky to land such a great guy?”
“We’re both lucky.”
Yes, we are, she thought. I’ll go to work, and I’ll deal with this horrible thing that happened to Peter, and when I’m done, I’ll go home to Nick, and he’ll make it all right.
They rode the rest of the way to HQ in silence, each drawing strength from the other to get through whatever awaited them at the other end of this journey.
As they approached HQ, the first thing Sam saw was the satellite trucks from every major local and national TV network lining the street outside the building.
“Holy shit,” Sam whispered. “I’ve never seen that before. Not even after the inauguration.”
“Brant, what’re our options here?” Nick asked.
“We’re going to try the morgue entrance,” the agent replied, sounding tense.
Upon spotting the motorcade, the reporters ran toward the black SUVs, pounding on windows and metal and anything they could reach.
“Jesus,” Nick muttered.
“What is this?” Sam asked. “Is it because we’ve been in hiding?”
“That’d be my guess,” Nick said.
“So the word is out that we were threatened?” Sam had never felt so cut off from the world in her entire life.
“A statement was released yesterday after the White House was pounded with questions about where we are and why no one had seen us in days,” Nick said.
“Then that’s why they’re all here. Wait until they hear my ex-husband was tortured to death on top of the threat. It’ll be a full-on feeding frenzy.”
“This isn’t already a full-on feeding frenzy?”
“Watch it get worse.” Sam’s nerves, already shredded over Peter, reached the red zone at the thought of being relentlessly pursued by reporters. They were second only to receptionists on her list of most-disliked people.
On second approach, the motorcade entered the parking lot through the rear entrance. The detail had Sam and Nick out of the car and
inside so quickly the reporters couldn’t get near them. They dashed through thick humidity into the cool air inside.
Chief Farnsworth, Captain Malone, Freddie, Gonzo, Jeannie and Lindsey were standing in the hallway, apparently waiting for them.
Jeannie burst into tears when she saw Sam and stepped forward to hug her. “We’ve been so worried,” Jeannie said.
“We’re okay,” Sam assured her while meeting the steely, concerned gaze of her chief over Jeannie’s shoulder.
With the double-sized Secret Service detail pushing in behind them, the hallway quickly became overcrowded.
“Give us some room,” Nick said to the agents, who did as he asked. With their charges safely delivered, half of them went back outside, leaving only his usual detail behind.
“I know we have work to do, but I need to ask how my son is doing,” Gonzo said.
“He’s great,” Sam said with a sympathetic smile. “He’s been a trouper. All the kids have been. I hope we can get him home to you soon.”
“Me too or Christina is going to need to be checked into a loony bin.”
“Lieutenant,” Farnsworth said, “you’ve been briefed on the Gibson homicide?”
“Yes, sir.”
“My condolences.”
Sam felt stranger than she ever had in her life accepting condolences on behalf of Peter, but she knew the chief’s sympathy was with her, not the ex-husband who’d given them all so much grief. “Thank you, sir. I’d like to see him.”
“Sam,” Lindsey said, her kind eyes brimming with empathy. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
“I’m fairly certain it’s not,” Sam said, “but I’d still like to see him.” She watched as the others exchanged uneasy glances. “Please.”
Lindsey nodded. “Sure, come on in.”
Sam tightened her grip on Nick’s hand and followed Lindsey into the morgue. At this point in her career, she ought to be used to the antiseptic smells, the gruesome scenery and the soul-crushing sadness that came from working one homicide case after another. But nothing in her life or career could’ve prepared her for the sight of her ex-husband’s battered face, mangled hands or tortured body.
Sam let out a gasp and felt her knees turn to water underneath her.
Nick grabbed her and pulled her in tight against him, his arms solid bands around her, holding her up when her own legs failed her. “Jesus Christ,” he whispered when he got a good look at Peter’s injuries.
The last thing Sam ever wanted to do was lose her composure at work, but there was no holding back the tsunami of emotion that overtook her when she saw the magnitude of what’d been done to him. No one, not even Peter, deserved to die this way.
Nick turned her face into his chest and held her tight.
After taking a minute to pull herself together, Sam said, “I’d like to be briefed on the investigation, please.”
“Sam,” Gonzo said, “we’ve got this. You don’t need to—”
“I want to know what’s going on.” She wiped the tears from her cheeks and pulled back from Nick. “Has his mother been notified?”
“Not yet,” Farnsworth said. “We were waiting to ask you how best to proceed with notifying his family.”
“I’ll take care of that.”
“Sam,” Nick said, “it doesn’t have to be you.”
“Who should it be?” she asked.
“Anyone but you.”
“At least she knows me. It’ll be easier to hear it from me than someone she doesn’t know.” Sam gratefully accepted a tissue from Lindsey and wiped her face as she desperately tried to regain her famous mojo. “I need to get out of here. Let’s go to the pit.” To Lindsey, she said, “You’ll let me know as soon as you have anything?”
“Of course,” Lindsey said, squeezing Sam’s arm. “If there’s anything I can do...”
“Thank you.”
Nick kept his arm around Sam as they left the morgue, her colleagues and the Secret Service following closely behind them. Her entire body felt cold, and her legs were still trembling from the shock of seeing Peter’s abused body. That image would stay with her forever.
“Do you need a minute, babe?” he asked quietly.
She shook her head. “I’m okay. Just don’t let go.”
He squeezed her shoulder. “No plans to ever do that.”
With hindsight, maybe it was a good thing they’d been threatened, that Nick had been forced to come home and they’d been together when she got the news about Peter. She wouldn’t want to have to face something like this with Nick on the other side of the world.
She went past her office and right into her squad’s conference room, taking note of the board where they’d started detailing the investigation thus far into the floater. Under the Ruby Denton heading, she saw the words RULED OUT. “So it wasn’t her?” Sam asked when Gonzo and Freddie joined her in the room.
“No,” Gonzo said. “Ruby’s dental records weren’t a match.”
“Then who was it?” Sam asked.
“We’re still trying to figure that out,” Freddie said. “We’re following up on a couple of missing persons who meet the age range Lindsey gave us. We’re having their dental records sent in, and Lindsey is checking them against our Jane Doe.”
That, Sam knew, would be a laborious and tedious process, not to mention the strain on families looking for a missing loved one. “Was Lindsey able to determine a cause of death?”
Freddie shook his head. “The body was too badly decomposed to get anything conclusive, but she did think it was possible there were ligature marks on the neck area.”
“Lindsey expects to know later today if any of the other missing persons is a match for our Jane Doe,” Gonzo added.
“Good work, everyone,” Sam said. “Now, about Peter...”
“We’re taking the lead on that investigation,” Avery Hill said when he joined them in the conference room.
“Like hell you are,” Sam said. “He was found in the District. You don’t have jurisdiction.”
“He’s connected to you, so he’s part of our ongoing investigation into the threat,” Avery said.
“You continue to investigate the threat,” Sam said. “We’ll investigate Peter’s murder.”
When Avery started to object, Farnsworth said, “You heard the lieutenant, Agent Hill. We’re the lead on Gibson, and of course we’ll keep you informed if anything we find intersects with your investigation.”
“And I’m supposed to just say okay to that because y’all have been so cooperative in the past?”
Under normal circumstances Sam would’ve laughed at the nasty retort delivered in Avery’s honeyed Southern accent. Today, nothing was funny.
“Moving on,” Farnsworth said, ignoring Hill, “what’ve we got so far on Gibson?”
Sam loved the way her chief shut down the pesky FBI agent without addressing his concerns. Who had time for a turf war when her ex-husband had been tortured?
“Crime Scene is processing his apartment,” Gonzo said. “We did a canvass of the building, and none of the neighbors we talked to reported hearing anything out of the ordinary.”
“That’s because he was gagged,” Lindsey said when she joined them. “We found duct-tape residue on his mouth and face. The neighbors never heard his screams.”
Sam was going to be sick again. “Excuse me,” she managed to say on her way out of the room. She rushed to the ladies’ room and into a stall, gagging on the bile that surged from her gut. Duct tape. They’d put duct tape over his mouth so the neighbors wouldn’t hear him scream. Dry heaves mixed with sobs. Then Nick was there, his hands on her shoulders, offering what comfort he could along with a handkerchief.
Sam was reminded of the first time he’d offered her his monogrammed handkerchief, th
e night they first met. Burying her face in the soft linen, she breathed in the clean, familiar scent of her husband.
“You’re going to be angry with me,” he said softly, “but I don’t think you should bury yourself in the details of this one, babe.”
Sam hated to admit he was right. “I still want to be involved. I can’t sit on the sidelines.”
“I know.” His lips brushed against her hair, and he reached around her to flush the toilet before helping her up.
“The vice president probably shouldn’t get caught in a ladies’ room.”
“I’m not the vice president right now. I’m Sam Holland’s husband.”
She broke down again, moved by his tender support. “I wanted to kill him myself a few times in the last couple of years,” she said between sobs. “So why does what happened to him make me so damned sad?”
“Because he might’ve been a controlling, violent asshole, but he didn’t deserve this. No one does.” As he spoke, he ran his hand over her hair in a soothing caress.
“I don’t cry at work. That’s not my thing.”
“They’ll understand, babe. How could they not? For better or mostly worse, they know you were once married to the guy.”
Sam took a deep breath, determined to get herself together and participate in the investigation to the best of her ability. “Definitely for worse. I need to focus on that and keep my emotions out of it.”
“Good luck with that. I despised the guy, and I feel heartbroken over what was done to him.”
It was, Sam thought, the exact perfect thing for him to say. “I love you.”
He cradled her face in his hands. “I love you too. And whatever you need, I’ve got it.”
“What I probably need most right now is a breath mint.”
Nick’s gorgeous hazel eyes lit up with amusement. “Nah.” He brushed his lips over hers before gathering her up in a tight hug.
She clung to him, breathing him in and absorbing his love and support. “I’m ready to go back out there. Are you able to stay for a while?”
“My schedule is clear because I’m supposed to be in the bunker, so I’m all yours.”
