Shadows (Black Raven Book 1)

by Barcelona, Stella

“How did he get involved?”

  He studied her, his eyes intent, the faintest trace of a smile at his lips. “I knew you’d want to know more. This is what we know now. As soon as your father perfected Shadow and LID technology, as soon as he claimed that the NSA would be implementing it, which, by the way, no one with the government has ever confirmed, Zachary Young and Jennifer Root went behind his back and auctioned the technology to the highest bidder.”

  The two people who her father had trusted over anyone else. She shook her head. “No. I don’t believe it.”

  He arched an eyebrow. “Data is unmistakable. The lawyer and his partner were the impetus. We have phone calls, text messages, and locales for meetings. There were several potential bidders. Trask had inside intelligence and knew exactly what he was buying, because he had inside help.”

  “Inside? Meaning inside BY Laboratories?”

  “No,” Sebastian said, with a frown. “Inside the government.”

  Her heart pounded. “Who?”

  He hesitated.

  “Who?”

  “To get to your father and Spring, I had to make a deal with the man that his name would be left out of this. I’m trusting you would have done the same thing and won’t break my word. Can I count on your silence?”

  She nodded.

  “The same person who your father trusted to get you to the Oval Office. Robert McCollum knew exactly how vital the technology was and he knew exactly what Trask should be bidding for it. He was well aware of the power it would give Trask. But you didn’t hear that from me. As a matter of fact, you will never hear that fact again, and, even though I know you’d probably like nothing better than to see him rode out of Washington on rail, you can’t repeat it. There will be no public airing of the evidence of the senator’s involvement.”

  She drew a deep breath, holding her right hand, palm flat, below her neck, while her thumb touched her right clavicle, her index finger thumping at the left clavicle. His gaze fell on the gesture, then rose, seemingly reluctantly, to her face. “Thank you.”

  He shrugged. “Not the first time I’ve had to agree to a distasteful compromise to do a job the right way. Senator McCollum will screw up one too many times, and fail. That’s what ultimately happens to men who abuse power. Trust me. I’ll be waiting for it and applauding when it happens. In the meantime, I’ll enjoy watching him worry about whether I really am going to keep my end of the bargain.” The deep undercurrents in his eyes, coupled with his words, chilled her.

  “Jennifer?” she asked. “Did you find her?”

  He nodded, with a slight frown and, for a moment, a look of concern for her flashed through his eyes. “Dead.”

  “She caused so much harm. To the people who trusted her the most. I can’t wrap my brain around this. I can’t switch so fast from caring about her and treating her like family, to knowing she’d trade a family that loved her for money.” Skye rubbed her upper arms with both hands, feeling chilled and hot, at the same time as her mind reeled with the reality of what Jen had set in motion. “I don’t know how to feel right now.”

  For a moment she thought he’d close the few feet between them, but instead he shoved his hands into the pockets of his jacket. “I vote for ecstatic. In the long run, your father was correct not to trust her,” Sebastian said. “Brilliant move on his part, and it saved you and your sister. Jen was working with the monster, until he decided that he had enough leverage on your father with Spring. Trask recorded everything. The fucking bitch tried to trap your father into revealing your location to Trask. Trask killed her in a manner that I am sure your father will never, not for one day of the rest of his life, get out of his mind.”

  “How?” she whispered.

  “He claimed she was you. In the heat of the moment, with her head covered, your father couldn’t know the lie,” he frowned, “he threatened to do the same to Spring. From what we can tell from the tapes, your father thinks you’re dead.”

  There was a long pause. The look in his eyes said that he had more details, but her stomach immediately twisted into a knot, as though she’d eaten something rotten, when she hadn’t actually eaten in hours. No, she hadn’t eaten anything substantial in days. She didn’t want to know more details. He was silent for a second, eyes on her, as she stood there, shocked.

  He moved a step closer, and suddenly looked like the man she’d been with for the last two days. There was concern in his eyes, compassion, and an understanding that she was barely holding herself together. He suddenly seemed more human than the machine telling her of death and backstabbing. The moment disappeared with a knock at the door.

  “Come in,” he said, with a shrug and a headshake, physically transforming himself back to the cold, aloof man who was keeping himself an arm’s distance away from her.

  One of his agents pushed the door all the way open, then stepped closer, and whispered something to Sebastian.

  “Two minutes,” he answered, “I’ll meet you at the ER drive.”

  Well, now she knew how long he was staying. “Thank you,” she said, “for bringing my sister and my father back to me.”

  “No need to thank me. I was only doing my job.”

  Only a job.

  That was it. The words resonated, filling the room with a meaning that was unmistakable. It explained his aloofness. Everything that she’d been through with him—everything—was only a job to him. Now, he was doing what anyone who had finished a job did. He had already mentally moved on to something else, which meant he had moved on from her.

  She’d been a job. That was it. The thought had an immediate, physical impact on her. Deep inside, where her heart was, there was a slow burn. It came with a disappointment that she hadn’t allowed herself to experience in years. It stole her breath, scorching through her flesh, leaving a raw hurt, the depth of which took her by complete surprise. She’d given one hell of a lot of tough girl talk.

  Once with me won’t count.

  Hah. He hadn’t fallen for it, but she sure had fallen for him. She’d fallen for her own line, and now she realized just how stupid she’d been. Once with him, no, she reminded herself, thinking about being with him on the plane, twice, and she was going to have to work hard at getting over him.

  He was giving her no indication that he was going to have the same problem.

  Don’t think about it, she told herself. Do not think about it. “Did Trask manage to make sense of my father’s backup?”

  He gave her a slow headshake and a slight frown. “We’re searching now and doing diagnostics on all servers and computers. It’s a slow process. There were casualties. Identifying bodies and dealing with authorities takes precedence. Plus, there was a fire at the site. That’s making the technical diagnostics more difficult. It’s going to take some time.

  “Your father will receive medical care here until he’s stable. When it’s safe for him to travel, he’ll be returned to the custody of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Marshals are already here. You and Spring are under the continuing protection of Black Raven. The Senior Agent in charge of your detail is Agent Katherine Scott. She’ll be checking in with you this morning and over the next few days will work out the parameters.” He paused, as she started to feel queasy. He was saying goodbye, without uttering the word. Wrong. He’d said goodbye some time ago. She just hadn’t realized it. “You’ll have my agents with you at all times. If you need anything, just ask them.”

  Them.

  Not him.

  Message received.

  He stood within touching distance, yet seemed a million miles away, more machine than the man with whom she’d spent the last two days. Rather than stepping closer, he left, without so much as a look of pain, or regret, or any damn thing to acknowledge that they had shared anything, much less something special.

  Loneliness cloaked her, suffocating her. He shut the door, and when it clicked shut, the harshness rattled her. She drew a deep breath. The twisting ball of pain that was now her stomach travelled up
. She ran to the bathroom, fell to her knees at the toilet, overwhelmed with the need to puke. There was nothing but water to vomit, but that didn’t stop the gut-wrenching heaves that wracked her body. When they subsided, she sat down, hard, cross-legged, and held her face in her hands.

  Seconds became minutes. He had warned her. To avoid relationships, he’d gone to prostitutes for the last ten years, for God’s sake. All to avoid a break-up, which he had labeled, ‘an extrication’. He may have been colossally bad with good byes, but he had just delivered the most effective one she’d ever received.

  The door opened. Sebastian? Her foolish heart leapt.

  “Oh, honey.”

  Her hopes crashed as she looked into the kind, worried eyes of one of her sister’s nurses. “Your father is about to be taken into recovery, and your sister is fine. Too much stress, and I bet you haven’t eaten since you got here, have you? Come on, let me help you up. There’s a girl.”

  Numb, Skye allowed the nurse to help her out of the bathroom and to a nearby chair. “Sit here for a moment and take deep breaths. Everything’s okay now. It really is.”

  “I’m fine,” she whispered, shaking off the very edge of the misery that had enveloped her, as the nurse stood beside the chair to take her pulse. If she said she was going to be fine enough, she’d start to believe it. Once she believed it, she’d feel it. She touched her hand to her cheek, only then realizing that tears were free falling.

  “Just fine.”

  ***

  11:00 a.m., Friday

  “Can we eat pizza for lunch?” Spring’s question interrupted her thoughts.

  “Of course,” Skye smiled at her sister, as she shook off the heavy mood that came with remembering Sebastian walking out of the room two days earlier. The only thing that had made his absence palatable was that she was with her father and Spring. He’d saved them, and when she focused on that, she was better.

  The cataclysm scenario was over, and the three of them were safe.

  Spring’s residual physical injuries amounted to minor scratches and bruises from her struggles against her captors. She remembered some of what had happened in the helicopter and when she had first arrived at Trask Enterprises. For the first twenty-four hours of their stay at the hospital, Spring had drifted in and out of a sedative-induced sleep. Skye had alternated between watching her sister sleep, and watching their father, in the adjoining room, sleep. Spring was going to be fine. Her father was going to recuperate.

  The evening before, he’d been conscious long enough to realize that Skye and Spring were both with him, alive, and he was no longer Trask’s captive. His relief had been profound. The reunion of the three of them had helped lift the veil of inexplicable misery that had fallen over her with Sebastian’s departure.

  Over.

  Their lives could return to Barrows-style normal.

  Now, Spring had anti-anxiety meds prescribed as needed. So far, the morning had been good. She hadn’t needed anything, thanks to Black Raven. The supplies that had been collected for Spring while they were at Last Resort had arrived earlier that morning, along with the clothes that they had there. As Spring finished breakfast, an orderly had come into the room, a puzzled expression on his face as he wheeled in a long, rectangular table. “I was told to set this up near the windows.”

  Spring had already organized five pounds of jellybeans into clear glass bowls. Using a new sketchpad, she was drawing a cake. She held up the sketchpad, and Skye nodded, but barely focused on the drawing of a three-layer cake. “That’s pretty, honey.”

  “You think so? I’m thinking maybe we should have four layers of cupcakes instead of a cake. I just haven’t decided what to make to celebrate, when we all get home.”

  All.

  Skye hadn’t told Spring that their father wouldn’t be leaving with them. When he left, he’d be returning to federal prison to serve the remainder of his term. Skye didn’t feel the need to tell her sister that. Not yet.

  She gave her sister a soft smile. “We can have whatever you want. And if it’s cupcakes, we can find someone nice to give the extras to.”

  “And I’ve got to do something Sebastian will like, too, because he’s going to be there, right? Do you think he’ll visit us today? I really, really can’t wait to see him again.”

  “Maybe,” Skye said, turning away from her sister as her smile faltered. It was the second time that day Spring had asked about Sebastian. Every time one of the Black Raven agents, with their broad chests and logo’d shirts, were visible to Spring, she asked them about Sebastian. Dear God, she had to figure out a way to make her sister forget him.

  That might be easy, once she figured out how to do it herself.

  “Tell me what flavor the cupcakes will be.”

  Instantly diverted, Spring flipped the page and started over, from the beginning. The wintery weather event was over, replaced with clear blue skies and crisp weather. Skye had raised the blinds in both rooms as high as she could and opened one of the louvered windows in Spring’s room. Light was streaming into the windows of both rooms. She had pulled her chair next to Spring’s table, close to the open window so that she could feel the fresh, cool air.

  The nightmare was over, she reminded herself. While Spring was focused on drawing, she stood, walked into the hallway, walked the few steps to her father’s room, and, when the marshal who stood guard at his doorway moved aside, she peeked in. She was wearing socks, jeans, along with a t-shirt and sweatshirt that she’d gotten in the hospital gift shop. Her soft, silent footsteps made no noise, but somehow, her father sensed her standing by his bed. He opened his eyes and lifted his hand to her, before falling back asleep with a soft smile on his face. Color was returning to his face. So far, he’d been too drowsy, even when awake, to talk about anything that had happened. All that had mattered to him was that she and Spring were together. That they were fine.

  She walked back into Spring’s room, resumed her position in the chair, pulling her feet up, and resting her arms on her knees, as she watched Spring draw what would be one of many, many cupcakes for the elaborate celebratory cupcake-cake she was planning. “That’s beautiful, honey.”

  Over. The nightmare was over.

  She’d had almost forty-eight, no, she glanced at her watch, saw that it was a little past eleven, and she corrected herself. She’d had more like fifty-one hours to process the reality that whatever she and Sebastian had shared when she’d been on the run with him had fizzled into nothingness, the minute his attention was directed elsewhere.

  Silly girl, she chastised herself, reminding herself of the life lesson that had been rammed down her throat when her mother died, years before Sebastian had ever walked into Creative Confections.

  People leave.

  It’s what they did. If not physically, emotionally.

  Her remedy for the lesson?

  Toughen up.

  Don’t get close. If they didn’t leave on their own accord, she’d be happy to lead them to the door with a smile. If she had no expectations, she couldn’t be hurt.

  Sebastian had saved them. Wasn’t that enough? Yes. It was. But seeing how easily he’d become distant hurt her, deep inside, in a place she’d long ago closed off. He’d opened doors that she had kept under lock and key. Or maybe she had opened the doors to him. It didn’t matter who had opened that place where hurt lived. She had to close it.

  For a second, she tried to tell herself that Sebastian was no different than any man she’d ever come across, but the thought was so preposterous that she almost laughed out loud. She’d have to do better than that, because actually, he was very different. Unique. She’d never fallen so hard before. Hard and fast.

  Shake it off, she told herself. Don’t be stupid. She’d known the moment that she had laid eyes on him that he was unavailable, and he hadn’t done one damn thing to mislead her.

  “Skye?”

  She forced her mental focus to return to her sister. “Yes?”

  “Pizza?�
�

  Skye nodded. “That’s a great idea, honey. I’m starving myself. We can order plenty for the nurses and for the agents who are helping us. What kind should we get?”

  “Pepperoni, mushroom, extra cheese.”

  “Okay. Let me figure out where we’re going to order from,” she said, “and we need to talk about where we’re going when we leave here.” Under the circumstances, she and Spring were going to remain at the hospital, until her father was discharged to the custody of the marshals. How many days that would take was an open question for the moment, but she still needed a plan.

  “Home.”

  She’d been about ready to stand, but that one, simple word kept her there, seated, her arms around her knees. Exactly where the hell is home, or where should it be? Skye had no clue. All she knew was that home was where she and Spring were, and the fact that she and her sister were together was all due to Sebastian’s tenacity.

  Gratitude.

  That’s what he deserves.

  The job was over, and he had moved on, but he deserved a big thank you, as he took whatever road he chose that led away from her. She placed her arms on the armrests and stood, as someone gave a powerful knock on the door. The medical staff usually gave a soft courtesy knock before walking in, without a signal from either her or Spring. The agents, however, waited for her signal.

  “Come in,” she said.

  The door opened fast. A four-legged, caramel-brown blob ran into the room, her pink leash trailing on the floor. Candy leapt the last several feet through the air, landing on Spring’s lap. Sebastian stepped into the room, his broad frame filling the doorway, his blue-eyes resting upon her, Spring, and back to her. Fifty-one hours had passed since she’d last seen him. It now felt like only a minute.

  “Sorry,” he said, though there was an underlying laugh in his voice that suggested he was anything but. He walked into the room, shrugged off a black cashmere overcoat, and laid it on Spring’s bed. He wore a charcoal gray business suit with a tie that had a palette of blues and gray. His dress shirt was crisp and white. With a full-dimpled, beautiful smile that matched the light in his eyes, he was so cover-model handsome he stole her breath away. Any progress she’d made on getting over the hope that something existed between them immediately evaporated. “I didn’t think she’d attack.”