Maximum Memories

by Abby Gordon

  She nodded then rested her cheek on the backpack. Max took her elbow and guided her to the door. Picking up her suitcase, he continued outside to the dark green SUV. With each step, his hand moved up her arm and around the back of her shoulders until she was tucked under his arm.

  “Max?” she whispered as he lifted her to the passenger seat. “What do we do?”

  He closed the door and walked around the front. He waited to answer until he was in the driver’s seat and had the key in the ignition. Emotions he had spent a lifetime running from welled up inside him. He couldn’t run anymore. Sitting next to Ginny, he realized he didn’t want to. Suddenly, all he wanted was to live in her cottage with her and Charlie. Play baseball with his son. Come home and see her face. Fall asleep and wake up with her in his arms.

  That was all he wanted.

  He turned to her and his breath caught in his throat.

  She was huddled, cradling her son’s pack as if it was the only thing that kept her alive. Pain was etched in every line of her face and body. Max vowed that Polaris would pay in blood for every second she and Charlie were separated. One hand went to the back of her neck and the other covered her hands.

  Tear-filled eyes rose to look at him.

  “Guinevere, I swear to you,” he said in a low fervent voice. “I will get our son back,” he vowed. “I swear it.”

  Her dark brown eyes searched his. Ginny nodded. So much had happened so quickly. Her quiet orderly life had been turned upside-down in the blink of an eye and the son she had spent a decade protecting was in the very danger she had sought to avoid. And the only man she’d ever wanted was either the only man she could trust or the only one who could utterly destroy her.

  She would trust him. For Charlie’s sake. And her own.

  Chapter Six

  Before he pulled out of Ginny’s driveway, Max got a call from Frank.

  “Bring her to House Four,” Frank said. “I’ve got a debriefing team standing by.”

  “Roger that,” Max replied.

  Ginny pulled her knees up to her chest and silently wept for the nearly two hour drive. He handed the SUV off to a younger agent when they arrived and guided Ginny inside. But inside, in the mammoth dining room guarded by sharpshooters, he was pulled to the far side of the room away from her. Arms still wrapped around Charlie’s backpack, she let two interrogators guide her to a table.

  Surrounded by operatives, she repeated what had happened several times to different people. Knowing, seeing their opinions of her, she forced herself to stay calm. She ignored their disrespectfulness and patronizing attitudes. In a monotone, she told them what had happened. She ignored their deriding comments when she told them of the weapons she had hidden. What she had used. It was painfully clear that they didn’t believe her. They believed she had been a hindrance to Max in trying to defend her home.

  After the first glance at Max, practically begging him to speak up to defend her, she gave up the effort. Max was being grilled by agents who also frowned, as if not understanding what he was saying.

  Ginny grew more frustrated by the moment. Every time she brought up Charlie being taken, her debriefer waved her concern off and called her hysterical. After three hours and the limp salad and milk that she’d requested, she refused to answer any more questions. One assistant deputy promptly got pissy with her.

  “You will answer my question.”

  “You’ve asked that question seven times. I’ve answered it the same way each time. What on earth makes you think anything has changed since the last time you asked?” Ginny cocked her head slightly. The corners of her mouth curved slightly up. If Charlie had been there, his first instinct would have been to duck. Or grab the video camera. “I’m done.”

  “Answer my question!”

  Across the room, Max’s head whipped around at the sharp voice

  “Ginny!” Max shouted, pushing his chair back and standing.

  “What are you doing?” Mark whispered.

  “You remember her looking at Al like that when he wouldn’t let up the chauvinist crap?”

  Standing, Mark frowned. Ginny just leaned back in her chair, arms folded and one brow raised. The man interrogating her stood up and tried to intimidate her by snarling as he talked.

  “Um, yeah, a couple times come to think of it,” Mark replied. “You think she’s about to…”

  “Yeah, I do,” Max replied, moving away from the table.

  “Here we go again,” Mark muttered.

  “Erickson, answer my questions!” the man leaned forward.

  “Trying to be a big he-man doesn’t make you one.” She shook her head. “Not hardly. I know what a real man is and an asshole like you isn’t even close.”

  “Ginny!” She heard Max yell again.

  “Erickson, for the last time…”

  “I’ve really had enough of this.”

  She looked at the man with his hands planted on the table so he could loom over her. With a slight smile and a cool look in her eyes, she pulled her knees to her chest, put her feet on the edge of the table and shoved it up and over. The man tumbled backward with the table on top of him and the papers, pens, and three laptops crashing around him. Ginny rolled to one side as her chair toppled.

  On her hands and knees, she looked up to see Max and Mark running across the room. Unfortunately, Al was closer.

  “Can’t you for just one second act like a reasonable person?” Al demanded, grabbing her arm and shaking her as he lifted her. “Why do you insist on causing so many problems?”

  “Al, let her go,” Max ordered. He could see Ginny’s eyes and knew she was about to unleash all her grief and anger on Al. “Ginny, don’t.”

  She gave him a “why not?” look, but Al shook his head as he shoved Ginny toward him. “You were right ten years ago. She screwed us over then and she’ll fuck things up now…”

  “Al, I was in a coma at the time and you know it,” Max said flatly, catching Ginny and holding her arms. He noticed how everyone in the room grew quiet. He looked around and no one would meet his gaze. And realized something. He’d never been officially debriefed. Something to discuss with Ginny. “You wanna tell me how the hell I could’ve been debriefed right after the mission?”

  Al froze, eyes darting about warily. Mark looked instantly alert. The assistant deputy director crab-walked backward before getting to his feet. Throughout the room, everyone edged toward a door.

  “Someone call Frank!”Al ordered, whipping his head around.

  “Oh, yeah,” replied Mark as he rolled his eyes. “That’ll solve nothing. Have you already forgotten what she did to him at her house? I’d say you’re damn lucky she didn’t knock you on your ass like she did ten years ago.”

  “She attacked a debriefer!” Al protested. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  Mark frowned. “Let me get this straight. Max was in a coma when he was supposedly debriefed ten years ago? So how could he have said anything about Ginny? Or the rest of us?”

  Max felt Ginny’s swift inhale and understood her reaction. Mark hadn’t known. Which meant…what? Had he been injured? Kept away until everything was accepted as fact? He glanced down at Ginny’s face but couldn’t tell what she was thinking. He knew that with Ginny that wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

  “But it’s true! The mission screwed up!” Al raged, storming up to Mark until the two were nose to nose. “Because of her! How can you think otherwise?”

  “Because that was a lie!” Max yelled. Taking Ginny’s elbow, he guided her around the table and toward the door. He had to get her away from everyone else. Away so they could talk. Away so they could hold onto each other. Their son was gone, but no one seemed to want to acknowledge that Charlie had been taken. He didn’t want to think about Ginny’s hurt, then realized no one was. Even now, everyone was looking at her with contempt and derision. Her son had been taken from her own home. And no one cared enough to feel sympathy for her. To ask how she was. Nearly to the door, he s
poke decisively. “This debriefing is over. When anyone hears from Polaris, call my cell.”

  “You so sure he’ll call?” Al jeered. “You think he’ll call about her bastard?”

  Max felt the shudder go through Ginny’s body. Casting a hard look over his shoulder, he made sure everyone in the room knew that his words pertained to all.

  “He will call. Anyone treating him in a manner that puts the boy in danger will have to deal with me. And I’m not in a good mood,” he smiled slightly, ice in his blue eyes. “In fact, I’m in about the worse mood I can remember in, oh, about ten years now.”

  In silence, they walked up the stairs.

  In silence, they walked down the corridor.

  In silence, they entered the suite.

  ****

  Ginny couldn’t seem to move on her own. Max led her to the couch and gently pressed her to sit down. The way she sat, arms wrapped around her, the slight rocking motion, unnerved him. If he felt the grief and anger, what would she be feeling? Somehow, he had to get her to shake off the grief and let anger fuel her. Anger would get her through.

  “Ginny, we need to talk.”

  She moaned softly and shook her head. Max rested his hand briefly on her shoulder. He wished there was time for her to hide from the world.

  “Ginny,” he started then shook his head. “I don’t know what to say. So much has happened today.” He sat next to her. “But something I just remembered, downstairs, in that room.” He held both her hands in his. “Ginny, look at me.” Slowly, her eyes lifted to his face. “I was never debriefed.”

  Slowly awareness came into her eyes. Good, he thought. He had to get her thinking. He had to get her moving. “Pride and ego. Deceit and subterfuge. It all conspired to keep us apart. Everyone took things for granted. My being debriefed. No one asking questions. And after a while, everyone involved just accepted the status quo.” She frowned, clearly starting to think. Max nodded and felt relief relax his muscles. The only chance they had of getting Charlie back was if she was an active part of things. “Someone didn’t want us together. Everything we’ve learned so far confirms that. But nothing seems to indicate why.”

  “Polaris,” she whispered.

  “All right,” he nodded. “So why now? What has happened to risk killing George and Sam now? A pre-emptive strike? Take us out figuring we’re most likely to be sent against him?”

  “That might make sense,” came the murmur. “So what would be the target?”

  Max strode over to the window that gazed out over the nation’s capital.

  “The Fourth is in ten days. An attack here during the celebrations?”

  “That almost seems too cliché.” Ginny shook her head. “And Polaris is anything but cliché. If he was planning something, going after any of us seems counter-productive. I mean, we’d just be more alert and ready for him.”

  “But doing something on the Fourth makes a statement,” he replied, remembering some of what she had said ten years earlier. “You said he liked to do that. Doing something on the Fourth would demonstrate his strength and abilities and would make a statement.”

  “We weren’t killed,” she suddenly whispered.

  “What?” He turned around. “You’re switching gears on me again,” he complained, shaking his head. “What do you mean?”

  “If Polaris was going after the team, why kill George and Sam but not us? And Charlie?” She shivered then stared at the wall. “Did anyone ever say how they were killed?”

  “No,” he said quietly. “Give me a second to think this through.”

  She nodded and he began pacing. They were doing what they’d done years ago. She would find a focal point. He remembered how she would zone out for a few minutes, absorbing what was going on around her, but her mind…dear God, the way her mind would suddenly come up with things! It had driven George, Sam, and Al crazy. Just as they had driven her crazy with their chatter when she’d been trying to focus. Max paused to look at her.

  “Frank said they’d been on special assignment so no one would tell him the details.” He started pacing again, barely registering the way she flinched at his words. “Ginny, ten years ago, when I called for back-up they didn’t answer.”

  “If they’d been under attack, they would have called,” she said slowly. “Unless the fire-fight was so intense they weren’t able to.”

  “Mark and Al responded.” Max began pacing. “Al, George, and Sam came to the hospital while I was recovering.”

  “What about Mark?”

  “I’ve worked with him quite often the past ten years,” Max replied, trying to remember details. “I can’t remember anything that seems off in anyway.”

  “Does that mean he knew all along, or was he hurt so he just accepted what was finally said, or was he kept so far out of the loop he really didn’t know? And who do we trust from here?”

  Slowly he nodded.

  “So what does that give us?”

  Max thought it remarkable that they’d so easily returned to their previous roles. Their give and take had almost nabbed Polaris ten years ago. Max could only pray that this time they finished the job. If Polaris slipped away this time, he’d come after them again and again. Until they and Charlie were dead.

  No way, Max vowed, gazing at the curve of her back as he made the circuit of the room. No fucking way. Ginny and Charlie would be safe. No matter what happened when all this was over.

  Ginny lifted her chin as she summed things up.

  “So far, we have two agents dead by unknown means. A known national terrorist possibly planning an attack. A Deputy Director of Operations who seems to know more than the project analyst assigned to the terrorist. Multiple agents who knew you were in a coma. And possibly as many who didn’t.” She took a deep breath. “We also have a DDO who should have been given access to my information and either wasn’t or was and then didn’t give you the complete file. A file that should have had Charlie’s name on it.” She closed her eyes. “And you and he know each other.”

  “He is my son,” Max stated firmly.

  “Yes,” she confirmed quietly.

  His gaze returned to the familiar backdrop of his nation’s capital as the last rays of the sun hit the peak of the Washington Monument. He refused to consider that they wouldn’t get Charlie back. And not just because of how it would tear Ginny in two. That his emotions didn’t scare him into running out of the room or ranting scared him almost as much as the emotions would have just a few hours before.

  What the hell was happening to him? He was a focused, dedicated, highly trained agent. He had no emotions. Emotions left one vulnerable. Emotions could get one killed. He hadn’t really felt anything until he’d first seen Ginny. From the beginning, he’d fought the way he felt toward her. Physically he’d wanted her and been determined to have her. He’d just as quickly respected her intelligence and abilities. Her dedication to the mission had mirrored his own.

  Hearing movement, he whirled around. Silently he watched Ginny pick up her suitcase and move with heartbreaking slowness into the bedroom. God, it hurt to see her like this! He pulled his suit jacket off and tossed it on the couch before resuming his pacing. There had to be something he was missing. She was missing. They were missing. Their son’s life depended on them.

  A few moments later the shower turned on. Drawing the curtains, he secured the door and followed. Halfway to the bedroom door, his cell rang.

  “Shannon.”

  “Polaris made contact,” Mark told him. “He’s calling the Deputy Director of Analysis conference phone at eight in the morning.”

  “And the boy?”

  “No mention.”

  “Understood. We’ll be there.”

  Taking a deep breath, Max went to deal with Ginny.

  ****

  Her brain could barely function. She put the suitcase on the bench across the room from the bed and pulled out her toothbrush. Tears filled her eyes as she stumbled to the bathroom. Nearly blind from her grief, sh
e cleaned her teeth and shed her clothes where she stood.

  With a sob, she brushed tears from her cheeks. The tears continued to flow as she staggered toward the shower stall in the corner. Her hand reached for the spigots and turned them. Ginny felt the hot water pour over her and closed her eyes. She took a deep breath and gasped as the emotional pain racked her body with a very physical convulsion.

  How could she feel so much pain, yet feel so numb? She could feel absolutely nothing beyond that her son was in danger. Her sweet boy was in the hands of a man sworn to destroy everything she would defend. Charlie was in enough peril just being her son. She refused to think about what would happen if Polaris found out who Charlie’s biological father was.

  And that brought her to the man.

  She leaned against the wet tile.

  Max.

  Just the thought of him made her body react. She inhaled with a shaky breath. As much as she was learning and realizing, he’d had the bigger shock. She had known who Charlie’s father was. And Max had believed her.

  A soft smile crossed her face. He could so easily have refused to believe her. He could have demanded a paternity test. He could have laughed at her or walked away and left them. But he hadn’t. He had stayed. He had asked questions. He had talked to Charlie. She closed her eyes. The image of Max holding Charlie right before the attack flashed behind her closed eyes. Max wanted Charlie. Wanted his son. Would he want her?

  As much from what he’d said and left unsaid, he’d spent the past ten years thinking the worst of her. That she had been cold-hearted enough to walk away as he lay perilously close to death.

  Ginny moaned softly. If she’d known, she’d have been at his bedside. Nothing could have taken her from him. She would have done anything to be with him. She hadn’t been there. And she nearly wept with frustration.

  Her own pride…no, she reminded herself, she’d been deceived just as much. She’d been lied to by those she trusted. And betrayed by those closest to her.

  If Max had been lead to believe that she had abandoned him, then she had been lead to believe that he had cast her aside. The blame for the mission failure had been placed on her young shoulders. She had been told that he held her responsible and then left for another mission while she’d been in the hospital.