Headhunters

by Charlie Cole

  It was hours in the car, but it felt like time to get to know each other again. Jess and I hadn’t been together that long, but it felt like forever now. And the time that we’d been apart during the operation was minor compared to everything else, but it felt huge in some way too. Just outside of Wausau, I noticed that Jessica was looking at me and playing with my hair.

  “What?” I asked. I felt myself smiling.

  Jess smiled back but just shook her head and sighed.

  We were content with one another. And that was enough. I picked up the phone and dialed again, but unlike so many calls I’d made before, I looked forward to this one.

  “Hello?” came the tired voice.

  “Alaina, it’s Simon. I’ll see you soon.”

  We pulled up to the cabin that sat nestled in Presque Isle, WI near the shores of Crab Lake. We were a scarce three miles from the Michigan border, give or take. It was about as far “up north” you can get in Wisconsin.

  I pulled to a stop outside of the cabin. The place had been my father’s in years past. After the tumultuous years of growing up in his house, I’d left for college and worked two jobs to pay for my education. It had taken years to finally get distance on the gulf that had grown between us. My father finally saw it, realizing what the problem was. In an effort to make peace, he’d given me his favorite fishing cabin as a gift. It seemed only fitting that we should be there now as I repaired my own family.

  The headlights of the car illuminated the cabin and I paused for a moment before extinguishing the headlamps.

  “What if they hate me?” I asked aloud.

  “They won’t hate you,” Jessica replied.

  “I forced them out of their beds in the middle of the night,” I said. “I sent them away and left them for days…”

  “You protected them,” Jess reminded me. “If you hadn’t done it, who knows what Kendrick’s people would have done to them.”

  There was truth in that. I tried not to think of the atrocities that someone like Agent Brock or Vaughn would have committed to my children… to Alaina, just because she was there.

  “I’m not the same man that left them,” I said. The words haunted me, thinking back over the move, the new job, how far we’d come since Claire’s death.

  “No, you’re not,” Jessica agreed. I looked at her and she was regarding me, judging me by what she was seeing. “But that’s not necessarily a bad thing.”

  “Isn’t it?” I asked.

  Before she could answer, I saw my son David’s face in the window. He looked outside, his eyes open and searching, acceptingly innocent and when he saw the car, he smiled the biggest smile I’d ever seen. His cheeks pushed up into little rosy apples and his eyes squinted into little half moons of delight. I could read his lips when he shouted, “Daddy’s here! Daddy’s here!” And then he was running from the front window and heading for the door.

  I exited the car and Jess did the same. We shared a look over the hood that said that whether we were ready or not, we were here and they needed us and that was what mattered more than anything.

  David burst through the door, running full speed in his pajamas, bare feet slapping the wooden steps. Melissa appeared a second later and she’s abandoned all pretense of being cool or waiting for Dad. They ran for me, arms wide and accepting, faces filled with joy and hope. I hadn’t seen much of either of those in the past few days.

  They collided with me, one after the other in that running/tackling hug that only children can do.

  “Daddy!” Mel cried.

  “Dad!” David chimed in.

  I held them to me and my heart ached with love. I missed them even though I was finally there with them. The gap of being away seemed deeper now than when we’d been apart.

  “Oh, I missed you guys…” I said, choking back the tears.

  David’s arms encircled my neck and squeezed and even though I ached from the crash, I let it hurt and held my son to me. Mel buried her face in my neck and leaned into me so hard, I thought I might fall over.

  “Missed you, Dad,” Mel said. She looked at me then, smiling, then a little confused before she asked, “What happened to your face?”

  She said this in a tone as if some horrible malady had befallen me like leprosy, a condition worsened because it was just, well… gross.

  “I had a little accident,” I said. “Nothing serious.”

  She looked at me and in my mind she had the ‘you’re full of shit’ look to her, the look that children adopt in their early teenage years. But finally, she seemed not to care and hugged me anyway.

  I looked past them and saw Alaina standing in the doorway, arms folded. Her face was hard and unreadable and I feared that the gulf there would be harder to breach than the one with my children.

  “Love you, Dad,” both kids said, one after another.

  “Love you, too. Hey, Jess is here too. Go say ‘hi’.”

  David and Mel swarmed Jessica, hugging her legs, asking her to pick them up. She did too, God love her. She was maternal in a way I’d almost forgotten. She was an incredible woman.

  I looked back at the doorway and Alaina was gone. She had seen us and walked away. I shook my head and made eye contact with Jess. She saw it too.

  “Let’s go in the house, guys,” I suggested. “You can tell me all about what you’ve been up to, okay?”

  The kids agreed, laughing, running and talking over each other, trying to regale me tales of time spent waiting. I opened the door for them and they scampered inside, followed by Jessica and finally myself.

  Once inside, the smells of the place came back to me and with them, the memories. The place smelled of cedar and Granny Smith apples and fresh coffee. Smelled like the home of my youth and for the first time I began to relax and let myself unwind and not fear that the peace would be shattered. I was home, with my family and that in the end was all I needed.

  Alaina was standing in the open kitchen with her back to us when I came in.

  “Hi,” I said.

  Alaina looked at me, turned back to what she was doing then presented two cups of coffee in saucers. One for myself and one for Jessica. I took it and handed one to Jess.

  There was something on Alaina’s mind and I wanted to know what it was. I found myself needing to know and perhaps that was a good thing. In my own way, I’d adopted Alaina as one of my own, and again, in my own way, perhaps I’d betrayed her the most by leaving.

  “We should talk,” she said at last.

  I nodded and gestured for the living room area. The place had been decorated in the style that I’d grown to love. Overstuffed couches and chairs in durable fabrics or leather. Rich wood table with deep, dark stained wood accompanied the furniture. Glass hurricane lamps stood lit, waiting for us to come and sit.

  Alaina sat in a leather armchair and put her feet up on the ottoman, her hands wrapped around a cup of coffee. She was watching us, Jess and I, and I felt a little as if I was being put on trial here. It would have been well within my bounds to tell Alaina that I owed her no explanation, and yet, somehow, I felt like I did. She was like a daughter to me, my oldest, if anything. And I wanted to keep her in the circle of family. As such, she deserved an explanation.

  Jess and I sat on the couch together and David and Mel filled in between us.

  “What happened to your face?” Alaina asked.

  “I was hurt during a covert operation,” I said. “I work… well, worked for a civilian contractor for the NSA.”

  “The National Security Agency?” Alaina asked. “Are you serious?”

  “He is,” Jessica offered.

  “Do you work for them, too?” Alaina asked.

  “No, I don’t,” Jess replied. “But you should know, Simon helped a lot of people doing some very dangerous things. He’s a hero.”

  “I’m not,” I said, unable to meet their eyes. “I’m no hero. I’m just a man.”

  I looked at Alaina and I could feel that side of me harden, that part of me that
thrived in the action on the bridge. I had to share something with her and so I needed to brace myself for it. At long last, I was ready.

  “Alaina,” I said. “When Claire was alive I started working for this company… we were called Blackthorn. We collected intelligence for domestic security operations. It… the work… consumed my life. Obviously it effected the family.”

  Alaina was nodding, piecing it together, but her arms were still folded across her chest. She wasn’t opening to me, not yet.

  “We moved then? Remember?” I asked.

  “To Chicago,” Alaina said. “I thought you settled down.”

  “I did,” I replied. “But someone from Blackthorn came after me. He wanted me to do things for him. Things that would have… endangered our family. Alaina, you have to believe me, I never thought he would come after our family.”

  Alaina was looking at me, unfazed.

  “If I ever thought it would have come to that, I would have done whatever he wanted to stop it,” I said. “Please believe me.”

  Alaina didn’t move, then slowly raised a shoulder in a half shrug.

  “I believe you,” she said.

  “The only way out was to send you guys away, to somewhere safe,” I said.

  “Are we safe here?” Alaina asked, tension creeping into her voice.

  I nodded, then offhandedly pointed at my face.

  “I made sure of that,” I said.

  “How can you do that?” Alaina asked. “And just walk away. I mean, you don’t work for them anymore…”

  “I don’t,” I replied. “But I know people. I know people that owe me favors. They have arranged it so that we’re safe and I’m free.”

  “But we’re safe?” Alaina asked again.

  “We’re safe,” Jessica said. She had both kids clinging to her, but sandwiched between us.

  “I’m sorry to do this to you, Alaina,” I said. “I really am. I’ll make it up to you, I promise, okay?”

  “Yeah, how?” she asked, but there was a smile there now that hadn’t been there before. She was softening.

  “Let’s go shopping tomorrow,” I suggested. “All of us, as a family.”

  The kids cheered and Jess and Alaina seemed to like the idea. We stayed up talking, and the kids stayed up with us. I knew there was no hope that we could shuffle them off to bed early, so we kept them up and talked and shared tales of our time in Chicago. Eventually, Alaina saw most of the big picture, not everything, but most.

  “I need sleep,” I said finally. My eyes were bleary and burning and I couldn’t keep them open any longer.

  “The bedrooms are made up,” Alaina offered.

  I thanked her and shuffled off to bed. I slept in my clothes that night, with Jessica beside me, still in her clothes as well. We laid in the bed and the kids slept with us, between us, by our feet, sometimes on top of us. In truth, we welcomed them in and snuggled them under the covers and slept without rousing for twelve hours.

  When finally I woke, I could hear Mel snoring with soft little baby breath sounds, content with the world. I opened my eyes and saw Jess, her face inches from mine, head on my pillow, her hair spread out in an auburn sea. Her eyes were a dark hunter green in the light.

  “Good morning,” I said, my voice still hoarse from sleep.

  “Morning,” Jess purred dreamily.

  And so it began, our life together as a family.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  We stood in a cemetery in Alexandria, Virginia. It had not been a great effort to get the family to come, but it hadn’t been any easier either. We stood at the grave of Claire Elizabeth Parks. We each held a white carnation. It had been Claire’s favorite flower.

  The night before the visit to the cemetery, I’d talked to Jessica and asked her how she felt about the whole thing. Was it weird? Should I go alone?

  “She’s part of your life, Simon,” she said. “I know that. I accept that.”

  I nodded.

  “It’s okay to love your wife,” she said, squeezing my shoulder. “It doesn’t mean you love me any less, okay? I know that.”

  “Yeah?” I asked.

  “Yeah.”

  So we went. It seemed right. This journey had started here for us. It seemed right that this part of it should end here. I remembered being there for the commitment ceremony and holding the children and listening to them sob. Now, Melissa wiped away a few tears, but mostly held my hand. David hugged my leg. He was a good kid, but this was all so unusual for him.

  The children each laid their carnation at the base of their mother’s headstone. They put their arms around each other as they walked back. It was cute, but sad in a way. Alaina placed her flower down next and crossed herself.

  “God bless you, Claire,” she said.

  I went next. I could not say what I wanted to say with the family there. If I’d had my way, I’d have poured my soul out to her. That I missed her. That I was sorry that I’d failed her. That I was committing to being a better father. But I knew she was not there to hear it. And the only person the words would do any good for was me.

  In my heart, I still loved Claire and would continue to love her. But the time that I wished to see her, to be with her by putting myself in harm’s way was over. I had too much to live for and along the way, I’d lost sight of that. I had gotten so wrapped up in the idea of saving the post 9/11 world that I’d nearly lost my entire family here on the home front.

  I put my fingertips to my lips and then touched them to Claire’s name engraved in the stone. I loved Jessica as well and there had grown to be a part inside me that would do anything to stop what happened to Claire from happening to Jessica. Was I better for it? I hoped so.

  I would defend my family regardless the cost. But in the end, what did that make me capable of? I’d had to change my perspective, take myself off the sidelines and get into the game to bring us back together at the end of the day. But had that played into the hands of Randall Kendrick?

  He’d wanted me to be more like him. He made no secret of that. I could only pray that I still held the line and did what was right and not follow him in the path he’d followed. It was a dark journey Kendrick had taken… I dared not follow it.

  I stood and walked to my kids. They hugged me and Alaina put an arm around my waist. I was surprised to see Jessica go forward then. Not only to lay her flower down, but also to lean close to the headstone, to say a prayer and then, I heard Jess say something. A word… no… a phrase… a simple phrase. And like a song that you try to decipher the lyrics for, I replayed the phrase again in my mind.

  “Thank you,” she’d said. “Thank you for Simon.”

  I was struck by that. By the circumstance. By the grace. By the kindness in the way she had said it. Not as an opportunist, but simply as one woman thankful to another for the man that had passed along when death comes.

  Jessica’s kind spirit had always amazed me. Her softness in the way she spoke, her concern. She meant no ill will here. She knew where I stood and was thankful for her place at my side.

  We walked together to the car and I noticed with a sigh of relief, an absence of black sedans. No agents there that day. No threats. No fear. The sky had cleared and there was not a cloud in it.

  We got into the car and drove. We stopped by a small market and bought the makings of a picnic lunch. Deli meat and bread and pickles and chips and soda. A pie for dessert on paper plates.

  We drove a distance and Jess’ hand found mine and I looked over at her and smiled. In the time that had passed, we’d begun to heal. Our physical wounds of course, but our emotional wounds as well… our spiritual wounds taking the longest.

  I didn’t dream about Claire after that. Neither good nor bad. But I had memories. Fond, fond memories… and that was enough.

  I pulled into a parking lot that seemed more secluded from the rest. A short distance away was a soccer field, closer was a playground with monkey bars and slides. Nearby were picnic tables. We got out and walked ove
r, the kids laughing and playing. I wore khaki pants and a golf shirt. Jessica wore a yellow sundress.

  We sat and made sandwiches and let the children play. I was working my way through a smoked turkey and cheese sandwich when my cell phone rang. I rolled my eyes. It was one of the first times I’d left the thing on since being at the cabin in Wisconsin.

  I unclipped the phone and looked at the display. My face must have shown something. Something Jess didn’t like.

  “Who is it?” she asked. Her voice was low and cautious.

  I shook my head. Not at her, but at the reality that this person was calling me. I took a deep breath and answered.

  “Hello?”

  A voice came on of an operator, but unlike any I’d ever heard before.

  “Please hold for the President of the United States…”

  I was immediately put on hold. I looked at Jess and covered the receiver with my hand.

  “Who is it?” she asked again, more urgently this time.

  “It’s the President,” I replied.

  “The president of what—“ She stopped herself in mid-sentence. “Shut up… are you serious? The President? The President president?”

  I nodded, smiling a little at her nervousness, but my own heart thumped a little faster in my chest, too. I wasn’t immune. The children had stopped playing and were approaching slowly. Finally, a voice broke the silence on the phone. It was a voice I’d heard on the television during news broadcasts, radio broadcasts, even once in person at a rally. But that had been work related.

  “Mr. Parks?” the President said.

  “Yes, sir. This is Simon Parks.”

  “Simon, I’d like to offer my deepest thanks for the service you have provided for this country. Director Jack Sinclair has brought me up to speed on your efforts. It’s that kind of initiative to keep this country safe that we need in this day and age.”

  I actually blushed.

  “Well, thank you, sir,” I said. “I appreciate you saying that.”