by Misty Evans
“Tell me Jax didn’t do it.”
“Jax?”
“Megadeth.”
“Ah. He sort of…supervised, I guess you could say. The surgery took hours and they’ve kept you sedated because I told them the minute you woke up, you’d hop out of bed and undo all the repair work they’d done.”
Although she was teasing, she still looked desperately serious. “Is Sabrina…?”
“She’s stable and they’ve moved her here to intensive care. She’s just down the hall.”
Colton glanced around. “Where’s Salisbury?”
“Jaya took him home to her place.”
Poor dog.
He took Shelby’s hand. “Any new info on our bomber?”
“No.”
That was it. Just no.
Her face, her stiff body, her voice. “Are you pissed at me?”
She didn’t say anything but the set of her mouth confirmed it.
“Beatrice told you about the report.”
“You knew about it and didn’t say anything.”
Being grilled about a phantom report wasn’t exactly making him feel better. “A man who wakes up after emergency surgery to find the most beautiful woman in the world at his bedside usually expects some fussin’ over him. Maybe a kiss, a thank-God-you’re-alive. Call me crazy, but I don’t think most men get interrogated before they’re even off their heart monitor.”
She leaned over, planted a kiss on his cheek and sat back. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
There were a lot of things he hadn’t. “About what exactly?”
“You know what.” She huffed, exasperated. “About this report. Beatrice claims someone filed this anonymously through the FBI’s system—which is impossible—and then someone else deleted it. She thinks I’m involved.”
You are. “It was either you or Agent Calisto. You were the only two Feds on the rescue mission with my team, and Calisto didn’t see what happened.”
Her eyes narrowed a moment, then fell to the sheets and their intertwined hands. “Why can’t I remember what happened that night?”
As he’d suspected, her memory had more holes in it than she’d been letting on. All those holes seemed tied to him. It was time to come clean, to help her remember the ugly truth.
He struggled to sit up, the pain in his lower right back making him break out in a cold sweat. He released Shelby’s hand and gripped the rail, forcing his body to do as he commanded, regardless of the knifing pain.
“Don’t,” she said, putting her hands on his chest. “You just had major surgery.”
The room spun and his body refused to cooperate. He sunk back down, eyes closed, stomach roiling. “We fought.”
“What?” She leaned close enough for him to smell her soap under the layers of grime from the explosion and hospital odor, so prevalent on his own skin.
“That night,” he said, through gritted teeth. Damn, he needed more morphine. He blinked open his eyes. “The night we rescued Connor.”
She snagged a cup of water from the rolling table nearby and put the straw to his mouth. “Drink. What’s so unusual about us arguing?”
He took a sip, the cool water coating his tongue and throat as he swallowed. “We argued over what you were putting in your report. About who shot Quan.”
He felt her tense. She set the cup on the table and gave him a confused look. “Why would we fight over that? You—”
She straightened slightly. A frown gathered in the corners of her mouth. “What aren’t you telling me, Colton?”
He blew out a sigh. “It was your first time in the field and you’d been working on finding Quan and 12 September for over a year. Your sole mission was to bring him in for questioning.”
“That I remember.”
“You had a lot riding on the success of that mission. Beyond rescuing Connor.”
“Like what?”
“A promotion.”
“I don’t care about promotions, only about catching bad guys.”
Which was one of the reasons the Bureau had been priming her to head her own counterterrorism team. “Our taskforce was a test run for you, for the Feds to see if you could handle your own unit.”
“Yes, I remember that.” She nodded, her eyes tracking over to his monitor. “I had so many plans, so many ideas I wanted to see implemented to stop terrorism.”
“Two hours after we rescued Connor, 12 September cells hit a mall in Milan, killing twenty people, eight of them Americans, and injuring a dozen more. The next morning, they blew up three more across Europe. You blamed yourself, believing that if Quan had lived, you might have gotten the information out of him to stop those attacks.”
She slowly rose from the bed. “But he died and I never had the chance.”
Colton waited, hoping she wouldn’t make him say it, that her brain would free itself and let her remember the rest.
It didn’t and she looked over at him with a raised eyebrow. “What else?”
Why couldn’t the truth ever be simple? “Overnight, you went from setting the world on fire to wanting to quit the FBI.”
“I blamed myself for Quan’s death, even though you killed him?”
Not exactly. “I convinced you not to quit the Bureau. You had the chance to save so many more lives, especially if your bosses believed Quan’s death was my fault.”
She took a step back and he saw gears clicking into place. “Believed it was your fault…? What are you saying?”
“I’d lie a thousand times over to protect you, Shel. You know that.”
“Oh my God.”
The horror in her eyes made his guts crawl. It was all there—the realization, the understanding, the sudden guilt. She blanched and staggered slightly.
Colton reached for her, but she was too far away. “It was your first kill. You saved me. Saved the rescue mission.”
“I shot him?” It was like she had to convince herself all over again. “The man I had been hunting all that time, who had the information I needed to stop 12 September cold. I killed him?”
He had to make her understand that their secret had been in her best interest. “You believed your career was over. That it should be because you screwed up so badly, which was total bullshit. You thought all the goals you’d been working on were down the drain.”
She staggered back another step, her hand going to the rolling tray to steady herself. “So I let you take the blame?”
“You didn’t let me. I insisted. You’ve always followed the rules. You don’t lie or cover things up. The thing is, I’m pretty good at both and I convinced you that your future with the FBI as a team leader didn’t have to be over because of one stupid terrorist.”
She shook her head adamantly. “I would never do that—cover up the truth. I would never file a false report to save my career.”
“Quan deserved to die. You and I both know it. Even if he’d lived, you wouldn’t have gotten any intel out of him in time to stop those bombings. I’m as sure of that now as I was then.”
“I can’t believe I let you talk me into this.”
It had taken hours of arguing on his part and then he’d gone over her head and made a deal with the counterterrorism director. “I’m pretty persuasive when I have to be.”
Shelby shuffled over to the chair near the wall, half-dragging her leg, but as always, determined to do what she wanted. She slumped into the chair and covered her eyes with her hands.
Colton bit his bottom lip and focused on that pain rather than the white hot poker in his back as he hauled himself up to a semi-sitting position. “You went on to prove me right, you know. You’ve stopped a dozen different killers since that night. You did the right thing, letting me take the rap.”
“The anonymous report,” she said, pulling at an invisible thread on her shirt. “I filed it, didn’t I? To try to fix things.”
“Most likely.”
“But why anonymously? And who deleted it?”
Probably the counterterroris
m director since he didn’t want Shelby sidelined for that one incident, but Colton couldn’t be sure. Between the CIA, FBI, and Navy, there were a lot of players involved. They’d all wanted Quan in the worst way. The counterterrorism director had done her a solid, keeping her from shit-canning her career over one mistake.
Shelby’s quiet horror continued to envelope the room, making Colton hurt in a way that no injury or goddamn surgery could.
The counterterrorism director had jumped ship eventually, going over to the NSA. Colton had hoped the issue died with him, but now… “I take full blame for forcing your hand with the report, Shel. You wanted to go to the Director of the FBI then and come clean, but I wouldn’t let you. If you want to tell him now, I’ll go with you and explain everything.”
She sat for a long moment, staring at the ceiling. The bitter silence, broken only by the beep of monitors, ate at him. His body was a goddamn mess since his insides had seen far too much damage over the years. Yet, what he’d done on the outside, hurting so many others when he’d only been trying to look out for them, was the thing he knew would kill him in the end.
Shelby’s gaze came back to his. Tears swam behind her pretty blue eyes. Her voice was strained, barely above a whisper. “That’s why we divorced, isn’t it?”
One more truth to lay on the pyre he was building for the final bonfire of his life. “One of many. You couldn’t stand to live a lie, and I was the embodiment of that lie.”
A knock sounded on the door. Nickelback stuck his head in. “There’s a guy out here says he needs to talk to Shelby. Name’s Daniel. Says it’s important.”
Shelby waved him off. “I can’t talk to him right now.”
Nickelback started to close the door, but Daniel yelled over his shoulder. “Shelby, it’s your mom! It’s her heart. She’s asking for you.”
Shelby bolted out of the chair. “Oh, no, Momma.”
“Wait,” Colton said. He tried to swing his legs around and sit up. “You’re not going anywhere without me.”
Nickelback came all the way inside, closing Daniel out. “Stay in bed, chief. I got this.”
Shelby pointed a finger at him, looking slightly like Jack when she did. “He’s right. Stay where you are. Nickelback can take me down. Momma’s probably just having an angina attack. I tried to get her and Daddy to go home hours ago, but they wouldn’t budge.”
“The killer could be in the hospital, Shel. He could be one of them.”
“I appreciate the conspiracy theory, but honestly, Colton, this is probably the safest place for me. There are cameras everywhere and all kinds of people. Our killer isn’t that bold or stupid. Now relax, and I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Nickelback brought him a cell phone. “Zeb will keep an eye on you and Connor’s down the hall with Sabrina. You need anything, hit 1.”
“Take Zeb with you. You need a two-man team.”
“Not leaving you alone, bro.”
“Where’s Megadeth?”
“Had to go back to his medical conference in New Orleans.”
Nickelback helped Shelby out the door, even as Colton continued to try to order them both to stay.
Zeb came strolling in before Colton could untangle all the tubes and get his sorry ass up. “Well, aren’t you as white as my hair.”
Colton gave up and lay back in the bed, his entire system a hot mess. “I can’t talk about it, old man, so don’t even ask.”
“’Bout what?”
He could hear the grin in the man’s voice. “About the spy.”
“Ah, yeah, good ol’ Wyatt Evers, code name Nightingale. Was he a loyal operative or a double agent? Guess you know the answer to that, don’t you?”
Evers was the only reason they’d been able to find Connor.
Now he was dead.
Colton was tired of lying. Tired of pretending.
What was one more stick on his ever-growing pyre?
“He was both, actually,” he said, and for the first time since that night in Baghdad, he told the truth about the other man he’d rescued from 12 September.
Chapter Nineteen
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A GLASS OF water and one of her angina pills and Shelby’s mother was feeling better. After all the stress, the doctors felt it was a good idea to put her in the cardiac ward and keep an eye on her overnight.
Colton, her mother, Sabrina. All three of them in the hospital.
All three of them here because of me.
Shelby wasn’t one for pity parties, but the truth was the truth. She no longer believed Colton was the reason for all of this—she was.
The killer may have started with the three vets, but now he was after her. Somewhere along the way, he’d decided to not only target the team that had rescued Connor, but to take it from a cool, removed act of picking off the players, to a personal vendetta.
Why?
That was the real question.
If she could only figure out the killer’s motivation, all of this would make sense.
The chapel was on the first floor at the far north end of the building. Daniel had brought her a cane—a fancy one decorated with blue and pink roses. It was a little flashy, although she still felt like an old lady using it.
Down the hall she walked, dragging her leg like some horror movie heroine struggling to get away from the monster as she made her way past the cafeteria and closed gift shop. Nickelback followed, giving her a little bit of space but keeping a close eye on her just the same.
Tending to her mother had at least given Shelby a break from thinking about the revelations she’d uncovered in the past hour thanks to Colton. She still couldn’t believe she’d let him take the blame for Quan’s death. He was a slick talker, but she’d never before let him convince her to do anything she hadn’t wanted to do herself.
Did I want him to do it? Was I that shallow of a person that I would put my career ahead of the truth?
The thought made her sick to her stomach.
His voice rang in her ears. You’ve stopped a dozen different killers since that night. You did the right thing, letting me take the rap.
The chapel was cool and quiet, the lights dim. A cross with Jesus on it hung in the alcove, various saints forever eulogized in the stained glass windows.
Her heart hurt over everything; her head throbbed as she tried once more to bring the memories up from her brain. The truth, the pain she had caused, even the life she’d taken—regardless of the fact Iman Quan had himself, taken countless innocent lives during his time as the leader of 12 September—would forever be on her soul.
Killing him hadn’t stopped the group. Another egomaniac had taken his place and they continued to wreak havoc all over the world.
You saved me. Saved the rescue mission.
Why couldn’t she believe that was enough?
She wrestled her leg into a pew and sat. Candles flickered at the feet of the crucifixion statue. Shelby bowed her head and prayed.
SHE MUST HAVE fallen asleep, because she woke to the sound of male voices, low and earnest, arguing at the back of the chapel.
A yawn kicked up from her chest, and Shelby rubbed the back of her now-kinked neck, turning to see who was arguing.
Nickelback stood in the middle of the aisle blocking Theo’s way. “I said no.”
“Do you really want me to arrest you too?”
“On what? False charges like you brought against Colton?”
“Oh, I’ll find something, Jon Wolfe.” Theo looked crazed. His usually tidy hair stuck out in all directions. His normally tucked shirt hung outside his belt. “That’s right. I know who you are. You were a juvenile delinquent just like Bells. Joined the Navy so you didn’t end up in jail. Then you got quietly asked to leave. Why is that? Screwed something big up, didn’t you? And you’re still a screw-up. That’s why you can’t get a real job and have to hide behind Rock Star Security. I bet I don’t have to d
ig too deep to find something to arrest you for.”
“Not that it’s any of your business, but I left the Navy to take care of my sick mother.”
“So it says in your file, but I have it on good authority that’s not the real story, so save it. Get out of my way. I need to speak to Shelby about something we found at the bomb site.”
Jon Wolfe, huh? The name suited him. “It’s okay, Nickelback.” Shelby ran her fingers through her hair. “Let him through.”
Her bodyguard’s broad body didn’t move for a moment, and even though she couldn’t see his face, the body language she knew all too well. Her dad and Colton used it regularly when they thought they needed to stand between her and a threat.
Good thing she was used to megatons of testosterone. Shelby swiveled back around and sent a silent prayer to the Lord, asking for patience.
Theo arrived a moment later and sat beside her. “Your bodyguard does realize that I’m one of the good guys, right?”
“He’s just doing his job.”
“And I’m doing mine.” He fiddled with his phone. “I heard about your mother. Is she okay?”
“Things have been rough on her since my shooting. Her angina is acting up after today’s”—Shelby checked her watch; it was after midnight—“yesterday’s bombing. Please tell me you have a lead on who did it. The sooner we wrap up this case, the better for everyone.”
“The man you saw…was he wearing gloves?”
“Yes. It’s in the report I gave the police.”
Theo held out his phone with a picture on it. “Like this?”
The glove was in an evidence bag. All she could tell was that it was black leather. “Was this found at the house?”
Theo nodded. “Does it look familiar?”
“Not particularly, but I can’t tell much from that picture. I have three or four pairs of black leather gloves myself. It could be one of mine. I need to see it, examine it up close.”
He nodded. “I guess I could bring it here. I’ll have to drive to Good Hope and retrieve it—Mindy’s going through all the collected evidence first thing in the morning to make notes before she sends it to the lab in Tulsa. It’ll take a while since I’ll need to make a round trip.”
