by Lisa Harris
“What’s that?”
He hesitated, unsure what his father would think about his latest decision. “I’ve asked for a transfer out of undercover work.”
His father’s brows rose. “Did Olivia have anything to do with this decision?”
“In part, though I haven’t even told her yet. All I know is, if our relationship is to have any chance at all, I can’t be spending my time living another life. She needs to get to know me. I need to get to know me.”
He’d almost lost himself the last few months. It was time to take a different road. Finding someone to take that journey with him had been unexpected. But his father was right. There was something about Olivia that was very, very good for him. “I think you’re a wise man. When the right woman comes along, you have to hold on to her.”
“I believe she’s worth it,” his father said.
He looked at the house where he’d grown up. He’d bring Olivia here sometime, but for now, there was another woman he needed to see.
“Go on in and see your mother. She knows you’re coming, but it’s still going to be a shock for her to see you. She struggled for eight months to resign herself to the fact that you weren’t coming back. I’ll wait out here a few minutes before coming inside.”
Michael walked slowly up the driveway toward the front door of his parents’ house. Memories flooded through him. Water balloon fights in the summer, running through the sprinkler, camping in the backyard and roasting marshmallows. He’d grown up here in this house, listening to his father’s wise advice, eating his mother’s southern cooking.
Before he’d even reached for the handle of the front door, his mother was suddenly standing in front of him.
“Michael.”
“Mama … I’m sorry … so … so sorry for everything.”
She gathered him into her arms. It was the second chance none of them had expected. “Welcome home, son. Welcome home.”
34
Olivia sank into the comfy couch she’d picked up at an estate sale last year, grabbed the TV remote, then stopped, dropping it onto the seat beside her. She needed a distraction, but reruns or infomercials weren’t what she was looking for. She’d spent the past hour praying, trying to settle her mind as it sorted through everything that had happened the past few days.
Ivan walked into the room with Gizmo—who’d been found wandering the hotel parking lot—right behind him and flipped on the lamp on the end table. “Can’t sleep?”
“No,” she signed, squinting against the light.
“Me either.” He motioned for the dog to lie down, then sat down beside her on the couch. “They told me it would be normal to have trouble eating and sleeping.”
“Nothing that happened this past week was normal.” Emotion teetering on the edge of her heart welled up. “I thought I lost you.”
“But you didn’t.”
She nodded, realizing that the memories of the past few days would eventually fade, but for now, they were still all too present.
“There is one other thing we need to talk about.”
Olivia fought against the initial panic. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong. It’s just something I’ve put off telling you, because … because I didn’t know how to tell you.”
He pressed his palms together in front of him, his eyes bright.
“Ivan …”
“A few months ago”—he began signing again—“I applied to another school.”
“Why?” she clipped back.
“I want a change. More of a challenge.”
After high school Ivan had offers to universities in several other states, but had eventually decided to stick with their local community college for the first two years. She hadn’t argued. She liked having him home.
“Two weeks ago, they sent me an acceptance letter.”
“Wow. That’s fantastic. What school?”
Ivan’s gaze shifted. “MIT in Cambridge.”
“Cambridge?” She hadn’t expected this. “I thought you meant a school here in Atlanta.”
“It’s only a day’s drive—”
“A very long day’s drive.”
Options ran through her mind. She could always get another job with a newspaper in Boston. The only thing she wasn’t sure about was leaving Michael.
She pushed aside the thought. “I’ve got a friend in Boston who could help us find a place to live and—”
Ivan shook his head. “You don’t understand. You’re not coming with me. I need to do this by myself.”
Olivia let his words sink in.
“Please,” he continued. “Please don’t think I’m not grateful for everything you’ve done for me. You gave up everything to take care of me, and I don’t take any of that for granted.”
“Of course not.” She blinked back the tears. “We’re family. Families stick together.”
“And just because I’m in Cambridge and you’re still here doesn’t mean any of that changes, but this is something I need to do. Last week proved to me that I want to focus on computer forensics. Plus, Tory said she would try to fix me up with someone she knows for a possible internship.”
“That’s wonderful, but—”
“Please, let me finish. While I was in the hotel room with those men, and then in that storage room, I thought I was going to die. All I could do was pray that you or Michael or one of the officers would find me. But I also realized that I rely on you too much. I need to prove I can get out in this world and make it on my own.”
“You don’t have to prove anything. Because you’re right.”
“I’m right?”
She pulled the throw pillow to her chest and fiddled with one of the tassels. It was a conversation they should have had a long time ago. “I’ve spent my entire adult life trying to protect you, but what I didn’t do was let you set off on your own. It’s time I let you fly, because I have no doubt that you can.”
“So you’re not mad?”
“Mad? Are you kidding me?” She pulled him into a hug, then drew back and caught his gaze. “My genius brother’s going to MIT.”
“I think you gained something as well this past week. Or shall I say, someone.” Ivan’s smile widened. “I like Michael, and his family. I think you need to hang on to him. He’s good for you.”
She brushed back a tear and laughed. “Yeah, he is good for me.”
“Is he going to drive you to the prison this morning?”
She nodded, some of the anxiety returning. Her father had asked her to visit, and she’d agreed, despite strong feelings of uncertainty. “You still don’t want to come?”
“Maybe one day, but not now.”
She gave his hand a squeeze. “That’s completely up to you.”
Olivia stopped in front of the prison lobby, the nerves in her stomach feeling more like a host to a large flock of starlings than a few butterflies.
She looked up at Michael, thankful for the calming effect he had on her. “Do you think I made the right decision in seeing him?”
“I can’t make that call for you, but I do think you need answers to your questions, and this isn’t something I can do for you.” He ran his thumb down her cheek. “I just want you to be safe.”
The answers she had so far had left her more unsettled than at peace. Tomas had confessed to betraying her father and working for Salazar, the man he believed would soon rise to power. Kidnapping Ivan had been an attempt to draw out their father, but it hadn’t been enough. Felipe had vanished from the hospital, presumed to have overpowered the guard whose only crime had been to protect him. Two nights later, Salazar and four of his men had been gunned down in a brutal attack outside of Atlanta, their bodies left on the side of the road, tortured and beheaded. No one knew for sure who’d ordered the attack, but rumors were running rampant that La Sombra killed them before fleeing the country.
Olivia grasped Michael’s hand. He was right. This was something she had to do on her own. “I always believed
that the truth would set me free. Maybe this is the final step in finding that freedom.”
Olivia showed the officer her driver’s license, then signed the visitors’ log. She walked past the security guard into the visitors’ waiting room, mouth dry, palms sweaty.
Antonio Valez sat on the other side of the room, looking lost, no longer able to hide behind his expensive suits.
“I appreciate your coming to see me,” he said as she walked up to him.
Olivia nodded, then let her gaze sweep his orange jumpsuit, wondering how to respond to the man who’d spent his life deceiving others. A man who more than likely would spend the rest of his life in prison. It had taken her a week to come to the point where she could walk into this room. Now she was wondering how much could be said in fifteen minutes.
She sat down across from him with the knowledge that nothing was ever going to be the same again. All the memories of the summers she’d spent visiting the island had now been shoved into the past where she wanted them to stay.
Her father broke the uneasy silence between them. “How’s Ivan?”
“He’s doing well. He’s been accepted to MIT, and wants to work in computer forensics.”
“Wow. That’s fantastic.”
“Yeah, it’s going to be strange not having him around, but it’s the perfect situation for him.”
“Sounds as if he’s doing what he’s always wanted to do.”
“He is.”
Olivia folded her hands together and rested them on the table between them. Part of her wanted to bolt. The other wanted to find a chance for their relationship to work. She’d never seen him so humble and unassuming. So engaged with what she had to say.
“And you? I’m assuming you’re going to stay here?”
“Yes.” She leaned back and started to play with the zipper of her coat. “I did a story for the paper and ended up getting a promotion, actually.”
“Congratulations.”
“Thanks.”
The decision to stay had come easier than she thought. Realizing that Ivan could take care of himself without her had stung at first, but then came with it the knowledge that the boy she’d raised really was grown up.
“Does your staying have anything to do with anyone in particular?”
She felt a blush cross her cheeks. “There is someone. He’s … someone I met recently.”
How did she tell him she was in love with the cop who’d taken him down?
“It’s Michael Hunt,” he said.
Olivia frowned. “How did you know?”
“I’ve gotten used to checking up on you over the years, to make sure you’re okay.” He sat back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. “I still find it hard to believe that I spent a year and a half working with him, never knowing who he was. Never imagined he might betray me … or one day, perhaps, become my son-in-law.”
“Just like I never imagined my father was connected with the cartel.” She looked up at him, wondering what she was looking for. Proof that he had a conscience? That the men he’d ordered killed had somehow deserved it?
He leaned forward and caught her gaze. “We live in two different worlds, Olivia. We always have and we always will. But there are some things we have in common.”
“Like?” she asked.
“Michael completes the missing pieces in your life … just like your mother completed me. And you and Ivan … I meant what I said before. I’ll never regret having you.”
She drew her finger slowly across the table, not ready to go there. “I read that they denied your bail.”
“I might not be the big fish they were after, but the list of crimes against me—even with my cooperation with the state—is enough to keep me here for a very long time.”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Anything.”
“Why wasn’t a family and a growing business enough for you?”
“You mean why weren’t you enough?”
His words punctured straight through her. Hadn’t that always been the question?
He shook his head. “If you were hoping for a bunch of profound answers, I don’t have them. I got involved with the cartel when I was twelve years old, because my father was involved with the cartel. Still, I thought I could play both sides of the fence, live life the way I wanted while helping Felipe launder money. In the end I couldn’t get out.”
“What about my mother? Did she ever ask you to walk away?”
He chuckled. “She knew I never would. The world I was in was as seductive as your mother. I thought I could do anything, and there was power in being in control.”
“How did my mother fit into this?”
“Maybe she was the only thing real about my life. But she also believed what she wanted to believe about me. For some reason she loved me for who I could have been, not for who I really was.”
Olivia flinched at his words. “Did you love her?”
“From the first day we met.” There was no hesitation in his answer. “No matter what you think about me, that is the one thing I need you to believe. I really did love her. I loved all of you in my own way. I know none of this makes sense to you, but I guess I spent my life trying to live in two worlds. The world where I had a family, your mother, you, Ivan … and a life where I had power to control what was going on around me.”
Emotions tangled inside her, as she realized she’d never really known the complicated man sitting across from her.
“I don’t know what else to say,” he continued. “But the truth is that I can’t pretend to be someone I’m not. I don’t expect you to accept that, but this is who I am.”
The man who hired hitmen to kill his enemies.
The man who’d loved her mother.
The man who’d tried to save her brother’s life.
She pressed her lips together as the guard walked toward them. “I need to go.”
“Maybe I’ll see you again?”
She stood up, her heart still conflicted as she nodded. “Maybe.”
“Olivia?”
She turned back around to look at him.
“When you leave here, there will be a box on your car. Take it. Please. It’s a gift from me.”
She found the box outside the prison on the hood of her car, while the morning’s gray skies loomed above them. She looked around at the lot filled with other vehicles, but no people. She set her bag down, then carefully slid the contents out of the package.
“What is it?” Michael asked.
“My mother’s music box.” Olivia’s breath caught as she opened the lid, letting the music from her childhood spill into the cold morning air like a salve across her fractured heart. “I’d always wondered what happened to this.”
For a moment, she was a child again, dancing with her mother and brother in the middle of the living room while the music box played in the background. She pulled out the picture that had been pressed into the lid and held it up to show Michael.
“She was beautiful,” Michael said. “Just like her daughter.”
“My father thought so. He took her to Switzerland one winter. She’d never traveled overseas, and he once told me that watching her reaction made it seem like he was seeing it all again for the first time.”
Olivia ran her fingers across the inlaid wood, then closed the lid before sliding it back into the box.
“A lot has happened over the past few days,” he said.
“Some days I still feel as if I can’t catch my breath.” She looked up at him. “In some ways, I feel as if I’ve lost everything. My father’s going to prison, Felipe’s vanished, Ivan’s moving away … But then I remember what I’ve been given.”
She looked up at him with tears in her eyes, a feeling of gratefulness and hope beginning to nudge out the hurt and loss.
“Speaking of what we’ve been given, I think the initial shock of having her son show up on her doorstep is beginning to wear off, because I just got a text from my mother. She’s pla
nning a huge family meal for all of us tonight.” He grasped her hands and pulled them against his chest. “I thought I might invite someone to join me.”
“Really.” She smiled up at him. “Who did you have in mind?”
“There’s this woman I met. She’s intriguing, fun, and beautiful.”
“Should I be jealous?”
He laughed. “Say you’ll come.”
“Your family won’t mind?”
“My mother actually insisted that both you and Ivan come.”
“I’d love to come.”
“Good, because while you’ve already received quite a crash course on the Hunt family these past few days, you still haven’t met my mother.”
She leaned into him. “Stop trying to scare me away, because I already like her. Your sisters … your father … They remind me that there are still good people in the world who are actually making a difference.”
The family she’d never had.
“They like you. And even more important than that—because while I love my family, some decisions are personal—I like you, Olivia Hamilton. I like you a lot.”
Anticipation of what lay ahead for them and their relationship fluttered inside her. He was the kind of man she wanted to spend the rest of her life with, and while she didn’t know if that was where things would end, she was ready to find out.
“There is one other thing. I’ve been praying about a slight change in my career direction.”
“Like what? I can’t exactly imagine you at a desk job.”
“Even after all that’s happened, I’m not exactly ready to give up life as a cop altogether.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“I’ve been asked to head up a special task force with drug enforcement, but I won’t be working undercover anymore.”
“With your skills I’m not surprised at all. Sounds as if you’re perfect for the job.”
“As excited as I am about the possibilities, there is one other thing on my mind right now.”
“And what would that be?” she asked.
“You and me.”
She felt his arm slide around her waist as he pulled her against him. The wind blew against her face, but all she could see at the moment was the one man who’d managed to capture her heart.
