by Josie Brown
He stands there with his hands by his side. He looks everywhere but at my face.
I don’t understand. After all I’ve done—for him? Indignantly, I ask, “Jack! What’s wrong?”
His lids fall heavily. When he opens them again, it is to stare at me with cold sad eyes. Finally, he mutters, “Ryan.”
I try to wipe my tears before he sees them, but they fall too fast.
“Donna…” His voice chokes with despair. “How could you?”
How could I?
I could—and I did—
For him.
I turn away. The accusation hurts more than if he had backhanded me across the cheek.
I’m just about to scream that at him when Lee’s door opens.
Ryan stands there.
Jack and I stare at him, then each other.
Ryan beckons to us. “You two kids have had quite a honeymoon. Come on in.”
Jack and I rise in unison.
But when he tries to take my hand, I jerk it away, and walk in.
“How did you know?” I look directly at Ryan.
“Your tracker led us to the Montage. We booked the rooms below Eric’s so that Arnie could set up additional surveillance.”
But of course.
“When Eric gave you the assignment of killing me, we were concerned you’d balk,” Ryan continues. “To tell you the truth, I was somewhat surprised with how easily you accepted it.”
“Oh! …Well…you know, I was trying to stall…buying time…”
Ryan’s laugh is the loudest in the room.
Jack isn’t laughing at all.
Neither am I.
Finally, I mutter, “I know the rifle had real bullets. So, how did you fake your death, Ryan?”
“I was wearing the latest and greatest concealable body armor.” Ryan winks.
“But…there was blood—”
“It was a squib. You know, fake blood, like they do in the movies,” Arnie explains. “Since Ryan was going to be hit by some projectile, we didn’t need to detonate remotely. Usually, we’d use a Bobcat—”
“He means a tiny rocket fuse,” Emma butts in. “The blood—we used the real stuff, not the non-smell fake stuff, since we were concerned about Gunter’s verification—was packed into condoms that filled the whole inside of Ryan’s windbreaker. She sighs. “I guess it’s one way to get rid of some of that ten-year supply we’ve got in our laundry room—”
“Not for lack of trying,” Arnie winks at Lee.
I’m so happy to see that Lee ignores him. Time to change the subject. “Ryan, how did you slow your pulse?”
“Right before I walked into sight, I stuck myself with an Epipen containing an extreme sedative that slowed my heartbeat to barely alive. We had to wait until I recovered to bring you in on it. Otherwise, the NSA would have had a right to charge you with terrorism.” His gaze slides to Lee.
Lee smiles at me. “They’re not Donna’s greatest fans, but I’m working on it.”
Jack’s scowl grows larger.
Lee ignores it. “As it turns out, Jack got here just in time to get in on these secrets. Jack, while you were in transit, DEA agent Jaime Mendoza filled us in on your tribulations under El Maestro. You conducted yourself brilliantly. You’ll be rewarded with a Prisoner of War medal.”
“Thanks. Yeah, dealing with narcos—just follow their lead and play by the book.” His sarcasm puts a frown on everyone’s face, including mine.
“The woman giving you a rubdown wasn’t in any book I know of,” I mutter, “Unless it was written by Sylvia Day.”
Jack’s head whips in my direction. “No need to be jealous—even if she hadn’t been killed while helping me escape.”
I can’t say anything to that. So instead, bite my lip to keep from crying out, why do you care so much? What about my sacrifice?
Lee winces, but being the ultimate diplomat, he turns to Jack. “I know you went through hell. I want to thank you for your service to your country.”
“Don’t thank me,” Jack says evenly. “Do us all a favor and take real action against the narcos. They’re the ones breaking up our families—not to mention those in our neighboring country. And by action, I don’t mean by legalizing even more drugs, like meth and heroin. As long as killers like El Maestro are making billions of dollars with exports of drugs to our country, they’ll continue to pay off politicians—on both sides of the border—and this reign of terror is going to continue. Time to follow the money.”
“I’ll put it on my to-do list.” Lee’s tone is as cold as ice.
Before Jack can retort, Ryan turns to Emma. “Why don’t you fill the team in on the contents of Eileen’s blue envelope?”
Emma nods. “Each line held a different encryption. The first was the location of the digital cloud containing audio and video files of the president’s Oval Office and Lion’s Lair meetings.”
“We were able to scrub those before Eric could access them,” Arnie adds. “To explain the empty file, we also left a note that can only be traced back to Eileen. It requests more money for providing the files. I’m sure Eric’s head exploded when he read it. Now that she’s dead, he’ll never really know what happened to them.”
“The other encryption contained a list of Quorum investments, along with its three Swiss bank accounts,” Emma continues. “We’ve left the money intact. However, we embedded a Trojan into the accounts. That way, whenever Eric transfers money out, we can follow the trail.”
“It’s time to take Eric down.” Jack’s declaration doesn’t leave room for argument.
“Agreed. And I think you’re the man—and Donna is the woman—to do it.” Ryan takes each of our hands in his before putting them together. “Donna, you know me well enough that I would never disagree with the decision that you made to follow through on Eric’s order. You did the right thing—for Jack, and for your family.” He looks me in the eye. “Since the moment Eric Weber came into your lives—separately, and jointly—he’s done his best to ruin them. But he hasn’t succeeded because you love each other. Because, together, you are a family.”
Is Jack still of part of our family?
Does he still love me?
I guess I’ll soon find out.
Emma lends us her car so that Jack and I have a ride home from Lion’s Lair. “Sorry about the stinky diaper in the backseat.” She wrinkles her nose. “Nicky always goes boom-boom at the worst times! I didn’t want to carry it into Lion’s Lair with me.”
Finally, I’ve got something to laugh at. “I don’t blame you. Where is the little guy now?”
“Arnie’s retrieving him from Janie’s wing. Lee insisted that her au pair could watch him.” Emma winks at me. “I’m just glad it’s not Frannie. Now, that would have been scary!”
She tosses the keys to me, but Jack snatches them first.
“I’ll drive,” he growls.
I shrug. “Then I’ll walk home.”
Emma sighs. “I’m out of here.” She disappears back inside Lion’s Lair.
Jack gets into the car and starts the engine.
I start down the hill.
He passes me with a wave.
He gets a middle-finger salute in return.
Still, he’s waiting for me just beyond the guardhouse at the beginning of the estate’s private lane. As I walk by, he rolls down the window. “Get in. I don’t want the neighbors gossiping about you again.”
“Since when do you care what they say?”
“Since you became my wife.”
“I can remedy that for you easily with a quickie divorce. No need to go to Mexico for it either. I’ll just take the next flight to Las Vegas—”
He’s out of the car.
He’s got me in his arms.
He’s kissing me.
I’m kissing back.
He rests his arms on my shoulders so that we’re eye-to-eye and heart to heart. “Donna Craig, I’d follow you to the ends of the Earth to stay at your side.”
�
��Since when? Since it dawned on you that the only reason I chose to sacrifice Ryan was in order to save you?”
“You’re right. It was hard for me to hear you agreed to murder our boss. At the same time, I can’t blame you. It’s exactly the choice I would have made if it would have brought you home to me.” The thought sobers him. “Apparently, Ryan feels the same way.”
I lean into his kiss.
When our lips part, I warn him, “We still need to talk—about…everything. Not now, but soon.”
Jack nods. “Agreed.” He knows I mean Lola. And I’m sure he’s got some questions of his own. An idea puts a smile on his face. “Want to go back to our honeymoon suite? We’ve still got one more day on our reservation.”
Now it’s my turn to laugh. When I tell him about Varick’s head, he gets it: three’s a crowd.
“That’s okay,” he replies. “Like you said, we’ll talk later. Right now, I’m dying to see the kids.”
Works for me.
We only drive half a block when I begin gagging from the stinking diaper. “Phew! I realize now that I’m not the only reason you got out of the car!”
The way in which he shrugs shows me I’m right.
Can we hold our breath until we pull into the driveway? One way or another we’ll pass out, so it’s worth the gamble.
Joy is the look in your children’s eyes when you walk in and say, “We’re home!”
Happiness comes with the crush of their hugs, the dampness of their kisses, and the vows they request that you’ll never go away for so long again.
Love is the knowledge that they don’t want to live without you.
When Jeff asks us what we did on our honeymoon other than “all that yucky stuff,” Jack entwines his fingers in mine before answering. “Nothing else. Everything we did was yucky, horrible, terrible—” He winks at Jeff. “You get the picture.”
It’s not a lie. I’m glad, because I always want to keep our promise to tell our children the truth.
Jeff must be picturing something because his face turns bright red. Aunt Phyllis is too, because she snorts, while Trisha giggles.
Mary smiles through her tears. Evan puts his arm around her for a quick squeeze.
Suddenly, I’m glad she has someone to confide in.
Jeff pumps his fist into the air. “Since you’re home, you can come to my ball game!” He turns to Jack. “Hey, Dad, want to help me warm up my arm?”
Jack nods. “Sure.” He kisses my forehead before following Jeff into the garage to grab their gloves and a ball.
We’re home, but not for long.
Chapter 20
How to Welcome Him Home
Huzzah! Your road warrior is home from his latest adventure! To make him wish he never had to leave your well-feathered nest again, here’s what you should do:
First, greet him with his favorite cocktail in hand. Why give him an excuse to go out to his local bar? Learning how to mix a mean martini allows him to forget his troubles and just get happy in the comfort of his own home—and his own wife’s arms.
Next, ask about his week! You’ll have just as much fun listening to him regale you with his acts of derring-do in the cruel world of corporate boardrooms as he will when he hears your scintillating stories about getting the stain out of your favorite coffee table, or ignoring the plumber’s ass-crack when the dishwasher went on the fritz.
And, finally, never get out of your negligee—unless it’s at his personal request. Remember, your birthday suit is very, very special to him. Look at it this way: when you’re the only naked woman in the room, he only has eyes for you.
The headquarters of Operation Teutonic Tyrant is the bonus room over the garage.
Evan doesn’t mind this because it puts him in the guest room, which is next to Mary’s room. He doesn’t know that I’ve got surveillance in both, which is why my timing is always so good when their flirting inches up towards petting.
“Ah, great memories,” Emma murmurs. She’s being sarcastic. The last time she worked in the bonus room was when the Quorum planted a cell in Hilldale. To keep the neighbors from being suspicious of all the activity coming in and out of my home, Emma posed as my nanny. This meant a few trips to the playground with Trisha. She hated being hit on by the neighborhood DILFs.
Confirmation that Eric is back in his old stomping grounds—the French countryside—comes when one of the Quorum’s Swiss bank accounts makes a deposit into a realtor’s account in the little village of Vaucluse, France.
After hacking into the realtor’s computer, Emma gives a long, low whistle. “Wow! About a year ago, he purchased an old Franciscan monastery that dates back to the twelve-hundreds, but it’s been abandoned for at least a couple of centuries.”
“Pull it up on satellite,” Jack suggests.
She taps in the GPS coordinates taken from the property deed. What we see is a five-story stone monastery on a valley floor, but built into the side of a sheer cliff of the Dentelles de Montmirail Mountain Range. Old vines are entwined in its ancient columns.
“That makes sense,” Dominic murmurs. “A stone fortress for a religious sect besieged by a series of unfriendly reigns would be quite naturally well reinforced against a siege by unfriendly forces.”
Looking up from his computer, Arnie groans. “Folks, we’ve got some good news, some bad news, and some really bad news. Which one do you want first?”
Ryan throws his hands up in the air. “Start with the good, and work your way backward.”
“Okay, well the good news is that when I hacked into Eileen’s phone texts, I grabbed Eric’s cell number, and so I was able to hack into his texts as well. The bad news is that something big is going down at his monk cave tomorrow night.”
Ryan winces before asking, “And what’s the really bad news?”
“It looks like it’s going to be an auction of one of the implosive nuclear weapons that Eric stole from some Russian munitions arsenal. The auction is to take place three days from now.”
Jack nods. “It’s late evening there. Zoom in. Maybe we can get a head count of the number of goons he’s got within his security detail.”
Emma widens the shot on Eric’s new lair and tilts the trajectory. What once looked like ants have grown into men holding semi-automatic rifles. “At least six on the ramparts, and another six on the grounds. Interestingly enough, none on the roof.”
“Its only access is a sheer cliff that rises at least eighty feet above the monastery. Eric’s security team wouldn’t expect entry from there,” Dominic replies.
“That may work for us. Look at this.” I point to a faint brown image snaking through the tree line below toward the summit of the mountain, which, unlike the other peaks, has been sheared flat by some act of nature.
Emma zooms in. “It could be some kind of trail.”
“Ah! I’ll wager it was the last resort for the monks, should the barbarians make it through the gates,” Dominic reasons. “Can you get in closer, so that we can peruse the roof for any openings?”
Emma shifts the point-of view to the room, and zooms in even closer. As he suspects, there is a small trap door in the floor of the roof.
“Bingo,” Abu exclaims.
“Emma, for the next seventy-two hours, open a screen that takes in a twenty-mile radius of the rest of the valley,” I suggest.
Emma nods. “Are we looking for anything specific?”
“Limousines. They’re probably bringing in the bidders.”
“I’d give ten-to-one odds that a few of them were recently at the Lion’s Lair summit,” Abu growls.
I nod. “I’m sure Lee would appreciate that intel. With photo surveillance, we should be able to ID some of them.”
“You’ll do better than that,” Ryan declares. “George is waiting for your mission team on the Van Nuys tarmac. You and Jack are storming Weber’s fortress. Abu and Arnie will provide backup and surveillance.”
“Hey, this may be a perfect test for my surveillance mini-d
rones. They’re the size of flies. In a place that size, we’ll need eyes all over the place to find our two targets: the nuclear weapon and Eric.”
Ryan nods. “Emma will feed the team TechInt from here. If Eric Webber is, in fact, holding a nuclear device, I want both him and it in custody before the auction commences.”
Emma grimaces. The elevator ploy with Arnie gave her a taste of honeypot, and I guess she liked it. Hey, I can relate. But I’d certainly offer my dear friend a word of caution: be careful what you wish for.
“Ideally, we’ll disarm it onsite. Dominic, the time you’ve spent on the Trident missile program’s detonation boot camp is about to come in handy.”
“Righto! Didn’t earn that badge for nothing,” Dominic quips. “I can’t think of a more fitting way to put an end to Eric Weber’s reign of terror.”
I’ve yet to find out why our British colleague is just as eager as us to clap Eric in irons.
The trip will take a few hours. Plenty of time to bond.
But, first things first: Jack and I need to talk.
As the team mission leader, Jack gets dibs on the plane’s bedroom suite, which means I do too. While the others—Abu, Dominic, and Arnie—settle in to watch a world soccer tournament, Jack and I flop down on our bed.
He doesn’t stop me from pulling off his T-shirt in order to examine his cuts and bruises. Yes, he’s on the mend, but a few of those wounds are quite deep and will take time to fully heal.
When I touch one of those, he flinches.
“I wish I had some sort of lotion, or salve, or something to help it heal…” I say, innocently enough.
Silently, he turns his head toward the wall.
Then I remember Jack and that woman on the video. “Jack, I…I love you, and I trust you. It’s just that—well, the way you acted on the video with…with that woman—”
“Her name was Lola.” He sounds so far away.
“Okay then, Lola. The two of you were so—so intimate.”
He sighs as he turns to me, finally. “I killed her fiancé. She wanted to kill me for it—until she realized I had no choice in the matter. She wanted out of Paraíso as much as me. That’s what brought us together. What you saw on the video—it was all for show. We knew the guards were watching us. By pretending to share our lust—not our love—she was able to pass me the intel I needed to break out.” He strokes my cheek. “Donna, every moment I was in captivity—my every thought, my every dream—was about you! I needed to know that you believed in your heart that I’d come home to you.” He pats his chest. “I wrote you every day—in here. It was the only way I could stifle the fear that I’d never come home to you and our family. Do you know why I cut off Varick’s head? Because he told me you were doing that devil Eric Weber’s bidding in order to save me! That they had proof of your treason, and were going to sell it to Lee’s enemies—as if you were his whore, or something.” He shakes his head angrily. “I put you in that position! I let you down.”
