He'd signed it Dave, but then added a P.S.
If, someday, someone asks you if I killed Anise Turiano? You can say with certainty that you heard it directly from me that I did not. I was, if anything, guilty of loving too easily and too foolishly. But not so with Sophia. I loved Sophia with all my heart—even when it wasn't easy to do so. But it was well worth it. You can tell whoever asks that I died having lived my dream.
Sophia was crying when she put Dave's letter in her lap. It was so unfair—she'd long prided herself on not being the kind of person who burst into tears every fifteen minutes. And it wasn't just her hormones, crazy as they were, that had done it—it was the way Dave's voice came through in every word he'd written.
“It sounds, from reading that,” Decker said quietly, “like he was planning to leave.”
“No,” Sophia said. “I mean, yes, it sounds that way, but… No.”
He shifted in his seat. “Sophia, I don't like asking this, but I have to. Before we risk more lives, I have to know if there's a chance that Dave went with them intentionally—the men in the elevator.”
“No,” she said again. “Absolutely not.”
“Intentionally doesn't mean willingly,” he told her. “If he was working with them, he was surely pressured—”
“No,” she said adamantly. “He must've written this before Jimmy called. The reference to Anise Turiano … ? When he wrote this, he didn't realize that the attack in the parking lot was really all about Jimmy. But it was. After he spoke to Jimmy, he was certain that it was.” She could see that Decker wasn't convinced. “Dave asked me to marry him in the elevator, moments before the attack. He wouldn't have done that unless he thought he had his life back.”
Decker nodded. “I do believe that he loves you. Very much.”
“Yes, he does,” Sophia agreed, the lump back in her throat. “Please, let's focus on getting him back instead of—”
“He's never written a will while on assignment before—”
“God, you can be so stubborn—”
“Careful,” Deck corrected her. “I'm being careful—”
“Too careful,” she said hotly. “You always were—”
“No, not always,” he countered.
And there it was—right there, as if it were sitting between them— everything that they hadn't said to each other for the past four years, since she'd tried to kill him in another ladies’ room, very different from this one, on the other side of the world.
They'd come full circle, and Sophia had to wonder—because he was Decker, and he was so damned careful—if he hadn't intentionally chosen this place to have this conversation here and now.
But he swore under his breath, as if he'd realized, too, exactly what she'd been thinking. “Jesus, maybe it's true what they say about always returning to the scene of the crime.”
“There was no crime,” Sophia said emphatically. “I didn't kill you, and you didn't kill me. And I'm sorry, but the sex was completely forgettable.”
“Not for me,” he said tightly.
“Yeah, well, for me? You were one of scores of men that I … I… serviced in those months right after Dimitri died. And I considered myself lucky if all they wanted was a blow job before they sent me back to my cell.”
He was silent.
“I know that still bothers you,” Sophia said quietly.
“Bothers?” he asked. “Yeah, it still bothers me.”
“I did what I did to stay alive,” she told him. “I used to beat myself up for that, but I don't anymore.”
“Well, I do,” he admitted, his voice rough. “I still beat myself up because I didn't help you. Because I took advantage—”
“So what?” she said. “Get over it already! You were human and you made a mistake, although you know, if I'd been in your shoes, I would have killed me. Right there. A bullet to the brain. Good-bye. But you didn't do that. You also didn't take me to the police, you didn't bring me to Bashir's palace—and either one of those things would have been a death sentence for me. My head, Deck, on some other woman's bedside table, as a warning to her. Maybe some fourteen-year-old he'd married, who hadn't yet realized how hopeless her life truly was.”
“Jesus,” Decker said.
Sophia leaned forward. “So what if you didn't help me right at that moment. And if you don't think that helping me later—searching for me, protecting me, getting me out of there, lending me money, getting me this job that I love with these people I love—all the things you've done for me, Decker … If you don't think that makes up for one small, human mistake, then help me now. Look into my eyes and believe me when I tell you that Dave had his reasons for writing that will, and that it's personal. I know what it is, and he didn't want me to tell anyone. Not even you—or he would have told you in here.” She waved the letter. “Kind of like you not telling us about Jimmy.”
He still didn't say anything. He just looked at her—that quiet, complicated, dreadfully damaged man whom she'd once thought she wanted. What a mess that would have been. She hadn't known it at the time, but he'd needed to heal as much as she had. A fact she was now well aware of.
“Help me now,” she whispered. “I want Dave back. I love him, Deck. I really do.”
Decker sat in the Troubleshooters women's locker room, looking at Sophia, and realizing that the words Dave had written were true.
She wasn't a victim—not even that of his own poor judgment. A human mistake, she'd called it. He'd made it, he was human—no doubt about that—and, yeah, despite that mistake, she'd survived.
The sex they'd had all those years ago was completely forgettable, she'd said—but it wasn't, not to him. But its unforgettable stature wasn't because it was Sophia's mouth, Sophia's hands, but rather because it had been so dangerous on so many levels. And because it seemed to confirm his fear that there was something wrong with him—for loving that mix of danger and sex so very much.
But Tracy was right—the only thing wrong with him was that he was a freaking prude. The sex he'd shared with Tracy just a short time ago had been off the charts. Best sex ever. Ever. And Tracy had been completely willing and eager. The danger she'd helped create was of a different kind.
There wasn't just hope for him, there was a real chance at serenity hanging out there on the horizon of his not-so-distant future. Serenity, embellished with moments of joy and true happiness.
A few days ago, he never would have believed that possible.
“Please, let's find Dave,” Sophia whispered, and as he gazed into her eyes, as he looked at her tired, anxious, and yet still stunningly beautiful face, he said—at the exact same moment that she did—“I trust you.”
He had to smile. “That's good,” he said.
But she had more to say. “I'm pregnant,” she told him. “That's what Dave didn't want anyone to find out, because he believed it would put me in danger. But I do trust you completely, Deck, so there's really no reason why you can't know.”
She was… “Wow,” he said. “Is this… good news — you know, something that you … wanted … ?”
Sophia laughed. “You don't know me very well, do you?”
Deck shook his head. “I guess I, uh, really don't.”
“It's unplanned,” she said, “but wanted. Very much wanted.”
“That's great,” he said quietly, and yeah, he felt a twinge of something that wasn't quite envy. It was awareness. Acknowledgment of something that might've been possible if they'd met in a different lifetime, or on a different planet.
But they hadn't. And it was clear to him that whatever she had, at one time, felt for him, it was nothing compared to what she now felt for Dave.
“Please don't tell anyone else,” she warned him. “And don't even think about wrapping me in gauze and telling me what I can and can't do. I'm healthy and strong. And I'm going to help you get Dave back. So tell me what you know. How are we going to find him?”
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
Anything?” Deck asked quietly.
Tracy looked up from her reception desk, where she was monitoring incoming e-mail from the company's main, untampered-with computer, coordinating the arrival times of the remaining Troubleshooters, and still trying to unearth operative PJ Prescott, who was nowhere to be found.
Decker had come up less than dry with his latest call to Commander Koehl. Not only were the SWCCs unable to come save the day, but the TS team was going to lose most of their SEALs, too. Everyone but Lopez— who'd recently had a surgical procedure on an old injury to his shoulder, yet hadn't mentioned it to anyone—was being called back in and going wheels-up, which meant they were getting on an airplane and leaving the country.
The commander was heading overseas, too, but not for a few more days. Because of their lack of manpower, Koehl himself was coming to join the search for Dave. Not that the TS Inc. team was actually in a position yet to do any physical searching. But they had a lead—a former Agency support staffer named Russell Stafford.
And Jo Heissman had finally made herself useful. She remembered Stafford quite well from their shared years at the Agency.
Relatively slight of stature, he was somewhat rotund, with thinning hair and glasses. Not exactly the monster Tracy had been imagining.
Jo had told them that Stafford was quiet. The times she'd met him, he'd stayed in the background. Like some support staff members, he seemed disdainful and resentful of the field agents, which made him unpleasant to be around. Jo reported that she herself had felt uncomfortable with him, and avoided him whenever possible.
“Most of the times I encountered him,” the doctor told them, “he was with his boss, Matt Hallfield—who had a very large personality and cared a great deal about his staff's allegiance. I always assumed Stafford's unswerving loyalty was the reason they were inseparable.”
Stafford was loyal until—if Tess's theory was correct—Hallfield discovered Stafford's embezzlement and treason, at which point Stafford killed his boss, making it appear to be a suicide.
Monsters, Jo had reminded Tracy, came in all shapes and sizes.
Her physical description of Stafford was invaluable information, but best of all, Jo was able to provide a list of other operatives Stafford had worked with, particularly from 1999 until 2001.
Tess was taking that information and digging to find out if any of the men—and they were all men—on Jo's list had also left the Agency around the same time Stafford did.
Sooner or later they were going to find the information that would lead them to Dave, and when they did? Tracy was making damn sure that they'd have enough operatives to help break him free.
“Nothing yet,” she told Decker now as she glanced at the clock. “But it's only been a half hour.”
They'd used her laptop—the one that Michael had compromised—to send a message to Stafford and the other men who'd kidnapped Dave and wanted Nash dead.
Alyssa, Jules, and Decker had all agreed that the best approach was to write an e-mail as if it were from Sophia: I don't know who you are, or why you've taken Dave. I do know it has something to do with James Nash—who is not dead as we'd all believed. He is in hiding—I don't know where. I am not any kind of operative—I work client interface at TS Inc. But I am Dave's fiancée. If you can guarantee his safe return, I will find out whatever you want to know.
The consensus was that Stafford and Michael—it was hard to think of him as Gavin Michaelson, which apparently was his real name—would respond by telling Sophia they were interested in nothing less than a direct trade. Nash for Dave.
Not that anyone on this side of the battle was willing to do that. But “Sophia” would attempt to negotiate. She'd ask for proof of life.
And Tess would analyze each e-mail they received, which would perhaps give the Troubleshooters team additional information to help them track down Dave.
Who was not only desperately ill, but probably being tortured.
That was the only certain thing they knew—that Dave Malkoff needed rescue, fast.
“I hate this,” Tracy told Decker now. “I keep thinking about Dave and wondering …” If he were locked in some basement somewhere. Having been locked in a basement by a psycho who'd wanted to harm her, she was feeling extra anxious. But she shook her head, forced a smile. “What can I get you?”
He looked a little surprised. “Nothing,” he said. “I, um, brought you coffee?”
She looked down, and indeed, he'd set a mug—the one with the smiley face—on her desk.
“You never have it the same way,” he added, “so I thought I'd let you …” He'd brought her a few packets of both sugar and sweetener, and a couple of those tiny milk containers, too.
It was so unbelievably sweet.
Or maybe it was her consolation prize. He had, after all, just spent a long, long time with Sophia in the ladies’ room. Hey, honey, I brought you coffee and wanted to let you know that I'm marrying Sophia. Thanks for the great sex. See you around.
“What, no scone?” she asked him.
He laughed at that, the worry-grooves at the corners of his eyes turning into laughter lines. She felt her heart lurch as she lost herself in the warmth of his eyes.
“Yeah, no scone,” he told her. “Even if we had any, why would I bring you something I know you don't like?”
“Yeah, I was just stalling,” she admitted.
“Stalling?” He was either the best actor in the world, or he really didn't understand.
“You're not here with bad news?” she asked.
“No, just coffee,” he said. “And …”
Here it came.
He leaned closer. Lowered his voice. “I wanted to make sure that you knew it wasn't your fault,” he said. “The thing with Gavin Michaelson.”
After spending that long, long time in the ladies’ room with Decker, Sophia had looked at Tracy's photo and had identified Michael-Peter-Gavin as one of the men from the elevator who'd shot Ken Karmody and was probably, right now, torturing Dave. Tess had chimed in with the information that Michaelson had, at one time, worked as an Agency operative, but had left after being marked as too reckless, too unreliable, too unpredictable, and, oh yeah, possibly too psychotic. He was described in his file as vengeful and amoral. Remorseless and erratic. Off-balanced and unstable.
And at that final confirmation of her own naive stupidity in dating the man in the first place, Tracy had escaped into the very same ladies’ room to cry.
She'd only been gone for maybe ninety seconds—just long enough to grieve and rage in private and then splash some cool water onto her face. She wasn't wearing any makeup, so there'd been nothing to fix after her tears. She'd come right back out.
She'd thought no one had seen her. Apparently, she was wrong. And now she was going to cry again, for an entirely different reason.
Decker had brought her coffee—and comfort.
“You were conned,” he now reminded her.
“Deck, I slept with this guy,” Tracy said.
“No you didn't,” he said quietly. “You slept with Michael. Who turned out to not be real. That's what you should be upset about. That your perfect man was an act.”
She had to smile at that. “Perfect, except for the part where he moved to Maine. That sucked.”
He smiled, too. “Perfection's overrated, anyway. If he was real, you'd've been bored in a month. No one to argue with.”
“I don't argue. I just sometimes disagree.”
“Vehemently,” he said.
“Passionately,” she corrected him again, and ooh, there it was. That look in his eyes that promised passion, indeed. But they couldn't go there, not here at her reception desk, out in the front lobby, although that was a lovely fantasy. Besides, he was listening—really listening—to her, so she told him the main reason she'd gone into the bathroom to cry.
“I feel as if I let Jimmy and the entire company down,” she admitted. “I was such an easy target. I didn't ask enough questions, I didn't—”
“It didn't matter,”
Deck said with that absoluteness that she loved so much. “He would have figured out a way to play you, regardless of that. Don't beat yourself up for something that you didn't have the training to guard against. You're not going to make that same mistake again. And that picture you took? It's been vital.”
She sighed. “I guess. I just keep thinking about Dave.”
“I know,” he said quietly. “I do, too. Bad memories, huh?”
Tracy nodded. “I know what it's like to face this near-certainty that no one's going to find you and …” She knew precisely what it felt like to feel death's inevitable shadow and yet still hope and pray that help was on its way.
“We found you,” Decker told her. “And we're going to find Dave. Weren't you the one who said you had faith?”
She smiled at that. “In you.”
“Yeah,” he said softly. “It's kind of crazy how much I love hearing you say that.”
Love.
He leaned closer, and speaking of crazy, for several totally insane seconds, Tracy was convinced that Deck was going to kiss her, right there in the front lobby. True, they were alone, but…
“Deck.” It was Jules. “Whoops, sorry, but it's important.”
“No.” Decker straightened up. “I was, um …” He cleared his throat. “What's up?”
“Yashi called,” the FBI agent said. “We've got an address for Gavin Michaelson. And we have good reason to believe that Dave is there.”
Alyssa and Jules didn't have to include him in the decision-making process. But Decker was grateful that they had. He stood with them at the front of the conference room as they laid out their plan—as vague as it was with their limited intel.
Limited intel, and seriously limited manpower.
“Sam will lead the take-down with Decker as his XO,” Alyssa had decided as Decker looked around the table. They had only a single SEAL for this op—Lopez. Cosmo was already gone, and Silverman and Gillman, who were outside standing guard, were going to leave for the Navy base as soon as this meeting was over. “They'll pick their team after we get there and we have a chance to assess the situation.”
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