Loyalty in Death

by J. D. Robb

  It was, he liked to think, a matter of privacy.

  He regretted only mildly the fact that since he'd met Eve, none of those agencies had cause to add any interesting facts about his activities.

  Love had him walking the straight and narrow, with only the occasional step into the dark.

  "Incoming," he murmured, and had Eve's head coming up.

  "Already?"

  "It's only the FBI," he pointed out, and tipping back in his chair, ordered data onto the wall screen. "There's your head man. James Thomas Rowan, born in Boston, June 10, 1988."

  "They so rarely look like madmen," Eve murmured, studying the image. A handsome face with sharp bones, easily smiling mouth, clear blue eyes. His dark hair was shot with distinguished gray, lending him the look of a successful executive or politician.

  "Jamie, as he was called by friends, came from good, solid, New England stock." Roarke angled his head as he read data. "And healthy Yankee money. Prep schools, Harvard. Poli-sci major. Likely being groomed for politics. Did his military stint—angled into Special Forces. He did some work for the CIA. Parents deceased, one sibling. Sister. Julia Rowan Peterman."

  "Professional mother, retired," Eve read. "She lives in Tampa. We'll check her out."

  She rose as much to stretch her legs as to get a closer look at the screen. "Married Monica Stone, 2015. Two children: Charlotte, DOB September 14, 2016, and James Junior, DOB February 8, 2019. Where's Monica?"

  "Display current data on Monica Stone Rowan," Roarke ordered. "Split screen."

  Going by the age of the subject, Eve decided the picture was fairly recent. So the Bureau was keeping tabs. She'd probably been an attractive woman once. The bones were still good, but lines had dug deep around her mouth, her eyes, and both the mouth and eyes carried bitterness. Her hair had gone gray and was carelessly cut.

  "She lives in Maine." Eve pursed her lips. "Alone and unemployed. Pulls in a retired professional mother's pension. I bet it's stinking cold in Maine this time of year."

  "You'll have to wear your long Johns, Lieutenant."

  "Yeah. It'll be worth a little chill to talk to Monica. Where are the kids?"

  Roarke called the data up and had Eve raising her brow. "Believed dead. Both of them? Same date? Get me more here, Roarke."

  "One minute. You'll note," he added as he bent to the task, the dates of death coincide with the date James Rowan was killed."

  "February 8, 2024. I saw that."

  "Explosion. The feds blew up his house, though the public stand is he did the job himself." He glanced up again, face blank and set. "But that's confirmed in this file—time, unit, authorization to terminate. It appears he had his children in the house with him."

  "You're telling me the FBI bombed his house to take him out, and took two kids along for the ride?"

  "Rowan, his children, the woman he'd taken as his lover. One of his top lieutenants and three other members of Apollo." Roarke rose, moved to get more coffee. "Read the file, Eve. They'd tagged him. They'd been hunting him since his group had claimed responsibility for the Pentagon bombing. The government wanted payment, and they were pissed."

  He brought fresh coffee to Eve. "He'd gone under, moved from location to location. Using new names, new faces when necessary." Roarke settled behind her as they read the data. "He still managed to make his videos and get them on air. But he stayed a step or two ahead of the hounds for several months."

  "With his kids," she murmured.

  "According to these files, he kept them close. Then the FBI ran him to ground, surrounded his house, moved in, and did the job. They wanted to take him out and break the back of the group. That's what they did."

  "It didn't have to be done that way."

  "No." He met her eyes. "It's rare in war for either side to consider the innocent."

  Why hadn't they been with their mother? It was her first thought, one that came unwillingly to mind. What did she know of mothers? she reminded herself. Her own had left her in the hands of the man who'd beaten and raped her throughout her childhood.

  And would the woman who had given birth to her have carried the same bitter look in her eyes as the woman now on-screen? Would she have had that same tight-lipped scowl?

  What did it matter?

  She shoved the thought aside, sipped her coffee again. For once, Roarke's superior blend left a bitter taste in her mouth.

  "Revenge," she said. "If Fixer was right and that's part of the motive, this could be the root of it. 'We are loyal,'" she murmured. "Every message they send has that phrase in it. Loyal to Rowan? To his memory?"

  "A logical step."

  "Henson. Feeney said a man named William Henson was one of Rowan's top men. Do we have a dead list on here?"

  Roarke brought it up to the wall screen. "Christ Jesus," he said quietly. "There are hundreds."

  "From what I was told, the government hunted them down for years." Quickly, Eve scanned the names. "And they weren't too particular about it. Henson's not on here."

  "No. I'll run a check on him for you."

  "Thanks. Shoot this much through to my machine here, and keep digging."

  He stopped her by brushing a hand over her hair. "It hurts you. The children."

  "It reminds me," she corrected, "of what it's like to have no choice, and to have your life in the hands of someone who thinks of you as a thing to be used or discarded as the mood strikes."

  "Some love, Eve, and fiercely." He pressed his lips to her forehead. "And some don't."

  "Yeah, well, let's see what Rowan and his group loved, and fiercely."

  She turned away to man her computer.

  The answer, she thought, was in the series of statements on file that Apollo had issued during its three-year run.

  We are the gods of war.

  Each statement began with that single line. Arrogance, violence, and power, she thought.

  We have determined the government is corrupt, a useless vehicle for those inside it, used for exploitation of the masses, for suppression of ideas, for the perpetuation of futility. The system is flawed and must be eradicated. Out of its smoke and ashes, a new regime will rise. Stand with us, you who believe in justice, in honor, in the future of our children who cry for food and comfort while the soldiers of this doomed government destroy our cities.

  We who are Apollo will use their own weapons against them. And we will triumph. Citizens of the world, break the chains binding you by the establishment with their fat bellies and bloated minds. We promise you freedom.

  Attack the system, she decided, cry out for the common man, for the intellect. Justify the mass murder of innocents, and promise a new way.

  We are the gods of war.

  Today at noon, our wrath struck down the military establishment known as the Pentagon. This symbol and structure of this faltering government's military strength has been destroyed. All within were guilty. All within are dead.

  Once again, we call for the unconditional surrender of the government, a statement by the so-called Commander-in-Chief resigning all power. We demand that all military personnel, all members of the police forces lay down their weapons.

  We who are Apollo promise clemency for those who do so within seventy-two hours. And annihilation for those who continue to oppose us.

  It was Apollo's most sweeping statement, Eve noted. Broadcast less than six months before Rowan's house had been destroyed, with all its occupants.

  What had he wanted, she wondered, this self-proclaimed god? What all gods wanted. Adulation, fear, power, and glory.

  "Would you want to rule the world?" she asked Roarke. "Or even the country?"

  "Good God, no. Too much work for too little remuneration, and very little time left over to enjoy your kingdom." He glanced over. "I much prefer owning as much of the world as humanly possible. But running it? No thanks."

  She laughed a little, then propped her elbows on the counter. "He wanted to. When you take out all the dreck, he just wanted to be president
or king or despot. Whatever the term would be. It wasn't money," she added. "I can't find a single demand for money. No ransoms, no terms. Just surrender, you fascist pig cops, or resign and tremble, you big fat politicians."

  "He came from money," Roarke pointed out. "Often those who do fail to appreciate its charms."

  "Maybe." She skimmed back to Rowan's personal file. "He ran for mayor of Boston twice. Lost twice. Then he ran for governor and didn't pull it off, either. You ask me, he was just pissed. Pissed and crazy. The combo's lethal more often than not."

  "Is his motive important at this point?"

  "You can't get a full picture without it. Whoever's pushing the buttons in Cassandra's linked to him. But I don't think they're pissed."

  "Just crazy then?"

  "No, not just. I haven't figured out what else yet."

  She shifted, rolled her shoulders, then set up to run comparisons on the names Roarke had fed into her machine.

  It was a slow process, and a tedious one that depended more on the computer than its operator. Her mind began to drift as she watched names, faces, data, skim over the screen.

  She didn't realize she'd fallen asleep. Didn't know she was dreaming when she found herself wading through a river of blood.

  Children were crying. Bodies littered the ground, and the ones that still had faces begged for help. Smoke stung her eyes, her throat, as she stumbled over the wounded. Too many, she thought frantically. Too many to save.

  Hands snatched at her ankles, some no more than bones. They tripped her up until she was falling, falling into a deep, black crater piled with still more bodies. Stacked like cordwood, ripped and torn like broken dolls. Something was pulling her in, pulling her down until she was drowning in that sea of dead.

  Gasping, whimpering, she clawed her way back, crawled frantically up the slippery side of the pit until her fingers were raw and bloody.

  She was back in the smoke, crawling still, fighting to breathe, to clear her mind of panic so that she could do something. Do what needed to be done.

  Someone was crying. Softly, secretly. Eve stumbled forward through the stinking, blinding mist. She saw the child, the little girl huddled on the ground, balled up, rocking herself for comfort as she wept.

  "It's all right." She coughed her throat clear, knelt down, and pulled the girl into her arms. "We'll get out."

  "There's no place to go." The little girl whispered in her ear. "We're already there."

  "We're getting out." They had to get out, was all Eve could think. Terror was crawling over her skin like ants, crab claws of ice were scraping the inside of her belly. She dragged the child up and began to carry her through the smoke.

  Their hearts thudded against each other's, hard and in unison. And the girl's fingers gripped like thin wires when voices slithered through the mist.

  "I need a goddamn fix. Why the hell isn't there money for a goddamn fix?"

  "Shut the fuck up."

  Eve stopped cold. She hadn't recognized the woman's voice, but the man's, the one who'd answered with that sharp, sneering snap. It was one that lived in her dreams. In her terrors.

  Her father's voice.

  "You shut the fuck up, you bastard. If you hadn't got me knocked up in the first place, I wouldn't be stuck in this hole with you and that whiny little brat."

  Breath shallow, the child like a stone doll in her arms, Eve crept forward. She saw figures, male, female, hardly more than smudges on the smoke. But she recognized him. The build, the set of his shoulders, the tilt of his head.

  I killed you, was all she could think. I killed you, you son of a bitch. Why won't you stay dead?

  "They're monsters," the child whispered to Eve. "Monsters never die."

  But they did, Eve thought. If you stood up long enough, they did.

  "Should've gotten rid of it while you had the chance," the man who had been Eve's father said with a careless shrug. "Too late now, sweetie-pie."

  "I wish to Christ I had. I never wanted the little bitch in the first place. Now you owe me, Rick. Give me the price of a corner fix, or—"

  "You don't want to threaten me."

  "Goddamn you, I've been in this hole all day with that sniveling kid. You fucking owe me."

  "Here's what I owe you." Eve cowered back at the sound of a fist smashing into bone. The sharp cry that followed.

  "Here's what I fucking owe both of you."

  She stood paralyzed as he beat the woman, as he raped her. And realizing the child she held tight in her arms was herself, she began to scream.

  "Eve, stop. Come on now, wake up." Roarke had bolted out of his chair at the first scream, had her up and into his arms by the second. And still she thrashed.

  "It's me." She shoved at him, kicked. "It's me, and I can't get out."

  "Yes, you can. You're out now. You're with me now." Shifting her, he pressed the mechanism on the wall and brought out the bed. "Come on, all the way back. You're with me. Understand?"

  "I'm all right. Let go. I'm okay."

  "Not a chance." She was shaking even as he sat on the edge of the bed and cradled her in his lap. "Just relax. Just hold onto me and relax."

  "I fell asleep, that's all. I nodded off for a minute." He eased her back to study her face. It was the understanding in his eyes, those fabulous eyes, the patience there and the love that did her in. "Oh God." Surrendering, she pressed her face to his shoulder. "Oh God, oh God. Just give me a minute."

  "All you need."

  "I guess I hadn't let go of today. Everything. All those people—what was left of them. You can't let it get in the way of the job, or you can't do the job."

  "So it slices you up when you shut down."

  "Maybe. Sometimes."

  "Darling Eve." He brushed his lips over her hair. "You suffer for all of them. And always have."

  "If they're not people to me, what's the point?"

  "None. Not for you. I love who you are." He drew back again to stroke her cheek. "And still, it worries me. How much can you give and still stand up to it?"

  "As much as it takes. It wasn't only that." She drew a breath, then another, steadying herself. "I don't know if it was a dream or a memory. I just don't know."

  "Tell me."

  She did, because with him she could. She told him of finding the child, of the vague figures in the smoke. Of what she'd heard, and what she'd seen.

  "You think it was your mother."

  "I don't know. I have to get up. I have to move." She rubbed her hands over her arms when he released her. "Maybe I was—what do they call it? Projecting or transposing. What the hell. I'd been thinking of Monica Rowan, what kind of woman would have turned her kids over to a man like James Rowan. Like I said before, it reminded me."

  "We don't know that she did."

  "Well, he had them, anyway, just like my father had me. It's probably all it was. I've never had any memory of her. I've got nothing of her."

  "You've remembered other things," he pointed out, and rose to warm her arms himself. "This could be one of them. Eve, talk to Mira."

  "I'm not ready for that." She pulled back immediately. "I'm not ready. I'll know when I am. If I am."

  "It eats at you." And at him, when he saw her suffering like this.

  "No, it doesn't drive my life. It just gets in the way of it sometimes. Remembering her, if there's anything to remember, isn't going to bring me any peace, Roarke. To me, she's as dead as he is."

  And that, Roarke thought as he watched Eve turn back to her machine, wasn't nearly dead enough.

  "You need some sleep."

  "Not yet. I can do another hour."

  "Fine." He walked to her and had her up and over his shoulder before she could blink.

  "Hey!"

  "An hour should be just about right," he decided. "You rushed me earlier."

  "We're not having sex."

  "Okay, I'll have sex. You can just lie there." He rolled onto the bed with her.

  There was something miraculous about th
e way his body fit to hers. But she wasn't going to pay any attention to that little miracle. "What part of no didn't you get?"

  "You didn't say no." He lowered his head to nuzzle her cheek. "You said you weren't having sex, which is entirely different. If you'd said no…" His fingers busily unbuttoned her shirt. "I would, of course, respect that."

  "Okay, listen up."

  Before she could speak, his mouth was on hers, soft, seductive. And wonderfully sly. His hands were already sliding, slipping, searching over her. She didn't quite choke back the moan.

  "Fine." She gave up and sighed when his lips laid a hot trail down her throat. "Be an animal."

  "Thank you, darling. I'd love to."

  He took every bit of the hour, while the machines hummed away. He pleased her, and himself, knowing when her body went lax with release under his, she would tumble mindlessly into sleep.

  And for a night, at least, there would be no more dreams.

  • • •

  It was dark in the room when she awoke, with just the lights from the console and screens flickering. Blinking, her brain still musty, she sat up and saw Roarke at the controls.

  "What time is it?" She didn't remember she was naked until she swung her legs from the bed.

  "Just six. You have some matches here, Lieutenant. They're on disc and hard copy."

  "Did you sleep?" She started to search for her pants, and saw the robe neatly laid across the foot of the bed. The man never missed a damn step.

  "Yes. I haven't been up long. I assume you're going straight in today?"

  "Yeah. Team briefing at eight hundred."

  "The report on Henson—what there is of it—is printed out."

  "Thanks."

  "I have a number of things to see to today, but you can reach me if you need to." He rose, looking dark and dangerous in the half light, the night's growth of beard shadowing his face, the black robe carelessly belted. "There are a couple of names on the match list I recognize."

  She took the hard copy he offered. "I guess it was too much to expect otherwise."