What had he been thinking, going to Angelo’s club?
He hadn’t been thinking, he supposed.
“Luke sent Echo Team to Detroit an hour ago.”
“What the fuck is in Detroit?”
“An old al-Nusra cell the Feds thought died off when Yasser Hadeed was killed. The FBI are staked out there now, so something must be up.”
Asher shoved back from his desk. “Why aren’t we going instead?”
“We’ve been grounded. Luke didn’t tell you?” Liam’s light-green eyes narrowed.
“I was busy,” he nearly growled out.
“Yeah, uh, getting the shit kicked out of you?” He faked a laugh. “Was that on purpose? Because like I said, I’ve never known you to walk away from a fight banged up.”
He didn’t know what to say. He’d sound like he’d lost his mind if he explained he’d purposefully gotten hit to relieve some of his stress.
“Back to Detroit—why are we grounded? What do I need to know?” He veered his focus to Luke, now in the doorway.
“Rutherford called. He doesn’t want us leaving New York. Stuck here until further notice. He’s worried we won’t be able to sit on the sidelines.” Luke leaned into the doorframe with folded arms.
Not a big surprise, considering their team’s history.
“Where were you last night?” he asked. “I called after I dropped my parents off at Jessica’s.”
Fighting.
“Yeah, mate, where were you?” Liam smirked, his eyes swerving to Asher’s knuckles. They had gotten banged up when he’d rammed his fist against the concrete wall back at the hospital in Berlin, but now they were a hell of a lot worse despite having them taped last night.
“You weren’t where I think you were?” Luke strode into the room and moved up alongside Liam, studying Asher the way Liam had.
“Can we focus on what’s going on?” Asher rose, uneasy. Maybe he shouldn’t have come into the office this morning.
He’d fought until his knuckles had bled, and then he’d found himself parked on a barstool, drinking until they closed.
Now it was six, still dark out, and he hadn’t slept at all.
He rubbed his eyes. “What do we know about this cell in Detroit?”
“More than twenty guys were arrested around the time Yasser Hadeed was taken out, but the Feds couldn’t get the charges to stick on five of them,” Luke began. “Since Samir reached out to one of Yasser’s enforcers, the FBI started tracking all of the remaining people connected to Yasser.”
“They have any credible intel these five guys are back in the game?” Asher asked.
“My buddy told me this intel as a courtesy because of Jessica, but surely he’s under orders not to tell anyone jack shit about Germany. So, other than this lead, I don’t know anything else.” Luke’s brows lowered at the mention of Berlin. The memory still clinging to his eyes like a dark, hovering shadow. “But if you’d answered your phone last night, you would’ve known all this.”
“And if you’d left a message, maybe I would’ve called back,” Asher snapped, too tired to go to bat with Luke.
“Never needed to before.” Luke scratched at his stubble.
And Asher had never mixed it up with his past since joining the team three years ago. Fighting was his drug, and last night might have been the gateway to more to come.
A cold bristle of air—was that a fucking shiver?—blew up his spine. “I’m square. Talk to me.”
“The boys are going to stay in Detroit. Keep a low profile so the Feds don’t sniff them out. I don’t want to be left in the dark.” Luke briefly glanced at Liam. “If these guys are working for Samir, we should know within a few weeks.”
Weeks?
Luke rounded the desk and slapped a hand to his shoulder, and Asher expelled a breath. He could smell the alcohol floating with it.
“You’ve been drinking, too?” Luke cocked his head to the side. “Maybe you should get some rest and come back later.”
“No. I need to be here. I need to make myself useful.” Asher fell back into his chair and scooted closer to his desk. “A thought crossed my mind, though, which is why I came in so early.”
“Yeah?” Luke asked.
“When I was on that op in Aleppo, Ara didn’t have much money. Jessica paid Ara’s way for years to help her get on her feet with her new identity.” The word sorry hung on the edge of his tongue again at the mention of the op—sorry for keeping his past with Jessica a secret. Sorry for other things he’d never be able to say. “I was going to check it out now, but I’m betting Samir didn’t have much, either.”
“You thinking Ara funneled some of the cash to her family back in Syria? To Samir?” Liam asked.
“No, or else he would’ve found her sooner,” Asher replied.
“Unless he already knew about her, but he didn’t have a reason to hurt her before,” Luke interjected.
Asher tapped at his computer keys. “I’m doubting Samir or his mom fell into a pile of money in the last six years. Not enough to afford a trip to a Paris hospital.”
“We have a lot to try and figure out,” Luke said. “You think you can trace the money trail from the hospital and see who footed the bill?”
Asher turned to Liam. “You or Owen might have more luck looking into it since we have to go through back channels without Command noticing.”
“I’ll get Owen. Knox and I are still working on ideas to track down Egon.”
Asher’s mind went back to Berlin, to the hospital—to the water jugs scattered on the floor. His raw knuckles burned with the need to hit again. “The Feds get Samir’s men to say anything?”
“They’re not talking. We expected that, though. Guys like them never roll on their group. They’d rather die.” Luke hissed a low breath. “But I’m following up on a few leads. We’ll figure this out.” Luke knocked on the desk two times. “I promise.”
“How’s Jessica?” Asher asked after Liam left the office to speak with Owen.
He shook his head. “I’ve never seen her like this.”
His spine bowed at the news. “She in pain?”
“Pretty sure it’s more mental than physical. But, uh, Eva will keep bringing Lara over to her place and, hopefully, it’ll lift her spirits to see her niece.”
“She needs time,” he recited the words he’d been repeating in his head. “She’ll be back to herself once she’s recovered.”
“Yeah, I hope so.”
There was more Luke wasn’t telling him. He could feel it.
Once Luke left his office, Asher grabbed his phone to message Jessica.
His fingers hovered over the screen, but he couldn’t bring himself to type. She hadn’t responded to his drunken texts yet, and it was still pretty damn early in the morning to be messaging her now.
He’d wait. Give her the time he knew she needed.
She’d been through a lot, but she’d be back barking orders at the office in no time.
Chapter Sixteen
She stared at her hands, at the smatter of blood on her palms.
Her eyes fell to the ground, to the pool of dark crimson atop the snow beneath her boots. More blood dripped from her fingertips, like red dye drizzling onto a snow cone.
Her stomach roiled. Her heartbeat slowed.
She extended her arm, reaching for Ara off in the distance, a backdrop of shining light nearly absorbing her. Her wide eyes stared back at Jessica. Scared, tired eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Jessica choked out.
Her eyelids lifted a moment later, and she inhaled a sharp breath when she found herself staring at her ceiling in her bedroom. Her third nightmare of the day. At least she hadn’t broken into a sweat this time.
She slowly dropped her feet off the side of the bed at the sound of the door buzzer.
“Jessica,” her mother said through the bedroom door a few moments later. “Your brother is here. He needs to talk to you.”
Her body protested the movement as she sto
od, her knees weak, her heart now racing.
She carefully shrugged on a cotton robe and tightened the belt, wincing from the bruises along her abdomen.
It’d only been a couple days since she’d been back from Berlin. Not quite enough recovery time.
Her jaw hurt the most. The rest of her body was like one giant, achy bruise—like a soreness from doing one too many reps at the gym, only magnified.
She gathered a breath and left the room, but paused midway down the hall when she caught sight of herself out of her peripheral view in the mirror.
Pivoting to face her reflection she found a woman she barely recognized staring back at her. A broken version of the person she’d forced herself to become over the years, a woman her team needed: strong, dependable, able to make tough choices.
All that was left of her now were haunted blue eyes, dry lips, and faint bruises like smudges of dirt beneath her eyes and on her neck.
No confidence. No strength.
“There you are,” her dad said. She followed his voice to find him standing a few feet away, his hands tucked into his jeans pockets, a grim look of discomfort etched on his face.
He’d been military for thirty years, shaped by his experiences, the same as her. He understood what she was going through far better than her mother could.
Of course, her father still didn’t know all the details of her work—it was safer that way—but he now knew enough to worry a parent to death. But the man also bled red, white, and blue—he’d never hold her back if her actions meant helping the country.
He cocked his head to the side, and his eyes thinned as she slowly ate up the space between them. “Luke has some news about your friend.”
My friend. The friend I let down. Her stomach burned like acid swished around, eating at her.
She caught sight of Luke talking to their mom in the kitchen. He was leaning against the center island with crossed arms, a hard look on his face as their mom spoke to him in her native German tongue.
Their father had met their mom when he’d been stationed in Germany almost forty years ago.
“Hey.” The whispered word had Luke redirecting his focus to Jessica, and he pushed away from the counter to approach. “Thanks for having Eva and Lara stop by earlier. It was good to see them.” Of course, she’d only held her niece for all of five minutes before she’d rushed to her bedroom to lock herself away and cry in secret.
“They’ll be back again tomorrow.” Luke came to stand before her.
As much as she wanted to refuse the offer, she simply nodded, and then she surveyed the living room off to her left, the bouquets adorning the area like she was at a funeral, as if someone had died.
Ara died, she reminded herself. Guilt butchered her, tearing her apart, making her feel like a branch swaying in the wind, ready to snap.
“Her body has been buried. She’s back home in Syria,” Luke said.
She knew he was leaving out the words what was left of her body. Despite his announcement, she couldn’t get herself to look away from the roses.
Bloodred. Bright-as-fucking-sunshine-yellow. Snowy white.
“I want them out of here,” she cried as her hands pressed to her abdomen. “All of them. Get all of the flowers out. Please.”
She turned on her heel, hurried back to her bedroom, and slammed the door shut.
She ignored the knocks on her door. The requests for her to come back out.
At the sound of a text, she padded to the end table by the bed and lifted her phone.
Asher: Hope you’re okay. Worried about you.
With a slightly trembling hand, she set the phone back down. She’d been surprised he hadn’t come over, ignoring her request for no visitors. Some part of her wished he had. But the other part of her was terrified of him seeing her this way.
She could barely look her family in the eyes, and so she wasn’t sure when the hell she’d be able to suck it up and get back to normal so she could see her team again. So she could work again.
And damned if she wasn’t scared she might never crawl out of the hole she felt like someone was burying her in—especially since that someone was her.
“You shouldn’t have come.” Jessica stared at her best friend, Grace Dalton, who stood on the other side of the door, holding wine and a brown shopping bag. She resisted the urge to do something strange, something she rarely did—hug. “Come in.”
“I knew the wine would work,” Grace said once Jessica locked up behind them. “Your parents gone for the night?”
“They left thirty minutes ago. I forced them to head to the hotel.” The perks of having a one-bedroom meant she could be alone, at least at night.
Grace set a bag on the dining table off to the side of the kitchen island and pulled out about five different types of slippers. “I had a feeling you didn’t own any, and these bad boys always make me feel a little better.”
She handed her two of the pairs. Fuzzy, pink slip-ons. And navy blue slipper boots with two white balls dangling off to the sides.
“I couldn’t decide, so I got a few options.”
Jessica forced her lips to curve at the edges as best she could and set the slippers back on the table. “Thank you.”
“Why is there so much uneaten food sitting here?”
“My mom’s been trying to comfort me with her favorite German cuisine: all the dishes her mom used to make.” She thought back to her grandmother’s funeral in Munich four years ago, to all the food shoved at her by relatives. “My family cooks to cope,” she said softly.
Jessica hadn’t found a way to cope this time, though.
She’d barely eaten, so that hadn’t worked.
Binge-watching Netflix hadn’t amounted to much of anything other than blurry eyes.
And sleeping had resulted in waking up with high blood pressure from nightmares.
Fail. Fail. Fail.
“The bruises are starting to fade. How are you feeling?”
“I’m okay.” Jessica motioned for her to head to the living area, and she followed behind.
Grace sat next to her on the couch and reached for her hand. “Luke didn’t tell Noah everything that happened, but you were the woman in Berlin I saw on the news?”
She’d be wearing a wig when she left her apartment for a few weeks, that was for sure.
Well, if she ever left.
“Yeah, that was me.”
“Don’t worry. I don’t think people will recognize you,” she said, reading her thoughts. “But maybe you could go out as a redhead for a bit.” She hid her emotions with a shaky smile, her tongue scraping along her bottom lip as if fighting a tremble there.
Grace, who used to be nearly as cold as Jessica, was about to cry. She’d changed after she’d fallen in love with Noah, a good friend of Jessica and Luke, and a former Teamguy.
“I don’t know how you do this job.” She covered her quivering lip with her hand and dropped her eyes closed. “If we lost you . . .” She sniffled but reopened her eyes. “I’m sorry. I came here to make you feel better—not for you to comfort me.”
She didn’t know what to say. Because, hell, she wasn’t great at comforting someone, or talking about feelings. “Thank you for coming.” She reached for her forearm and pressed her palm over the sleeve of Grace’s blouse. “Thank you for caring, too.” She meant the words, even if they’d been hard to say.
Grace had always been in the dark about her job up until Luke had asked Noah and Grace to be godparents to Lara. Luke knew better than to ask anyone on the team since they all worked in a dangerous profession.
“Of course I care.” She blinked back more tears. “Sorry. Something about motherhood has softened me.” She placed her free hand atop Jessica’s. “Is there anything I can do?”
She lifted her eyes heavenward. “Just be here,” she whispered. “That’s more than enough.”
Chapter Seventeen
“Are you kidding me?” Asher backed up against the wall at the fight club. “F
ive.” Sarah held up her palm between them. “You’ve been here five nights in a row, and I had to hear you’re back in town from Angelo.” She shook her head. “And believe me, he’s in a lot of damn trouble for waiting so long to tell me you’ve been fighting every night.”
“Calm down, okay?”
She swatted her hands at his chest. “What happened? You left Mom’s place over a week ago like a bat out of hell, and now I find you here?”
They were near the back exit of the club, Angelo’s private entrance.
“Tell me what’s going on,” she hissed.
“I had to go out of town and handle some things.” He pulled on his shirt over his head.
Her hands flailed again. Palms smacking his chest. “Why the hell are you here? You hate Angelo and this place.”
He wasn’t sure how to answer that. He wasn’t buddy-buddy again with the guy, but he needed this place. He needed his old friend right now.
The days had blurred by.
Fighting. Drinking. Research.
Repeat.
Not always in that order.
He missed Jessica. He’d never admit it to the guys, but . . .
He missed her smile. Her laugh. Her annoyed look when he said something dumb. The way her bottom lip only tucked between her teeth for him.
Hell, he missed the blue balls he got from her eating cherries.
He was pretty sure her absence was why he was losing his damn mind.
That, and every time he closed his eyes, he remembered her in the s-vest. Seconds from death.
Whenever he slept, he woke up to the same dream—cutting the wrong wire and losing her. His life wasn’t like the movies. Nothing was ever like fiction. But his dreams always played out like some major Blockbuster film. Only, in his head, the bad guys won.
Day after day with no word from Jessica and only updates from Luke . . .
He was going stir-crazy. And from what Luke was saying, she wasn’t getting any better.
After every fight he attempted a phone call.
No answer. No surprise.
A few more texts would be sent once he was five drinks in. Maker’s Mark. The good stuff. Yeah, well, the good stuff also made him eerily vulnerable and had him giving in to his desire to message her like some frat boy with a crush.
Stealth Ops Series Box Set Page 59
