Cover Me (Elite Force #1)(30)
Author: Catherine Mann

“No, I understand.” The fanatical fire for a cause would make a person sell out their own family.

“Good. We’re on the same page then.” And as long as he perpetuated that feeling, the mission would move along smoothly. He angled past the only chair in his cramped office and sat behind the desk. “You’ll make your mark. You’ll make a difference.”

Everyone wanted to think they could change the world, reshape history, coerce others into believing the same damn things they did.

Idiots. The smart ones—people like him—figured out which side had the most money and shouted, “All in.”

Not that he had any interest in sharing his own philosophy and diluting the money pot. Let the activists blow up this power plant two days from now to make their statement. It would divert attention from his work, from the package coming through. The big payoff that would make it possible for him to deliver the treatment Andrea needed.

Three days until completion of his mission.

While Alaska was reeling from the explosion of a major power plant, struggling to heat homes, he would smuggle in his largest group of people yet—terrorists making their way into the U.S. across the Russian border. The Aleutian community provided the perfect out-of-the-way place to stash them, giving them a chance to test out their newly acquired American accents and knowledge until such time they could be assimilated into sleeper cells in the lower forty-eight.

Not everyone who left the community died. Just the ones who weren’t on his list of new Americans, international spies blending into the middle-class mainstream. Not that the individual on the other end of the phone knew all of those details, rather just assumed the “newbies” were a part of their own ecoterrorist cause, reaching out across the country.

“Listen, maybe I can make an exception in Misty’s case, because of her medical condition,” he pacified… he lied. Stroking his beard, he spun his chair around to look out the window over the thawing Bristol Bay, past the fishing boats. It was almost as if he could see them on their island mountain as he looked down the Alaska Peninsula that led to the Aleutians.

“All you have to do is make sure Misty doesn’t leave for a little while longer. Just keep things calm for now and we can revisit the subject later. How does that sound?”

“Okay, I can tr—”

The rest of the words got lost as Brett’s office door burst open. Heavy oak creaked the hinges as the secretary he shared with three other employees poked her head inside. “Mr. Livingston?”

His sat up straight fast. Donna knew to interrupt him only if his wife had an emergency.

He covered the mouthpiece of his phone, dread already gelling in his gut. “I assume this is important.”

“It is,” Donna said excitedly, her chin bobbing with agreement and a barely restrained need to speak.

The woman’s helpless, giggly act grated on his last nerve. His wife was so damn strong. Even locked inside her broken body, Andrea never complained, still embracing life head-on.

Brett spoke into the cell phone. “I’ll have to call you back.”

He disconnected and turned his focus back to Donna. He raised an eyebrow, signaling his impatience.

“One of our friends from the police station told me to let you know something on the hush-hush.” Donna was allowed to assume they had an in with the station because of the power plant being a high-value target for attack. “They’re calling in the National Guard, something about a serial killer’s graveyard on a mountain.”

***

“Why are we going to base?” Sunny asked for the third time since he’d told her they needed to throw on their clothes ASAP and meet with the military security police.

Not that he’d answered her the other two times, beyond saying it had to do with the search for Ted and Madison’s bodies. She wouldn’t have gone anywhere else with him, otherwise. She’d been away from home long enough. But the need to find out more about Ted and Madison’s disappearance was too strong for her to bail out now.

Clothes tossed on haphazardly, she thrust her arms into her parka and followed him down the last flight of stairs leading out of his top-floor apartment. Chewie’s paws click, click, clicked double time behind her.

“Wade?” she demanded for the fourth time and counting.

He zipped his parka without missing a step on his way toward the looming front door ahead. “It will all make sense when we get there. I don’t want to give the wrong impression until we have all the facts.”

Dim morning sun filtered through the frosted glass around the door. A second-floor resident in the restored house peered out into the hall, a woman wearing a man’s bathrobe. The door closed quickly as the disheveled lady ducked back inside.

Enough. Breathlessly, Sunny stopped on the bottom step, gasping in air cooler than the apartment, but nowhere near what they would both face outdoors.

And wasn’t that a metaphor for this whole moment? She had one chance, one second, to segue herself from being a part of the amazing connection they’d shared upstairs—and bursting out into the cold harsh reality. She’d experienced a once-in-a-lifetime night with him, and while she’d known it had to end, it was being stolen from her too quickly, too abruptly.

Chewie stopped alongside her by the rows of brass mailboxes for the apartments above, his furry bulk offering unfailing support as always. “Damn it, Wade, do you really expect me to follow you without question?”

He pivoted hard and fast, his face tight. “If you want unconditional honesty and explanations, then that street runs two ways, baby. Feel free to join in.”

His words smacked her with their fierceness—and truth. She was holding back, expecting things from him that she wasn’t willing to give in return. And right here, right now, as she stared at his strong and honorable face she wondered if maybe, just maybe, a decade and a half of silence could be shared.

As the scent of bacon and eggs from a nearby breakfast wafted into the empty hall, she swallowed hard, trying to find the words. She hesitated an instant too long.

Wade nodded shortly, pulling his hood up. “That’s what I thought.” He threw open the door to a covered walkway connected to the stretch of garages. “We need to leave.”

Her feet leaden with regret, she started after him. By the time they finished on base, the money would have been wired from her brother. The gym provided a cover of anonymity for him in transferring funds. She’d hoped to spend the morning losing herself and her fears with Wade in his bed, maybe in his shower. But that wasn’t going to happen.