She looked away, her distress evident on her features.
“I know what that’s like, Jess. I froze in the middle of a mission too. Right in the middle of a damn shot. I put someone in the crosshairs who was simply not there. He was in my head, but he wasn’t in the line of my shot. And I screwed up.”
She looked back at him. “You can’t compare the two,” she said dully.
“I am comparing the two,” he retorted.
“No, I mean mine was much worse.”
Now Robie looked taken aback.
Reel rose and started to head to the door.
“Jess, can you at least tell me what changed between the time we got back from Mississippi and right now? Things . . . things seemed so . . . perfect. For the first time in my life. And I thought it was the same for you. I thought that—”
“What? What did you think?”
He glanced up at her. “That I wouldn’t have to be alone anymore.”
She looked away from him. “That was an illusion, Will. That wasn’t real.”
“No, Jess, it was. It was real. We were both there for each other.”
She shook her head. “Have fun with Malloy. Let’s find Blue Man. And then we can get the hell out of here.”
“And then what?”
“You go back to being Will Robie. And I go back to being Jessica Reel. Because, at the end of the day, that’s all either of us has.”
CHAPTER
48
It was midnight when the knock on the door came.
Robie was up in an instant, the pistol held loosely in his right hand.
He approached the door of his room and, standing to the side of it, said, “Who is it?”
“Valerie.”
Robie silently groaned. “Is something wrong?”
“Can I come in?”
He opened the door, expecting to see her dressed in some sexy number and holding a bottle of gin.
She was still in uniform.
“What’s up?” asked Robie, as he stepped aside to allow her to pass into the room. He closed the door and turned to her.
The pistol was pointed at his chest.
“Is there a problem?” Robie said calmly, even as he thought about how he would disarm her.
She pulled a piece of paper from her pocket and handed it across to him.
He reached out for the paper, gripped her wrist instead, spun her around, ripped the gun from her other hand, and deftly pushed her back on the bed.
He slipped the gun into his waistband and held up the paper.
“What the hell are you doing?” he said quietly.
“Read the paper, you bastard. And tell me if it’s true or not.”
He could see tears sliding down her cheeks. He glanced at the paper, already fairly confident about what would be on it.
He unfolded it and read, Your sister is dead. Ask the Feds. They were there.
He folded the paper and put it in his pocket.
Malloy sat up on the bed. “Is it true?”
Robie didn’t answer.
She stood. “Is it true?” she said in a louder voice.
Robie still didn’t answer.
“So it is true,” said Malloy, her voice smaller, weaker.
She sat back down on the bed and looked at the floor.
Robie pulled up a chair and sat across from her.
He leaned in and said, “Dolph killed Luke. And he killed your sister. And we were there, as Dolph’s prisoners.”
“But you escaped. Why didn’t you tell anyone? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Robie sat back. “It wouldn’t have changed what happened to Holly. And we’re going to get Dolph for this.”
“How? He’s probably out of the country by now.”
“He’s not out of the country, although he’s lying low. He knows that we have him for murder. But we have eyes on him, Valerie. He’s not going to get away.”
“What eyes?”
“You have to trust me on that one.”
“Trust you! You’ve done nothing but lie to me.”
“I’ve told you everything I could tell you.”
“We slept together, Will. And you screwed me knowing that my sister was dead. Knowing that I was worried about her? You let me believe she was okay.”
“That was not how I wanted to handle it, trust me. But it was very complicated. We were caught between a rock and a hard place and we had to make a decision. And maybe we made the wrong one. I’m sorry. I never wanted this to happen.”
She gave a hollow laugh. “Oh, great, that makes everything just fine.”
“I know you’re upset and you have every right to be. But this was the only way we could play this out. Or at least we thought it was.”
“Play it out? So my sister being murdered by that dick is just a game to you?”
“None of this is a game. You know that. We’ve been nearly killed a handful of times since we’ve been here. Hell, it was safer in Iraq.”
She started to say something and then paused. “You were in Iraq?”
“I’ve been in a lot of places.”
She slowly nodded. “How did she die? How did Dolph kill my sister?”
“I can’t think of one good reason for you to know the particulars.”
“Tell me, Robie. You at least owe me that.”
He drew a long breath and said tersely, “Gunshot to the head. She died instantly.”
Malloy suddenly turned green. “Oh, God, I’m going to be sick.”
He helped her up and half-carried her to the bathroom. He shut the door and heard her vomiting.
He sat back down in the chair and waited, his mind reeling with all that had happened in the last five minutes.
Robie was good at many things.
But I’m not good at this. Lying to people who don’t deserve it. Trying to comfort people when I’ve spent most of my adult life training hard and planning meticulously to take the lives of others.
“Shit,” he muttered, putting his face in his hands and rocking back and forth in the chair.
Five minutes later he heard the toilet flush and the sink tap turn on.
He sat up and wiped his face and tried to clear his mind.
A couple minutes after that the door opened and Malloy walked unsteadily out. She sat heavily down on the bed and wouldn’t look at him.
“Who sent you the note?” asked Robie.
“I don’t know. It was shoved under the door to the station. Why?”
“I’d just like to know.”
“I thought Holly and Luke were on their way out of the state,” she finally said. “You said you put them on a bus.”
“We thought we did too. She had it all planned out. Reel and I were helping them, like we told you.”
“Why?”
Robie didn’t answer right away. “Everybody deserves a second chance.”
She looked up at him. “I think you’re telling the truth for once.”
“But later we got ambushed again by Dolph’s goons. And they had Holly. They used her as a bargaining chip to make us come quietly. They took us to Dolph’s compound. There they showed us a picture of Luke, minus his head.”
“Omigod.”
Malloy looked like she might be sick again.
Robie jumped up, ran into the bathroom, soaked a washcloth in cold water, and brought it out to her. She accepted it without a word and swabbed her face with it.
“And . . . and then he shot Holly?”
“Yes.”
“But why?”
“Luke loved her. Luke was leaving Dolph’s group because of her, and the little prick couldn’t stand that.”
“And then he tried to kill you. But you two got away. Only you never said exactly how. You just said you broke out.”
“And that’s all I can say on the subject, for now.”
“I want to go and find Dolph and put a bullet in his head.”
“You’d just be pissing your life away. I told you that we’re going to get him, Valerie.”
“And so I should just accept that as gospel and sit on my ass and do nothing to avenge my sister?”
“Holly would not want that asshole to get a shot at killing you, too.”
“Holly never even liked me. I was the bossy older sister.”
“Yeah, she said you were bossy. But if you don’t think she cared about you, then you’re wrong.”
“How would you know?”
“She talked to me about you. She said she was jealous of you. How you wore the uniform and put your life on the line. She never thought she could measure up to that.”