“He said—” Another quick glance at the kids, just in case. She’d learned the hard way her boys had ears like rabbits. “He said he was Danny’s informant and I shouldn’t trust the FBI. He said I needed to take this…” She dug in her pocket for the drive he’d given her. “To Marcus. To HORNET. He wants them to find him before someone or something called The Wolf kills him.”
“The Wolf?”
She tucked the drive back into her pocket. “Your guess is as good as mine. Danny never mentioned The Wolf or a man named Alexander Cabot—that’s the British man’s name. Or at least the one he gave me.”
“Well, Danny wouldn’t have said anything, would he? If this is something big enough, dangerous enough, to have armed men chasing you, he wouldn’t have wanted you and the kids involved.”
“But he’s gone, and so by default, now we are.”
“Yes.” Regina was silent for a moment, then cut across several lanes of traffic.
Leah caught a brief glimpse of the sign for the airport before the SUV flew down the exit ramp. “Where are we going?”
“Not we. You. You’ll go get my Marcus and drag him home to protect you and these kids.”
“You know where he is?”
“He thinks I don’t, but I always know. Same place he went last time he did this. Indonesia.” She rolled her eyes. “Surfing.”
Of course. Nihiwatu, Occy’s Left. He and Danny had talked about riding that wave since they were kids and had read an article about it, but it had always been more Danny’s dream than Marcus’s. The realization that he’d gone off to live out her husband’s dream sliced open so many barely healed wounds. “I-I can’t go to Indonesia. I don’t have my passport or—”
“You have it. It’s in the bag I packed for you when I picked the kids up from school.”
“But I can’t afford a last-minute ticket.”
“Take my credit card. You’re an authorized user.”
“No. You’re talking crazy. I can’t leave the kids!”
Regina sent her a sideways glance. “Sweetheart, listen to me. Right now, they’re safer away from you. I’ll take them to HORNET’s compound. Nobody will get to them there.”
Oh, that hurt. The pain stabbed through her heart, a cruel knife, and she rubbed at her chest. Her babies should always be safest with her. Always.
She shook her head, and tears she tried so hard to keep back spilled over. “I don’t want anything to do with HORNET.”
“I know.” For an instant, Regina’s voice broke. That tough outer shell cracked and showed a brief glimpse of her own pain and sorrow she kept hidden underneath. “I know how you feel about them, and nobody faults you for it. With what happened to Danny, you have every right. But they are good people, Leah. They will protect your kids with their lives.”
Regina brought the car to a stop in front of departures.
Leah didn’t move. She just sat there, shaking her head. “I can’t leave them.”
“You have to.” Regina turned in her seat and gathered Leah’s hands in hers. “I spent most of my adult life protecting my son from one of the most dangerous crime families in the world. I know better than anyone how to keep those kids safe.”
“Oh no. It’s not that I don’t trust you.” She was appalled that Regina might ever think that. She trusted this woman more than her own mother. “I just—”
“No, I know. It’s okay. I understand it’s a lot to ask right now. If I’m honest, I was always going to ask this of you. It just happened sooner than I had planned. Marcus needs you. He needs the reminder of you—of us, of family—or we might never get him back.”
Did Leah want him back?
Yes.
No.
God, she didn’t know. She was so angry at him for leaving her when she needed him, and angry at herself because she knew deep in her heart she had been the one to drive him away.
Regina gave her hands a squeeze. “And, now, you need his help. You need each other.”
She glanced back at her kids. She had no doubt Regina could keep them safe, but she did very much doubt her own ability to convince Marcus to help. And the thought of leaving her children when they had just been attacked sat like lead in her belly. But Regina was right. The kids were probably safer without her, and she didn’t have many options right now.
“Tomorrow,” Leah decided. “Tonight, we’ll find a hotel. I need time to explain what’s happening to the kids. And I don’t want you taking them to HORNET. Take them anywhere else. Just…not to them.”
Regina’s lips thinned with disapproval. Obviously, she’d expected Leah to go right along with this plan, hop out of the car, and demand a seat on the first plane to Indonesia tonight. That was what Regina would have done, but Leah wasn’t that bold or spontaneous. She needed time to think. To plan.
“Please,” she said softly. “Tomorrow.”
Finally, Regina gave a slow shake of her head and shifted the car to drive. “Fine. Tomorrow, but I’m buying you the first ticket out.”
Chapter Seven
Sumba, Indonesia
There was no better therapy in the world than riding a wave. Nothing eased your troubles like paddling out over approaching swells. Nothing soothed the soul like dropping in on a bomb wave and getting barreled. The liberating speed, the cleansing spray of water, the taste of salt, the pump of adrenaline numbing every ache and pain.
Marcus had forgotten that about surfing. After Danny died, he hadn’t wanted to even look at a surfboard, because they’d had plans to hit the waves that horrible fucking morning, and Danny never got the chance. But after that November night eight months ago, when he passed out drunk in the snow and would’ve frozen to death had Gabe not found him, he realized he needed surfing. He needed the meditation of it, the purifying wash of the water and salt, or else he was going to lose his sanity.
He’d left the HORNET compound in Wyoming that night and hadn’t been back since. Gabe had left several increasingly worried messages asking when he planned to return, and he’d deleted every one of them without answering. He wasn’t ready to go back. Maybe he’d never be ready.
The longer he stayed away, the more he realized that part of his life was over.
He didn’t blame HORNET like Leah did. He knew they’d done everything in their power to keep Danny alive. But it hadn’t been enough. Even if Danny had been shot in the operating room of the world’s best trauma center, it wouldn’t have been enough. The bullet had destroyed his heart, torn it to irreparable shreds. He’d seen it for himself when HORNET’s top-of-the-line medic had opened Danny up in a last-ditch effort to save him.