I didn’t respond. In three years, the list had grown from fifty to sixty-four. Sacrificing one more, even if it led us to why agents were being killed and by whom, wasn’t something I could condone. I didn’t give a shit about the greater good.
“Irish?”
“Fuck off, Cope.”
“Come on, you have to agree it’s what needs to be done.”
I turned my head and leveled my gaze at him. “I will never agree. Never.”
6
Flynn
Crested Butte, Colorado
Four Years Ago
In the eight years since my brother Holt and I went to the same school at the same time, the bullying and taunting had gotten progressively worse to the point where I considered either dropping out of school or running away. Some weeks it got so bad, I thought about killing myself.
The worst part was that the more they called me a fat cow, the more I ate, and the more weight I put on.
Recently, along with the heifer jokes, my classmates had also started calling me a lesbian. While most of the girls in my class had outgrown their own tomboy stages, I hadn’t. For me, it wasn’t as much about outgrowing it as having no means to look more like a girl.
My father continued buying me jeans and western shirts, the only shoes I had were cowboy boots, and I’d taken to cutting my own hair just so he wouldn’t do it.
Maybe I could’ve talked to my brothers about it, but were they really that dense? Holt especially, since he knew how bad the taunting had gotten in elementary and middle school.
On the other hand, they had their own issues with our dad, especially since Buck left. His share of our father’s bullshit was divided equally among the three remaining boys.
Right after I turned sixteen, Roaring Fork Ranch’s cook, Johnny, died of a heart attack while making what he referred to as “morning chow.” Since I’d spent so much time with him both when I was told to when I was younger and more recently just because I wanted to, I stepped in to help while my dad looked for another cook.
After three weeks of me handling all three meals every day, I think my dad stopped looking, and consequently, the job became mine—not that he paid me to do it. I didn’t mind, though. I loved being in the kitchen, trying out new recipes. It made me especially happy when the cowboys came back for second or third helpings. Suddenly, I was no longer invisible. As they piled food on their plates, they’d occasionally tip their hats and thank me.
I’d get up at four in the morning every day and prep both breakfast and lunch, which some of the ranch hands would help serve on the days I had school. The minute I got home, I’d get dinner going. The downside was, the whole time I cooked, I tasted whatever I was making—and I’d also sit down and eat with my father and brothers.
Being in the kitchen and around food gave me comfort and allowed me to forget, at least for a little while, about the pain of being mercilessly teased every single day. The side effect was I was gaining more weight. It was a vicious cycle.
Most evenings, like tonight, my father and brothers ate in the dining hall with the rest of the hands. I was just about to sit down to join them when my father rushed from the table and hurried outside, covering his mouth with a bandanna.
“His cough is getting worse,” I said to Porter.
“Yeah.”
“You have to make him go to the doctor.”
Cord looked up from his plate. “Did you say make him?” Both he and Porter laughed.
I clenched my fists. “I’ll do it, then.”
Holt looked from our two brothers to me and shook his head.
“Someone has to,” I said, staring him down. I knew my three brothers, who were bigger, stronger, and outnumbered my father, were afraid of our “old man,” as they called him. I wasn’t. What could he or anyone else do to hurt me that would be worse than the pain I’d endured for as long as I could remember?
“I need someone to take me to get my license.” I’d been driving since I was ten or eleven. Everyone on the ranch learned how once they could reach the gas pedals. Now that I was sixteen—almost seventeen—I could start doing it legally.
“I’ll take you,” offered Cord. I’d rather Holt do it, but he didn’t speak up. “Maybe we’ll get Pops to go with us and dump his ass at the hospital instead.” The last part, he’d said under his breath, but I heard him.
As it turned out, we didn’t have to trick our father to get him to go to the hospital; an ambulance delivered him there when Porter found him passed out in the barn.
After running several tests, the doctor came in while I was in the room and gave my father his prognosis. Perhaps if he’d seen a physician sooner, something could have been done to slow the cancer that had spread throughout his body. As it was, my father wasn’t expected to live as long as six more months.
“We need to get Buck home,” I said to my brothers when I told them what the doctor had said.
“He won’t come,” said Porter, walking out the front door and slamming it behind him.
“He will,” I said to Cord and Holt. “He has to.”
7
Irish
Washington, DC
Three Years Ago
“I heard all hell has broken loose in California with Kilbourne’s mission,” I said to Cope when we met at yet another undisclosed location.
“Things aren’t always what they seem.”
I studied him, waiting for him to elaborate. It had been three years since Cope let Special Agent Malin Kilbourne run with the mission involving the money that had come into the super PAC and the mystery surrounding the higher-ups and the agency’s response.
While he didn’t share much, he did occasionally reassure me that she was still very much alive.
“I heard Striker was being airlifted to a hospital.” Also in that time, Griffin “Striker” Ellis, once our boss, had left the agency to work for a private intelligence firm called K19 Security Solutions. The man who replaced him at the CIA, Kellen “Money” McTiernan, was the least likely candidate for the job, but he’d been given it anyway.
Rumor was he came by way of the NSA and was known to have an IQ above people like Einstein and Hawking. I hadn’t interacted with Money much outside of requisite meetings, and Cope wanted to keep it that way. The fewer people able to track my movement, even during a mission, the better.
“I also heard Ghafor was taken out.” The man was the known head of the Islamic State, the organization Kilbourne had been tasked with infiltrating. How she’d lived through that assignment remained a mystery neither Cope nor anyone else could explain.
“Like I said.”
“I see.” Which meant those on the inside of the mission didn’t want anyone in the chain of command to know whatever Kilbourne had unearthed. “So, he’s alive.”
Cope nodded.
“No ambush.”
“That’s right.”
“McTiernan and I are headed out there now to get a full briefing. Once that’s complete, we’ll be pulled into a high-level NSA assignment necessitating that we’re both off the grid.”