Only her father was a bitter recluse and preferred to live isolated and alone, rather than make any meaningful reconnection with her, both before and after his captivity. He barely spoke to her at the best of times. He was slowly getting better and had apologized to her once.
But why did Quinn call her? The fact that he wouldn’t say anything on the phone bothered her and also made everything he did seem clandestine and shaky. And she’d done enough of that for a long time. She’d been hiding long enough that she didn’t want anybody to know that she was back in town. She wasn’t afraid of going back to the compound any longer, in theory, for now, but she’d also paid a heavy price and still didn’t sleep well.
Frowning, she realized she didn’t have much time to meet up with Quinn either. Which meant that the men were close by. Something else that was a little disturbing. She headed out and decided that she would walk. If nothing else it would help burn off some of her nervous energy since getting that call. What could be so wrong that Quinn wouldn’t tell her over the phone?
When she walked into the café, the two men were already here, looking the same as always. She walked over to join them. Ryland stood, gave her a quick hug, and went to get coffee for them all. She looked at Quinn and said, “You still haven’t said anything about why you called me.”
“Let’s wait for Ryland to get back,” he said.
She looked over and watched Ryland, moving slowly in the long line. “I gather he was hurt,” she muttered.
“Yes, but he won’t appreciate it if you point out that he’s not doing as well as he’d like us to think he is.”
She snorted at that. “You guys all have more than your fair share of egos,” she muttered.
“Yep,” Quinn said, “we do. But it also gives us an awful lot of stiffness in our spine to get through some really tough scenarios.”
The tone of his voice made her suspicious. She gave him a sidelong look to see him studying her carefully. “What are you looking at?” she snapped.
“You,” he said. “Wondering how you’ve been, how life has treated you. We used to see you more often.”
“Yeah, Bullard and I had a disagreement,” she said. Her lips turned down. “I figured it was time to make up with him.”
“That would be a lovely option.” And just then Quinn turned, so she didn’t have a chance to ask him about his odd tone of voice.
When Ryland sat down beside him, she asked him, “So how bad was it?”
“How bad was what?”
“Your injuries?”
He gave her a crooked smile. “Survivable.”
“Well, you’ve survived,” she said. “I’m not sure how well though.”
“Well enough,” he said. “I’m here helping this guy out.”
“Where’s the rest of the team?” she asked, her gaze going from one to the other. “And what the hell’s going on? In all these years nobody’s ever called me and demanded a face-to-face meeting.”
“Maybe we should have,” Quinn said. “I hope you don’t feel like you were left out of the loop.”
“Of course I was left out of the loop,” she said. “I wasn’t family. That was obvious enough.”
“Did Bullard ever tell you that?”
“No, but he was at a strange juncture in his life, and I’m probably the one who threw it in his face.” She stared out the nearby window. “I wasn’t close with my dad, but it was hard losing him. Then to find him after all that time … only to see the shell of the man he’d been.” She hated the reminder even now. Her father was improving, but he was only willing to do it on his terms. Meaning, alone and isolated, as he recovered from his years of imprisonment. He’d been rescued at least five, maybe six years ago now, but he wasn’t in any hurry to get back to a normal life anymore.
“Interesting,” he murmured. “Still, Bullard’s a good guy, same as you.”
Then she laughed and said, “Yes, you’re right. I know he is. So where the hell is he?” She looked around, as if he would pop out of the woodwork.
“We don’t know,” Quinn said quietly.
She froze and slowly pivoted to look at him. “What does that mean?”
“It means, we don’t know. It means, there was a really ugly accident, and he was blown up in a plane.”
“Oh, my God.” She stared at Quinn and Ryland, her skin turning clammy and cold, and all she could think about was that she’d waited too long. She really had been trying to get back here to make peace with Bullard, but she hadn’t been quite ready to face some of her own night terrors. She had hoped that maybe she could contact Bullard and meet him somewhere else. “How bad?”
“We haven’t seen any sign of him since,” Quinn said bluntly.
She closed her eyes and reached for control, even while her heart was madly beating. “So he’s dead then.”
“We’re not saying that,” Quinn said. “Ryland was in the same accident.”
She turned and stared at him. “Seriously?”
“Yes.” And he quickly explained what they knew.
“Dear God,” she said, when he fell silent. “That’s no simple accident. That’s sabotage.”
“You are right. Quite likely it is,” Ryland said. “But I survived.”
As he spoke, all her mind could do was latch on to the fact that Bullard was likely gone. And that made no sense. The one thing about Bullard was, he was this massive soul, full of life. She sagged into her seat. “Dear God,” she whispered, yet again unable to formulate any other reaction, as she turned her gaze to stare blindly out the window.
“I’m sorry,” Quinn said. “I didn’t want to tell you this way. We were hoping to have good news. We are still looking for him. In fact, Dave is in the South Pacific area right now, working on rumors of a couple men who were picked up in the water.”
She winced at that. “But were they alive?”
“I didn’t ask for details,” he said, “because, so far, Dave’s had no luck.”
She gave a strangled laugh. “Unbelievable,” she said. “Of all the people in my life, I didn’t think Bullard would ever cash in his chips. No, he was bigger-than-life, as if death were no end for him.”
“He is bigger-than-life,” Quinn corrected.
She stared at him. “Do you really think there is any hope?”
“There’s always hope,” he said.
“Are you just saying that to preserve the company?”
“No,” he said, “not at all. I am more optimistic than some people in the company maybe, but I firmly believe in Bullard’s ability to pull out of everything.”
She shook her head silently. “Why hadn’t I come back before now?” she said suddenly, staring at both men, as if either had answers for her. “I was just trying to make up for being an idiot.”
“About your boyfriend?” Quinn asked.
“I suppose Bullard told you all about it, huh?” Izzie felt her cheeks growing hotter and hotter. She knew her face was getting redder by the second. A sure tell of how embarrassed she was to have her personal laundry aired out among all the men she had once included as being part of her family.