“I don’t want breakfast, Mom.”
She threw her hands into the air. “Then tell us what you do want.”
“I want respect. And an apology wouldn’t hurt,”
Dad sighed. “Cara, we have apologized, and frankly, you’re being?—”
“Being what, Dad?” I met his full-on stare with an accusing glare of my own, daring him to say out loud what I knew he was thinking, what both my parents had let slip on occasion over the years. “Being a flake? Being unserious? Being different from all of you like that’s some kind of sin? I want two things for Christmas.” I ticked them off on my fingers. “A true, heartfelt apology for all of it, not just today. And your respect. When you’re ready to give both of those things to me, you know my number.” I hugged Jake, picked up my purse and clothes bag, and walked to the front door.
My family seemed frozen in shock.
“But you won’t be able to reach me for a couple of days because my phone got smashed.” I stepped out the door, then back in. “And Merry Christmas. I love you.”
I was nearly to my rental car when Jake caught up with me. “Hey, Sis, I’m sorry about all of this. And I want you to know, I respect the hell out of you and your art.”
“Thanks, Jake.”
No one who shared my blood had ever said anything nice about my art before then. I blinked back tears.
“I’ll work on Mom and Dad,” Jake said softly. “You’re right. They owe you an apology, too. And you are the fucking prize.”
CHAPTER 23
NICK
Ispent half of Christmas Eve day in a reinforced underground bunker, wearing a bomb suit. Now I stared down at the odd 20 by 30 by 10 centimeter box made with military-grade plastic. It had projecting arms and a guidance system that made it clear it was a military drone. But it wasn’t one of ours and it had other hallmarks that made it different from anything I’d seen before. That’s why it had caused such a shitstorm when it had fallen into HEAT’s hands.
Worse, the fucking thing was built to stand on business. I’d disarmed three different booby-traps, two of which could have taken out me and possibly the HEAT team in the next room. Once I’d bypassed those tripwires, I’d been able to disassemble the weapon and get a good, long, look at the guts of it.
“Pasco was right,” I told the team through the speaker system, because they stood behind a steel wall fitted with a thick, triple-paned window. “It’s not Western technology.”
“Of course it’s not,” said Pasco, cocky as ever.
I held up the weapon so Lang and the others could see what I’d seen. “A lot of this is just standard technology configured in a different way. What I don’t like about it is the potential payload.” I turned it over and pointed to the exposed inner compartment. “It’s built to withstand a lot of toxic materials for at least some period of time. It could be used to disperse something chemical, biological, even radioactive.” I shook my head. “And there’s one configuration of wiring I don’t understand, but I suspect it could be used to cause a super-aerosolization event.”
A collective gasp came from the group watching me.
Yep, my reaction exactly. That, along with a whole pile offuck me.
One of the great limiting factors in deploying toxins capable of mass destruction was a way to efficiently distribute them. Any indication that our enemies were taking a step forward in that capability was cause for sounding multiple alarms. And for contacting multiple agencies whose top scientists were about to have their holiday vacations ruined.
Kat pressed her lips together and nodded. “I’ll send the bad news up the chain. Will you be ready to brief at 1400 hours?”
“Affirmative.”
“I’ll help set up the briefing slides,” Lang said. “Take a break, Roman, then meet me in the SCIF in fifteen,” he told me, referencing the area of the building set aside to do the highest level of classified work.
Hayes and Wheeler helped me out of my suit. Since they were the team members who spent the most time in the field running up against bad guys, they were as proficient at getting in and out of safety gear as I was.
When I was back in my civvies, Kat motioned for me to follow her. We took the elevator up to ground-level and went to her office, where she closed the door.
“Have a seat.” She sat in the chair beside me instead of moving behind the desk. “It’s been a whirlwind since we got you here, so I wanted to say I’m sorry things went sideways yesterday. You never should have been left finding your own way across the country. HEAT should have transported you ourselves, but other agencies inserted themselves into our process. X is taking it up with the leaders of the Senate subcommittee who provide oversight.”
X was the big boss, the founder of HEAT, and a woman to be reckoned with. I didn’t envy the senators who would be at the receiving end of her outrage over yesterday’s shitshow.
“I’m also sorry about Cara,” she continued. “About what happened to her, and about the fact that it seems like you two have gone your separate ways.”
“Kat, I’ve always liked and respected you, which is why I’m going to warn you, you’re treading on dangerous ground.”
