AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I look up at Dana, and she’s just staring now, her eyebrows knitted together.
Shaking the notebook at her, my calm control abandons me. “This is Jessa’s handwriting. What is this?”
She stares at me closely for the first time since I saw her at the farmhouse. Slowly, her demeanor changes, and anger replaces her fear.
“You know she looked for you. She never stopped looking for you until Maxwell took her.” She stands up and steps away from her chair, placing it in between us to give herself some space. “She loved you Jack, and she left town to protect all of us. She came back looking for you. She searched everywhere, but you vanished. It’s like you were a ghost. You and your dad.”
I wince.
He wasn’t my dad.
He was my commanding officer.
We were playing a part.
I lied to Jessa, and she came back looking for that lie.
“Then, when she came back from wherever Maxwell had her, she said it was time to move on. She said she saw your pictures. You—married. She said your wife was stunning. Two beautiful boys. Such a happy family.” Her anger for her friend’s sadness is evident in her sour tone. “Living the glamorous life as a fucking accountant. She said Maxwell warned her to let you go. To never search for you again. He said if he found out she ever looked for you, even once, he would make you watch as he killed your entire family before he put a bullet in your head.”
My limbs turn heavy. I drop the notebook on the table and take a step back.
How could I not consider her? I loved her more than anything, and her loss almost killed me.
All expression drops from my face, but that only angers Dana further. Her dedication to her best friend is impressive, and she’s not ready to back down just yet.
“So she did what she always does. She protected you and stopped looking. She never spoke your name again, but she never stopped thinking about you. It consumed her. I suggested she write your name down on a piece of paper when you crossed her mind, just to get it out of her head. Then she could burn the paper and try to heal.”
She shifts her eyes from mine to the bag, and tears begin to roll down her face again. “Pieces of paper became full sheets; then they became notebooks. When she filled enough of them, she would burn them. She writes your name down every time she thinks about you.”
The scope of Jessa’s feelings hits me like a bolt of lightning. Day after day, I crossed her mind. I let her memory go a few years ago because I couldn’t find her. She couldn’t find me either, but she never stopped thinking about me. Even after she was told I had moved on.
She has been left on her own, to fend for herself, to rescue herself, and she survived. She compartmentalized thoughts of me into little notebooks and kept putting one foot in front of the other so she could live another day. She believed I had simply moved on to live a happy life with a family of my own.
Not only that, but she did everything she could to protect what she thought I loved. She stopped looking for me to protect my children—children who don’t even exist. Children who should have been hers.
“How long?” My throat is dry.
“What?”
“How long has she been doing this?” I run my finger along the seam of the notebook and ask quietly.
Her tone softens to match mine. “Since about a month after she came back to me, well over six years ago.”
The room is silent, and Logan hasn’t moved from his spot.
I need to see her now, but I know Logan won’t be happy if I leave him standing here empty-handed.
“Why are they working with Maxwell, Dana?” My question sounds more like a plea.
She takes a breath and looks between me and Logan, trying to decide if she should trust either of us.
She knows who really wants her answer, so she looks at Logan when she speaks. “I don’t know for sure. I know she was keeping things from me, and I know it was to keep me safe. The safety and anonymity of everyone who works under Zane is top priority—but I have a theory.”
A sliver of Logan’s kindness returns to him, and he motions for her to take her seat again. Then he sits across from her and lets her speak.
“I think she and Zane are trying to figure out a way to bring Maxwell’s organization down from the inside. All of it. Not temporarily disable him. I think they are working to take everything out. We will never be free from him unless he’s completely annihilated. I know she is compiling information for Zane—folders, evidence—and she has been running simulations with him on a program they were working on, but it isn’t one they’ve ever used for Maxwell or any other job.”
“What program?” In spite of his eagerness to obtain any information he can, Logan maintains a calm, curious tone.
