AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She understood that this awful reaction was a long time in the making, but it took this man, thisAmericanwhom she hadn’t trusted to bring her up from the depths of her tangled mess of emotions and thoughts.
It was as if everything was hitting her at once, sending her whole body into shock. The two years of trying with all her might to bury everything she’d experienced and lived during the harrowing evacuation, the resentment, blame, and disgust with the United States handling of the situation, the inability to save her interpreter, even as he risked his life for her, the growing dissatisfaction of how she’d been raised, the exclusion of all of the history of her Torres Strait identity, the emotional jolt of meeting Kodiak and having him delve inside her psyche and her heart, getting her to release all the pain and emotions clogging her system, ruining her liaison with the special ops team and putting her job in jeopardy, fucking up this whole thing with Mickey. But instead of getting angry, instead of blaming her, and chastising her, he’d wanted to know why.
His phone chimed, and she went to move away, but he took her hand and placed her palm over his heart, then he pulled out his cell. He stared at it for a moment then frowned.
“What is it?” she asked with a husky touch to her voice.
“A confusing text from…ah…an important inside source against NSH.”
“What does it say?”
“Alice.”
She frowned. “That’s it? Just Alice?”
“Yeah. She’s been…damaged and trying her best to get the information she knows to us.”
“Damaged? You mean injured.”
“Yeah, sort of.”
She gave him a confused look, but he didn’t follow up with any explanation. “But Alice, that’s so cryptic. There’s Alice Springs. Do you think that’s what your informant meant?”
“I doubt it, but we should get back to work.”
“Yes, you’re right.”
There was a slight softening in his eyes when he spoke, his voice gruff, “You have to let go before we can move.”
She laughed softly and it felt good. “Right-o, mate. That is a prerequisite.”
“Don’t get me wrong. I like it.” He chuckled, then sobered, reaching for her wrist before she got too far away from him, drawing her back to face him. “Look, I want…need to talk to you more about this whole thing. I want to share my experiences, and I want to know more about yours, but at this point, we do have to get back to work.”
His frankness touched a disturbingly responsive chord in her, and she found she hungered for more discussion. She felt the same way, her whole being needing to dissect everything with the hope of getting closure. It felt like the best step forward since she’d left Afghanistan and resumed her life in Sydney. “How about you come over and cook me somechow chow. I haven’t ever met anyone who was there at the same time I was. I need to talk, too. It’s all been so bottled up inside me, and I’m a bit ashamed of how I treated you all. It wasn’t fair to lump you all together.”
“Dinner and conversation sounds good. As soon as we have a break.” He let her wrist go and started for the door. “Don’t beat yourself up. Everyone has a reason for their actions.” He gestured for her to go through before him, then followed her out. “Now, what is it about Mickey that got your antennae up?”
She told him about the incident, and what had happened. It got her senses tingling all over again. “It’s one of those odd things I was telling you about. It’s out of the ordinary.”
“Two thugs chasing a homeless man?”
“Yes, Mickey said he had no contacts with Lenny.”
“Who’s this Lenny?”
“Lenny Cox.” Her face screwed up into a mask of distaste. “He’s the scum of the earth—drugs, bookies, extortion, and prostitution.”
“You think he sent his goons after this homeless man?—”
“Archie.”
“—Archie for a snatch and grab? Why would they want him?”
“The only thing I can think of is…leverage.”
“Hmmm, yeah. I’m getting your drift. Okay,” he said as they came up to the door where Mickey was cooling his heels, nodding to the officer guarding the door. “Let’s see what Mickey knows.”
It surprised her, the sudden feeling of absolute ease she had with him now. He had never given her any reason to doubt him, and she had to acknowledge that now or it wouldn’t be at all fair to him. She held his gaze for an instant, finding something strong and steady in the dark brown depths. Then she looked down and had to take a deep breath.
