“Anything unusual while I was gone?” I ask once we’re upstairs. Dumping my bag next to the couch, I drop into the worn cushions. Scooby immediately plops his giant head into my lap, and I give him a good scratch before sending him to lie on his bed. I hate to say it, but the big goof is growing on me. I like the idea of Charlie having him around as an extra layer of protection, even if he seems pretty useless as a guard dog. He might not attack an intruder, but maybe he’ll take him out at the knees in his excitement, giving hisowner a chance to escape. Sometimes, a few extra seconds are all you need.
“I would’ve called if anything was amiss. Water?”
I give her a nod and watch her cross the room to retrieve a couple of bottles from the fridge. She’s changed into something more comfortable. Some type of oversized T-shirt that hangs off one shoulder and teases me with the barest hint of her cleavage. She’s wearing a pair of leggings that hug her curves, and I scrub both hands over my face to keep myself from ogling. Her feet are bare, her toenails painted a bright pink, and somehow that only makes her more endearing. Her hair is pulled up into her trademark messy bun that may look like a complicated updo, but probably only takes her a few seconds to secure. A few loose tendrils frame her freckled face, and the urge to pull her to me, hug her close, and assure myself that she’s okay is so strong it’s unsettling.
“Have you eaten?” she asks, thrusting the flimsy plastic bottle in my face before she drops down on the other end of the sofa, drawing her knees into her chest and leaving about a foot of space between us.
“I had a quick grilled cheese. I’m not too hungry right now.”
“Let me know if that changes. I made stew earlier, and there’s plenty of leftovers.”
“Thanks,” I say before we both fall silent, glancing at each other every so often while we sip our waters.
“So, are you going to tell me, or are we going to act like you didn’t say what you said and watch a movie instead. Because I’m good either way, but I won’t pretend I haven’t been thinking about what happened to your wife.”
I cup the back of my neck and consider taking the easy way out by asking her what type of movies she’s into, but I’ve never been a coward. I opened Pandora’s box when I told her about my wife’s passing, and, deep down, I think I did it because I want her to know.
“Elena and I got married young,” I begin, and don’t miss the way she immediately sits up a little straighter, leaning in like she can’t believe I’m actually going to talk about myself, and doesn’t want to miss a single thing.
“We met in the group home I got dumped in when the state got tired of moving me around foster homes because of mybehavioral problems.” I curl my fingers into quotation marks, rolling my eyes to make it clear what I think of the description. “They liked to call me difficult. I call it refusing to lie down and letting my foster fathers wail on me without at least trying to defend myself, but that’s neither here nor there.”
I fiddle with the cap of my water bottle, keeping my eyes on the mundane task so I won’t have to see the inevitable look of pity on her face before I forge on.
“Ultimately, it worked out in my favor because I much preferred the group home. It was there that I met my best friend Maddox. We bonded quickly—pretty much became inseparable—before he introduced me to Elena. I fell for her hard and fast, and we became quite dependent on each other during our stay at the home. I knew the moment we met she was my forever,” I say, and glance at Charlie just in time to watch her eyes soften at the admission. “I married her straight out of college and loved every second of our life together. Sure, we had our ups and downs, mostly due to the dangers of my profession,” I say and blow out a heavy breath when Charlie quirks a questioning brow. “She didn’t love that my undercover work took me away from her for weeks, sometimes months at a time, but we made it work. When she told me she was pregnant with our first child, I was ecstatic, and doting on our daughter became the highlight of my days. But when Emily had just turned two, I was assigned one of my biggest cases yet. A major milestone for my career. One that would take me deep into the underbelly of a well-known criminal organization. My handler suggested me as the primary agent due to my heritage and the fact that I was fluent in Spanish. I talked to my wife, because itwould once again take me away from my family for an unknown amount of time with little to no contact. In the end, she knew how important it was to me to help take that piece of shit down, so she encouraged me to go for it. Which is how I ended up working for a man called Mateo Gonzalez.”
“The name sounds familiar,” she tells me with a thoughtful expression. “Wasn’t he a well-known arms dealer? His death was all over the news a few months ago, if I remember correctly.”
“That’s the one. Even though the weapons weren’t my primary focus at the time. I was more interested in his son’s little human trafficking side hustle,” I tell her, as the old familiar hatred begins to flare in my chest.
“Anyway, I was with Mateo for about eight months. Started at a low-level position and quickly worked my way up the ranks. Became pretty close with his son, Carlos. I proved myself to him enough times—thanks to the bureau feeding me intel—that he began to trust me, and I was this close to busting his operation wide open.”
Holding my thumb and forefinger about an inch apart, I shake my head with regret, remembering the day everything came crashing down around me.
“But then shit went sideways, my cover was almost blown, and my superiors decided it was time to pull me. I argued at first, butthe need to keep my wife and little girl safe eventually made me see reason. A few months later, an informant gave me the date and coordinates for a major exchange. We’re talking truckloads of women and children. We geared up and raided the warehouses. Gunfire was exchanged, and lives were lost on both sides, including Carlos’s. I didn’t mean to kill him. He was a sick fuck. The scum of the earth. A vicious killer who took pleasure in raping and torturing the innocent. I wanted him to rot in a jail cell for the rest of his miserable life, but he pulled a gun on one of my team members, and I didn’t have a choice. About two weeks later, I’m walking out of our favorite Chinese place when my cell phone rings. Elena hadn’t been feeling well, and I told her I’d take care of dinner, so she could get some extra rest…”
I pause, swallowing around the lump in my throat and bracing myself for this next part.
“I glance at the screen, instantly suspicious when I see it’s an unknown number. I pick up, but don’t say anything, waiting for whoever’s on the other end to reveal their identity first. When he finally spoke, I’m sure all the color leeched from my face.”
Immediately, I’m transported back to the exact moment my hand tightened around the device, squeezing so hard I’m still surprised the screen didn’t crack.
“Hello, Alex. Or should I say Special Agent Foster?” The heavily accented voice cuts through the whooshing sound in my head, and I almost drop the bag clutched to my chest.
The leader of a notorious cartel calling me by my real name is bad fucking news, and I make sure my voice is firm when I say, “How did you get this number?”
“Does it matter? We both have a lot of resources at our disposal, Agent. It doesn’t matter how I came across the information. What you should be more concerned about is what I can do with it.”
“What do you want?” I ask, already pulling away from the curb. Hitting the speaker button, I run a trembling hand through my sweat-soaked hair as I wait for Mateo’s chilling voice to fill the truck’s cabin.
“Revenge,” he says simply, and I swallow the ball of dread in my throat before it settles like a heavy boulder in my gut.
“An eye for an eye, Agent. You took my son from me. The only person I ever truly loved, and now you’re going to find out what that feels like. I’ve decided to let you live with that agony for a while before I eventually come for you and end your misery. But first, I want to watch you suffer the way I’ve been suffering since you took my boy. Run along now, Cole. Your family is waiting for you.”
The click of the call ending is deafening as I gun the engine and race toward home like a madman. Ignoring the various red lightsand stop signs along the way, I almost cause an accident, but I don’t care. My heart is pounding so hard I can feel it in my temples. Palms are slick on the steering wheel. Nausea twists my gut into painful knots.Please, God. Please, let them be okay. I’m still praying when I come to a screeching halt in my driveway. I don’t bother turning off the engine, leaving the car door wide open as I sprint to the front door and throw it wide.
I haven’t yet gotten to the kitchen, but I already know. I can feel it. The absence of life in a home that’s always felt warm and welcoming. Rounding the corner, I stop short, a noise that doesn’t sound human spilling from my lips when I spot the bodies sprawled out on the cold, hard tile. My legs no longer support me, and I collapse, sinking to the floor beside them. My blurry gaze locks on the unseeing eyes of the woman I love. She’s cradling our daughter to her side as if her last moments were spent trying to shield her from harm. Both of my reasons to live, forever gone from this world. Because of me.
A choked sound escapes, and I force myself to meet Charlie’s glassy-eyed gaze. “He killed them,” I tell her in a raw whisper. “Gunned them down like a couple of dogs in their own damn home. I know in my heart, Elena did everything in her power to protect our daughter, but they never stood a chance against a trained assassin. They took my wife and daughter. My little girl.” My voice hitches, and I suck in a gulping breath to regain control. “She was just a baby. Only three years old. God, you should’ve seen her,” I say around a wobbly smile. “She was the cutest little thing you ever saw. She had these wild corkscrew locks that bounced every time she moved, and these huge, blue eyes that always held so much affection for everyone she came into contact with. An infectious smile that lit up her whole face, and a belly laugh that always turned my day around, no matter how shitty it may have been. I was her hero, and I let her down. I couldn’t protect her when it mattered most, and I hate that her last moments were spent in terror. Watching her mother being murdered right in front of her. Staring down the barrel of some stranger’s gun. I’ll never forgive myself for putting them in that situation.”
