“I feel like I’ve known you your entire life,” Jack said, rocking back forth as if he belonged on this porch more than she did. Perhaps that was true—at one time. “When Slade and I first thought this was only gonna last a few years, he’d come visit, and he’d bring pictures of you. It was hard because I missed Trent so much it hurt, but boy, did Slade think the world of you.
Her eyes burned, but she wouldn’t let the emotion that bubbled from her gut escape. She needed to remain detached. To be the person the Army had trained her to be for just a little while longer. “I have a million things I need answered,” she started. “But why don’t we start with why you had to stay dead for twenty years. And tell me why my uncle died protecting that secret."
Jack set his glass down and looked at the space between the table and the railing. "None of this was supposed to happen." His voice was low and weighted. "It was supposed to be temporary."
Dove shifted in her chair. "Mr. Mallor?—"
“It’s Jack.”
“Okay. Jack.” She pressed her palms flat on her thighs. "With respect, I have heard a version of that sentence from men in positions of power my entire career and it has never once made me feel better about what came after it. So I'm going to need you to skip to the part where you actually tell us what happened."
Trent reached over and took her hand. “I’ve been listening to people give us the runaround for a few days now. I’m with her on this.”
Jack looked at his son for a moment, then sat forward and rested his arms on his knees. "When the case against Edward Kirk and Armond Jackson fell apart and Slade found out about the hit on my life, he had less than a day to figure out what to do.” Jack laced his fingers together. "He made a decision. He believed—and I believed—that he could fake my death, keep me out of sight, and use the time to find what the prosecution couldn't. The evidence that would actually stick." He leaned back, snagged his drink, and took a sip. "He knew the ME. Knew what the man would do for the right price. So we used him."
“Do I even want to know how he knew that?” Dove had always admired her uncle. He was smart, and she knew he’d sometimes skirted the rules, but that was a bit of a workaround.
“He didn’t give me the details, and honestly, I didn’t ask,” Jack said. "Gulf Coast collapsed. Kirk walked away. And everything Slade tried to find turned out to be dead ends.” He raised his glass before tipping back his head and tossing back the last few drops. "You can't bring a dead man back to life with nothing to show for it. And trust me, we argued about this for days, weeks, years. I wanted to come home. I wanted to see my boy graduate from high school. See him grow into a man. Be with the only woman I've ever loved. But as time went on, that became harder and harder for a lot of reasons."
"I have questions about all that." Trent traced a slow line across Dove's knuckles, back and forth, like he was keeping time. “But right now, I want to hear about Dutton.”
“He was a young kid when I went to testify, and I barely spent any time with him. Wasn’t even on our radar when we faked my death,” Jack said. “But about five years ago. When we learned about his relationship with Courtney," Jack set the glass down. "That's when things started to shift. Courtney had built a practice in Tallahassee defending criminals, and those assholes needed evidence to disappear. She found a way to do that through Sovereign Resources." He stood, moved toward the railing, and glanced out at the water. "Legitimate mining operation on paper. But if you needed something gone—documents, physical evidence, bodies—Sovereign had the infrastructure. The equipment. The reach. A concierge service for anyone with enough money."
"We know all of that," Trent said. “Why can’t anyone take them down?”
Jack leaned against the railing and folded his arms. "It took years to gather what we did, and most of it wasn’t enough to build a case. It wouldn't have needed a fire, a dead witness, or another to recant their testimony for it to fall apart.”
"So what changed?" Trent asked. "What made you come forward now?"
“Slade was close," Jack said. "Closer than he'd ever been. He had pieces that were finally, after twenty years, pointing to the same place. And then they started moving into this town. On this land." His hands tightened on the railing. "That's when I knew we were out of time."
“I still don’t understand why now. Why not eight years ago? Or twelve?” Trent's voice had changed. Still controlled, but underneath the strength he always carried, no matter what was going on, a little boy lingered, and Dove wasn’t sure the man could hold on. "Twenty years, Dad. Mom spent twenty years?—"
“You think I don’t know that?” Jack pounded his chest. “You think that it didn’t chip away at me, too?”
“I’m just trying to understand,” Trent said softly.
Jack sighed, as if he resigned himself to something. “Shortly before I agreed to let Jack fake my death, they threatened my family." Jack turned from the railing. He looked at Trent straight, the way Dove had noticed he did when the thing he was saying cost him. “I had to protect you and your mother and WITSEC wasn’t an option. Not when the case was already falling apart.” Jack spoke so fast, and his voice cracked on each word. "And then it became about protecting Slade’s career. The only person we had on the inside who could still move, still access information, still build a case." He looked at his hands. "And then years went by. And they kept going by. There was nothing I could do but stay dead. If I came out of the shadows, there would have been consequences. Legal ones. I couldn’t do that to you. Or your mother.”
The porch was quiet except for the frogs, the water, and the low hum of the night.
"At some point," Jack said quietly, "a temporary decision becomes the only life you have left."
Dove had been watching Trent's face. Somewhere behind his clenched jaw, rage, frustration, grief, gave way to something deeper. Something truer. Something that two men who obviously loved each other still could build on.
Her heart dropped to her gut. She’d never have that with her uncle again. He was dead. Gone forever. A sudden need to call her parents filled her soul.
Jack rubbed his face with his palms. “Last year, things started to heat up. We had more and more information, but still no proof. And then Dove here left the Army, and both Slade and I worried about Trent and Linda.”
“Excuse me?” Dove stared at Jack.
“Slade knew you were hurting and thought the Aegis Network would be a good fit for you and even better if you were down here and?—”
"I was recruited," she interrupted Jack. "I was told I was hand-picked. That Buddy had specifically identified me as someone who?—"
"Buddy did pick you," Jack said. "That part is true. Your record spoke for itself. Your skills. The work you'd done." He held her gaze. "But Slade may have put the idea in Buddy's ear first. And in the owners’.”
The words landed like someone dropped a twenty-pound sledge on her head.
