Navy Justice (Whidbey Island, Book 5) Page 7

“I’m sorry, Joy. I guess I needed to blow off some steam with a good laugh.”

  “Glad I could help. Now that it’s out of your system, how about refocusing and going over what you know?”

  The thought of a bomb or a missile hitting either of the bases on Whidbey and injuring innocent civilians as well as Navy personnel stoked the fire that’d fueled the most fundamental reasons Joy had joined the military. She’d wanted to serve her country, protect its citizens and help defeat the bad guy wherever and whenever possible.

  “Joy, you know I can’t tell you any of that.”

  “You can’t tell me details, fine. But you can list who you’ve been targeting. No names—just call them persons A, B, C, whatever. I just need a timeline.”

  “I realize now it was a cell of four, three since this morning’s events. I think one of them is a veteran, unfortunately. Army.”

  “I hadn’t even thought of it being another vet.” She should have, though. The horrors of war were enough to make the most stable, honest human being turn to alcohol, drugs and worse. Mental illness rates among war vets were skyrocketing, and the VA Hospitals overflowed with PTSD patients.

  “It’s not anyone I ever worked with, not former Navy or Marine. The guy was in the Army and saw several people in his unit killed or injured by an IED. Based on what I’ve seen of him, he probably has TBI.”

  Traumatic Brain Injury. “That’s rough.”

  “I’ve met all three players in this local cell face-to-face. The shooter is the first one I didn’t know. The cell’s small, and they’re not the type who have the months of training by al Qaeda or ISIL behind them. They’re homegrown terrorists who want some kind of vengeance because they feel the US Military wronged them—or the cause they’ve been associated with online.”

  “Only one of the three you know personally is a veteran?”

  “Yes. There’s one guy who acts like he has ties to another suspect, but I don’t have anything solid there. Look, you have to trust me. I know my job, Joy.”

  “If you know it so well, why are you here asking me for help? Asking me to put my honorable discharge on the line, not to mention my new civilian job? A job, by the way, that wasn’t easy to land?”

  “Because I need your help. I can’t say it any more clearly. I can’t do this alone. If these lowlifes have somehow hooked up with the worst of the bad guys from overseas, they have to be stopped more than ever. I promise you, you’ll come out a hero when all’s said and done.”

  “I’m no hero, Brad, nor am I interested in being one. I’m a lawyer. A civilian lawyer. Maybe you just should’ve taken them out with your SEAL methods.”

  He grunted. “Trust me, it crossed my mind. But a SEAL’s trained to take out the enemy on foreign soil. Not civilians in American territory. As an FBI agent, I have to play by the rules, too. And there’s more—don’t ask me for details here. The longer I track them, the more Intel we get, and the better our odds of finding how and what they’re communicating with the overseas operatives. How they got hold of a surface-to-air missile, for instance. Plus, the likelihood that they’re going to slip up increases with each hour I remain undercover. These seemingly loner operatives could help us blow open a much larger network.”

  She leaned back in her chair. It was mind-boggling to consider how much the FBI and other LEAs did to keep the country safe on a daily basis.

  Her task was much simpler.

  “Tell me about your boss.”

  “Mike Rubio. You met him briefly during the Norfolk trial. He was the officer in charge of my SEAL team. We’ve worked together for almost two decades.”

  “And yet you have no way to contact him other than through official channels? I’m not getting this, Brad. You have to have someone to reach out to. And won’t he be worried about you?”

  “He might be, but we’ve been through worse. I already told you. I can’t make a move until I know where the cell is and what they’re up to. Or if my team’s narrowed in on them or even taken them out by now. That might not show up in the press right away.”

  “Yeah, I know.” So many Navy cases had initially attracted media attention, but after it was determined that it would be in the nation’s best interests to keep the facts classified, reporters had been notified and the cases left to die a quiet media death.

  “Do you think Mike’s looking for you?”

  “I’m sure he is.”

  She knew that Mike was like family to Brad. It was the SEAL bond.

  “I understand, but you don’t have to be a SEAL to understand that you share deep bonds with your teammates.”

  His teammates. Afghanistan.

  He nodded.

  “The overseas operatives you mentioned, the terrorists—you had something to do with targeting them downrange, didn’t you?”

  Admiration flashed in his eyes a second before his expression returned to its battle-hardened mode. “That’s classified. But yes, I may have a connection, or a personal interest if you will, with the bad guys driving these domestics to commit terrorism.”

  She wanted to push him on this, to find out more. If he’d been on a witness stand, she would have. But he was in her living room, and she knew he’d shut down completely if she got too close to the truth.

  He thought he was protecting her, no doubt.

  “It must be hard to have left the Navy, only to find the same bad guys are wreaking havoc in your own country.”

  “Yeah, it’s not pleasant. But at least I know who I’m dealing with.” He stared down at his clasped hands.

  A moment later he looked up at her again. “It’s a kick in the gonads that we didn’t take care of them all during the war. I thought we had, on several occasions, but this particular group is like a hydra.”

  “That’s their basic structure, isn’t it? The sleeper cells exist to become operative and go live just when they seem to be eradicated.”

  “Yup.”

  He stood up and started to pace. “I feel bad telling you all this, but since it’ll help you find the information I need...” He turned to her, his gaze searching for something she didn’t understand.

  Or didn’t want to.

  “If I’d overlooked anything during our debriefs, one of the other guys would have spoken up. Same goes for Mike. I’ve often seen things he missed. That’s the point of the debrief and operations report. Everything of consequence, and a lot of extra stuff no one ever uses again, is in those reports. I’m telling you, Joy, any leads from our contacts downrange have been thoroughly exhausted by now.”

  “Hmm.” She’d read some of the reports from the raids on Farid’s village. Even with her need-to-know status as a JAG, she’d come across several places in the reports that had been sanitized for the legal proceedings. The lines blacked out by a Sharpie had troubled her then and troubled her now. Was the answer to the cell’s motives in those lines?

  “Spit it out, Joy.” She loved the way they’d slipped back into their easy working relationship. They’d worked well together and shared similar views on world events. And Navy justice.

  She’d left her sexual fantasies about him to her imagination, however. But after being kissed by Brad tonight, she couldn’t control her desires anymore. His touch had broken her carefully constructed dam against unwanted emotions.

  Leave it alone.

  She couldn’t relive that kiss, not now.

  “I hate to say this, but unless you can come up with something more specific, we’re going to have to wait on the files. Once I get a good look at them, I might be able to piece together some kind of scenario. I don’t suppose we can go talk to Grimes in person?”

  He shook his head. “Not yet. I’m not ruling it out, but it’s better if we lie low for now.”

  Joy sat up straight.

  He’d said we.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “I’M NOT ONE for drinking during the workweek but today feels like it’s been three weeks in twelve hours.”

  She refilled their wineglasses a
nd pushed Brad’s toward him. Thankfully, he seemed a little more relaxed.

  “Believe me, this isn’t the way I planned to meet you again.”

  “Really? You planned to meet me again?” Intrigued, she sat back down across the table from him. Ignored the flip-flop of her stomach at his admission. He didn’t mean it the way she wanted him to. Did he?

  He turned his glass between very capable fingers, swirling the wine. It’d been such a brief moment, that kiss earlier. Yet she’d stored away the memory of how wonderful his fingers had felt as he caressed her face, ran them through her hair, stroked the nape of her neck.

  “I resisted looking you up for a long time, Joy. In case you haven’t figured it out, I’m a damned mess. Before Marci, I’d never had a relationship that lasted more than six months. Marci and I lasted longer and even got engaged only because I was out of the country for three quarters of our time together. I’m not a good roommate.”

  “Oh?”

  “I’ve been on my own for too many years. I’m trained to be a nomad, rootless.” His eyes sparkled in the candlelight. She was glad she’d lit the table votive as the blue glass sent a soothing reflection across the burnished oak. Like the water of Puget Sound in the morning.

  Before she’d witnessed the explosion.

  “All of us in the Navy feel like nomads. There’s no crime in wanting to keep moving around.” It had grown old for her, but she’d done it as a kid, too.

  “Did you move when you were a kid?” she asked.

  He looked surprised at the question. “No. I grew up in a big rambling suburban house with four siblings. They’ve all become doctors like my parents. I’m the only exception. You?”

  “We moved a lot. I have one brother, who’s a diplomat like my parents. Mom and Dad are in Paris, Tommy and his wife, Elaine, are in Djibouti.” She took a sip of her wine and choked on it. Coughing, she put the glass down.

  “Don’t feel obligated to drink with me.” There was humor in his tone.

  “It’s just that I’m more of a hot tea girl this late.”

  He nodded. “So you moved a lot when you were young?”

  “Yes. All over the world. Going to the Naval Academy seemed a natural fit for me, since I didn’t want to do the exact same thing my parents had, but I wanted to serve. I went to law school after my first tour and I never looked back. Until...”

  “Until?”

  “Farid. That case was the hardest I’ve ever had. If you hadn’t been so solid in your testimony, Farid might have faced the death penalty for something he didn’t do.” She shuddered.

  “He’s innocent, Joy. You still believe it, don’t you?”

  “I do. But you have to admit, it would’ve been easy to think he wasn’t. And now, with this incident, it’d be handy for the international terrorists if they had an agent already in-country. To a lot of people, it might seem reasonable to think Farid’s the one calling the shots. Or if not him, someone he’s connected to. If these local terrorists were at all suspicious of you, they could’ve shared your photo with their contacts. Farid would recognize you anywhere. How do you know, in fact, that they don’t have their aim on you?”

  “It’s too convenient. Of course, the bad guys would use him, or me, as a fall guy if they could. But Farid’s not even ‘Farid’ any longer. He’s in WSP, as you undoubtedly remember. And no one, other than my colleagues and SEAL team, knows I went FBI.” Farid had been placed in the Witness Security Program and lived quietly somewhere as an American citizen.

  “I’m sure you’re right. But I have to cover all the angles.”

  His sigh reached out across the table and she wanted to comfort him, hold him, reassure him.

  But she couldn’t even reassure herself that this would all turn out okay.

  “The war trials put you off the Navy life, then.”

  She shook her head. “No, no, not the Navy life, per se. I just had a come-to-Jesus moment where I had to face certain facts. I’d been dreaming of settling down for years. I didn’t have anyone to settle down with, so I had to find a place I could call home.”

  “Weren’t you ever afraid you’d be sorry after you got out? That you’d have regrets? Do you?”

  “Not at all. I can always go into the Foreign Service as a counselor, or work for a firm overseas if I’m so inclined. We never know what the future holds, but I’ve been the happiest and most at ease since I bought this house and started a new life for myself here. It might sound fanciful, but Whidbey Island has woven its magic around me.”

  “And that includes knitting. I noticed some projects and yarn in a basket by the fireplace. I don’t recall you showing a crafty side when we worked together, though.”

  “I don’t just knit. I’m interested in community theater, too, but there wasn’t any opportunity for acting in the Navy. Knitting can travel with me anywhere. I even knitted in Gitmo and on the carrier—in my room with the door closed. I wasn’t about to share my creative escape with the other officers.”

  “I don’t blame you.” He leaned forward on the table and took her hands in his. She trembled at how quickly the warmth ran up her arms and made her face feel hot. Her nipples tightened in arousal, and she was completely focused on Brad. “Listen to me, Joy.” As if he knew she was fantasizing about him.

  “I’m all ears.”

  “I wanted to come and find you, ask you out. It’s something I thought long and hard about. When I got transferred to the Seattle office, I looked you up and saw that you were still assigned to Whidbey. I’d hoped to wrap this case up on Monday or by the end of this week at the latest, and then...”

  “Then what?”

  “I would’ve called you, asked how you were, asked if you were involved with anyone.” He took a deep breath. “Then I’d have invited you out, picked you up and taken you to a waterfront restaurant. Talked for hours. Caught up, allowed you to see the side of me you never got to know.”

  “What held you back? Marci’s death?”

  “Isn’t that enough, Joy? I couldn’t try to start a new relationship with so much baggage. I didn’t think I was still in anyone’s crosshairs. Apparently, I may be.”

  He released her hands and sat back in his chair.

  “Brad?”

  “Yeah?”

  “The answers are no and yes.”

  It was her turn to show him her other side.

  * * *

  THE SPARK IN Joy’s eyes scared Brad more than any inbound missile or bullet ever had. He had to make sure Joy didn’t take anything he’d said the wrong way.

  “I told you this so you’d know I didn’t forget you, Joy. But I’m a lousy bet for a relationship. I could never bring you into the mess that’s my personal life. And I never took you for the casual dating type.”

  The spark died a quick death.

  “Apparently, FBI agents get trained in playing God. Anything else you want to tell me about myself?”

  “You’re right. I’m an ass.”

  “That’s about you, not me.”

  Her strength of character was what had drawn him to her on a deeper level than her sexy looks. She’d never been afraid of him, or afraid of challenging his convictions. Joy’s trust cracked open a door in his heart he’d thought forever sealed by years of ops and a nomadic existence.

  “Joy, why have you trusted me? I didn’t seek you out sooner, I busted my way in here and now I’m screwing up your first week at your new job.”

  “Shouldn’t I trust you?”

  “Touché.”

  She broke eye contact with him and looked away. “Timing’s everything. It’s pretty clear to me that we’re not meant to be more than friends or colleagues. I’m grateful I’m still in a position, of sorts, to help you with your mission. On the personal front, well, let’s just say I’m in the market for stability. No offense, but former SEAL current FBI agent doesn’t fit the job description.”

  He couldn’t keep from laughing and, after a pause, she joined in. Her eyes sparkled as her
face relaxed into a wide smile. This was how it would be if they’d met as two normal people. No missions or cases preventing them from enjoying their time together.

  He made another silent vow that he wouldn’t let any harm come to her.

  “I’m not expecting this to get drastic, Joy. In a few days I’ll have these bastards under lock and key, and the system will take care of the rest. But if there’s even a hint that it’s going south, I might have to ask you to come with me. To take off.”

  “Please. You’re being dramatic again.”

  He heard the sadness in her voice. If he didn’t have to worry about innocent civilians being put at risk, he’d turn himself in now to get her out of potential trouble and leave her to the life she’d worked so hard to achieve.

  “Maybe I am.”

  “How much do you trust your boss?”

  “With my life. Mike’s not the bad guy here, Joy.”

  “But you said you can’t trust anyone.”

  “What are you suggesting? It’s not him, Joy.”

  “How do you know that? How close have you been since you started working for him at the Bureau?”

  Her questions were spot-on, and the pounding in his temples began again. No amount of alcohol was going to dull the pain of the thought of betrayal, no matter how ludicrous.

  “It’s not him,” he insisted.

  “If you’re sure, then I accept that.” But she didn’t look convinced.

  “You know what I think, Joy? I think you watch too many damn TV shows. Not everyone’s a bad guy. I’m as aware as you are that some of our people have turned. But no one I’ve worked with has.”

  “We need a break. Our brains need a chance to process all this.” She stood up and stretched. He let himself stare at her body as she reached above her head, her snug yoga pants and T-shirt leaving little to the imagination.

  “I’ll take the sofa.” He wasn’t planning to be anywhere but right by the front door, and within earshot of the kitchen side door.

  “You’ll never be able to rest.”

  “One of us needs to stand watch.”

  “I’ll do it. You can sleep in my room and I’ll stay out here.”