Page 16 of The Woman Left Behind

“The mall.”

He muttered a few more cuss words. “Because it never occurred to you to ask us where to get boots that fit, huh?”

She bristled up at him again. Even though they were sitting side by side, the top of her head barely came to his chin, but that didn’t stop her. She had no common sense, he thought; most men wouldn’t cross him, but she didn’t hesitate. But maybe she sensed he’d rather break his own hands than hurt her. No, that wasn’t it, because she fired up at all the other guys, too, and as far as he knew none of them were tied up in knots over her.

“A: Y’all were gone. B: I needed them fast. Running in sneakers was hell, with sand getting inside them. C: I was too tired at the end of the day to do much more than eat a sandwich and take a shower. I found what I could find as fast as I could find it.” She bit the words off, clipping each sound with an audible snap of her teeth.

He could chew her out, argue with her, or just cut bait and move on. He decided on the latter, because she’d argue until nightfall. “All right. I’ll find you some boots that fit. In the future, damn it,tell meif you have a problem. I’m not a fucking mind reader.” Again that uncomfortable awareness at his word choice zinged through him. Fuck, was he going to have to stop sayingfuck?

“Yes, sir,” she said so flatly he knew he’d be lucky if she so much as asked him what time it was.

He scrubbed his hand over his face and blew out a frustrated breath. “I don’t know how much good it did to put those bandages on your feet when you have to put those wet socks back on, but it’s either that or I carry you to the pickup point. Boom should be there soon.”

She muttered something that sounded like “cold day in hell,” but it was enough under her breath that he didn’t push her on it. Instead she picked up the socks and began working them on her feet. After packing the pieces of foam inside the socks, around her heels, she gingerly tugged on her boots and stood. She made a face. “Not great, but I can walk. It’s better than before.” Then she grudgingly added, “Thanks.”

Probably just as well he didn’t have to carry her; he’d have liked getting his hands on her again way too much. Better that they keep on the way they were, with her throwing up her temper as a way to keep him at a distance, and him locking away his impulses to go all caveman on her because, God, he’d like nothing better than to throw her over his shoulder and carry her to bed, or to the floor, or hell, against the wall.

And that would destroy the team. Even if the changed dynamics didn’t blow everything to hell, if he made a move on her himself after putting her off-limits to the other guys, their resentment would do the damage. He’d done what was safest for her and best for the team, and now he had to live with it.

He could hear the far-off rumble of an engine. Both relieved and annoyed, he said, “There’s Boom. Let’s move.”

Six

When one was trying to draw a coyote into a trap, one had to be very careful not to set off any alarms. Coyotes—in this case Axel MacNamara—were sly and notoriously skittish. Joan Kingsley knew she didn’t have a prayer of getting close to him, therefore he had to come to her. That was where the trap came in, because he couldn’t know she was involved in any way. If he even suspected, he not only wouldn’t venture into the trap, she was likely to lose her own life.

Sometimes she wondered why she hadn’t already been assassinated, but the knife edge of grief had been so keen she hadn’t really cared. He could easily make her death look like an accident, though really that could be gotten around just by controlling the “investigation.” The fact that he hadn’t made her suspect he anticipated having some use for her in the future, by blackmailing her into cooperating with whatever scheme he’d concocted. There was nothing she put past him.

Perhaps she wanted to live, now, though she hadn’t at first after Dexter was killed. Not even their son had been enough to ease her grief. He was grown, and no longer lived at home; though she loved him very much, he was no longer a part of her everyday life and she accepted that he never would be again. Nevertheless, part of her wanted to stay alive because of him, because of the possibility of future grandchildren that would be Dexter’s grandchildren as much as hers.

For that, she would live. And to live, she needed to rid herself of the pestilence that was Axel MacNamara.

She had a plan. It would involve moving some chess pieces into place without MacNamara realizing who was doing the moving. At this point Devan was doing all the actual work, because she had to look absolutely uninvolved.

Devan likely thought she was still in the dark about his real identity, and in a sense she was, because she didn’t know the name he’d been born with. Nevertheless, since Dexter’s murder, from Devan’s actions and resources she had concluded that he was a Russian plant, perhaps even Russian himself. Instead of disappearing and protecting himself, he’d remained in touch with her, subtly feeding ideas of vengeance to her. At least, he thought they were subtle. Joan Kingsley was a born politician, and she could spot half-truths and emotional bullshit manipulation from a thousand yards away.

Before Dexter’s murder, she had even appreciated the lack of bullshit in Axel MacNamara. That was likely his only good point, but having no subtlety himself meant recognizing it in others was difficult for him. He functioned in D.C. only because those in power saw the benefit of having a rabid wolverine on their side.

But shewouldbring him down. The end game would be his death, but before then she would drive him mad by attacking what he cared about the most: his precious GO-Teams, and using those attacks to maneuver him into position.

Graeme Burger, South African banker, obscure and easily manipulated, was the current chess piece to be moved into place.

The game had begun.

“Guys,” Jina said the next day when they were taking a break, sitting on the ground and guzzling water. The September sun was hot, the sky a cloudless blue bowl overhead. “What do you tell your family about what you do? My parents are making noises about visiting.” She hated being worried about seeing them, but reality was reality and she had to deal with it.

Boom scratched the side of his nose. “My wife knows, in general. Not the details, but she knows I can get called at any time, and that I can’t tell her where I’m going or how long I’ll be gone.”

“Ditto,” Snake added. “No way to hide it, when you’re married. My kids are too young right now to ask questions, they just accept whatever we tell them. I don’t know what we’ll tell them when they get older, just play it by ear, I guess.”

Behind her, Levi folded his long length to the ground; she knew it was him without looking around. Her skin tingled, up her spine and neck, and abruptly she felt as if she was being blasted by heat. She was always acutely aware of his location, though they seldom spoke directly to each other. He didn’t want her there and she knew it, knew too that proving to him she could do the job was way too important. She didn’t want it to be, but it was. The best she could do was keep him from seeing how he affected her, even if only for the sake of her pride.

Crutch tilted his blond head back and poured water on his face, then flopped on his back and folded one arm back to pillow his head. “I told my mom I work for an engineering firm that gets sent all over the world.”

“What’s weird about that is he doesn’t have an engineering degree, and his mom buys the lame-ass excuse anyway,” Jelly said, snickering.

Crutch shrugged, as if to say there was no explaining what people chose to believe.

“My mom would never buy that.” Jina squinted up at the blue sky. “I told her I was learning a new computer program.”

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