Page 76 of Fighting for Brielle
“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” he swore as he shook Justice’s hand and hugged his parents.
After Ben left, their frustration mounted. Even Tex, working every connection he had and trolling the dark net with Hutch, made little headway in the search for Brielle and Faith. As the days passed, Justice caught Tex cursing and pounding his computer keyboard. Trying to build the trust of faceless contacts he’d made using the dark net was taking too much time.
At the end of a tough day tramping through the mountains, Justice lost his temper. Focusing his anger on Brendan, he grabbed him by the shirt and threw him against a wall.
“This is all your fault! You knew what was happening out here, and you deliberately kept Brielle in the dark.Youput her in danger. If anything happens to her, I swear to God, I’ll kill you!”
Trey and Bryant pulled Justice off their brother, and he twisted out of their grasp.
Brendan coughed as he caught his breath. “Justice, I swear, we didn’t know. Homeland Security…”
“Bullshit. Fuckin’ bullshit!” Justice spat.
“We didn’t know everything.” Brendan gazed at his parents. “Secretary of State Washburn wanted to use Brielle, and I wouldn’t let her. That’s when she decided to send Justice out here.”
“Why? Why me? And don’t bullshit me.”
“All right, you want the truth? Madam Secretary didn’t want you to know you led your team into an ambush.”
Justice reeled. His heart slammed into his chest. “What the fuck do you mean?”
“You were led to believe you were taking medical supplies to a village filled with sick women and children, but that was a lie planted by insurgents to lead you into a trap. You weren’t supposed to know you’d been given false intel. Why do you think the Navy retired you? Madam Secretary arranged it. In fact, she insisted upon it.”
Pain tore through Justice’s gut. He emitted a roar of rage and lunged at Brendan, intending to rip him from limb to limb. He landed a single upper cut to the jaw that knocked Brendan off his feet before Cameron and Franklin intervened.
“Justice, stop!” his father commanded.
Cameron hauled Brendan up, and held Justice at arm’s length when he tried to hit Brendan again. Franklin grabbed Justice’s arm and yanked him away from Cameron and Brendan.
“You’re not helping the situation,” Franklin admonished.
“Oh, yeah? Decking that bureaucratic asshole felt pretty good to me.”
Brendan tested his sore jaw. “For the record, McQuaid, I urged Madam Secretary to tell you the truth.”
“Yeah? Tell that to my team’s families. I’m the one who has to live with this. Knowing my team died because someone passed along bad intel. And even though that’s true, in the endIwas responsible.Iwas their leader. Their lieutenant commander. The buck stopped with me.” His voice rose in fury. “They’re dead! And it’s my fault!”
Justice tore out of Brielle’s house and fled down to the beach. He ran fast, his arms and legs pumping rhythmically, his heart keeping time. Memories of that day flashed through his mind. Eating breakfast in the mess tent. Talking smack. Making plans to play football when they got back from their mission. Only they didn’t make it back. Because he’d led them into a trap.
He screamed.
He cursed.
He stumbled and dropped to the sand.
He failed the mission. Failed to protect and keep his men safe.
He drew his knees up to his chest. His head pounded, and he felt nauseous. He leaned over and vomited. Reeling from the truth, he dragged the back of his hand across his mouth. He and his team had been betrayed, but he couldn’t allow that to defeat him. Not now. Not now when Brielle’s life depended on him. He took a deep, cleansing breath. He’d deal with what happened in Afghanistan later. Time to step up and be the leader, no,the man, Brielle needed him to be.
Justice gazed up at the sky, heavily laden with stars. “Time to get my shit together. Get my focus back. Deal with what’s in front of me.”
He took his time returning to Brielle’s house. Justice still wanted to pound Brendan into the ground, but he apologized, bid Cameron and Brianna good night, and went home to try to get some sleep. He had another long, fruitless day planned. And another. And another.
* * *
Three weeks. Twenty-one days. Five hundred and four hours. Thirty thousand two hundred and forty minutes. One million eight hundred and fourteen thousand and four hundred seconds. That’s how long Brielle had been missing. Her brothers didn’t want to give up, but they had put their lives, families, and careers on hold to search for their sister. Only Finnigan, Macklin, Tawny, Hutch, River, Dooley, and Martini remained to help Justice. Cameron and Brianna and Tex, of course, refused to give up or stop looking for Brielle.
After deciding to focus on Oregon in their search for Brielle, Justice grew tired of feeling like a hamster spinning on a wheel. Dressed in his uniform in order to intimidate his quarry, he stepped briskly into City Hall and rode an elevator to the second floor.
