Ten shook his head. “God, I hope you are because he’s staring at you, too.”
James sent his brother a warning look. “Am not.”
“Are too.”
“I will end you, Ten,” he said under his breath.
Ten laughed. “You’ll try. Let’s go, lovebirds. Don’t keep Pops waiting. He’s actually a really great man. I think you’re going to like him.”
Ten turned and started up the bricked walkway.
James was blushing as he looked back at her. “Don’t pay him any mind. He’s kind of an asshole.” James flushed further as he nodded to Alicia. “Sorry. He’s my brother.”
Alicia smiled. “So I’ve heard. I think I’ll go in and say hello to Mr. Grant.”
She started toward the door.
James suddenly seemed to find his feet endlessly interesting. “I could show you around if you like. Dad sent us out here to talk to you. I’m supposed to show you the house and then you can talk to him.”
“Why?” She needed to know. “Why does he want to talk to me? I don’t buy it. I’ve seen it all and this doesn’t add up.”
James’s eyes met hers. “You’re smart, Phoebe, and you could be something more. You could help your country. That’s what we do. Dad finds kids who need homes and something to believe in and he gives us both. He took me in when I was eight and we found Ten when he was thirteen when he came to live with us. In a couple of years I’m going to college, but after that I’m joining my dad. You could be with us if you want to.”
“In what?”
James’ s shoulders went back, his pride evident. “The Agency. I’m going to be a spy and you could be, too.”
A spy. Yeah. That sounded cool.
Cooler than anything else she was going to do. When James turned and walked toward the house, she followed. It was all she could do to not take his hand.
13 years later
“Hey, Phoebe.” Ten walked into the room, his presence almost a nuisance.
God, she hated that, but she felt that way. She didn’t want to see him, didn’t want to see anyone. She wanted them all to go away so she could fade. She wanted to do nothing more than lie down and utterly fade away. Maybe if she didn’t eat, didn’t drink anything, she could see him again.
She didn’t reply to Ten, simply stared at the wall.
“Everyone’s leaving. I thought you might want to come out and say good-bye.”
She hadn’t wanted them to come over anyway, so she figured the hoard of visiting vultures could find their way out on their own. They had been Jamie’s co-workers, people who knew their dad, but she hated them. She hated everyone.
“Don’t do this to me.”
She ignored him.
“Goddamn it, Phoebe. Don’t you dare fucking do this to him.”
Her eyes came open as if of their own accord. Ten had said “him” and her body responded. “I’m not doing anything.”
The words came out on a growl. She was resentful. He shouldn’t be here. He’d only been Jamie’s brother. He hadn’t been his wife, his lover. Ten hadn’t been trying to have Jamie’s baby.
“You’re fucking giving up, Phoebe.” She could practically feel Ten’s will as he paced across the floor. Ten’s cowboy boots thudded along the hand-scraped hardwoods as he continued to move. Ten always had trouble staying still. He paced when he was anxious. He’d been really anxious since that moment that they’d heard Jamie had been captured by jihadists. Ten had spent months trying to find him, months in the deserts of Iraq. And then more time trying to find his body because the fuckers had moved them, likely hoping their bodies would never be found, that the families would never be able to give them a proper burial.
The jihadists caught Jamie with an Army unit after their convoy had been hit by an IED. Jamie had been working on tracking a terrorist sect using a group of Army grunts as cover.
It hadn’t been cover enough.
Her precious husband had been brutally killed along with every single one of his teammates.
All except for one. When Ten had finally found the place where Jamie had been held and murdered, there had only been one of the soldiers left. Jesse Murdoch. Why had he survived when her husband had been murdered?
Did it even matter since he was gone? It was so much easier to lie here. She didn’t want to eat, didn’t want to drink. She’d even stopped hurting. Her body was utterly numb.
She didn’t move, didn’t react because it didn’t matter.
“Phoebe?”