Carla Neggers - The Mist

“I used to wonder what kind of people lived in these big old houses on the ocean,” Bob said to Davenport as he walked up the hill. “Now I know. You meet Harlan yet? Lizzie’s pop?”

“Briefly,” the Brit said.

“He’s one of you. American, but a spook.”

Davenport ’s hazel eyes settled on Bob. “He says he’s a semire-tired hotelier.”

Bob held up a hand. “Don’t start with me.” He nodded to the horizon as the sun burned white through the last of the gray. “I gather your Brit friend got away.”

“So he did.”

“He’s one of you, too.”

“British, you mean,” Davenport said.

Bob knew the drill. They were all supposed to pretend the missing Brit was one of the bad guys.

Myles Fletcher was another damn spy.

“He killed Walter Bassette,” Bob said.

“In self-defense, after he discovered Bassette planned to kill your daughter and confronted him.” Davenport shrugged as he, too, stared out at the water. “She stopped quarreling about being under police protection, didn’t she?”

“Hell of a wake-up call.”

“Myles isn’t subtle, but he’s effective.”

Bob saw Davenport ’s expression change, soften-if that was possible-as he lowered his gaze down to a knot of Maine state troopers and feds. At first, Bob didn’t get it. Then he saw Lizzie Rush break off from the law enforcement types and head up the hill in their direction, her black hair shining in the mist-filtered sunlight. She was soaked up to her knees in seawater, but Bob had no doubt she was up to handling a British lord, spy and SAS officer who was falling in love with her.

“If you’ll excuse me,” Davenport said.

As he started to her, John March and Harlan Rush eased in next to Bob, and none of them spoke for a moment as they watched the two young people embrace.

“You know,” Harlan said finally, “when I taught Lizzie how to fight, I wasn’t thinking she’d be defending herself against a gun-toting billionaire out here on the damn rocks.”

“What were you thinking?” Bob asked him.

His eyes, the shape of his daughter’s if not their light green, shone with the mix of pain and happiness that, Bob had decided, was memory. “I was thinking I didn’t want to lose her.”

“She’s as brave and as beautiful as her mother, Harlan,” March said.

Rush didn’t argue. “She doesn’t like secrets.”

“Neither does Abigail.”

“A different generation.”

Bob frowned at the two men. “Who the hell has secrets anymore these days? My kids know everything.”

March shrugged and seemed almost to manage a smile. “We all have our wars to fight.” Lizzie and Will joined them, and March went on briskly. “We boarded Lavender Lady a few minutes ago. We didn’t find Fletcher or any sign he’d been there.”

Bob spoke up. “He got what he needed and disappeared. A ghost.”

Harlan Rush and Davenport -two bona fide spooks-didn’t say anything. Neither did March, who, Bob figured, knew when a lizard crawled out from under a rock anywhere in the world.

Lizzie stayed close to her Brit as she addressed John March. “I could have done things differently this past year.”

But before March could respond, her father rolled his eyes. “Lizzie. Damn. What did I teach you?”

She smiled at him. “How to block a punch from Cousin Whit.”

“After that.”

She sighed. “Don’t look back with regret.”

“Right. Look back to learn, but since you’re never doing this again, spying on some lunatic billionaire, there’s nothing to learn. So there’s no need to look back at all.”

But Bob knew she would. They all would. Abigail, terrorized by a man obsessed with her father. Scoop, bloodied. Fiona and Keira, traumatized.

They’d recover. What other choice did they have?

Lizzie turned her pale green eyes to the FBI director. “ Norman believed you destroyed the life I could have had.”

“Maybe I did,” March said.

“Do you think you’d be the FBI director today if you had?”

“Doubtful. Your father would have arranged an accident for me. Payback.” But March’s rare display of humor didn’t take. “Lizzie, your father was prepared to trade himself for you and Abigail. I was, too.”

“Two of us for one of you?”

“Two for two.”

Harlan Rush’s eyes misted. “Whatever it took.”

Bob decided he’d had enough and scoffed at Lizzie. “Shin splints. What crap. You should have knocked on our door and talked to Scoop, Abigail and me. Leveled with Scoop when he caught you.”

She didn’t look the least bit intimidated by him. “I didn’t have any information you didn’t have. You might have prevented me from going to Ireland. Then what?”

“Keira would have had to rely on her Irish fairies.”

“Maybe she did,” Lizzie said.

“Don’t start with me.”

She grinned at him and Bob was pretty sure he saw her Brit kiss the top of her head. Maybe it was just a brush of his lips.

Who the hell knew anymore.

But Bob saw Owen Garrison walking across the yard and said, “Batman arrives.”

Owen spotted Abigail sitting on the stretcher down by the dock and broke into a run. No one tried to stop him.

Bob glanced at March and quickly averted his eyes. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to see the director of the FBI was crying. It was that the man deserved a moment.

Harlan Rush crossed his arms on his chest, looking as at home on the Maine rocks as he probably did at a poker table in Las Vegas. He nodded toward Davenport, still with an arm around Lizzie as they walked back toward the water, and said to Bob, “His grandfather was a good man. I ran into him during the Cold War from time to time in my misspent youth. Funny how things work out. Does our Lord Davenport spend a lot of time fishing in Scotland?”

“Apparently,” Bob said.

“That’s what his grandfather used to do, too.” The old spook sighed. “I don’t know if it’s occurred to Lizzie, but we Rushes don’t have a hotel in London or Scotland.”

“You should open one,” Bob said. “It’d give her something to do while she and Davenport think up how to get into trouble again.”

Boston, Massachusetts

6:30 p.m., EDT

August 27

Owen took Abigail’s hand and led her into a large, spacious apartment in the renovated building on the South Boston waterfront that was to be the new headquarters for Fast Rescue. She stood at the tall windows overlooking the harbor. Jeremiah Rush had set aside rooms for everyone at the Whitcomb on Charles Street, and the E.R. doctor had told her to rest. But she’d wanted to come here.

“There are two apartments here that we can choose from,” Owen said, staying close to her, “or we can renovate the house on Beacon Street. I don’t care where we live. I just want to be with you.”

She leaned against him. “We’re lucky. We have each other. We have friends, families…”

Owen seemed to understand what she meant. “Norman Estabrook made his choices, Abigail. So did the men with him.”

She thought of Myles Fletcher coming to her on the yacht that first time and had to fight back tears. Was he safe now? Was he safe ever?

“Abigail…”

“I’m not going to feel sorry for myself over what happened. It wasn’t good, but…” She smiled at this man she loved. “I’m here with you now, and that’s enough. I knew you were there for me. With me. The whole time.”

“I’d have traded places with you in a heartbeat.”

“Maybe things worked out the way they were meant to.” She watched a large yacht sailing out into the harbor. “I was so sick on that damn boat. I tried not to let myself think I might be pregnant. But when Fletcher said it, I knew.”