Kay David - Not Without Cause

His confidence in her was reassuring. For a minute, she felt as if her dad were sitting beside her. “And Prescott?”

He crumpled his coffee cup, the action holding a finality. “Prescott’s a civilian. If something happens to him, it would be unfortunate, especially if he’s innocent. Try to bring him back.”

Her words came out with difficulty. “How do you want it to happen?”

“I don’t really care,” he said coolly. “But if I were you, I’d find out if Haden knows where Prescott is before you take care of…things. Other than that, it doesn’t matter. You’re the professional.”

TELLING HER MENTOR she needed some time, Meredith left without giving Dean Reynolds a firm answer. She turned in her rental car at the airport, found her terminal and sat down, her thoughts a lot more convoluted than they had ever been before.

She’d loved working at the CIA and felt as if she’d been made for the job, but that had been the trouble, according to Reynolds. She’d been so good—“born to it,” he’d said, “the kind of agent we get once in a lifetime”—it was felt her talents were being wasted at her post in D.C.

Still, she’d been surprised by Reynolds’s support. The Agency was a place where it was every man for himself. Reynolds was an uptight, by-the-book patriot lawyer who’d been the Director of Operations for years. He’d survived four presidents, two wars and a terrorist attack at the CIA’s headquarters eight miles outside downtown D.C. He didn’t hand out favors easily.

At the conclusion of Meredith’s third year, though, Reynolds had pulled her into his office and pushed a laptop computer across his desk to her. Open on the screen was a written report, the pages of which vanished after she read each one. In the corner there had been a drawing of a small black box. She’d understood what that meant at the end—when the words Classification: Black Box had flashed across the screen, then disappeared.

She’d had no idea there was a level of secrecy within the Agency designated as black box. A class so far above the others that it was described only as silent. When Dean had explained the protocol, she’d been speechless.

“You’ll have to be fired from the Agency,” he’d said. “And you will have to leave in disgrace. No one can ever know that the Operatives have the president’s blessings. If anyone did find out—” He’d stopped abruptly and broken their eye contact. After a short pause, he’d continued. “If they find out, it would be bad, very bad, for all concerned.”

In a daze of disbelief, she’d almost laughed out loud at that point, the old joke about “I could tell you but then I’d have to kill you” coming to her. One look at the older man’s expression, however, had sent her amusement fleeing. She’d gone home and agonized over the opportunity but in the end, she’d agreed, the patriotism running through her too strong to resist the pull of performing a service this special for her country. She’d thrown in only one condition—she wanted her father’s help. A former Navy intel man, he’d been quickly approved and even welcomed into the circle.

The Operatives had come together shortly after that. Handpicked by her father and cleared by Meredith, the three men on the team each had their speciality: Stratton O’Neil was a sniper. Jonathan Cruz used his hands. Armando Torres was a doctor, and no one understood exactly how he did what he did.

Meredith’s weapon of choice was the knife.

They were assassins and only a handful of people knew it.

Of those, fewer still knew the whole truth: Every hit they’d ever made had been a sanctioned one, vetted and cleared by the president of the United States himself. The secret was buried so well that even the men on the team didn’t know. At least, not officially. They’d guessed by now, she was sure, but nothing had ever been said about their status.

Haden had not been included in the group who knew these facts. He thought the Operatives were mercenaries, plain and simple. A year or so after she’d been “fired,” she’d run into him at Heathrow. He’d been on his way to the Sudan and she’d been going to Hong Kong. She’d wanted desperately to avoid him, but escape had been out of the question. He’d started straight for her the second he’d seen her.

“I hear you’ve a very rich woman,” he said without preamble.

“I make a living.”

His eyes had turned hard and glittery. “A real killing?”

The double entendre had left her trembling on the inside but she’d smiled. “You could say that.”

He’d shaken his head in disgust and walked away. Watching him leave, Meredith had understood, in a way she hadn’t before then, that her former life was truly over. All she had left was her job. Everything else had been sacrificed for her country.

With the motivation of a higher purpose guiding their actions, the Operatives had proceeded to make the world a safer place. She’d never felt a moment’s doubt about their goals until today when she’d looked in Dean Reynolds’s eyes and heard him say Jack Haden’s name.

Watching a 747 angle into its berth twenty feet from where she sat, she sighed heavily and admitted to the hesitation she’d felt during her meeting with Dean. She didn’t doubt his intel but something just didn’t feel right.

Her doubts plagued her the whole flight home. She knew the Miami airport better than she knew her own backyard but when she got in late that night, she got lost pulling out of the parking lot. Finally, she found the right road and she headed home.

Turning into her driveway at midnight, Meredith parked inside the garage and lowered the door. When it was completely down, she unlocked the car and retrieved her overnight bag from the trunk. Once inside, she flicked on the lights and turned off her burglar alarm, then she went through the house with her blade at her side. Her actions were routine but they weren’t taken lightly. A price had been on her head for years.

She finished her check and came back to the kitchen. Laying her knife on the countertop where her cell phone already rested, she leaned her hip against the cabinet and closed her eyes, her mind occupied with the images and sensations Dean’s proposition had brought back to her.

Haden’s face in the dark, his body, toned and hard, the touch of his fingers along her jaw. She’d hidden her memories beneath a layer of protective armor after their breakup, but Dean’s words had ripped that shield right off.

She’d given up everything for her country; the possibility of a family and a husband, not to mention children, were not in her future and they never would be. She’d traded those things for adrenaline and power—life-and-death power—and it was way too late to go back and make changes.

If she’d ever had a chance at having any of those things, it would have been with Haden, though. He’d been wild, but under the craziness there had been a rock-solid man she’d come to care for more than she’d expected. More than anyone she’d ever cared for before—or since. He’d been special and rare—one of those guys who caught you unaware when you’d decided no one else could possibly surprise you.

For a single second she wanted to walk away and ignore the decision she’d wrestled with for the past five hours, but she knew that wasn’t a real option.

If Reynolds wanted Haden dead, it was going to happen.

If she didn’t take the job, then someone else would. Haden would fall ill. Or get hit by a car. Or drown in a pool.

He was a dead man walking.

Before she could think about it any more, she picked up her cell phone and dialed. It was almost 1:00 a.m. but Dean Reynolds answered on the second ring, his voice deep, his manner alert. “Reynolds here.”