Authors: Maya Banks
He reached forward and placed a digital recorder on the coffee table. He pressed the play button with his thumb and stood back.
Manuel flinched when Jules’s wavery voice filtered out of the recorder.
“You don’t need me anymore. Why won’t you just let me go?”
“Oh, but I do need you, Magalie. One last time.”
Manuel’s stomach rolled as he listened to the exchange. Jules sounded so small. Defeated. Then fury washed over him with the next words.
“If you refuse, you can kiss your little boyfriend goodbye. Don’t fuck with me. You know what I’m capable of. Removing lover boy from the picture would be nothing more than swatting an insect with a flyswatter…
“Do this assignment, and you’ll have what you most want. Your freedom. Refuse and I’ll make your life a living hell. Maybe you remember what happened the first time you hesitated.”
Manuel lost Jules’s responses. He focused solely on the bastard taunting her. He knew that voice. But it couldn’t be. It simply could not
be
.
“Or maybe you liked it? Did you enjoy it, Magalie?”
Then Jules’s tired, defeated voice. Full of resignation.
“I’ll do it.”
Tony reached down and shut off the recorder. Then he stared hard at Manuel. “This is only the beginning, Manuel. Are you prepared to hear the rest?”
“Jesus Christ, Tony! That sounded like Sanderson.”
“It was. It is.”
Manuel’s mouth dropped open. It was incomprehensible. What the hell was the director of Manuel and Tony’s counter-terrorism unit, a man Manuel had trusted, called a
friend
, doing threatening Jules into assassinating a United States senator?
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Patience was rewarded. Jules knew this. And on the second day of her vigil, she knew her time had come.
She’d come to this secluded garden adjoining the National Cathedral, numb with the depth of her despair. Fueled by the need for revenge, driven to protect Manny with her last breath. And it could well mean the end of her.
She curled her fingers around the cold stock of her gun and waited. Waited for the senator to make his appearance.
The sun was sinking lower in the sky. Only a few hours of daylight remained, yet she knew he would come. Her phone call to the senator’s office would not go ignored. Whether Northstar would accompany him was anyone’s guess, but the senator was a good place to start in her quest for vengeance.
She sucked in the cold air, let it wash over her, then breathed it out again in a visible puff. She knew it was near freezing, and yet she didn’t feel any discomfort. The light jacket she wore was not for warmth, it was to disguise her weapon.
She stared rigidly over the spiraling pathways, waiting for the senator to appear. She’d shoot the bastard, but first she’d make him tell her where she could find Northstar.
Over the last three years, she’d wondered what it would take to completely turn her into the cold-blooded monster she feared. Now she knew. Her transformation was complete. Gone was the girl who felt each kill to her depths, each one chipping away at her soul. She embraced this kill. This one would set her free.
She rocked slightly, the movement soothing, helping her focus on the task at hand. Unbidden images of Manny streaked through her mind. Instantly she was bombarded with pictures of what her life might have been like had Northstar and the senator never crossed her path.
She rocked faster.
More time passed and still no sign of the senator. As the sun dipped lower into the horizon, she continued her vigil. Then, as the shadows crept across the bench where she sat, she saw him.
“Yeah, that was my reaction, too,” Tony said grimly. “But it’s him. After I heard this conversation, I did some digging. I haven’t slept since I don’t know when.”
“Join the club,” Manuel muttered. He ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t understand any of it.”
“I don’t think it’s possible to understand the extent your lives were manipulated,” Tony said, a whisper of amazement in his voice.
Manuel stared hard at him. Manipulated? Somehow he knew he was about to embark on a twisted journey, one that was going to shake the foundations of everything he thought was true. And that scared the hell out of him.
“Spill it,” he demanded.
Tony paced back and forth in front of the couch. “First of all, Jules’s name really is Magalie. Magalie Pinson. Her parents were indeed Frederic and Carine Pinson. They were French immigrants who settled in the U.S. right out of college. The CIA recruited them for a top-secret shadow group they labeled the NFR.”
“
What
?” Manuel demanded. “The NFR is a CIA brainchild? But it’s a terrorist group!”
Tony shook his head. “Think about it, Manuel. A group assembled by the CIA under the guise of a terrorist cell. They do the dirty work for the CIA and the CIA takes none of the blame. Think state-sponsored assassination, only on a larger scale. The NFR could take out targets that would be a political nightmare for the U.S. to get involved with.”
Manuel shook his head in denial. God, it couldn’t be true.
“I hacked into Sanderson’s computer. Took me all damn night, but I was successful. Bastard had extensive logs dating back from the NFR’s inception. Dates, names, targets—you name it, he had them listed. Apparently the NFR was formed in the late sixties, but they didn’t become very active until the early eighties when someone he referred to as FAAID, and later as SAID, took over.”
“But why Jules?” Manuel asked, his head spinning. “If she was the Pinsons’ daughter, how did I find her all those years ago? And my recruitment—I refuse to believe that’s coincidental.”
Tony shook his head in regret. “No, it wasn’t, Manny. You and Jules have been manipulated for years. For whatever reason, the Pinsons wanted out, only FAAID wasn’t having it. The Pinsons disappeared, taking their daughter with them. I’m assuming they must have abandoned Jules or maybe they were killed. I wasn’t able to find any information as to how Jules ended up on your street twenty-three years ago. But Sanderson discovered Jules was the Pinsons’ daughter when she was ten. The Trehans had her fingerprinted as part of an abduction awareness campaign.”
Tony paused and turned to look at Manuel. “Whoever FAAID is, apparently he was livid over the Pinsons’ defection. He directed Sanderson to set into motion the events that later transpired in France when Jules visited after graduating college.”
“And my recruitment? Sanderson recruited me personally.”
Tony nodded, his expression grim. “He recruited you so he would have something to control Jules with.”
“Son of a bitch!”
Manuel stood, clenching his fist. God, he wanted to kill someone. They’d been puppets. For the last fifteen years, they’d been nothing but laboratory mice under a microscope. Jules had never had a chance.
“And Manuel, her recruitment story. It was true. Every bit of it. Sanderson has a rather detailed account of just what they did to make sure she complied with their wishes.”
Disgust dripped from Tony’s voice. Manuel knew well what he must have found. He wanted to puke.
He closed his eyes, seized with the enormity of his error. A mistake had never felt bigger than this one.
“Oh my God, Tony,” he choked out. “I sent her away.”
“At least you didn’t feed her to the sharks,” Tony said. “Your instincts were good. You let her go.”
“I let her go because I love her, and I didn’t have the balls to cuff her and turn her over to the feds. Not because I
believed
in her.”
He closed his eyes. He
hadn’t
believed in her. He forced his mind back to the details at hand. “Why does Sanderson want the senator dead? Because he was going to help Jules?”
Tony frowned. “I don’t really know. There are several mentions that SAID wanted to shut down the NFR and cease operations. Maybe the senator scared them. His stance on terrorism has always been tight, and with his appointment to Homeland Security, he could have exposed the NFR’s ties to the CIA, especially if Jules talked.”
Manuel’s mind raced in a sick pattern. He took in all that Tony had said and tried to put all the pieces together. Who was SAID/FAAID? Whoever he was, he’d been in France three years ago when Jules had taken her trip. He’d lain in wait for her along with Sanderson.
France. SAID. Senator Adam Denison. The name floated in front of him like a beacon. Jesus.
He turned to Tony, his face drawn in horror. “Tony, wasn’t the senator once the French ambassador?”
Tony’s brow wrinkled in confusion. “Yeah, until two years ago when he won the Senate election.”
“French Ambassador Adam Isaac Denison. Senator Adam Isaac Denison.”
Tony’s eyes registered his understanding. “Holy shit.”
“It all makes perfect sense,” Manuel said. “The senator, who was then the French ambassador, headed the NFR, a shadow group within the CIA. Imagine how good it would make the senator look to bust the NFR wide open in the early days of his Homeland Security appointment. Sanderson must have resisted the idea of disbanding the group. Which would explain why he wanted Jules to assassinate the senator.”
Bile rose in Manuel’s throat. Everything she’d done had been to keep him safe. Just like she’d said. And he’d judged her and dismissed her. Guilty. He’d been judge and jury, and he’d convicted her without a second thought.
Panic tightened every nerve ending in his body. Jules wasn’t safe. Not from the senator and not from Sanderson.
“I’ve got to find her.”
Tony glanced uneasily at him. “I know where she is.”
Manuel’s head shot up. “What do you mean you know where she is?”
Tony shifted from one foot to the other and shoved his hands into his pockets. “I kept tabs on her after she left the Ronald Reagan building. I knew you’d let her go, but I thought it in our best interest to monitor her movements.”
“So where is she?”
Manuel started for the door, his need to find her overwhelming. He couldn’t lose her. Not after all they’d been through. Not after he’d turned his back on her.
“I think she’s planning some kind of damn suicide mission.”
Manuel spun back around. “What the
fuck
are you talking about?
“For the past two days, she’s sat in the same place. All day long. She sits, doesn’t move. Just waits for something. Or someone. I think she’s waiting for either the senator or Sanderson. Maybe both. I think this is her last stand, so to speak.”
Manuel’s blood ran cold. “Where, Tony? Tell me where, damn it. I have to get to her before they do.”
“The Bishop’s Garden. And I’m going with you.”
Manuel didn’t wait to hear more. He ran from the apartment as fast as he could go. He threw himself into Tony’s SUV seconds before Tony barreled into the passenger seat.
He tore down the street, honking at slow traffic, swerving around stopped vehicles. He cursed, he yelled, he was scared to death.
“How far up does this go, Tony? Who can we trust?” Manuel demanded as he maneuvered through the busy streets.
“I’m calling the FBI,” Tony muttered. “Screw the CIA.”
Several minutes later, the longest of his entire life, Manuel turned into lane leading to the cathedral then slammed on the brakes. “Isn’t that Sanderson’s car?” He pointed to a gray sedan parked several spaces down from the small entrance to the garden.
Tony jumped out, gun drawn. Manuel slammed the SUV into park and charged out after Tony. Manuel could see someone in the driver’s seat, and he motioned Tony to the other side.
Guns raised, they circled around until Manuel had a direct bead on the driver.
He was dead.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Jules’s hand curled tightly around the gun as the senator strode toward her. When he was a few feet away, she stood up, drew the pistol and leveled it at him.
“That’s far enough.”
Scorn rippled across the senator’s face. “Going to kill me, Magalie? I think not. You’d never get away with it.”
She shivered as her gaze swept over his sneering visage. She remembered his face well. It was burned into her memory.
“I don’t care whether I get away with it or not. Where is Northstar?”
“Dead. Just like you’re going to be,” the senator said in a cold voice.
Could he be lying? Or had he already gotten to Northstar? It mattered little to her. As long as the bastard was dead.
She stared intently at him. “Why did you do it?”
“Why what? Why recruit you? Why kill Northstar? Blame your parents, Magalie. It was for them that I enjoyed destroying you. I imagined the look on your father’s face as I raped you.”
Rage swept over Jules. Her finger tightened on the trigger, and she knew in that moment, she could kill him in cold blood. And damn the consequences.
A quiet popping erupted, and for a moment, she thought she’d done it. But no, it wasn’t loud enough, and she didn’t recall pulling the trigger. Her entire body jerked, and she fell to the ground. Pain arced through her body, ricocheting from her chest, radiating outward with amazing speed.
She blinked in confusion as her gun dropped from numb fingers. Her fingers. She looked up to see the senator holding a gun with a silencer. His image swam, and she blinked again to try and clear the cobwebs.
Her free hand traveled to her chest. She felt wetness, and when she pulled it away, she looked down to see it bright red with her blood.
“Once again you underestimated me. Rest in peace, Magalie. Say hello to your parents for me.”
She watched him walk away. In the distance she heard shouting. Her muddled brain tried to make sense of the noise. Manny. He was here.
Oh God, the senator would kill Manny. She couldn’t allow it. No. No. No!
Tears leaked down her cheeks. The pain was more than she’d ever endured in her life. She could
feel
her pulse growing weaker. She could feel herself slipping away. She had to get to Manny. Had to save him.
She pulled herself along the ground with her arm, nearly passing out from the agony. Awake. She had to stay awake. She felt the smooth metal of her gun, ran her hand down until she gripped the stock.