Chapter 28
Chapter twenty-eight
Noah
The bedroom Imogen had been waiting in was at the back of the house, overlooking the garden, and that was where we ended up.
We were sitting on the edge of the bed in the quiet while the sounds of the men working filtered up from downstairs.
Footsteps. Voices too low to make out. The occasional sound of a door.
She’d stopped crying. She was sitting very straight with her hands in her lap and the portfolio on the bed beside her. I just gave her time to sit with everything. With the knowledge of what she’d done and the real understanding of what that meant.
I knew that sometimes there weren’t any words, which was okay because words weren’t what you needed; what you needed was just for someone to stay. Julius and Mika had done that for me, and now I had an opportunity to do that for Imogen.
After a while, she said, “I couldn’t let him take you.”
I looked at her.
“When he grabbed you, I saw his face.” She shook her head slightly.
“I knew what he was going to do. He’d use you to get the portfolio and then—” She stopped.
“I knew what he was capable of. I’ve known for years.
” Her hands tightened in her lap. “And I knew as long as he was alive, we would never be safe. Not me, not the baby, not you.” She looked at me.
“Not any of the people he’d already decided to come after. ”
I thought about what it meant to make a decision like that in a fraction of a second. To have the weapon and the knowledge of what it would mean not to take action, and then to do it. To pull the trigger.
I wouldn’t have wished anyone dead. I knew that about myself. But sitting there in that room, with the stillness of the house and the reality that Anton Corvane was no longer a threat, I felt something that I wasn’t proud of, but wasn’t going to pretend I didn’t feel.
Relief. Complete and total relief that was threaded with guilt for feeling it.
“It’s okay,” I said, because it was. It was complicated, and I was sure it would take her a lot of time to work through it, but it was okay. I was there. She was there. The baby was there, and we were all going to be okay. “Whatever you’re feeling right now, it’s allowed.”
She looked at me for a moment. Then she made a sound that was a mix between a laugh and a sob.
“My therapist is going to have a very busy year,” I said with a laugh.
“Yeah.” She nodded. “Mine, too.”
We heard the helicopter before we saw it.
I crossed to the window and looked out over the back garden, and there it was, coming in low over the tree line, lights blinking, descending onto the wide flat lawn below. The spinning of the rotor flattened the grass in a wide circle.
Two men got out.
Even from up there, I recognized Wolfe. He had a way of moving through a space like he owned it that was hard to miss. The man beside him was taller, dark-haired, and moved with easy authority. The two of them together would either be reassuring or terrifying, all depending on who was seeing them.
“That’s Chance Kelly,” I said.
Imogen came to stand beside me at the window.
We watched them cross the lawn toward the back entrance where Hawk was waiting, and I thought about all the phone calls and planning and weeks of waiting that had led to this moment.
To two men stepping off a helicopter onto a lawn in Ashford Grove at midnight, all because a woman in a blue gown had kept a business card.
Chance introduced himself to Imogen the same way he’d introduced himself to me all those months ago, in a calm, reassuring way to let her know he understood that the person in front of him had just been through something.
“Mrs. Corvane,” he said. “I’m Chance Kelly, FBI.
I need to talk to you, but I want you to know before we start that you’re not alone with this.
Everything you tell me tonight is going to help us figure out the best path forward for you.
” He looked at her steadily. “But I’d like to speak with you privately if that’s all right. ”
She looked at me.
“I’ll be right outside,” I said.
She nodded.
I stepped out into the hallway and closed the door behind me, and that was when I felt it.
The full weight of the last two hours landed on me all at once.
My legs were fine. My hands were steady.
But somewhere between the vehicle, the hallway, breaking Corvane’s hold, the shot, and then the quiet aftermath, I’d been running on something, probably adrenaline.
And now that something was fading fast and leaving the ordinary tired version of me standing in a hallway in Houston at midnight.
I took in a deep, steadying breath and went downstairs.
The guys were in the kitchen. Jackson was leaning against the counter. Hawk and Gator were at the table. Jackson looked up when I came in, and he gave me a tired, tight smile. The one that told me he was glad to see me, but that I’d scared him half to death.
I sat down at the table, and someone put a glass of water in front of me.
“Imogen okay?” Gator asked.
“She’s with Chance,” I said. “She was holding it together.”
“She’ll be okay,” Hawk said. “Chance is good at this part.”
I looked at my hands on the table. The bracelet on my wrist that Mars had given me for protection, the dark stone catching the kitchen light, and the watch on my other wrist that would’ve tracked me if Corvane had gotten away with me, and just sat with the relief I felt that I wouldn’t need either of the two.
All because of the choice Imogen made a couple hours ago.
“Will he take care of her? I mean, actually take care of her. She killed someone. She’s pregnant. She—”
Jackson slid into the chair next to me and took my hand. “Chance will do everything he can to make sure she’s protected. He’s good people. He knows what she was walking away from, and he knows what she brought with her.” He held my gaze. “She’s not going to fall through the cracks.”
I nodded. I believed him. I believed him because he was Jackson, and he didn’t say things he didn’t mean.
I looked at him. “Are you mad at me?”
“No.” He said it without hesitation. “I was scared to death. Those seconds between him grabbing you and you breaking the hold were the longest seconds of my life.” He held my gaze.
“But I’m more proud of you than I can say, baby boy.
You protected her. You saw what was happening and you took action, then you used what I taught you, and you got yourself free.
” He paused. “I’m starting to realize that you’re never going to be someone who puts his own safety first, and I love you exactly the way you are, so the only thing I can do is make sure you’re as prepared as possible for when you get yourself into trouble. ”
I looked at him for a long moment.
“So more training,” I said.
“More training,” he agreed.
Chance came out of the room about an hour later with Imogen beside him and Michael Troy behind them.
She wasn’t in handcuffs, which I took as a good sign.
She was carrying the portfolio and her bag.
She looked exhausted, like someone who’d been through a long conversation and come out the other side of it changed.
I was on my feet before she reached the bottom of the stairs.
“Hey,” I said.
She looked at me, and for a second, her composure wavered before she pulled me into a hug. Then she pulled herself back and said, quietly, “It’s going to be okay. He’s going to help me.”
I nodded.
“I’m going to have to go with them tonight. There are things to sort out, statements to give.” She glanced down at the portfolio. “But Chance says what I have is—” She stopped. “He says it’s significant.”
“You knew it was.”
“I knew,” she said. “Thank you, Noah. For the card. For tonight. For all of it.”
I didn’t know what to say that wasn’t insufficient, so I just said, “Take care of the baby.”
She nodded once, and Chance put his hand briefly at her back and steered her toward the door, and she walked out of the house and into whatever came next.
I watched her go.
Chance came back inside a few minutes later. The front door closed. He looked at me with the assessing, direct gaze of a man who had something to say and had been waiting for the right moment to say it.
“She offered us more than Corvane’s records,” he said.
“She has information on three other men connected to the same network. Names, accounts, routes.” He put his hands in his pockets.
“And she killed a man we can prove had purchased another human being and was actively threatening that person.” He held my gaze.
“What Corvane did to you, what he was going to do tonight, what she walked away from to bring us evidence, legally, all of that matters.” He paused.
“We’re offering her immunity in exchange for her full cooperation and testimony. ”
The kitchen was quiet.
“She’ll be okay?” I asked.
“She’ll have the full resources of the federal government helping her build a new life,” he said.
“Her and the baby both.” He looked at me for a moment with something on his face that was less federal agent and more just a person.
“You giving her that card at the Gala set all of this in motion. This network has been a priority case for three years, and because of tonight, because of her, we have a real shot at dismantling it.” He shook his head slightly. “Not bad for a florist.”
I looked at him. “Right,” I said with a laugh.
“Well, if you ever want a career change—”
“He’ll let me know.” Jackson appeared at my shoulder, and without a word, I leaned back against him and felt his arm come around me.
Chance chuckled and shook his head. “I hear you, Crowe. I hear you.”