Chapter 16
“Senator Keaton Lane is here to see you, sir.”
Jax scowled at the phone. He’d just talked to Mrs. Lane this morning, updating her on the situation with Cassidy. Austin’s message should have reassured them. Cassidy had been found, was in the company of a HERO Force agent, and should be home soon, assuming all went well going forward.
“Show him into the conference room.”
The senator must be worried. As a parent himself, Jax understood what it was like to have your heart separated from your body and walking around the earth, where anything could happen to it.
Violet was his world, the spitting image of her mother.
He walked to the conference room thinking not for the first time about retiring from HERO Force completely.
Since Cowboy had officially taken charge, it seemed Jax’s presence here only serve to undermine the other man’s authority.
That was the last thing he wanted, and Cowboy certainly didn’t need to be supervised.
The question was what Jax would do instead. He no longer wanted to be in combat or dangerous situations. Jessa deserved more peace than that. Though he hadn’t told anyone yet, she was pregnant again and his priorities were drifting farther and farther away from this place.
“Senator Lane.” The other man was standing and Jax gestured to a chair. “Have a seat. I talked to your wife this morning.”
“Yes. That’s why I’m here.” The recessed lights cast everything in a theater-like golden glow, highlighting the perspiration on the senator’s head. “She wouldn’t want me to be here talking to you. She doesn’t need to know what I’m about to say.”
Jax leaned back in his chair. “I’m listening.”
“She said your man found Cassidy, but he’s not bringing her home.”
“That’s right. Your daughter feels strongly that the other reporter, Julianne Garrison, is still alive.”
“I see. So your man is letting her stay in harm’s way?”
“That’s one way to look at it, I suppose.”
The senator punctuated his words with a pointed finger. “I hired you to bring her back safely. My daughter. Just mine. I didn’t hire you to save the world.”
Jax tapped his pencil eraser on the polished wooden table. “It’s my understanding that it’s Cassidy’s desire to look for her friend that is keeping them at the compound. Not Austin’s.”
“I should have considered he might be loyal to her instead of me, given their history.”
“And what history is that? You never said, exactly.”
The older man pursed his lips, as if the answer to that question tasted sour and foul.
“They were romantically involved. It was a long time ago. It isn’t relevant today.
But you have a responsibility to me as your client to get my daughter out of there as soon as possible, no matter what she wants. ”
Jax understood the senator’s fear for his daughter’s safety and his desire to get her back as soon as possible. And if the other man seemed hard and unconcerned with the other reporters safety, then perhaps that was just a father’s instinctive desire to care for his own.
“Why didn’t you want your wife to come with you today?”
The senator leaned back in his chair. “I told you. She wouldn’t understand what I’m asking you to do. Typical female. She can’t make a decision based on win versus loss. Acceptable casualties. She would have everyone die while she deliberated on how to save them all.”
“You know there was an accident. I don’t have constant contact with Austin at this time. He was able to reach us once, but it’s not a phone call we can return and it doesn’t mean we’ll speak to him again.”
“But you have other soldiers on the ground.”
“Yes.”
The senator leaned forward, pointing his finger again. “Then when they get there, you tell them the only life that matters is the one they were hired to save. Cassidy’s. Not Julianne’s.”