Epilogue
Brooks
One Week Later
I sat at the kitchen table cleaning up the cards from the game of strip poker we’d played when my phone rang.
“Miss me already?” I asked.
Rafi snorted. “Not yet. But I thought you should be the one to make the call. Turns out Roman Pierce is the biological father of an illegitimate child. Guy lives in Sterling Falls, Montana. The kid found out about him three years ago, and they’ve been getting to know each other.”
“And?”
“He has information he wants to trade for a deal.”
“What kind of information?”
“His son has been texting him about a woman he’s obsessed with. The texts are dark, and Pierce says the kid might be acting on them. He’s mentioned an operator you worked with a couple of years ago.”
“Who?”
“Conrad Hayes.”
I stood up. Conrad was one of the best guys I’d ever met. “I’ll talk to Aria. I’d like to help Conrad, but it’s her call.”
I hung up and found Aria in the doorway watching me. “What’s going on?”
I filled her in. “This bastard was going to kill me, and he would have killed my sister.” She shook her head. “I want to see him get everything that’s coming to him. But if getting that information will save someone else… We have to do it.”
“I’ll let Rafi know.”
A couple hours later, I wrote Conrad an encrypted email, notifying him of the danger of Davis Hartley.
After I finished, I sent it, and then looked at Aria.
She was standing at the sliding door in one of my shirts, barefoot, watching the water. I walked over and wrapped my arms around her from behind. She leaned back into me without hesitation.
“It’s done,” I said.
She turned in my arms. “Good. Now what?”
“Now we enjoy the rest of my vacation.”
She rose onto her toes and kissed me once, soft and sure.
“That’s a good plan,” she agreed.
The End