Chapter 43
Chapter Forty-Three
Two months later
“The place is looking great.” Her dad crossed the Shrine lobby, striding toward her. Dressed in dark wash jeans, boots, and a heavy jacket over his Henley. Even in his late fifties he kept slim, probably burning a lot of calories racing to catch up with her mother all the time.
Except Mom had been waylaid talking to Sylvia across the other side of the room.
Dad caught her up in a hug. “Missed you.”
She chuckled. “I saw you at breakfast.”
They’d had her over to the RV to eat before she came here to work. Debriefing on their tasks for the day before they parted ways.
“I can miss you whenever I want.”
Eliana snorted. They’d had a heart-to-heart about her adventure day in the woods all those years ago. About how they’d found her asleep. But after she explained her dream, they suspected that Lydia Rosenberg had shown up while she was out alone in the woods with Cabot.
They’d tried to find Lydia. Tried to figure out what she had done.
Nothing had ever come of it, and after Lydia seemingly never tried again to get to Eliana, they’d eventually stopped being scared she was a target and settled back into worry.
No wonder she had grown up feeling as if she lived in a protected bubble.
There had been a murderer in her nightmares, one who had found her when no one else knew where she was.
But Lydia Rosenberg would never hurt anyone ever again.
Neither would anyone from the Reverence Sisters. The group members had been rounded up and convicted, or rehabilitated, depending on their involvement in attempting to infiltrate the Shrine.
“How is Luci today?” Eliana said.
Her dad nodded, his arm around her shoulders. “She’s getting better every day. Doing well in rehab, learning the basics. I get the feeling she’s determined. That helps.”
“If anyone could get better through sheer strength of will, it’s Luci.”
“Javier said to tell you that Carlos’s favorite color is blue.”
Eliana chuckled.
“Should I know what that means?”
Eliana smiled.
Javier, Carlos’s dad, had been staying with him and visiting Luci every day.
Eventually, he would take her back to Salt Lake City with him, so she could stay at home while she completed the rest of her recovery.
Sure, she wouldn’t ever be completely the same vibrant woman she had been, but that didn’t mean they had lost her.
They might never know the full extent of her experience, but they had her back, and that was what mattered.
“Blue?” Dad asked.
“I went to see Luci, and her dad was there,” Eliana explained. “I was showing her dresses for my date with Carlos. She was helping me choose what to wear.”
“Ah.” Dad scratched his jaw. “Am I supposed to be happy about this?”
“Would you rather it was someone else?”
He nodded. “Good point.” After a beat, he said, “Where is he taking you?”
“Chateau Brionne. Seven o’clock.”
“Is he picking you up? Don’t tell me you’re supposed to meet him there.” Her dad looked ready to start boiling.
Eliana smiled. “Yes, he’s picking me up in his truck. Even though my new place is in the complete opposite direction from his house and the restaurant.”
“Good.”
Eliana sighed, watching her mom walk toward them and wondering if she would ever be as confident in who she was as Kenna Banbury.
Then again, if she wanted to be, she had to realize that it might only come after a lifetime of solving crime.
After one brush with an investigation, Eliana thought she might be good here and not out on her own without even Carlos for backup.
Especially with her new role at the Shrine.
Tony had recovered from his gunshot wound enough to be transported home. After a long conversation with her parents, he’d headed back to Arkansas, leaving her in place as the head of security.
The one person with access to the vault.
“Everything good, honey?” Her mom kissed her cheek and gave her a hug.
“Yeah, it’s good.”
Dad told her, “In a couple of days we’re going to head to Milwaukee and see Maizie and her family, then we’ll be going back home.”
She’d known this was coming, but it was still hard to hear. “Having you in Chicago has been amazing.” Eliana pulled them both close in a hug. “Really amazing.”
“But you’ll come visit the first chance you get?” he asked.
Eliana nodded. “Carlos wants to visit his dad and his sister regularly, and I’ll want to come see you guys. Especially now that you’re on the all-new Board of Governors. The human board.”
“Mmm,” Mom said. “I told Sylvia what I thought about that.” She shook her head. “That system should’ve been phased out years ago.”
“I know.” Eliana nodded. “She said you gave her an earful.”
Her dad chuckled.
Eliana glanced around the lobby. “A lot of people died in here. Some I knew, and others I’d never met.”
“But you took care of business, and no one else got control of the Board.” Mom nodded. “And we didn’t lose any family.”
“Did Sylvia ask you guys to speak at the Symposium in October?”
Her mom’s expression shuttered. “I’m thinking about it.”
Her dad cast a knowing look Eliana’s way. Whatever the answer would be, her father would be where he always was. By her mother’s side.
Eliana said, “I know I’m repeating myself. But thanks for coming here.”
They’d worked a case of their own in the past few months, nearly faced the worst moment of their lives, and pulled through. The killer was behind bars now. Justice had been served.
A different kind of justice had ended Lydia Rosenberg. Patience, the Mother of the Reverence Sisters, would be on trial soon enough, and facing conviction—life in prison—for what she’d done.
Days later, the protesters would be back in front of the Shrine.
Life would continue.
But they weren’t the same. Recent experiences had changed all of them.
Eliana could never have anticipated the ways she’d grown.
And if she’d been told that she would feel more like the child of Kenna Banbury and Oliver Jaxton now than she had even just a few weeks ago, she probably wouldn’t have believed it.
But she knew better now who she was.
She’d faced her destiny and made a choice.
“No need to thank us,” Mom said. “As long as it’s all over and things can go back to normal. Then I won’t be lying awake at night wondering what’s happening to you.”
“Until you get a case,” Eliana pointed out. “Then you’ll be busy working.”
“If I need help solving it, I’ll give you a call.”
Eliana grinned. “I’d like that.”
Her parents pulled her close for another hug, and Eliana watched them until they left through the front entrance.
Sylvia came over, a guarded look on her face. “Everything all right?”
Eliana nodded.
“Good. We’re due downstairs.”
They walked together to the elevator. Down two levels. The doors opened, and Eliana stepped out.
Sylvia stayed in the elevator car. “I’ll be in my office.”
“Okay.” Eliana headed for the vault, bending for the eye scanner.
“Insert for stage two.”
She put her finger in the slot, then sucked the bead of blood from the end. She entered the passcode and opened the heavy door, pulling it back so she could step inside.
The vault door closed behind her.
Lights flickered and hummed, the yellow glow illuminating the space as the walls opened like doors, the panels retracting between server racks.
The system said, “State your name.”
“Eliana Hope Banbury Jaxton.”
Instead of three heads, the system flashed news reports on the screens that made up the back wall. Images of a bombing outside Tripoli, followed by devastation in Caracas. Financial reports scrolled on one side, and then a man’s photo.
“Nicoli Fullerton, currently the CEO of Advanced Cyber Holdings, is in back-alley talks with the UK Ambassador to the US, and our intel suggests the two plan to destabilize disparate areas of the world in order to secure investments in copper. Our sources have uncovered directives indicating they intend to assassinate the president of the United Arab Nations. For the full report, tap the screen to begin download.”
Eliana tapped the screen.
“Please advise action.”
Eliana’s phone buzzed as soon as the download finished. She skimmed enough to add to what she already knew. These people needed to be stopped.
She said, “Deploy assets.”
“Directive received.”
The wall panels slid back out, covering the servers. She had just enough time to get more coffee before she gave the Westbury Elementary group their tour.
“System shutdown.”