Breach Point - Chapter 2
Saturday morning proved as fun as last night’s television critique.
Jane and Min ran an easy four-mile jog around the property, looping several times but staying away from people.
When her uncle had first bought the ranch, he and the guys had groomed trails into the surrounding forest, which also secretly tied into a park to the west of the property.
Jane and the others could at any time escape the confines of the house to exercise in the woods to their heart’s content.
If that didn’t satisfy them, they could swim in the backyard pool. With the weather as cold as it had been, Jane preferred the hot tub. But she could also indulge in the large outbuilding, which contained a weapons range that had the power to make their absent arms expert giddy.
Belowground, the basement housed a mini-armory with reinforced concrete walls, blast-resistant ceilings, and multiple five-foot-wide lanes stretching over seventy-five feet.
After her run with Min, she dragged Smith into a firing competition, which she won with a smug smile.
Then lost a knife fight to Min, as expected.
Personally, she thought he wanted to make up for nearly getting his head shot off the night prior.
Even though she hadn’t gotten the safety off, she felt sure she could have shot him and done enough damage to win their match.
Smith finally conceded that both were much stronger and tougher than he could ever wish to be and escaped to grab takeout for an early dinner.
Left alone, finally clean and dressed, Jane walked with Min along the trail they’d recently run. Under a beautiful, clear autumn sky that surprisingly held no rain clouds, the weather promised Bainbridge a balmy fifty degrees with a cool breeze.
They walked in silence for a while, each comfortable with their own thoughts.
After an interval, Min broke their shared peace. “What’s your deal?”
“My deal?” She glanced at him, aware that every member of her family put one in mind of rugged adventure and lethal danger. And, according to her friend and fellow agent, Jenn, older-man hotness, which gave Jane the ick.
“Yeah. You lost a guy you were dating. You were clearly close to him. Then you killed the people who killed him. Still, you don’t appear satisfied. There’s something around you that feels spiritually hungry, Jane.”
“You know, whenever someone tries to stereotype you into being some mystical ancient swordsman—”
“You mean Shawn.”
She grinned. “I do. You tell him to knock it off. So why the spirituality comment? That’s not like you.” Though it kind of was. Min acted like he was nothing more than a hired killer, but he liked to pontificate about the reasons behind literally everything.
“Action and reaction. Balance, young grasshopper.” They both grinned at the Kung Fu reference. “What’s the deal? You’re sad. I don’t like you sad.”
To her mortification, tears welled out of nowhere. She sniffed and held them back, but barely. “I don’t like me sad either. I don’t know.”
They walked some more.
“I guess it’s, well, it’s all unfinished. For the first time in a long time, I felt something for someone. An intimate feeling of connection.” She glanced at him, saw him watching, listening, and continued. “It wasn’t easy to open up to feeling that. I genuinely liked him, Min.”
He wrapped an arm around her shoulders but didn’t speak. Just comforting with his solid, safe presence.
“I’ve grieved. I should be over it by now.”
“Jane, it’s only been a little over a month since he died.”
Doing the math, she realized it was just shy of two months by four days.
“Give yourself time. Vengeance helps heal. Don’t listen to anyone who says it doesn’t. Feelings are harder for you because you think you shouldn’t feel them. You’re a lot like Chris and Malcolm that way.”
“Thanks a lot.”
“But if you don’t allow yourself to grieve, you’ll bury that negative feeling. It will weaken you, and you can’t afford to be weak.”
“I know.” She sighed, feeling as if she’d failed a test.
He squeezed her closer. “It’s okay to cry. To feel. Pain makes joy all the sweeter.”
“You never seem to feel it.”
“Oh, I do. Like you, I bury it. Then I need to take extra time to let myself sit and ache with my memories. It’s never easy.”
“No, it’s not.”
They continued past a few busy squirrels and a fox that peered out at them then darted away.
He stopped, staring after it. “That’s why Chris watches us so closely, you know. He makes us talk to Sven regularly. To get our heads on right.” Sven, another member of Team Ten and their resident psychiatrist.
She looked up at Min, concerned by the sadness she saw in the tightening of his lips, the slight downturn of his brows. “What happened?”
“I was too late to save a young woman not much older than you. Nothing I could have done would have prevented her death, but I still have a hard time reconciling myself with how she went.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. The criminal who took her life paid dearly for it.” He smiled, and she knew the killer’s terror dealing with Min must have been awful. “I balanced a life for a life. I’m still upset about it, when I normally don’t get bothered by the crap we’re forced to deal with on the job.”
Jane had always appreciated talking to Min. He didn’t make excuses or hide what he felt. Well, not if she asked him. The man had a poker face worth envying.
“Are you ready to retire? Is that why you’re here?”
“What?” Her question surprised him. “Hell no. I love my job. But I do regret the consequences now and then.”
Relieved, because Min was a vital part of Team Ten on the battlefield, she nodded.
“I totally understand.” She tugged him to walk again.
“I’m doing my best to deal with Matthew’s death.
I can’t tell if I’m having a hard time dealing because I liked him or because his killer is still out there.
No matter who pulled the trigger, I know August Kaminski is behind it. ”
“And despite what the authorities say, you don’t think he’s dead.”
She snorted. “Blown up in a boat racing away from the cops? Heck no. It’s too simple. Too easy.”
Min nodded. “Too public.”
“Exactly. No, Kaminski’s out there. We never learned what the secretive group he’d organized did with their information. Only that they gathered it and passed it around. So many unanswered questions.” And that bothered her. “I feel like I’m letting Matthew down,” she admitted.
“If you give up now, you are,” he said bluntly. “But there’s no expiration date on vengeance.”
“Justice.”
“Sure. Call it justice.” He smirked, the sadness gone from his gaze. And gone from her too at that moment, walking with family who understood. “Just don’t give up going after it. You’ll find this guy and take him down.”
“Put him in jail, yes.”
He grinned. “Exactly. And isn’t that what makes life worth living?”
“You have a point.”
They walked back to the house.
“So, just to get it out in the open, will you tell me why you’re really here?” she asked him.
Smith came out, overheard her, and shrugged in answer. “Well, Min? Will you tell her why we’re really here?”
Min sighed. “I guess. We’re concerned about you.”
“I know.”
He rubbed her head, as if she were a puppy.
“Stop it.”
Smith snickered.
“But we’re even more concerned about your cousin.”
Jane’s thoughts ground to a halt. “Raine. I should have known.”
Smith nodded. “She’s into some nasty stuff. We’re here to help her. Seeing you is a bonus.”
She glanced back at Min, saw the tail end of a weird look he shot Smith, and punched him in the arm.
“Hey.” He rubbed his arm. “That hurt.”
“Oh, don’t look surprised. You earned it.” She glared at Smith for extra measure. “I’m going to wash up. Then we can eat together. Just one big, happy, lying family.” She headed into the house past Smith.
“You suck at lying,” Smith muttered to Min behind her.
“Me? It was your stupid story about Raine that sunk us,” Min muttered back. “Moron.”
“Idiot.”
“Me? How am I the idiot?”
She stomped to the bathroom to wash up, impressed they could lie straight to her face.
And look so honest and concerned while doing it.
* * *