Chapter 15 #2
Seeing him walk away from her had hurt more than she’d expected.
She’d known it would happen this way, but her heart had still ached as Grant followed Noah into the crowd to do damage control.
Sergeant Walker had offered to take her to the hospital to be checked, but she’d waved him off.
Her neck was tender where Andropov had grabbed it, but STAG’s reaction had been so quick, he’d barely had a chance to do any damage before Grant tackled him and Reid pulled her to safety.
So when the MPs had arrived, apologetic but firm, she hadn’t hesitated to go with them, not allowing herself to look back.
Now she was stuck in a nondescript office building in the middle of Atlanta, an attorney at her side—thanks to Colonel Lockhart—as two federal investigators peppered her with questions for the fourth day in a row.
A one-way mirror lined the wall behind her, and she didn’t even want to think about who might be listening in on the other side.
She straightened her shoulders, reminding herself she had nothing to hide.
“Mrs. Holland, can you explain how you came to be aware of your husband’s activities?” one of them—Brenda, her ID badge said—asked, tapping her pen against an open notepad.
She gritted her teeth. Again? They’d already asked a dozen variations of this exact question. “I wasn’t aware of them at all, until Sergeant McDowell stopped in for a visit. I showed him some strange texts I’d received, and he asked STAG to investigate the phone number.”
It all sounded so simple, yet it had been anything but. Tucking her hands underneath her legs, she continued. “Eventually, Sergeant Lawson found a file on Jeremy’s laptop that contained copies of all of the emails he had sent to Andrei Andropov’s company. That was when I learned what he’d done.”
Brenda frowned and flipped through her notes, as if hearing this for the first time. “But you took out a loan from DropKom. It was your information and signature in those files.”
Pressure throbbed behind her eyes, and she pinched the bridge of her nose.
“That was done without my knowledge.” She glanced at her attorney and he nodded, and she continued with the response he’d instructed her to give.
“If you compare my signature to the one on the application, you’ll notice it’s significantly different.
I never signed on a loan. My husband applied under my name. ”
“You were living under the same roof. You expect us to believe you never noticed anything unusual? Didn’t you wonder where his sudden influx of cash came from?” Brenda’s gaze drilled sharply into her.
“I didn’t–didn’t have access–” Everly forced herself to draw a shaky breath. Would they believe the truth, if she told them?
Brenda dismissed Everly’s stuttering response with a wave of her hand. “The fact is, it’s your name, your social, your signature on that form. That’s either complicity or gross negligence, Mrs. Holland.”
The lawyer had warned her they’d do this—try to intimidate her, trip her up, catch her in a lie.
Everly breathed in through her nose, then slowly out of her mouth, trying to soothe her shattered nerves.
Without Grant’s calm, collected presence at her side, she was struggling to keep her head above the waves of the investigators’ assault.
What was it that Grant had said after Andropov called her? Don’t let the bastards rattle you. Something like that. She opted not to take the bait that Brenda had laid out, and sat in silence until the agent spoke up again.
“Where were you during STAG’s investigation?”
“At Grant—Sergeant McDowell’s cabin. North of here, in the mountains.”
Dave, the male investigator, frowned and scribbled something on his notepad. “And what’s your relationship to Sergeant McDowell?”
“He’s a friend. He and Jeremy were very close.” Everly twisted her hands under the table, wondering how many more intrusive questions they could possibly invent.
“Are you romantically involved with him?”
Crimson heat bloomed in her cheeks. She glanced at her attorney, hoping for a way out, but he nodded, urging her to answer the question. Useless man.
“Yes,” she whispered.
“How long have you been seeing Sergeant McDowell?” Brenda asked, and Everly had never wished so badly for a hole to open up in the floor and swallow her.
“I don’t see how that’s relevant,” she said, the words coming out sharper than she’d intended.
The investigators exchanged a glance, and a pit opened in her stomach.
Brenda leaned forward, as smug as a cat who’d cornered a mouse. “So let me get this straight—you’re being investigated for a federal crime, and the man who took over the case just happened to be an old family friend?”
The pit in Everly’s gut grew deeper.
Dave didn’t even look up from his notes. “Not just a friend, right? You’re involved now. Sleeping with one of the men investigating your crime. That’s one hell of a way to throw him off the trail.”
Everly stiffened. “That’s not what happened at all.”
Brenda let out a faint, derisive hum. “You have to admit, the timing’s incredibly convenient. He shows up, you start seeing him, and suddenly STAG starts defending you like you’re one of their own.”
She blinked hard, desperate to stave off the sting behind her eyes. Don’t let them see you cry, she urged herself. Don’t give them that satisfaction.
“The facts speak for themselves.” Dave angled towards her, as far as his paunchy gut would allow, and tapped his file folder on the table as he spoke.
“You were the sole signer on a loan tied to the theft of classified intelligence.” Tap.
“You’ve provided no evidence that the signature isn’t yours, and the man who could verify it—your husband—is dead.
” Tap. “And the only person able to corroborate your version of events is the soldier who slept beside you in a cabin for a week.” Tap.
“Sounds like something out of a Lifetime movie.” Brenda propped her chin in her hand, eyebrows raised in mock concern. “Go ahead. I’m dying to hear how you spin this.”
The door whooshed open behind her just then, before Everly could say something she might regret.
“Meeting adjourned.”
She knew that voice. Everly looked up, into the one-way mirror, to see Colonel Lockhart standing in the doorway, arms crossed and eyes full of thunder.
Brenda’s head snapped up. “Colonel, we’re in the middle of an interview—”
The colonel glanced at his watch. “Actually, you’re at the end.”
“You can’t just waltz in here and start calling the shots!” Dave’s face was as red and round as a ripe tomato. “This is a federal investigation–”
“And it’s about to become a federal embarrassment, once word gets out that you’ve spent the last four days harassing a military widow,” Lockhart responded, his voice deadly calm.
Dave blinked, like he wasn’t sure he’d heard right.
Lockhart stepped forward at last, gaze sweeping the room with deliberate slowness.
“I read your reports,” he said. “Twice. There’s nothing new on day four, just like days one, two, and three. Nothing prosecutable. You’re going in circles because you don’t want to admit you were wrong about her.”
He reach for the rolled up sheaf of papers in the cargo pocket of his uniform and slapped them on the table.
“STAG analysts have confirmed the loan originated from a secured government terminal, accessed during a classified overseas training mission. Mrs. Holland had no access. She could not have submitted it.”
Brenda opened her mouth, then closed it again, like a fish out of water.
He leaned one hand on the table, the other on the back of Everly’s chair. “This woman is a victim of identity fraud, burglary, assault, and God knows what else. And you’re in here grilling her like she’s got the launch codes in her purse.”
“Our director will be hearing about your little power trip immediately, Colonel.” Dave pushed back from the table with a sneer and shoved his papers into a briefcase.
“I certainly hope so. Do me a favor, will you?” He shot Dave a lazy grin. “Tell her Jack says hello. And good luck explaining your interrogation tactics on Capitol Hill.”
A heavy beat of silence followed. Then Brenda stood, snapping shut her notepad. “We’ll reconvene later.”
“No,” Lockhart said, sharp and final. “We won’t.” He jerked his head towards the door. “Now get out.”
Dave and Brenda hurried out of the room, Everly’s attorney on their heels. Colonel Lockhart frowned after him as the door clicked shut. “Hell of a lot of silence for someone on our payroll.”
Everly sighed and turned to face Lockhart as he sat down in the chair the attorney had vacated. “I think Dave and Brenda have their minds made up about me.”
Lockhart shook his head. “They’ve got nothing, and they know it. This entire thing is a farce.”
“Colonel Lockhart, I swear to you that I had absolutely no idea what Jeremy was doing. And if Grant hadn’t decided to visit me at home last weekend, I would’ve been there when Andropov broke in.
It’s because of him that STAG was able to figure out what Jeremy had done.
” A solitary tear trailed down Everly’s cheek.
“You don’t need to convince me,” he said, his voice as sympathetic as the day he’d knocked on her door and found her barely functional.
He slid a box of tissues towards her. “You’ve held your own through all of this, and no one could ask for more.
” He drummed his fingers against the table.
“I’m going to make some calls, see if I can pull a few strings to expedite this.
No need for the CIA to violate your privacy any more than they already have. ”
Everly pulled a tissue from the box and dabbed her cheeks. “They’re not going to try and pin this on him, are they? Grant didn’t do anything wrong. He doesn’t deserve to lose his career because of me.”
“Don’t worry about that. It’ll be a cold day in hell before I let the CIA muscle out one of my finest operators.” Colonel Lockhart cocked his head. “You really care about him, don’t you?”
“I…I love him.” She twisted the now-limp tissue in her hands and focused on the colonel’s spotless tactical boots. “I know what you’re probably thinking, that it’s too soon, and a terrible idea. I’m pretty sure Grant doesn’t feel the same—”
“Everly.”
Colonel Lockhart leaned forward, elbows on his knees, till she finally looked him in the eye.
And to her surprise, she saw understanding there.
“I’m not judging you. Either of you. I get the feeling there’s a lot that I don’t know here, but one thing’s for certain.
Sergeant McDowell could do no better than to have you by his side.
So let’s get you back where you belong.”
Everly sniffed and managed a watery smile. “You know, Colonel, I’m starting to think there’s a softie underneath that hard-ass exterior of yours.”
He winked as he rose from the table, already punching numbers into his cell phone. “Then it looks like we’ve both been keeping secrets.”