Chapter 41
OLIVIA
I’d been in America for six agonizing nights.
My father’s attempt at cooking wasn’t the cause of my agony. It was my regret over an excessively tall man who knew how to move with deadly silence.
I’d been a glorious asshole to Ethan at the hospital.
Every night since he’d left me in that hospital bed, I’d dug his phone number out, the one I’d written on a piece of paper.
Which had been unnecessary because I had it memorized.
I stared at the paper and confirmed the numbers again, repeating them in my head.
We’d begun that horrific day together in bed. Showered and got dressed together, like we were a couple, and I’d liked that. Then, the airport where I’d jumped out of the car to lay down suppressive fire when Jason had been hit.
It led to the hospital in Munich, and Markus’s pale face. He was still there now, but improving every day, Shawn had said, when we’d spoken earlier this week. I could barely think about the rest without going numb and empty.
Vitale’s office.
Landstuhl.
It had been way, way too much.
I’d shut down and shut Ethan out so completely after all of that. The joke was on me, though. I still couldn’t stop thinking about him. In Germany, it had been bad. In America, I was a mess. Wondering where he was, what he was doing, if he was healing. Whether he was thinking about me.
It made me crazy, which was ironic. Staying at my father’s place usually did that.
My trip was cut short when a man named Hendrix called and asked me to Washington, D.C. for a face-to-face. He didn’t say what it was about, only that he worked for the Central Intelligence Agency and was Ethan’s boss. I was left with the impression I shouldn’t refuse, or it could be bad for him.
I took the first flight in they offered me and scheduled the meeting for the following morning.
Now I lay restlessly on my hotel bed in D.C., staring at the crack in the curtains that wouldn’t close all the way and couldn’t shut off the thoughts in my head. Had something happened with the Abramos? Was Ethan’s job in jeopardy?
Thinking of him made all the questions I hadn’t gotten a chance to ask him race through my mind. His choice to join the CIA had to make relationships difficult, but was he allowed to love? Had he been in love before?
Why the hell was I thinking about that?
Enough. I was done behaving like a glorious asshole. It was probably too late to call, in more ways than one, but I dialed the number anyway. Maybe I’d get voicemail.
It rang.
And rang.
I launched upright in bed when there came a click and the call connected.
“This is Foster,” his sleepy voice said.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.” I glanced at a clock. Holy hell, it was one in the morning. Was he even still in Virginia?
“It’s all right,” he said quickly, sounding like he was suddenly fully awake. “What’s going on? Everything okay?”
“Yes, it’s fine.”
“Good.”
He waited for me to speak, but all I gave in return was paralyzed silence. Hearing him again emptied the thoughts from my brain.
“Can I help you with something?” he asked softly.
I pushed out a breath. Taking risks, living dangerously, it reminded me I was alive. I wanted to take this risk. “I’m sorry about how I acted, Ethan. I don’t like how we left it.”
“Yeah,” he replied. “Me either.”
It fell quiet again.
“What are we going to do about it?” It was meant to be teasing but came out completely serious.
He paused. “I’m sure I can figure something out.”
I fell back on the bed, the phone pressed to my ear, relieved he didn’t seem to hold a grudge. He’d come after me, attempted rescue, and called in a strike team. Shawn made it sound like doing that had been detrimental to his career.
And I hadn’t said thank you. Not even given him a goodbye when he’d left. I’d been terrible.
“Where are you, Detroit?”
“Uh, no.” He didn’t know I was in D.C.? “Are you still in the States?”
God, I hoped we were still on the same continent.
“Yeah. I have a delightful psych eval at seven tomorrow morning.” He paused. “It’s a standard protocol thing.” He’d tacked that on like he worried I might think something was wrong with him.
“I’m a pilot, so I’m familiar with those.” Talking about feelings and behavior while a stranger stared at you, giving you absolutely no feedback, ranked close to Vitale’s office or the mountain. “How long are you going to be sticking around?”
“If I’m cleared tomorrow, they’ll authorize me to go back after the holidays.”
My heart fell out of rhythm. “Back to Europe?”
“Yeah.” There was a sound as he let out a deep breath. “I’ll be stepping back from operations for a while. My last few ops didn’t go so well. I’ll be assisting from a field office until further notice.”
“You’re okay with that?”
“Oh, yeah,” he said. “I asked for it. This ‘being someone else’ bullshit, it gets old.”
A smile tugged at my lips. “So, you’ll just be Ethan. The freakishly tall guy from Kentucky, with the Croatian mother and the father who builds custom homes on some river.”
“The Ohio River Valley,” he corrected, “not necessarily on the river.”
“Whatever.”
“You know an awful lot about me,” he said, his voice warm.
“I’m betting I haven’t even scratched the surface.”
There was a pause, as if he were carefully considering his next statement. “But you want to.”
“Yes.” There was no hesitation from me.
“I’m glad you called. Maybe don’t make me wait six damn days next time.”
I closed my eyes, so glad to hear his voice. “I’m sorry.” I’d never been more sincere.
“So, you’re not in Detroit. Where are you?”
“I’m in Washington.”
There was another pause. “D.C.? Why’s that?”
“I’m not sure. I have a meeting with Hendrix in the morning.” I didn’t want to keep secrets from him. “Do you think this is part of your eval?”
“It’s possible. They know we’re friends.”
He put extra emphasis on the wholly inadequate label I’d given him in front of my dad, and—oh, I definitely deserved that.
I fidgeted with the pillow on the empty side of my bed. “Can I see you after? You want to grab dinner?”
I held my breath as I awaited his answer and tried not to feel like the boy-crazed teenager I’d once been.
Thankfully, he didn’t make me wait. “Yeah, we could do that.”