Operation: Normal (21 page)

"But you're really a spy, right?" My eyes drank in every detail of his face, and I wished
for full daylight so I could see him better.

He looked away. "Later, okay?"

With a frustrated sigh, I settled back against Zach. "I've waited eighteen years; I guess
another hour or so won't kill me."

When we got to Zach's hidden bike, a BMW, I half expected Dad to object to my getting
on it. But all he did was ask if Zach had a spare helmet, which he did. Of course, Bryce tailed us
all the way back to Austin, and Zach never went over the speed limit once. We pulled into the
parking lot of our apartment building at 7:00 a.m. That's when I realized that Dad did not intend
to come inside with us.

Incensed, I walked straight back to that big black car and told my dad that now was
later
. I promised Bryce that we would take him wherever he needed to go once I'd
finished with him.

With my father hobbling on crutches, we rode up to the fifth floor on a very brightly lit
elevator. I never took my eyes off him and so noticed that his face got redder with every floor we
climbed. Once we got to our apartment, I tapped lightly on the door so I wouldn't wake
Kayly.

Not.

I actually banged on it with both fists. The door flew open and there stood Mom,
looking as if she hadn't slept in weeks. She burst into tears as she pulled me and Zach into the
apartment and initiated an impromptu group hug.

"Oh, thank God," she said, kissing first me and then my flushed boyfriend. Her gaze
swept us both from head to toe. "Are you guys okay?"

"Now we are," I said, suddenly exhausted and happier than I'd been in my entire
life.

I pulled Dad on into the apartment and shut the door firmly behind him. For an Interpol
operative, he looked ridiculously nervous.

"Hello, Clint," said Mom.

He gave her a solemn nod by way of greeting. "Kat."

"Sit," I said, pushing him toward the nearest chair. "I have a million questions, but first I
have got to pee."

Dad grinned at that and visibly relaxed. I headed down the hall, stopping only to kiss
Kayly, who rolled toward me in her walker, both arms up and begging me to take her. When I
didn't, she reached for Zach, but he wouldn't either.

"Not 'til I wash my hands," he said, holding them up for her to see.

While Zach and I cleaned up a little in separate bathrooms, Mom started cooking
breakfast, so by the time we both returned to the living area, the apartment smelled like...bacon?
Was that really some of the bacon I'd bought sizzling in a pan? I made a bee-line to the kitchen to
find exactly that. I looked at Mom; she looked at me. Neither of us said a word.

Dad sat in the rocker. I sank onto the nearby couch, wet clothes and all. Zach plopped
down on the floor between my feet and lifted Kayly from her walker so he could kiss and then
hold her.

"First question," I said, dragging my eyes from that precious sight to my dad. "Why did
you break eighteen years of silence and call me last Sunday?"

"Because I'd just found out that someone had hacked into Interpol's personnel
files."

"Your worst nightmare, right?" I teased without thought.

Dad was clearly not amused. "You have no idea."

"Actually, I think I'm beginning to." Flustered by my apparent
faux pas
, I
quickly moved on. "Second question: Why did you call me on Wednesday?"

"I had a serious feeling that something was wrong."

I nodded and opened my mouth to ask the next question.

Zach beat me to the punch. "How'd you break your foot?"

Dad looked at him. "Blow-out on my Jeep on Thursday. It flipped. I got thrown from the
vehicle."

"So spies don't have to wear seat belts?" I said.

"I'm not a spy, but point taken. I should've buckled up."

"Where were you when it happened?" Zach said.

"Let's just say I was working undercover south of the border."

I thought about that for a minute. "What did you do after the accident?"

"Since the crash annihilated my phone, I had no choice but to walk out of the desert to
the nearest town."

I tried to picture that. "On a broken foot? How long did that take?"

"I finally got medical attention around one, Saturday morning."

"Whoa." My heart sort of flip-flopped at the thought of Dad hurt and needing help for
that long. "When did you tell Zach to check on me?"

"You called Zach and told him to check on Ally?" interjected Mom sharply from the
stove. I could tell by her hurt expression that she actually thought I'd told Dad and not her about
my boyfriend.

Dad looked at me, then at Mom. "Not exactly."

"Then what,
exactly
, did you do?" she asked, walking over to look down at him.
She had a spatula in her hand.

Dad never took his eyes off of it. "Well, while trying to contact Adele--"

"Ally told me you'd been talking to her for years," said Mom. "Isn't staying in touch
with someone in this building just as dangerous as staying in touch with Ally, herself?"

"Not the way we do it--"

Mom raised her hand to stop him. "Never mind. I don't want to know." Pivoting, she
returned to the stove.

"Go on," I softly prompted, impatient for him to continue.

He glanced uncertainly at Mom, now jabbing the eggs with her spatula. "Well, my
thoughts sort of crashed into Zach's, and I asked a favor of him."

Wow. "But how did you even know that he was mine?"

"If he hadn't been, we'd never have collided like that." Dad shrugged. "Don't ask me to
explain it, Ally. I can't. Unlike Aunt Adele, I've never tried to understand, much less enhance my
psychic gifts. I just use them when I need to, in this case as a way to keep up with you girls
without leaving any kind of trail."

"But what about that check you deposit in my bank account every month? Doesn't that
leave a trail?"

"Not if the money comes from a Swiss account."

Zach caught Dad's eye. "Tell me more about this psychic stuff."

"Specifically?"

"Do you know what I'm thinking?"

Dad took one look at Zach's face and hooted. "Relax. I'm no mind reader."

My boyfriend exhaled in a measured whoosh. "Good to know."

"So you finally got medical attention, guessed something wasn't right, and told Zach to
check on me. What happened next?"

"Nothing really. I had surgery on my foot, got some IV antibiotics, and re-hydrated. At
that time, I thought I could still salvage my assignment, so I stayed in character until Sunday
night, when I got such a bad feeling about things that I went half nuts. I borrowed a phone from a
nurse I thought I could trust and called you."

"It was a lousy connection."

"Yes, it was," he agreed, taking the steaming cup of coffee my mom walked over and
handed to him. "But I heard your voice, which did wonders for my morale and my sanity."

"Would you like some coffee, Zach?" Mom asked.

"Please." He put Kayly back in her walker, got up from the floor, and followed Mom to
the kitchen, where she poured him a cupful.

"Thanks." Zach joined me on the couch.

"The connection was so poor, in fact," continued my dad, "that I didn't catch everything
you said. I did hear the bit about a fire. I assume that's why you're living at this address now." He
looked around the room. "Nice place. Are you going to keep it?"

"We don't know yet," Mom said. "Breakfast is ready."

We put the Q&A session on hold and went to the table. Looking at the bacon and
eggs Mom had prepared, I almost felt like I was sitting down to a regular meal with both of my
parents, my boyfriend, and my little sister. I'd never felt so normal in my entire life.

Of course, Mom ate nothing but toast, Dad wouldn't take his eyes off his plate, and Zach
was so nervous he couldn't pick up his mug without sloshing hot coffee over his fingers. Then
there was Kayly, who begged for bits of bacon. Mom was not pleased.

"So what's your theory about the threat letters?" I asked my dad.

"What threat letters?"

"The ones I got." Belatedly realizing he hadn't heard me tell him about them on the
phone, I filled him in all I knew about them. "Do you think my kidnappers wrote them, believing
that I would tell you and that you'd back off your case?"

A smiled tugged at the corner of Dad's mouth. "I'm dead certain that the guys who got
you did not cut out little letters of the alphabet and glue them to paper."

"Then who could have sent them?"

He shook his head. "I have no idea."

"Last question. For now." I spoke around a bit of buttered biscuit. "What happened after
you called me Sunday night?"

"I decided to abort my assignment and called for pick-up. They said they'd have me out
of there by noon today. We thought it would be best to keep me in character until then so another
agent could pick up the pieces. A nurse gave me a shot for pain around midnight, which knocked
me sideways. Around three-thirty I woke up suddenly with the absolute knowledge that you were
in some kind of trouble. I borrowed the phone again and tried to reach both you and your mother,
with no luck, so tried Aunt Adele and then Zach psychically. I got no one."

"So what did you do?"

"I believe that's another question."

"Da-ad!"

"I called Interpol again and told them to track you."

"How could they do that?"

"The phones I sent you awhile back. You can be located anywhere if they're on."

Our cells came from Dad?

Mom sort of gasped, which must have sucked food down her windpipe. At any rate she
started coughing like crazy. "You sent those phones--"
cough, cough
"--so you could
track us?"

"Only in extreme emergencies," he hastily assured my mother. "You know how I worry
about you two, Kat."

She hesitated, then nodded.

"So Interpol located me?" I said.

"Yes, though apparently I could've saved them the trouble and just asked Aunt Adele
where you were, like Zach did." He grinned at my boyfriend, who grinned back. " Actually, now
that I think about it, she probably got those coordinates from me. Anyway, once my guys
realized where you were, all bets were off. Someone came to get me. We flew back immediately
to stage a rescue."

I grinned. "Only to find out that Zach had already saved my butt."

Dad grinned back. "That's right. We were a couple of miles from the house when he
clicked into my head. I knew you two were very close. I told him to run like hell for the
road."

I put down my fork and looked from Dad to Zach to Dad again. "Do you think Zach's
been added to our calling circle because I love him so much?"

This time it was my boyfriend who choked. I pounded his back for him.

"Actually," said Dad. "I think Zach's in it now because
he
loves
you
so
much. Any more questions, anyone?"

Mother and I looked at each other, then at the guys.

"Not at the moment, though you're not off the hook forever," I said.

Dad ignored that.

Zach cleared his throat. "I don't have a question, but I have something to say." He got to
his feet like he was about to make a formal statement. "Ms. Mills, I know that you don't think it's
a good idea for Ally and I to get involved, and I understand why. I mean, this is a very
complicated situation. But the thing is... It's too late for that. We're already so involved that
there's no turning back."

Mom just looked at him.

"Not sexually, of course," blurted Zach. "I mean, I thought she was thirteen until
yesterday. N-not that we'd have done anything if I'd known how old she really is--"

I frantically slashed my hand across my throat several times, signaling him to kill it.

He did with a sigh. "What I'm trying to say is we can make this work. We really can. It
won't be easy, but it will be worth it. You'll see."

"I believe you," said Mom.

"You do?" Zach and I chorused in astonishment.

"Yes. Ally obviously adores you, as does Kayly, I might add. And I owe you big time
for helping them. The least I can do is give the relationship a chance."

Zach suddenly sat as if his knees had given way.

"All done?" asked Dad.

My boyfriend nodded.

"Good. Then I have some things to say. First of all... Thanks, Kat, for having Ally and
for not telling her about me. I know it's been hard being a single parent and keeping
secrets."

"Not as hard as you might think," murmured my independent Mom, with a guilty
flush.

Dad didn't seem to catch that. "Second... Thanks, Ally, for letting me barge in and out of
your life like this."

He thought he was barging back out?

As if.

"Um, Dad?"

"Let me finish." He looked at Zach. "Last and probably most important, thanks, Zach,
for seeing after Ally, for saving her life, and for loving her so much that I knew you could be
trusted the instant our thoughts crossed." He stood and reached across the table, offering Zach his
right hand. Zach took it just as Kayly threw a handful of scrambled egg at him.

Needless to say, we all laughed. It was one of the best moments of my life.

Too bad I had to spoil it.

"About you barging out of my life--"

He stopped me with a shake of his head. "Keeping you safe has been an obsession of
mine since before you were born, Ally. Everything I've ever done, and not done, was to that
single end. I know it's been hard on you. Hell, it's been hard on me, too, and it'll be worse now
that we've actually met. But it's a sacrifice I'm prepared to make."

"Well I'm not!" Everyone jumped. I stood up and planted my hands on either side of my
plate so I could lean over the table and glare at my father.

He just looked at me.

"I've done without you for eighteen years and for what?
The bad guys got me
anyway
. You can't live in fear anymore, Dad. You just can't. If you do, they've won."