The Avenger (37 page)

"We're the only family you've ever had, Jack," Warren sneered. "What the fuck you think you're gonna do instead of Invictus?"

Jack turned to face the man who'd been a father-figure to him for nearly twenty years, the person who'd become his whole family from the age of seventeen when he'd been ripped from his foster family and Slater. From Livvie.

He felt the sick bile of betrayal, both given and received, burn his throat. The Judge was right in more ways than he knew. Jack vacillated between remorse and fury. Pissed that he showed any reaction, he unclenched his fists.

Warren wouldn't miss the signs.

Sure enough he didn't, and the knowledge seemed to curb the director's temper. "You know as well as I do that there's no going back from where you've been," he reasoned.

With considerable effort, Jack reined in his emotions. He had to believe otherwise if he intended to have any kind of future with Livvie. "You think so? I've served Invictus nearly twenty years and – "

"You're a valuable commodity, Jack, and we own you," Warren snapped. He took a calming breath and continued, "And besides that, it's nigh impossible to go back to the real world." He stepped forward tentatively. "Come on, Jack, you know that."

A commodity, Jack thought, all these years he'd been a product, and he would continue to be bought and sold until his usefulness ended.

The Judge stood close to Jack near the window. "Jack, men like us ... we're not good with civilians." He sniffed the cigar and put it in his jacket pocket. "We're hell on families. We're not made to be husbands and fathers. You said it yourself. We're born to be the warriors in this sorry-assed world."

Suddenly weary of the battle, Jack decided he wouldn't explain further. The letter said it all. He wasn't returning to Invictus. The confrontations with Howard Randolph and Ted Burrows had been the death knell to his work.

From the moment that Olivia had stared wide-eyed and terrified into his eyes, he knew he'd never be able to return to the messy work of the Organization, no matter how noble or necessary the Judge made the cause seem. He couldn't stand the agony of living with himself if he did. The anguish of never having Livvie in his life.

That price was too high and he damn well wasn't paying

He smiled when he felt like grinning and caught himself

"What the fuck are you smiling for?" Spittle gathered at the corners of the Judge's mouth, his breath matched his mood, stinking and foul, and his eyes were unfeeling pits.

Jack gazed at Warren, saw the rage and exhaustion running through every line and crease of the map drawn there. The dark cast to the eyes, the knowledge not only of what he'd done himself, but what he'd ordered his agents to do. And the horrible necessity that required that kind of work. Those kinds of decisions.

Jack knew one day he'd look into a mirror in some god-awful third-world country and see those same signs etched on his own face. If he didn't quit right now. While he had the chance.

That's why he smiled when he felt like grinning. Hell, felt like laughing out loud. But of course, he wasn't about to tell the Judge that.

The director stood within inches of Jack's face, his florid complexion threatening apoplexy. He jabbed a thick forefinger at Jack's chest, punctuating each word. "We own you, Jack. Don't. You. Forget. That."

Warren barely reached his shoulder and as Jack looked down at him, he wondered how he'd ever respected this puppet of a man who stood before him, issuing his puny threats. Well, maybe not so puny. The Director of Invictus could make good on many of his threats.

But he didn't know about Jack's ace in the hole.

"There's a Swiss bank account," he began. "Unnumbered, of course."

A cloud of serenity floated over him as he spoke the words. "But that's not important, Warren. What you need to know ... " In imitation he punched a finger into Warren's shoulder. "is what's in the safety deposit box associated with the account."

Understanding crawled slowly across the Judge's face, but instead of speaking, he clasped his right hand over his chest and sank into his chair. His movements were so dramatic that Jack nearly laughed aloud until he realized the man was truly shocked, his face ashen, his lips slack, his eyes vacant.

Jack pressed two fingers to Warren's carotid artery. A fine steady pumping drummed gently beneath his fingers. He felt surprisingly relieved the old man hadn't croaked. He pushed the button to summon Higgins.

Maybe Jack was beginning to heal after all.

Warren looked up at him, twisted his lips. "You won't make it," he wheezed. "In a month, a year, you'll come crawling back."

Jack bent close to the Judge's ear. "Remember how I said not to fuck with me, Warren?"

The Judge shrugged and managed a weak smile. "Sorry, Jack, but I'm afraid that happened a long time ago."

Jack straightened up. "It'll work." He pushed past the doubt. "I can
make
it work."

Higgins rushed in, took in the situation, and offered the Judge pills and water. His color returned after a few moments. "Get out," he snarled to Higgins.

"You're a goddamn fool if you think it's that simple," he told Jack after Higgins left.

"The documents make it that simple. The meticulous accounting of every single one of my missions. Names, dates, places, all chronicled in neat little notebooks." Jack jerked his head angrily. "Extremely damning evidence. I think you'll leave us alone."

"Documentation means jack," Warren snorted. "You think that'll protect you if I want to go after you?"

Jack balled his fists and jammed them in his pockets, wanting more than anything to smash something until his hands were bloody stumps.

"This is really about that broad, isn't it," Warren jeered. "You think that's gonna last? You think she won't wake up every morning and see the blood on your hands? Be disgusted by you?"

With Warren's taunts ringing in his ears, Jack turned on his heel and marched out the door of the Invictus office, down the long flight of stairs to the lobby, and out into the brisk Maryland spring. Hailing a taxi, he directed the cabbie south on I-95 toward Washington, D.C.

He slouched in the back of the cab, thinking furiously all the way to Washington. Damn it all! Damn the whole Invictus Organization! The Judge was wrong.

#

Olivia waited for him at the Lincoln Memorial, standing at the base of the statue, reading for the tenth time the immortal words carved there. She hadn't wanted to wait in Baltimore where Invictus had its home. She much preferred this place with all its history, the bustling, but elegant old city with stirring monuments and memorials. Californians spoke of antiquities in terms of decades, but this place reached back into the centuries. She wanted to savor it before she returned home.

She heard Jack before she saw him. Slow in turning to greet him because she was afraid. What had he told the director? Was his contract with Invictus like membership in a gang? What had Diego Vargas said about gangs?
Blood in, blood out?
But hadn't Jack sacrificed enough blood, both his and others?

Would Invictus let him go? Or would they hunt them for the rest of their lives? Jack knew the kinds of men who'd be sent to chase them. Expert killers, relentless in their pursuit. Now Olivia knew them too.

That night in the abandoned church, she'd seen the kind of man Invictus sent. That night Jack had turned into something that'd shaken her very being.

The Jack she'd known the last six months – the Jack she'd come to love all over again – that Jack was the man she was willing to sacrifice everything for. She'd told him she would follow him wherever he went, whatever he did, even though it scared her to death.

"Like that 'whither thou goest' thing?" he'd asked.

"Exactly," she'd answered.

But, God, she now prayed, please let him go because she didn't really know if she could carry out her promise. If she could live like that.

"Olivia." His word was a mere whisper on the frosty air of Washington, D.C.

She couldn't hear the answer she sought in the tone of his voice. She'd never asked him directly what had happened with Howard Randolph in that interrogation room, but she realized now she'd have to know to move on.

She couldn't help it. She got to the point right away. "Before you say anything, I have to know about Howard Randolph. Did you ... did you hurry that along?"

"You really want to know?"

"No ... yes. I
have
to know."

"Randolph's death is not on my hands." A small vein tightened at his temple and she realized how much the case has tormented him. How much he'd lost over the years with Invictus.

"I ... did he suffer?"

"No," he whispered, "He didn't. I made sure of that. Even if he deserved it."

"I can't bear to think of that. I can't be with you like that."

"Randolph's been gone for six months. He has nothing to do with us anymore. He probably got much less than he deserved, but he's gone."

Not the definite answer she'd wanted, but good enough, she thought. "Did the Judge release you from your contract?" The final break, she had to know he'd severed all connections with Invictus.

Jack remained silent, his expression blank. But she read the doubt in his eyes and her heart crashed like a bird with a wounded feather as she turned away.

#

The words stumbled around Jack's mind like a foreign language. He couldn't speak. What could he say, he thought? What would he do with a woman like Olivia anyway? He knew the kind of man he was. A proficient killing machine, relentless in pursuit of murderers and assorted madmen. And Olivia knew what he was, what'd he'd been. She'd seen the monster he'd become.

He touched her shoulder and she whirled around, a pretty pink color heightening her high cheek bones. "They're not going to let you go, are they?" she whispered, tears in her voice.

Her hands tightened into fists as if she'd pound him even while those wet brilliant eyes flooded. He reached for her again, but she batted his hand away. "Livvie," he began.

"Damn you, Jack." She was crying openly now. "Damn you all to hell."

She stormed off before he could speak again, but turned back at the bottom of the steps and nodded, coming to a serious understanding. Then she walked steadfastly away from him toward the Reflecting Pool, her figure rigid in the light breeze.

"Olivia," he whispered as her figure receded, a mere puff of air in the cold, clear spring of Washington, D.C. Shock froze him to the spot for a brief moment.

And the wind or fate or sweet kismet caught the word. She turned around and saw his face. He grinned as he strode toward her. At once her expression was bright and clear, the pretty, carefree face of the girl he'd loved for so long.

Olivia raced toward him, leapt into his arms as he swung her around. "Damn you, Jack Holt, you frightened me," she laughed on a sob. "I was so afraid."

"I know that I can't have you and a normal life along with the job," he said matter-of-factly. "I choose you." He buried his face into her neck, inhaling the sweet scent of her. "Squirt," he murmured.

Their kiss was tender and sweet beyond any imagining. As the kiss deepened, as passion rose like a powerful magnet between them, she whispered huskily into his ear.

"I want you now. Close. Inside me so tight you'll never leave again."

He laughed with the light-hearted gift of a lover who'd found his lost mate. "Now that sounds like a plan."

###

Coming Soon from Jo Robertson

THE TRAITOR

Gabriel Santos was not a man to cross.

His name among the Mexicans was
El Diablo
and although his given name reminded José of a holy angel, the street runners had forewarned him
.
Indeed, the persistent rumors of the man’s ferocity and the myth that he had made a pact with Satan seemed true.

Stepping from behind the industrial waste bin, Santos emerged from the shadows and caught José off guard.
El Diablo's
enormous bulk morphed from among the gray shades of the alley into one dark silhouette as he stood at the narrow end like a legendary titan.

José trembled like a leaf in the wind even though the drug runners had also told him to show no fear around Santos. With his long black hair tied at the neck, his lean hard form, and his dark scowl, he looked like
un angel caído,
a fallen angel.

But José knew the man was no angel.

"A good
soldado
does not keep his
jefe
waiting," Santos said, lips barely moving, a puppet whose strings were pulled by an unseen force. "Nor does he flinch to show his fear."

The warning was clear, and José worked to control the shaking of his body.
Sí, El Diablo.
And did he only imagine the smell of sulfur? He crossed himself and scurried to close the distance between them. When Santos motioned toward the opposite side of the alley, José stationed himself at the brick corner of the building. Then he followed Santos’ lead and crouched down to wait in the shadows. In this way as their target approached them, he would be flanked on both sides of the alley’s narrow end.

There would be no escape.

Long minutes crawled by and the muscles of José’s thighs began to cramp. He longed for a cigarette, but did not dare risk lighting one. He wondered, not for the first time, why Santos had chosen him for the job tonight. José did not mind smacking the girls around. He was very good at controlling
putas.
But to take the life of a man, that was serious business.

He shifted position, dislodging minute chunks of debris under his feet. The small plink of gravel sounded like thunder to his taut nerves. Seconds later, the scratch of a match being struck preceded a tiny flare of light, and the rich, smoky odor of a cigarillo wafted across the alley.