The Mist (26 page)

Fletcher grinned. "As if I have a choice."

Lizzie contained her emotions. "You were right. Norman was headed to a yacht. He had it all planned. I was to be his..." She took a breath, not looking at his body. "The boat's name is
Lavender Lady
."

"
Lavender
--"

"My mother loved lavender," Lizzie whispered.

"The man was a manipulative, controlling bastard who relished the thought of being John March's nemesis, with you at his side," Fletcher said. "You've helped this past year more than you know. I promise you. We'll catch the rest of these bloody bastards."

"I'll do what I can--"

"What you can do is keep Lord Will busy and off my tail." He turned to his friend. "Take care of Josie."

"She'll hate the idea," Will said, but his humor didn't reach his eyes. "She's been muttering about killing you for two years even when she thought you were dead. She said we should find your body, dig you up and kill you again."

Fletcher's grin broadened. "That's my girl."

He ran onto the dock, jumped in the speedboat and took off into the fog.

Lizzie began to shake. Will turned to her, easing his arms around her, and they held each other as the last sounds of the boat carrying his friend faded in the distance.

Near Kennebunkport, Maine
10:45 a.m., EDT
August 27

W
hen Bob saw Lizzie Rush for the first time, standing on a rock with the tide swirling at her feet and Will Davenport not taking his eyes off her, he decided he might as well give up. Things had happened in his city in the past thirty years that he didn't know about and never would, and most of them involved John March.

He, March and Harlan Rush had arrived just as the Maine SWAT guys were sweeping the property for bombs, bodies, thugs and weapons, but Lizzie, Simon, the two Brits and a beat-up Abigail had the situation under control.

All the Maine guys found was a .22 revolver in a sugar canister.

The old lady who'd lived her last years here had been as self-reliant as her offspring.

Paramedics were still trying to talk Abigail into letting them
strap her to a stretcher. She'd collapsed in her father's arms when she saw him, but she was back on her feet now, reenergized, ready to argue with anyone or anything.

And puking. Bob could take her fat lip better than the vomit.

He watched Davenport walk up the hill from the water. The fog was burning off, creating a glare. The investigation was just getting started. Two thugs dead and two thugs captured. One dead billionaire.

One missing Brit.

"I used to wonder what kind of people lived in these big old houses on the ocean," Bob said to Davenport as he walked up the hill. "Now I know. You meet Harlan yet? Lizzie's pop?"

"Briefly," the Brit said.

"He's one of you. American, but a spook."

Davenport's hazel eyes settled on Bob. "He says he's a semire-tired hotelier."

Bob held up a hand. "Don't start with me." He nodded to the horizon as the sun burned white through the last of the gray. "I gather your Brit friend got away."

"So he did."

"He's one of you, too."

"British, you mean," Davenport said.

Bob knew the drill. They were all supposed to pretend the missing Brit was one of the bad guys.

Myles Fletcher was another damn spy.

"He killed Walter Bassette," Bob said.

"In self-defense, after he discovered Bassette planned to kill your daughter and confronted him." Davenport shrugged as he, too, stared out at the water. "She stopped quarreling about being under police protection, didn't she?"

"Hell of a wake-up call."

"Myles isn't subtle, but he's effective."

Bob saw Davenport's expression change, soften--if that was possible--as he lowered his gaze down to a knot of Maine state troopers and feds. At first, Bob didn't get it. Then he saw Lizzie Rush break off from the law enforcement types and head up the hill in their direction, her black hair shining in the mist-filtered sunlight. She was soaked up to her knees in seawater, but Bob had no doubt she was up to handling a British lord, spy and SAS officer who was falling in love with her.

"If you'll excuse me," Davenport said.

As he started to her, John March and Harlan Rush eased in next to Bob, and none of them spoke for a moment as they watched the two young people embrace.

"You know," Harlan said finally, "when I taught Lizzie how to fight, I wasn't thinking she'd be defending herself against a gun-toting billionaire out here on the damn rocks."

"What were you thinking?" Bob asked him.

His eyes, the shape of his daughter's if not their light green, shone with the mix of pain and happiness that, Bob had decided, was memory. "I was thinking I didn't want to lose her."

"She's as brave and as beautiful as her mother, Harlan," March said.

Rush didn't argue. "She doesn't like secrets."

"Neither does Abigail."

"A different generation."

Bob frowned at the two men. "Who the hell has secrets anymore these days? My kids know everything."

March shrugged and seemed almost to manage a smile. "We all have our wars to fight." Lizzie and Will joined them, and March went on briskly. "We boarded
Lavender Lady
a few minutes ago. We didn't find Fletcher or any sign he'd been there."

Bob spoke up. "He got what he needed and disappeared. A ghost."

Harlan Rush and Davenport--two bona fide spooks--didn't say anything. Neither did March, who, Bob figured, knew when a lizard crawled out from under a rock anywhere in the world.

Lizzie stayed close to her Brit as she addressed John March. "I could have done things differently this past year."

But before March could respond, her father rolled his eyes. "Lizzie. Damn. What did I teach you?"

She smiled at him. "How to block a punch from Cousin Whit."

"After that."

She sighed. "Don't look back with regret."

"Right. Look back to learn, but since you're never doing this again, spying on some lunatic billionaire, there's nothing to learn. So there's no need to look back at all."

But Bob knew she would. They all would. Abigail, terrorized by a man obsessed with her father. Scoop, bloodied. Fiona and Keira, traumatized.

They'd recover. What other choice did they have?

Lizzie turned her pale green eyes to the FBI director. "Norman believed you destroyed the life I could have had."

"Maybe I did," March said.

"Do you think you'd be the FBI director today if you had?"

"Doubtful. Your father would have arranged an accident for me. Payback." But March's rare display of humor didn't take. "Lizzie, your father was prepared to trade himself for you and Abigail. I was, too."

"Two of us for one of you?"

"Two for two."

Harlan Rush's eyes misted. "Whatever it took."

Bob decided he'd had enough and scoffed at Lizzie. "Shin splints. What crap. You should have knocked on our door and talked to Scoop, Abigail and me. Leveled with Scoop when he caught you."

She didn't look the least bit intimidated by him. "I didn't have any information you didn't have. You might have prevented me from going to Ireland. Then what?"

"Keira would have had to rely on her Irish fairies."

"Maybe she did," Lizzie said.

"Don't start with me."

She grinned at him and Bob was pretty sure he saw her Brit kiss the top of her head. Maybe it was just a brush of his lips.

Who the hell knew anymore.

But Bob saw Owen Garrison walking across the yard and said, "Batman arrives."

Owen spotted Abigail sitting on the stretcher down by the dock and broke into a run. No one tried to stop him.

Bob glanced at March and quickly averted his eyes. It wasn't that he didn't want to see the director of the FBI was crying. It was that the man deserved a moment.

Harlan Rush crossed his arms on his chest, looking as at home on the Maine rocks as he probably did at a poker table in Las Vegas. He nodded toward Davenport, still with an arm around Lizzie as they walked back toward the water, and said to Bob, "His grandfather was a good man. I ran into him during the Cold War from time to time in my misspent youth. Funny how things work out. Does our Lord Davenport spend a lot of time fishing in Scotland?"

"Apparently," Bob said.

"That's what his grandfather used to do, too." The old spook
sighed. "I don't know if it's occurred to Lizzie, but we Rushes don't have a hotel in London or Scotland."

"You should open one," Bob said. "It'd give her something to do while she and Davenport think up how to get into trouble again."

Boston, Massachusetts
6:30 p.m., EDT
August 27

O
wen took Abigail's hand and led her into a large, spacious apartment in the renovated building on the South Boston waterfront that was to be the new headquarters for Fast Rescue. She stood at the tall windows overlooking the harbor. Jeremiah Rush had set aside rooms for everyone at the Whitcomb on Charles Street, and the E.R. doctor had told her to rest. But she'd wanted to come here.

"There are two apartments here that we can choose from," Owen said, staying close to her, "or we can renovate the house on Beacon Street. I don't care where we live. I just want to be with you."

She leaned against him. "We're lucky. We have each other. We have friends, families..."

Owen seemed to understand what she meant. "Norman Estabrook made his choices, Abigail. So did the men with him."

She thought of Myles Fletcher coming to her on the yacht that first time and had to fight back tears. Was he safe now? Was he safe ever?

"Abigail..."

"I'm not going to feel sorry for myself over what happened. It wasn't good, but..." She smiled at this man she loved. "I'm here with you now, and that's enough. I knew you were there for me. With me. The whole time."

"I'd have traded places with you in a heartbeat."

"Maybe things worked out the way they were meant to." She watched a large yacht sailing out into the harbor. "I was so sick on that damn boat. I tried not to let myself think I might be pregnant. But when Fletcher said it, I knew."

She felt Owen's arm tighten around her, but he didn't speak. The doctor in the E.R. had confirmed that she was pregnant. Four weeks. They'd have a spring baby.

"I loved Chris with all my heart. If he'd lived..." Abigail thought of the man she'd married and lost so long ago. "The memory of him is good. He'll be a part of my life forever."

"I know, babe," Owen said. "I'm glad for that."

She turned to him. "I love you."

"Then let's have a wedding."

"Will Davenport offered us the use of his house in Scotland. Anytime. Owen, I don't want to wait another second, never mind months...even days..."

Owen smiled. "Good, because I told Will to cut the grass. We're coming. I can't wait any longer, either."

She touched his mouth with her fingertips. "My cuts and bruises are superficial. I'll be fine..."

He kissed her on the forehead. "Just being with you is enough." He held her and smiled again. "Bob's going to Ireland
with his daughters and Keira for Christmas. Telling him he's invited to a wedding in Scotland--"

"Oh." Abigail's face hurt, but it felt good to laugh. "This'll be fun."

Will spoke to Josie from the Garrison house on Beacon Hill. Simon was pacing in the near-empty drawing room, periodically pausing to stare at Keira's sketches of the Dublin windowbox and her Celtic stone angel.

"Did he die a clean death this time?" Josie asked.

"He's a phoenix, our Myles."

"Our?"

Silence. She knew now. There was no more doubt.

"I'm still in Ireland," she said, her voice cracking, "but Arabella and I are having tea upon my return to London. Your baby sister is quite worried about you."

"Tell her to get her needle and thread ready."

"You and Lizzie Rush?"

His heart almost stopped, but he said, "Abigail Browning and Owen Garrison are having their wedding at my house in Scotland in a few days."

"Ah. Well, then."

Simon obviously couldn't stand it any longer and took the phone. "Hello, Moneypenny. Any chance you can get me to Ireland? I want to leave in the next ten seconds."

Will smiled. Knowing Josie Goodwin, she had a plane already waiting at the Boston airport for him.

Boston, Massachusetts
9:30 a.m., EDT
August 28

T
he doctors had sprung Scoop sooner than they'd expected, and Bob found him at their burned-out triple-decker, out back inspecting his garden. He was bandaged and clearly in pain, but he stood up with a squished tomato. "Bastard firefighters trampled my tomatoes. That was uncalled for."

"They were dragging your sorry butt out from behind the compost bin."

Scoop sighed. "My apartment's got so much smoke and water damage, they're going to have to gut it."

"Whole building."

"You can supervise. Where are you going to live?"

"Keira's apartment for now," Bob said. "The lace curtains have to go. I don't care if it's Irish lace."

"What about her?"

"She has plans."

Scoop was silent a moment. "Simon."

Bob winced inwardly. What a dope he'd been. Fiona had tried to tell him it wasn't her. It was his niece. "Scoop..."

"They're good together."

Scoop wasn't exactly up to it, but nothing would stop him from heading with Bob to Morrigan's Bar at the Whitcomb Hotel on Charles Street. Simon had left for Ireland. Jeremiah Rush and a couple other Rushes were there, including Jeremiah's father, Bradley, and his uncle, Harlan, the spook.

Lizzie showed up late. Nobody knew where her Brit was, or at least no one was saying.

Fiona was pink cheeked and happily playing Irish tunes with three of her musician friends. She saw Scoop and blushed, and Bob's heart broke, but he knew she'd be okay.

John March appeared on the steps for a few seconds before turning around and heading back toward the lobby. Lizzie got up and quietly followed him. Her father stayed put.

Making peace with the past, Bob knew from experience, wasn't the easiest thing to do.

Theresa arrived with Maddie and Jayne. "We got through this one," his ex-wife said and gave Bob's hand a little squeeze. "Thank you."

"I didn't do much."

"You didn't get killed."

"All in a day's work."

They sat at a booth together, and Bob was off his guard for that split second that put him back in the past, and he saw what he could have had if he hadn't been such a jerk. But Theresa and
their daughters looked happy, and he figured the least he could do was not to saddle them with his regrets.

At a break, Fiona joined them with more Ireland brochures and printouts. "The Rush hotel in Dublin is now officially on our Christmas itinerary. I made reservations for us to have Christmas Eve tea there. It's expensive."

"What a surprise," Bob said.

"Jeremiah has a brother in Dublin. His name's Justin. He's just twenty-two."

"So long as they serve those little buttery mince pies my grandmother used to make, I'm good. And sing Christmas carols." Bob smiled as Jayne crawled onto his lap. "I like Christmas carols."

Lizzie found John March alone at a quiet table in the Whitcomb's elegant second-floor restaurant. He had a bottle of good Irish whiskey. He poured her a glass as she sat across from him. "I met your mother here before you were born. Before she'd met your father. I was a young cop. She was a pretty Irish girl who happened to know some very bad people. She stayed here."

"Good taste," Lizzie said, but her mouth was dry, her hands trembling. She'd stood up to Norman Estabrook and his killers, but this, she thought--talking to a tortured man about the mother she never knew--was almost too much for her.

"She was in Irish tourism development," March said. "Except, of course, she wasn't."

"It was a good cover for her intelligence work."

"She knew what she was doing, Lizzie. She went up against very dedicated, very bad people." He looked away. "I wish I could have saved her. If you hate me..."

"I don't. I never have, even when I suspected that I didn't know everything about her death. I'd have loved to have known my
mother. I'd love to have her at my side if I ever get married and have babies of my own--"

"Lizzie." His dark eyes, so like his own daughter's, filled with tears. "I'm so sorry."

"I had a wonderful, interesting upbringing, with a truly loving family. My mother has remained unreal to me, but the choices I faced this past year, the decisions I made, dealing with someone like Norman, have brought me closer to her, helped me to understand her better."

"She loved you and your father with all her heart."

"And you, Director March?"

He didn't flinch at her question. "I could have fallen in love with her. Maybe I did. We met just before Kathryn and I started dating. But then pretty, black-haired, green-eyed Shauna Morrigan ran into Harlan Rush here at the Whitcomb, and that was that."

"My father knew she was a spy?"

"He wasn't a part of what she did. She had IRA contacts in Boston. That's how I hooked up with her. After you were born, she quit. But it was too late."

"Who killed her and her family?"

"An FBI agent with ties to the Boston Irish mob was responsible. I'd been on his trail. She got me closer to him. He found out. He thought killing her would keep me from him. He gave her up to her enemies in Ireland. It didn't matter that she'd retired. They killed her and her family." March drank more of his whiskey. "We cooperated with the Irish in order to save lives."

"So that's why their deaths were ruled an accident. What happened to this corrupt FBI agent?"

"He died in a South Boston gunfight. The shooter was never
found." March polished off his whiskey and set the glass down firmly. "Rough justice. They were violent, turbulent times, Lizzie. We got those mobsters, but others took their place."

"Do you think she knew she'd been murdered?" Lizzie looked down at the amber liquid in her glass. "Or did she believe she fell?"

"I think she loved you and your father, and the rest of it isn't where I would dwell."

"I wanted you to have answers."

"People do. You're not alone. The older I get, the fewer answers I have. I wish I'd known your mother was in danger. I wish I'd saved her. After she died, everyone just wanted to save you, her little baby she loved so much."

"I knew I didn't have the whole story." Lizzie tried to smile through her tears. "Tripped on a cobblestone outside an Irish pub and fell to her death. Ha. What about Simon's father?"

"Brendan Cahill was a friend. He was killed ten years after your mother."

"Ripple effects," Lizzie said, giving the man across from her a long look. "You have a lot of secrets, Director March."

"So I do."

"Thank you for being there for me this past year."

"Lizzie..." He sighed, less tortured. "Abigail and Owen want you at their wedding. It's in Scotland in five days. The Davenport castle."

"Will says it's a house."

"You can tell me what you think when you see it. In my world, it's a castle."

"You mean you've been there?"

He shrugged. Another secret. "You should get your father talking sometime. He has tales to tell about British lords and ladies."

She laughed. "I'll bet he does."

"He loved your mother, and she loved him. Most of all they both loved you. Maybe the rest doesn't matter anymore. Live your life, Lizzie. Don't put it on hold because of the past." He leaned back, eyeing her as she rose. "And stay in touch."

On her way out of the restaurant, she noticed a framed photograph she'd never seen before of her parents hand in hand on the rocks in Maine, her mother visibly pregnant, both of them smiling as they looked out toward the ocean.

"Your father hung it there this morning," Jeremiah said next to her.

"Where is he now?"

"It's Uncle Harlan. Who knows?"