The Price of Valor Read online

  Orion pulled them out. “Coffee.”

  She filled a cup and he took it, turned back to the window.

  So maybe they were all grumpy this morning. All but Jake Silver, who’d shown up wearing his earbuds and a grin.

  Apparently, things were going well with Aria. Finally. Ham had invited her on the trip, but the pediatric cardiothoracic doc had surgeries scheduled. Still, Jake seemed a little less at loose ends, a little more focused since Aria had walked into his life and stayed.

  But that’s what happened when you found the one your soul loved. You felt complete. As if the world had steadied beneath your feet.

  Ham drew in a breath, tried to ignore the deep ache inside.

  “Maybe your wife is still trying to protect you.” Garrett’s words stirred in his head.

  That wasn’t her job. He was supposed to protect her.

  He glanced over at Orion. “You okay?”

  Orion nodded, his jaw tight as he stared out at the clouds.

  Yeah, sure he was.

  Ham didn’t have to do the math—Jenny had turned Orion down. Which made no sense to Ham, but then again, he was batting zero in the understanding-women category lately. They’d returned from dinner out on Sunday afternoon and Jenny had driven back to Minneapolis in her own car, while Orion rode with Ham. Orion said exactly nothing for two excruciating hours.

  They arrived separately to the airport this morning too, and Orion barely spoke to Jenny, although she’d tried to engage him in conversation.

  Nope. Orion could be stubborn when he wanted to be, and he’d walked ahead of them, bought a cup of coffee and sat three seats down from Jenny and Scarlett as they waited for the flight. Jake had shown up late, of course, wearing headphones, probably listening to a podcast, and now sat next to the women, watching a movie.

  Once they got working, maybe things would work themselves out. Depending on what White said, Ham had planned a few days of urban SAR training with Pete Brooks, who ran point on one of the Red Cross SAR teams. Pete wanted to connect them with a K9 handler to familiarize the team with working with rescue dogs and some new tech they were utilizing.

  It only made Ham think of that mangy dog Signe had loved so much.

  Aw, shoot, he’d loved Caesar too.

  Now Ham’s thoughts were back to Signe, and how when she believed in something—like rescuing a drenched dog—she went all in, refusing to give up.

  “More coffee?” The flight attendant leaned over him with a tray of coffee cups. He took one. Nudged Orion.

  Orion took two and set them on his tray.

  “Need me to open a vein for you?” Ham said.

  Orion looked at him, his eyes a little cracked with red. “How long is this field trip?”

  “Fundraiser’s tomorrow night at the Patriot Hotel. Then we’re going to do some urban K9 SAR training for a few days.”

  “Yippee,” Orion said. He looked back out the window. But not before his gaze fell on Jenny, sitting with Scarlett.

  “Okay, buddy. What’s going on between you and Jenny?”

  Orion sighed. “She said no.”

  “I got that part.”

  “It gets better.” Orion’s mouth tightened around the edges. “She practically shouted it for the entire town to hear. ‘No, I won’t marry you, Orion.’ Then she ran out of the joint like I was some kind of a jerk. I caught up with her at the car, and she was crying so hard she couldn’t talk, and when I tried to comfort her, she pushed me away like I really am a jerk and . . .” He shook his head and glanced at Jenny again, so much pain in his expression Ham had to look away.

  How well Ham knew that expression. “So, she didn’t give you a reason?”

  “Nope. We went back to the Marshalls’, she packed and left for Minneapolis. I tried to call her, but she didn’t pick up.” He shook his head. “I don’t know what to do.”

  “Maybe there’s nothing you can do.”

  Orion shot him a look. “Yeah. How are you doing with not being able to fix things between you and Signe? Having fun yet?”

  Ham said nothing as Orion stared back out the window.

  The sky over Reagan airport was overcast and dour, rain spitting down. Ham ordered an UberX and they drove inside the Beltway to their hotel, just off the National Mall.

  The Patriot Hotel, circa 1847, was a grand twelve-story building with white columns and had so much history embedded in its gilded walls, Ham felt as if he’d walked back in time. He stood outside the golden-hued reception area with more two-story columns and grand chandeliers and inhaled the sense that the place held a thousand secrets.

  “Seriously?” Jake said as he came in, his duffel bag over his shoulder. “This is where the fundraiser is being held? I guess I should have brought a suit.”

  Ham looked at him, a little wide-eyed, and Jake winked. “Just kidding, boss.”

  “A lot of history in this place,” Ham said. “You probably need to wear a suit to bed.”

  “I heard there are tunnels from the Patriot to the White House,” Orion said, walking toward a red, round conversation sofa that looked straight out of the Gilded Age.

  Jenny stood at the entrance, surveying the ornate ceiling.

  Scarlett, his new communications tech, walked past her, on her cell phone. Ham had met the former Navy petty officer just three months ago while on an op in Ukraine. She hung up the phone, glanced around the lobby, and Ham’s gaze followed her search until it landed on a man sitting in one of the gold brocade Queen Anne chairs. Military in his bearing, he was wide-shouldered, with his dark hair cut short, wearing a pair of jeans and a long-sleeve blue oxford rolled up to the elbows.

  Right. Ford Marshall, Scarlett’s boyfriend. Ham should have expected to see him here, maybe, but the man was an active-duty SEAL, so who knew where and when he’d show up.

  Ford came over to Scarlett, gave her a hug and added a kiss.

  With him was a burly black man, also exuding a military aura, with a wide smile aimed directly at Scarlett.

  “Hey, Trini.” She glanced at Ham. He walked over and shook the man’s hand. Also a SEAL, Ham guessed.

  “Ford and Trini have a ninety-six, so I invited them. Hope that’s okay.”

  Ham refused to compare Scarlett to Signe. Because had Signe, even once, contacted him while he was on leave, he would have been on the first plane to anywhere.

  He should probably get his brain off Signe and the what-ifs. “I have one extra ticket for tomorrow’s event—”

  “I’ve got family to see, so I’m out,” Trini said.

  Ford slid his arm around Scarlett’s shoulders. “Thanks, Ham.”

  Ham headed to the front desk and checked his team in. White had given them all separate rooms, so Ham handed out keys then headed up to his own, on the eleventh floor.

  There, he dropped his bag onto the white bedspread and went to the window.

  The view looked out onto the National Mall, the spire of the Washington Monument spearing the blue sky, the trees that blanketed the horizon an array of yellow, fiery orange, and pale green.

  Signe, where are you? Please be okay.

  Ham pressed his hand against the window, the pane cold against his palm. But it didn’t stop Signe from reappearing in his memory, opening the closet door, and sitting down opposite him after his mother’s funeral.

  “Want a Rice Krispies bar?”

  She’d pulled her dress over her knees. She wore tube socks and tennis shoes, so he guessed the dress was her grandmother’s doing.

  His eyes had adjusted to the darkness, and in the thread of light, he made out her face, her tentative smile.

  He hadn’t realized how much he’d missed her until this moment. For the first time in a week, it seemed he could breathe.

  “How’s Caesar?” he asked.

  “Grandmother found him and I got a whipping, but she said he could stay in the barn so . . .” She grinned at him. “It was worth it.” Her smile vanished. “I’m sorry about your mom.”

&n
bsp; His eyes welled up. “It’s okay. Dad says she’s in a better place now. Not suffering anymore.”

  “Do you really believe that?”

  He gave her a slow nod. “Yeah. I think so.”

  “Your mom was really nice, Ham. She made cookies for my birthday.”

  Silence.

  Then, “Ham, do you think my mom’s in heaven?”

  What did he know? “I guess so.”

  “Grandmother says she isn’t. That she threw her life away on drugs and God turned his back on her.” She sighed. “Do you think God does that?”

  He shrugged.

  She was quiet for a long time. “Grandmother says that I’m a bad person because I don’t obey. I ask too many questions. I get in the way. And, because I don’t have a dad.”

  Sometimes Ham really hated her grandmother. He knew it wasn’t right to hate—his mother had said that Signe’s grandmother was just grieving, and that it made her say things she didn’t mean. But when she screamed at Signe and hit her, it sure seemed like she meant them.

  “Do you think your mom can tell God that . . . that I’m sorry?”

  “Sorry for what?”

  “For being bad. I won’t throw my life away.”

  He didn’t know what to say. He just knew that he really wanted to climb back into bed with his mother, feel her arms around him. Listen to her sing her hymns.

  Remind himself that he wasn’t alone.

  He drew up his knees, locking his arms around them. Signe said nothing when his weeping became audible. Then, Signe’s hand slid through the light from under the door and held out a Rice Krispies bar.

  Now, he touched his forehead to the window. Please, God, don’t let her throw her life away. Help me find her.

  Ham stepped away from the window and shook away the memory before he lost his mind.

  The team met for dinner at the hotel’s Cafe Du Parc. Ham ate seared rockfish and watched as Orion sat picking at his braised short ribs. Jenny and Jake had a conversation about the best way to serve oysters. Scarlett had abandoned them for a date with Ford, and frankly, Ham couldn’t get through dinner fast enough.

  Especially when Jenny touched Jake’s arm and laughed and Orion threw down his napkin, got up, and stalked away.

  “You might go easy on the guy,” Ham said to her.

  She looked like she’d been slapped and he felt like a jerk, and then she ground her jaw, as if trying not to cry, and yeah, he wasn’t the guy to fix anything.

  “Jenny?”

  She fled from the table. Jake raised an eyebrow and Ham just shook his head and handed the waitress his credit card.

  It was after ten by the time he returned to his room, but he was still dressed, still staring out at the lights of a darkened DC when his cell phone rang. “I’m here.”

  “I know,” White said. “Go down to the service level. Someone will be waiting.”

  Ham nearly sprinted to the elevator.

  A moment later, the doors opened to the basement floor, and Ham got out. A man stood at the entrance, his back to him, wearing a gray suit coat, his hand stuck into the pockets of his dress pants. He turned.

  Ham’s heart stopped. “Logan?”

  Petty Officer Logan Thorne, one of the SEALs Ham had rescued in Afghanistan. His brown hair was cut short, his green eyes solemn, but he wore a slow, deliberate smile Ham would never forget.

  “Chief.” Logan held out his hand, but Ham bypassed it and pulled him into an embrace.

  “Seriously? What—I don’t—” He put him away. “Orion said you were on the lam in Alaska!”

  “I was. Long story. I’m back and working for White now on special projects. One of them concerning an out-of-pocket NOC list.” He walked to a door at the end of the hallway and keyed in a code.

  It opened and he held it open for Ham. “Down three flights.”

  Ham took the stairs down to another secure entrance. Logan opened it and they went inside to a corridor with dim lighting and the smell of age emanating off the cement.

  “I knew there were tunnels down here,” Ham said.

  “They lead all over the mall area, but this one in particular leads to White’s favorite restaurant, the Hamilton.”

  “I like the name.”

  He followed Logan down the corridor, up another flight of stairs, and into the back room of a kitchen. Logan walked through the area without blinking and came out into a larger room that reminded Ham of an old speakeasy, with a long, deep walnut bar, chandeliers, and cigar chairs.

  Logan led him into a back room and closed the door.

  Senator Isaac White sat alone at a table, drinking a cup of coffee. He was impeccably dressed, of course, in a gray suit and blue tie, but Ham easily remembered the day when White wore muddy BDUs and night-vision goggles. The man cleaned up well, his blue eyes warm as he met Ham’s grip. “Thanks for meeting me, Ham.”

  “Anytime, Senator. Or should I say, Mr. President.”

  “Isaac, please, and it’s too soon for that. But thanks for the sentiment.” He laughed, though, and offered Ham a seat.

  Ham would have preferred to stand, the buzz under his skin nearly lighting him on fire. “So, what is this all about?”

  Isaac ran his thumb around the edge of his mug. “Logan, can you give us the room?”

  Logan left, the door closing softly behind him, and Isaac leaned forward and reached into his pocket. Pulled out a piece of paper. “This is a copy of an email I was forwarded from a contact I have in Europe. It’s a request for contact from one of our operatives in deep cover. The operative calls himself simply Three, and we think he or she has the NOC list. The contact claims that they stole it from the Russians and need to get it into safe hands.”

  Ham picked up the email. “Who did you get this from?”

  Isaac considered him. “The Prince. Also known as Roy.”

  The name punched Ham, and he drew in his breath. “Royal Benjamin.” He glanced at the door. “Does Logan know this?”

  “Yes. He is aware that Roy has been working as a blacklist operator for a few years now.” Isaac didn’t continue, but Ham had a sense that Logan knew it because of his run-in with a rogue CIA group at work inside the company—a story he’d told Orion a year ago when he showed up shot in Alaska, on the run and in trouble.

  Ham didn’t ask how Logan had hooked up with White, but the senator had told him once that Logan was safe, so . . .

  “Then why did you have him step out?”

  “Because I wanted you to be free to say no,” White said.

  “No?”

  “Roy sent me a message and told me the meet went south. He was there, scoping out the scene before the meet, but so was someone else—possibly a rogue agent. How he found out about the meet, Roy doesn’t know. Just that he intercepted Three, and when Roy tried to chase the operative down, he failed. Which means the NOC list is still at large.”

  “And where do I fit in?”

  “Somehow, Roy was compromised. He said that the operator won’t trust him, and that he needs someone Three might agree to meet with on sight.”

  Ham frowned. “I don’t understand.”

  Isaac sighed. Nodded. “I remember what happened in Chechnya, Ham. That you lost your wife.”

  Ham took a breath.

  “I also know about your daughter, and the idea that your wife didn’t die, but in fact embedded with a rebel Chechen group for the last ten years.”

  His heart had begun to drown out Isaac’s words.

  “We have reason to believe that . . . well, Three is in fact Signe Kincaid. Your wife.”

  His wife.

  And although he suspected it, even longed for it, the words out of Isaac’s mouth flattened Ham. He had nothing, even when Isaac produced a picture on his phone, laying it in front of Ham.

  It was blurred, and just a side view, so it was hard to tell, but the woman wore her blonde hair tied up in a bun, a pair of sunglasses, and her profile . . .

  Yeah, Ham would know Sign
e anywhere. He bit back the crazy urge to cry.

  “If we can reestablish contact with her, would you be willing to set up a meet and recover the NOC list?”

  Oh, he’d do much more than that.

  You can’t fix this, Ham.

  Oh yes, he could.

  He would bring her home.

  Jenny should probably quit the team. Because it didn’t take a doctor of psychology or a former CIA profiler to recognize the pain her very presence caused Orion.

  Just like the pain his presence caused her. Because the man cleaned up oh, so very well. He wore a black suit, white dress shirt, and navy-blue tie, and had shaven. Frankly, one look at him made Jenny want to turn around and leave the ballroom, despite the glitter of the event with its golden chairs, white tablecloths, and ornate chandeliers dappling magic around the room, enhanced by the classical music playing from the small ensemble at the front.

  The Red Cross knew how to throw a gala. She thought she spotted a few celebrities in the audience—Trace Adkins, Sara Evans, and even Eli Manning milling with the crowd.

  None of them caught her eye like Orion Starr. He’d walked into the room with Jake, a hard set to his jaw, and when he looked her way, she’d averted her eyes.

  She simply didn’t know what to say to him.

  Oh, what a debacle.

  Now, he sat across from her, with Jake, Scarlett, and Ford between them to her left, Ham and his Red Cross friend Pete Brooks with fiancée Jess Tagg on her right. Which meant Jenny had a nearly unobstructed view—save for the orange bird-of-paradise flower arrangement in the middle of the table—of Orion and the way he just wouldn’t look at her, either.

  It was all her fault.

  She could have handled her response to Orion’s sweet proposal much, much, much better.

  She’d simply panicked—a reaction, really, that had been building for the nearly twenty-four hours after she’d watched him rescue Aggie and the two other children at the carnival.

  Of course he scrambled up that Ferris wheel after Ham.

  Of course he rescued the two other children in the other basket.

  And of course he’d relish darling Aggie’s affection, the way she called him Uncle Ry.