Caught by the Chief of Staff (A Presidential Affair Book 2) Page 11

  Rick unlocks the front of his screen and dials a number I’m not close enough to see as he begins driving again. I can hear a faint ring and then a terse “Hello.”

  “We’ve been compromised,” Rick barks. “Time for the eagle to soar to the nest.” And then he hangs up.

  “Rick?”

  “I need yours,” he says quietly. So quietly, I almost don’t hear him.

  I reach in my bag and pull out my phone, handing it to him. He sets it in the cup holder between us and reaches across me to the glove box, popping it open. He pulls out a small black device that looks like an external cell phone battery and flips it on. A little green light begins blinking on top of it, and I wonder what the hell that is when he sets it under my phone in the cup holder before taking another turn, putting us on the highway.

  The drive is long and silent, and the farther and farther away we get from D.C., the more worried I get. I’m sure Rick has a plan in mind, but he hasn’t said one word to me about where we’re going or what we’re doing.

  My phone beeps a weird sound I’ve never heard before, and Rick picks it up, punching several buttons as they pop up while he drives. It’s kind of scary how he can fiddle with my phone while speeding down the interstate, but I’m too afraid to mention it. I get the feeling there is more at play than I know, and I have to wait to find out what it is, and that is not easy for me. I want to be out searching for my daughter. Someone has to have seen something.

  Rick pulls off the interstate and turns down a two-lane country highway. There’s nothing but farmland around for miles and miles. We stop at an old Texaco station, and Rick pays in cash before filling up. I don’t even bother to unbuckle my seatbelt. I’m afraid to upset him again. I know I deserve it, but I never want to see Rick turn that kind of anger toward me again.

  He climbs back in the car and buckles up before pulling out of the old gas station and continuing to drive down the highway for what seems like ages to my anxiety-ridden self. Finally, he pulls onto a long gravel drive. It winds down and around to a large farmhouse. Rick drives around the backside of the house and then to a big red barn.

  Rick puts the Tahoe in Park and then reaches under his seat, pulling out a rather large-looking handgun before he climbs out. He slides open the big doors then jumps back in the car and pulls into the barn and shuts it off. I have no idea what we’re doing here. I really hope this barn in the middle of nowhere isn’t where I’m going to die.

  He turns his body toward mine, a thunderous expression on his face. I can’t help myself; I scoot backward before I can stop myself. I know that Rick would never hurt me, at least I think I do, but right now, he’s just so… terrifying.

  His face instantly blanks. It makes me wonder what’s going on behind those dark eyes that seem to notice everything. I wonder what he sees when he looks at me. Can he see inside me? It scares me more than it should. I want to know what he’s thinking and why he’s brought me out here to this old barn.

  “Cara—” he starts.

  “It’s okay,” I interrupt him, even though we both know it’s not.

  “It’s not.” He lets out a heavy sigh. “Let’s go inside.”

  Rick pushes open his door and steps out of the car. I unbuckle my seatbelt and follow his actions, hoping my instincts haven’t led me astray. He waits for me at the back of the car, holding his hand out to me. I take it without hesitation, something that makes his face soften just a bit. I guess wondering if I trusted him or not was weighing on him more than I knew.

  He leads me out of the barn before stopping to let go of my hand and pull the heavy doors closed. And then he takes my hand in his again and leads me up the back porch of the old but well-maintained house.

  “Rick?” I ask.

  But he holds his finger up to his lips, silencing me. “If I tell you to, you run.”

  I don’t know what to say to that, so I just nod before he leaves me standing on the porch while he pulls the gun out of the back of his slacks, looking more than a little lethal. It’s easy to see how he was such a decorated SEAL.

  I wait for what seems like hours but was probably only a few minutes for him to search the house for who knows what, and I can’t stand it. Finally, he puts me out of my misery, but I damn near jump out of my skin when he finally shows back up. I’m not cut out for this kind of life, and I’m from New Jersey, so that’s saying something.

  “It’s all clear,” he says, pushing open the door for me. “You can come on in now.”

  I nod and pass through the open door into a homey looking country kitchen. It’s laid out a lot like the kitchen at my house. The house Rick bought for me. He must have some kind of thing for open concept and a lot of light, but now isn’t really the time for interior design. I wonder whose house this is, not for the first time, and also what we’re doing here.

  “Rick?” I prompt again.

  “Have a seat, Cara,” he says gently, pointing to the oak table and chairs in the corner of the kitchen. I do as he asks, thinking to myself that if he wanted to kill me, there’s no one here to stop him, so I might as well just get it over with.

  “Where are we?” I ask quietly. It’s too quiet, and we both notice the change. His face contorts back to that angry expression again.

  “Jesus fuck, Cara, I’m not going to hurt you,” he bites out.

  “I know that,” I whisper, looking away from him as he runs a frustrated hand through his hair.

  “Do you?” he roars, making me flinch, which makes him even angrier. I don’t understand what’s going on or why he’s so mad at me, all I know is that I’m scared. But I also know that Rick, no matter how mad, would never lay a hand on me.

  “Yes,” I say, rolling my shoulders back. I mean the words that I say to him. I think I just needed a minute to come to terms with what I already knew. Rick is upset, but he would never harm me. “I do.”

  “Fine,” he says after a minute, when he pulls up a chair at the table.

  “Where are we?” I ask again. This time, Rick turns his full attention to me, his dark eyes seeing more than I’m probably comfortable with, but this time, they don’t scare me.

  “My grandparents’ house,” he answers with the last thing I thought he would say. “They’ve been gone a long time. I keep the place for emergencies. No one knows it’s here.”

  “Why are we here?” I ask, feeling more and more frustrated by the second. I hate that Rick has been badgering me for months to spill my secrets, while he ekes out information one tiny grain at a time.

  “We needed a safe space to call in the cavalry,” he answers. “The others will be here soon. It’s time we laid it all out on the table.”

  “O-okay,” I stammer. I think I know where this is going, and suddenly I feel really nervous. My belly flips over and over, and I’m sweaty everywhere. I think I liked it better when I thought he was going to kill me.

  “Start talking,” he orders.

  “I was afraid you’d say that.”

  “President Vetoes Controversial Bill”

  Chapter 14

  The truth revealed

  “Cara,” Rick growls my name, making me jump in my seat. “Now. We’re running out of time.”

  “I don’t know where to start,” I admit honestly.

  “The best place to start is usually the beginning.” He sighs.

  “All right,” I tell him. “Then let’s go back nine years.”

  “Okay,” he says, his eyes snapping to meet mine, and his spine is now ramrod straight. “When? Nine years ago, be specific.”

  “March,” I say with a sigh. “When you were deployed.”

  “What happened?” It’s like he can barely force out the words, even though he needs to with every breath in his body. He needs to know what happened. Why our daughter was taken, why I left him with no forwarding address, why our lives derailed wholeheartedly, Rick needs to know everything. “Tell me.”

  “I had been feeling a little sick for a while, and finally that morn
ing, I had my suspicions about what it was,” I begin my sad tale of how we lost everything.

  “Was everything all right? You’re not sick now, are you?” he asks. I can hear the concern for me in his voice. Even after all this time, after everything, Rick still cares for me. It both elates me and rips open my heart.

  “It was,” I tell him. “I threw on a pair of leggings and your sweatshirt and ran down to the PX on the corner. I bought the pregnancy test and then hurried home again. I didn’t even read the directions. I just popped the cap, peed, and waited. I need you to know how excited I was to find out we were pregnant.”

  “Okay,” he says without any hesitation. “I believe you. What happened next?”

  “I took a shower and put on real clothes,” I say, getting lost in the memory of what was the worst day of my life—that is, until today. “I grabbed my purse and jumped in the car. I headed to the Target that wasn’t too far from the apartment. We needed milk and cereal. It was the only thing I could keep down in the mornings. Not to mention, I wanted that baby book everyone raves about and some prenatal vitamins. I remember thinking those vitamins were so fucking important.”

  “What happened next?”

  “I picked up my vitamins and the book and then…” I have to pause and take a breath. It hurts so much to remember.

  “And then?”

  “And then I let myself walk through the baby section. I picked up the cutest pair of baby socks with little anchors on the ankles. And a baby blanket that—”

  “Matches,” Rick interrupts me. I can see his wheels turning. “Rachel still sleeps with it.”

  “She does.” I smile sadly at him. “I bought them for you. I was so proud of you, and I wanted our baby to have that too, boy or girl.”

  “You really did tell her about me her whole life,” he says like it’s all suddenly clicking into place and he finally believes me at face value.

  “Yes.”

  “Then what went so fucking wrong?” he asks as he stabs his fingers through his hair. His frustration that our lives were not ours to control is obvious. And I get it. It’s a tough conclusion to come to. I’ve had years to adjust; Rick is just now learning about all of the dirty details.

  “I went to the grocery section and picked up a big box of Cheerios. And then I headed to the dairy case. I was just reaching for a quart of milk when my phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number and thought it might have been you. I was so excited to tell you about the baby. You had thought you’d be able to call that day, and you were always messing up the time difference.”

  “I was the worst.” He laughs.

  “You really were.” I smile at him. “But when I answered, there were some weird pops and beeps I didn’t understand. I almost hung up, but then this weird robotic voice came on. He told me that he was sending me some photos and that I needed to look at them.”

  “Did you?”

  “Yes,” I answer.

  “What were they of?”

  “You.”

  “I never cheated,” he swears. “Not once.”

  “I know.” I smile sadly. “I never doubted that. They were of you overseas. Laughing, working out, on patrol. Things like that.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “The caller told me that if I didn’t leave you, you would die by friendly fire that night.” I let the words hang in the air, the threat I carried with me all these years, the unspoken words of the burden I have carried that are now shared between us.

  “Cara,” he says gently, sadly. Rick knows and understands my sacrifice now.

  “Yes.” There are no other words that need to be spoken; we can’t go down this road, because it won’t find our daughter. We’ll come back to this bridge one day, if we get our daughter back. If not… I’m not sure I’ll ever go on.

  “Then what happened?” he asks, and I’m thankful for the change in subject.

  “I dropped the quart of milk all over the floor of Target,” I admit. “The caller told me to pretend like nothing was wrong. And buy my vitamins. I decided I didn’t need milk, since I would be leaving and you wouldn’t be back for a long time. So I bought the things in my basket and then went back to the apartment. I left those things in the trunk of my car. I went up to the apartment and packed a bag. I didn’t want to take anything else from you than I already was, so I left it all behind. Including my wedding rings.

  “And then I sat on the couch as the sun set outside, and I cried and cried. I still wasn’t ready when you called, but I knew what I needed to do. I had to protect you. You couldn’t die because I was too selfish or too scared. So—”

  “So you left me.”

  “I did,” I answer him honestly for the first time in years. “Left as soon as I hung up the phone, driving all night. I felt restless, like I couldn’t sleep. So I just kept going. And when I finally stopped at a motel to rest, I looked through a phone book, found an attorney with the least sleazy name, and asked him to file for divorce in the morning. And then I cried myself to sleep.”

  “And after that?”

  “After that, I found a way to live without you, because I had to. I couldn’t lay down and die, because we had a baby on the way, and she needed me. She still needs me.”

  “Cara—” he starts, but we’re interrupted. I jump at the intrusion. I was so lost down our sad memory lane.

  “What the fuck is going on here?” the intruder roars, making Rick roll his eyes before he turns to me.

  “Cara, you know the President and First Lady of the United States.”

  “Top White House Staffers Noticeably Absent in D.C.”

  Chapter 15

  More hard truths

  “Cara!” Grace says, rushing toward me. My spine stiffens. I’m not sure what’s going to happen next, and then she envelops me in a fierce hug. “I was so worried!”

  “It’s okay,” I say softly.

  “It’s not okay!” she’s still yelling. One thing I’ve noticed about Grace is that the normally cool, calm, and collected former attorney is kind of a livewire now that pregnancy hormones are coursing through her body.

  “Let’s all move this into the living room,” Rick suggests. “Then we can brief you guys on the situation.”

  Jake lets out a frustrated sigh. “We might as well wait. Ryan is bringing Jules. As much as I want all the info right now, you should wait to brief us all at once.”

  “Is it a good idea to bring Black into the fold?” Rick asks, and I wonder what the fuck they’re talking about.

  “It is,” Jake says. “You can trust him.”

  Rick clenches his jaw and then releases it. “Fine.”

  “I know you don’t like him—” Jake starts.

  “I don’t know him,” Rick interrupts. “He’s too private.”

  We all file into the living room and take our seats. Jake pulls Grace in to share an oversized armchair with him, and I look away. My cheeks heat at their public display. They may have started as enemy sharks swimming in the same big, New York pond, but now they are the real deal. I love Grace, and I’m so happy she’s found her forever. And so very sorry I played a part in hurting her before they figured it all out. She’s long since forgiven me, but I haven’t. Not yet.

  Gus, Jake’s main Secret Service agent, and Joe, his driver plus, file in and flank the room, always at the ready. It must be hard not having any privacy at all. Although it doesn’t seem to bother Jake and Grace much. Rick, for the most part, has always been on the fringes and out of the limelight. I wonder how he straddles the line.

  I’m distracted by my thoughts when Jules barrels into the room spitting mad, with the president’s aide-de-camp hot on her heels.

  “Would you kindly get your paws off me!” she snaps before coming to a halt as she notices the full room. “What’s going on here?”

  “Sit down, Jules,” Jake says quietly. “This is serious.”

  “What’s happened?” she asks, her demeanor instantly changing from pissed off lioness
to alert as she drops to the arm of the sofa farthest away from me. I notice the captain stands with his back against the wall. His limbs hang loose, giving the impression he is relaxed, but the marine is anything but.

  “Rachel has been taken,” Rick says to the room.

  Jake closes his eyes for a second before opening them again, and when he does, they burn bright with determination and retribution.

  “Is there any connection between her kidnapping and this morning’s revelations?” Jake asks.

  “I think so,” Rick says.

  “Is this place even secure?” Captain Black bites out.

  “Yes,” Jake replies calmly, his voice even when I can tell he feels anything but. “This property is secure and off public records. Rick and I meet here often.”

  The captain nods once before yielding the floor. “All right.”

  “What makes you think the two events are connected?” Jake asks.

  Rick wraps his arm around my shoulders from where he sits on the arm of the sofa next to me. He squeezes my shoulder once, a signal to be brave and hang tight while we get through all this, and then he lets go before answering his best friend and boss.

  “Nine years ago, Cara and I were married,” Rick says to those in the room who did not know. Grace and Jake’s faces are both carefully blank.

  “What?” Jules asks.

  “And nine years ago, Cara left me when Jake and I were deployed.”

  Captain Black’s eyes narrow on me for a split second. His judgement is evident and finding me lacking.

  “Ouch,” Grace whispers.

  “She was blackmailed,” Rick adds.

  “What?” Jake barks out.

  “I was sent pictures of Rick overseas and told that if I didn’t leave him, he would die by friendly fire that night,” I answer them.

  “So you left,” Jake adds.

  “Yes.”

  “To protect Donovan,” Black adds as he openly appraises me, only this time I don’t feel like he finds I come up short. I don’t know why his approval matters; it just does.