Chapter Four

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First class air travel had the benefit of comfort and a degree of privacy.

"Apparently not everyone suffers from budget cuts," Michael commented as he unbuckled his seat belt.

"You could be sitting in the tail end. Be grateful." Raines handed Michael a three-inch thick binder. "Here. It's a long way to Tokyo."

Michael opened the book and skimmed the contents. The State of the Northern Mariana Islands was typical background reading prior to an assignment in unfamiliar territory.

"Don't let that put you to sleep, Westen," warned Homeland agent John Chen as he adjusted his seat back, slid on a pair of half-glasses and re-folded the copy of the Wall Street Journal he'd brought with him.

"I don't sleep on planes," Michael mumbled.

This morning Chen provided background as Raines outlined the operation HSI devised.

"You're the greedy American," Raines said. "You'll go in, dangle the carrot, resist and then take it. As soon as he accepts, John arrests him, and you get to handle his security if he brings any."

"Sure. Just two of us?"

"Why not?" Raines asked. "You can handle it."

"Reviewing fundamentals, that's all."

"Westen, I've got two agents in place; they've been there about two weeks," Chen said.

John Chen was a former CIA agent who now headed one of the special Homeland investigative units. He'd been tracking a Chinese businessman, Zhang Xi, who had been selling illegally-obtained US and UK developed software on his website for almost a year.

"He's not selling bootleg Windows or Photoshop. The software Card acquired and sold to Xi was critical to defense, space technology and engineering programs the military and NASA uses. Every minute it's been gone, lives have been lost. After Xi obtained the software, he broke it into component parts and he's been selling it online at xiloaddotcom since then.

"We're purchasing from the site?"

"As soon as we found it," Chen said, "and as often as possible for legal."

"This only works if he comes to Saipan," Raines inserted. "If we haven't made him an attractive enough offer yet, we'll know soon. There's a possibility he won't show up."

"I wouldn't bet on that," Chen warned Raines.

The website had been the focus of copyright attorneys for a decade. Every successful software pirate operating outside of the U.S. was highly skilled at evading arrest or extradition, and Zhang Xi, their target, the largest seller of pirated software in the world, excelled at it. He'd been untouchable since he'd made it a habit to never leave his homeland.

Except once.

A week after Card's death, Chen was able to trace Xi's movements to Saipan where Xi made contact with Card. It was the gotcha moment Chen was searching for, an opportunity waiting to be exploited.

The crime, which fell within Homeland Security Investigation's expansive reach, was first identified when a senior NASA engineer was conducting a routine review of leading pirate websites. As he was clicking midway through one of the programs for sale, he realized he was looking at a description his own component, a software module used in specialized programs for a ballistic missiles defense system.

He purchased the software, waited for the download and there it was—the result of many months of his hard labor. U.S. national security was on sale on a Chinese discount software website. He quickly located another program that had been plagiarized, altered in small ways, but his program had been stolen, line for line.

Angered by the theft, the engineer sounded the alarm, and received instantaneous attention from officials at Missile Defense Agency, now several generations removed from the Star Wars Defense program. Chen worked closely with scientists as they followed the convoluted trail back to the source, but it wasn't until Tom Card had been killed, his office emptied, and his work stations and home secured that the connection was discovered.

The significance of Card's traitorous action which put new, highly classified technology in the hand of the country's enemies and on the open market, was that it slowed efforts to secure several networks for another year.

The sting Chen was creating got an assist when Raines arrived, fresh from interviewing Michael Westen following the DEA bust and Card's death. Chen and Raines had worked together on several projects years earlier, so they were on the same page when it came to putting Xi out of business.

Whatever Card had been doing in China, Yemen and Pakistan—they had committed themselves to unraveling it, destroying it. Initially, Chen had been concerned about bringing Westen on board, but Raines gave him access to the files he'd kept on his activities which confirmed the maligned agent's skills would be the assist they needed.

Chen proceeded and made the initial offer to the Chinese businessman. He would run the op, but it would be Michael who would finesse the transaction. Of Chinese heritage, Chen spoke both Mandarin and Beijing dialect Chinese, so he would act as Michael's interpreter. Only ten percent of the population in the Marianas spoke English; Chinese, the Philippine languages and Chamorro predominated, even though the Marianas were an American territory.

And that was the beauty of the operation. If Xi's shoes were on the volcanic soil of an American territory, Homeland could arrest him and return him to Washington.

"They think," Chen told Michael, "the profits Xi made range around $100 million on the first batch Card sold. If we promise him more, we think he'll bite. Greed usually wins. It's a good thing that sonofabitch Card is dead, Westen, because if you hadn't killed him, I would."

"You've got a question," Chen said thirty minutes into the briefing when saw Michael frowning.

"The HSI unit dismantles criminal organizations. I've been—" Michael started.

"Why do you think we need your help?"

Raines glanced at Michael. "My gut tells me you're tied to this, somehow. I don't know what plans Card had for you."

"Just your gut?"

"You know how research works. Pull a thread here, follow a trail there, when you end up with the same unanswered questions in several places you look to see if anything links them together."

"Your name shouldn't have been anywhere near Chen's investigation, but it was," Raines said.

Michael watched Chen's demeanor change from mild mannered special agent to warrior. "Imagine holding your nation's most important, most expensive, most sophisticated technology in the palm of your hand and then selling out your country. While you were getting crap about shooting Card, we finally had access we needed to fill in the missing pieces of information that tied him to Xi."

Michael shot Raines a quick look. "So the main reason you kept my team isolated for three weeks was to give Homeland time to dot the is and cross the ts for this case."

"Yeah," Raines said.

Ten hours later, he told himself he should have been happier with Raines' efforts to play fair than he was.

He stared out the window of the plane into a night dark sky and reached inside his shirt pocket to retrieve the grainy photo print of Zhang Xi. The image had been teasing his memory since he first saw it.

He studied Xi's face then closed his eyes. What if . . . the man had more hair?

And was thinner?

What if he had seen this man ten years ago in Djibouti?

"Well, damn," Chen said, flipping the newspaper page. "Sometimes I wonder what in the hell we're doing." He tapped headline: US battery firm sold to Chinese company, then held it so Raines could read it. "Why steal critical technology when we'll sell it to you? Dammit. This kind of thing makes me wonder what in the hell I'm doing this for."

Chen handed Michael his newspaper and stood. "Excuse me. I need to . . . move around."

Michael glanced at the story then handed the newspaper to Raines.

"I ask myself the same question."

"I don't know why. You know the answer.

Next he handed him the photo. "I've seen him before."

"Where?"

"Djibouti, about 10 years ago when you were in Yemen."

"Will he recognize you?"

"No. I was watching him from inside a building."

"Why?"

"He was selling RPGs and land mines to Greyson Miller's father."

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Fiona yawned and stretched, her movements mimicking the fat, grey tiger striped cat yawning and stretching on the opposite side of the bed.

The digital clock on the bedside table read 9:07 a.m. There were worse things to do than isolate one's psyche and coddle it with sleep.

The cat jumped down and meandered toward the kitchen, tail waving in the air. She'd learned leaving his food bowl filled constantly eliminated his tendency to yowl.

The loudest thing in the house was the cat. The TV and radio remained silent. The only information source she sought was a telephone directory. It was amazing how much information it contained—maps, business locations, phone numbers.

Although she could hear airplanes above and cars on the road outside from time to time, Elsa's home was in a very quiet location, and Fiona was enjoying the silence of sunny days and windy evenings.

The pattern of sound was so steady, low and calming that rest came easily. Sleeping had helped her regain her equilibrium.

When she walked away from Michael, she stepped out of the spinning gyroscope, fell and hurt herself. Restorative hours of sleep didn't change circumstances, but having a rested body allowed her mind to work with some clarity, and feel normal sensations again like hunger.

As she lay in bed, she remembered a package of frozen strawberries was in the freezer, and wondered if frozen strawberries and vanilla yogurt blended in the Cuisinart would make a wonderful breakfast.

Mornings were peaceful, but her evenings were troubled.

She decided she'd slept so much because she'd missed hours and hours of it for almost a year. Prison had not been restful. It struck her upon waking from one of her 12-hour sleep cycles that she might be taking the path of least resistance to deal with depression. If she slept, she didn't think. She didn't hurt. At least that was her self-diagnosis.

By the time she arrived at Elsa's home, her extended adrenalin high peaked, careened off the steep mountain and crash-bump skidded all the way to the bottom.

She'd started talking to herself. "Have you ever made a good decision for yourself?"

The answer was easy. "No."

The cat apparently thought she'd been talking to him and would meyowl.

Before her flight to the Keys, she weighed Jesse's warnings about changing her identity. Then she remembered what was stashed in her bag—all the essential documents she needed to live with Michael in a non-extradition country.

When she pulled out the collection of new IDs, Jesse nodded his approval.

"Who are you? I forgot," he wondered as he checked her counterfeit Florida driver's license. "Yo, Kimberly. Hey, I think you and Pearce have the same first name now. I'll tell her if I ever see her again."

"Is she back here?"

"Maybe. Hey, Fi, when you're there, keep your head down and check in so I don't worry."

She promised him she'd call him after she got to Elsa's place, and she did. She left a message on his office phone three weeks ago.

"This is Kimi—all is well. See you soon."

It took her two blinks to decide her name was not Kim, not Kimberly, but Kimi. It was as far removed from being Fiona Glenanne in both in style and substance as she could imagine. And, it was a great starting place for planning the rest of her life.

Trusting Jesse's instinct about changing her identity had been easy. When the last metal-barred door closed behind her as she left the prison, she realized she'd developed a new anxiety, one that could send an icy spear of fear down her spine. The thought of being incarcerated again was chilling.

Her friend Ayn told her she'd learned her lesson in prison; Fiona had agreed at the time, but she wondered if that was only the first step she needed to take to complete lesson she obviously needed to learn.

Yesterday was gone, and as absent from today as Michael.

She'd seen that sincere disappointment on his face before, always in the moments that preceded him leaving for someplace else. That would never change and neither would he.

She could change.

Today, she wanted—needed—something to look forward do, something to build the new person she wanted to be.

She'd been toying with an idea for two weeks. What would a Kimi look like?

As soon as she asked herself the question, she knew.

Next question: Did she seriously think Michael was going to change?

This new self-examination process had been prompted by an underlying anger she hadn't experienced in years.

She knew he loved her; that wasn't in question. He knew she loved him. That wasn't in question either. Yet in that last embrace on the tarmac, she pulled away from him and knew they had done this before, many different ways, for many years. He couldn't change. He said he wanted to, but she could see the dishonesty of that in his face. He was getting ready to leave; men waited for him. He would return to the CIA, and she would . . .

She would leave.

She had to. As long as she separated herself from the familiar and stayed away from him, she would be fine.

Her thoughts returned to their explosive reunion after he finished the South American op. Twenty-four hours. They barely had twenty-four hours together. It was crushing to know the cycle would repeat itself, and it would continue for as long as she allowed it.

That had to change.

She would have to figure out what to do, how to live, now that she would no longer be involved with the illegal arms trade. Card's negotiation on her behalf had neutralized her in two different ways. It allowed her to leave prison as his protected CIA asset, but it sealed her fate. She was poison now, and especially for those partners who were aware Michael had triggered Greyson Miller's arrest.

Miller's reach as an arms trader extended to Europe and the Middle East and, the last she knew, South America as well.

Not only was she poison now, she was vulnerable to anyone who might connect her to the arms trade.

Her life crystallized into a summary of all the things she couldn't have.

She could not have Michael.

She could not have her former career.

She could not have her family without putting their lives at risk. Sadly, all of these unhappy realizations fit under one tidy umbrella. She had been trapped by fate, destiny, karma, a predetermined course of events—and she was stuck with it.

At least she stopped fighting it before Michael had.

She had been so very young that night when she learned she was one of the unlucky people who could only give her heart once.

The dimensions of time and space slipped away and isolated her from being as she was encased in a silent cocoon to meet her destiny. When he began walking toward her, this perfect stranger whose name she did not know, she stepped inside a haze of countless tomorrows. A soft smile softened his features, and his eyes sought hers. In that instant, she memorized everything about him, and as she did, she felt the need to run away, to escape.

He'd asked her to dance, but she couldn't find her voice because she couldn't understand what was happening to her. Flickering flashes of what would be between them momentarily stunned her, stealing her ability to speak. Did she hear the words or dream them when he said "you will be my forever."

The dim lighting inside the pub faded as she adjusted focus to see him through the viewfinder of her heart, as his face was transferred from lens to mirror to pentaprism, his image preserved forever, imprinted upon her soul.

He held out his hand; she put hers in his, and the touch of his flesh on hers was so electric, so familiar and so alarmingly new, she reacted as the frightened woman she was. She pressed a pocket-sized revolver against one of his ribs, but it did not deter him.

When they parted later that evening, everything she had always known had changed permanently, and there was nothing she could do about it. The realization that he would be her other was unsettling.

It was impossible to understand why her natural resistance evaporated when he touched her. She embraced temptation while trying to protect herself, and the moment she let down her guard to trust him completely, he disappeared.

She thought she might die. She encased herself in emotional steel.

Then fate intervened again; it led her to Miami because he kept the way for someone to find her.

It was there he told her what they'd shared in Ireland hadn't been enough. For him. She could see his lie, and she'd teased and pressed him to make him admit it, which he finally did. Then he'd pushed her away once again, slower then, perhaps because they had possessed each other so completely, so thoroughly, that night in the loft.

The question between them had been answered.

She didn't have to call him a liar to his face if he denied it. All she had to do was look at him, hold his gaze. He would always look away first.

She kept drifting into the past, and she had to stop.

"I can't do this again."

Saying it out loud solidified her decision. That was the moment Fiona Glenanne, now Kimi Harrison, decided she would disappear, a day at a time, a step at a time.

It was just her misfortune she was stuck loving Michael. She could not change that if she wanted.

"Dammit!"

Loving Michael had been the most disastrous event of her life. He should have arrived with a warning sign:

DANGER: Fall in love with me, and I'll fall in love with you, and then I'm going to push you away while I'm pulling you into my arms. You'll wish you never met me, because if I have to choose, I'll choose my job, my country, what I do—all of these things will be first before you. Always. If you love me, then want what I want. Those are my terms. I won't negotiate, but I'll tell you things that will make you think I've promised you something, but the only promises I'll make will be to others for something that involves my work. You can help me and I'll thank you for it, but that is all.

What had she promised Michael?

Sam had asked the question. Did he think she wouldn't know the answer because she couldn't respond? She'd promised him everything. She promised to love him forever, and she did not break her promises. She couldn't.

The painfully crippling thing was knowing it would never be enough. Michael had shown how easily he could turn and walk away.

They had a history, a story stuck on the same page, so she closed the book; she was making changes, starting now.

Swinging her legs over the side of the bed, she pulled off her sleep shirt, and headed for the shower.

After she shampooed her hair, she blow dried it, then brushed it into a smooth pony tail. Twisting it up, she used a rubber band to contain it then reached for a pair of scissors and cut off the ponytail above the rubber band.

What remained fell down and curved around her cheeks. It was uneven, short and choppy.

Fiona's new beginning began by piercing her heart with a pair of scissors. This was more than symbolic. It would be the visible reminder she needed to separate who she had been from who she would be.

She didn't plan on finding tears muddling her eyes, so she swiped at them. Studying her reflection in the mirror, she saw she was still herself. Revised.

Her hair, she found, spearing fingers through it, was much shorter than she planned. She found a pair of jeans, added a flirty tank top and slid her feet into her lowest sandals.

Hairdresser first, then shopping. She'd change her exterior. Catching one more glance of herself in the mirror, she reached for her bag and retrieved the keys to Elsa's Mini. The salon accepted walk-ins.

She wondered, briefly, what Michael would think. He liked her hair; she'd had always known that. Then she banished that thought. It wouldn't matter what he thought.

She told herself she wasn't doing this because she was angry with him. She had done this because Michael Westen would no longer be a consideration in how she lived her life. Too many of her life decisions had been based upon his life.

This insanity had to end.

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Salon was a generous name for the small shop with three chairs and two shampoo stations.

Fiona called yesterday when she spotted the Locks of Love logo in their yellow pages ad. Perfect. She would donate her ponytail to the organization that used human hair to make wigs for cancer patients.

Lou, the woman with whom Fiona had spoken yesterday, turned out to be the owner, stylist and colorist.

"Oh, sughar, why didn't ya'll just come in and let me cut that ponytail?"

Fi handed her the plastic bag with her rubber-banded tresses. "Because I wanted to do it myself. Can you fix what's left? It's a bit shorter than—"

Lightly touching her hair, Lou fussed. "Oh, mayaah. I'm thinkin' you need some stylin' and you could brightn' an lightn' it up a bit."

"Whatever you think." Usually, she was very particular about her hair, but not today. Not today.

Fiona quickly learned all about Lou from Lou. She'd moved to Key West from Mobile because her drunk-ass louse of a first husband ran off with her good for nothing youngest sister and they moved to California, good riddance. She decided to go the opposite direction and landed in Key West where she started her own business and met husband number two, Milton. Another truck driver.

"That man makes me feel loved," she said. "I got a real prize this time."

Fiona listened to her cheerful chatter and had to smile. When she saw the final result of Lou's work, Fiona was pleasantly surprised. Lou had snipped and straightened and gently highlighted and added a small fringe of soft bangs.

Fiona hardly recognized herself. It was just what she wanted.

"I like this," she told Lou. "Very much."

"Makes you look . . . hmm, French, I'd say."

"Ma grand-mère était française," Fiona said with a small smile.

"Huh?"

"I said my grandmother was French."

"Mine was all-American mutt." Lou said and they both laughed.

Fiona looked in the mirror again, and smoothed the hair near her ears. "Really, thank you. I like this."

"Oh, sughar, it'll take you a while, but you'll get used to it, and all that haihr'll grow back by the time that heart's all healed up."

"I didn't—"

Lou smiled empathetically. "That short cut was man-related. I've seen it beforh. And speakin' of, my man just hit the million mile mark. That's a real select club of drivin' fools. We're celebratin' down at Hogfish Bar and Grill tonight. Won'cah come and take that new do for a test drive? We're just a buncha old farts who like to drink and laugh a lot."

She had to smile. "Maybe I will."

Hair done. Shopping next.

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Fiona decided her new look was . . . was . . . it was fine.

Lou had highlighted, trimmed and introduced her to hair gel which she politely rejected. Her hair might be as short as Madeline's, but she was drawing the line at gel. She was not going to look like her mother-in-law.

It had taken her an hour of clenching her teeth together, gulps of ice water and some measured breathing to quell the panicky reaction she'd engendered in herself with that comparative. By the time she returned to Elsa's house, though, she was calm. Better.

She'd joined Lou and Milton and a group of their friends, all of different ages and sizes, and liked the sense of camaraderie in the group. One of their younger friends, a retired stockbroker who had moved to the Keys a year ago was focusing all of his attentions on her, but Lou had an eagle's eye on the situation.

"Kimi, I want you to meet someone," she invited and started pulling at Fiona's arm.

That was when Fiona spotted the watcher.

She'd been aware of appreciative looks sent her way, even with her new conservative way of dressing. But there was something about the watcher that seemed so familiar, and then she knew why that was. He was Greyson Miller's younger brother.

It had been several years she had last seen Greyson's brother, so she was hoping he wouldn't figure things out. He was studying her with a smile and a quizzical expression on his face.

Her haircut obviously was providing a genuine disguise, and she hoped her new choices in clothing added another layer of protection. If not, she was armed, discreetly. She was wearing a soft pink floral print dress that fell to the middle of her calves. Like all of the new things she'd purchased, it had less structure, was less form-fitting, softer, more feminine. This change would also take some getting used to.

"Kimi, this is old coot is my neighbor, Ted Nicholas."

"Hello," he nodded.

"Nick, guess what she can do?" Lou said enthusiastically.

"Nice to meet you," Nick said.

"Nice to meet you, too."

Lou nudged Fiona who was clearly puzzled. "Say that thang, hon."

Fiona grinned. "What thang?"

"She speaks French, Nick. Isn't that what you said you needed? Someone who spoke French?"

"Why, yes. Parlez-vous français?"

"Oui," Fiona said.

"Great, I need a translator."

"Pourquoi avez-vous besoin d'un traducteur?"

He laughed. "Parlez-vous français exhausts the limit my French. When did you learn to speak the language? As a student?"

"Non, comme un enfant. Ma grand-mère ne parlait pas anglais." She said it with a smile, as she maintained a peripheral view of the bar where the watcher had moved. "My grandmother didn't speak English, so I learned from her when I was a child."

"I have a project I'm working on. I'm a biographer and I need some old, handwritten letters translated. I'll be honest. I can't afford to pay much, and I know old style cursive writing is hard to read."

Fiona noticed her watcher moving closer and he was now listening to their conversation. When he heard her ask Nicholas in French why he needed a translator, he changed his focus and ordered another drink before rejoining the man and woman he was sharing a table with.

"I've never done that kind of thing, but I'd be happy to translate your letters."

"Would you really?"

She spent the rest of the evening talking with Nick about his project and left the bar shortly after Greyson Miller's younger brother did. She watched carefully to see if she was being followed on the way back to Elsa's house, and she wasn't. But when she returned to Elsa's house, she found Jesse's phone and called.

When he didn't answer she left a message. "I'm missing you, honey. Are you coming down for a visit soon?"

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Life in Miami without Michael or Fiona's had left a large hole in Madeline's heart. Her sister Jill had come to visit for the second time in 42 years.

On her first trip to Miami, she came to help Maddie after Nathan was born, but that ended in disaster.

Frank had been on one of his moods, and Jill had no patience with drunks or bullies and had told him so. The man pulled his fist back to express his displeasure with her remark and she picked up the nearest thing to defend herself. It was an empty cast iron skillet she used to block his punch.

Frank's knuckles ended up bloody, Maddie screamed, and Frank ordered Jill out of the house. Jill set the skillet down and told him she would be leaving two days later, as she'd planned. "I'm here to help your wife and my sister, and I'll leave when she's stronger," Jill said.

"Get her out of here," he'd ordered Maddie, and left, breaking the back door hinge, and roaring out of the driveway in need of a new muffler. The loud, abrupt noise woke a colicky Nate who Maddie had just rocked to sleep.

Maddie had pleaded with Jill to leave in the morning, and told her it'd be so much worse if she didn't.

When Jill saw little Michael sitting on his knees, a sweet, sturdy toddler with his father's coloring and mother's eyes, crouched and looking around the corner into the kitchen, she stopped, picked up the boy and returned him to his bed. Maddie followed and picked up her crying infant and sat down in the rocking chair to rock him to sleep.

Between Maddie's nerves, post-partum pains and Nate's colic, the baby wouldn't settle down, of course.

"I'll take him," Jill said. "You see to Michael."

Jill watched as her sister's oldest child seemed to be comforting his mother, patting her hand. That's when she softly suggested that life would be easier and better for all three of them if she just came home with her.

"It'll be safer, Maddie."

But nothing Jill could say would make Maddie want to leave her abusive husband. "When he gets like that, I'm worried he'll hurt you or one of these precious babies."

Maddie wouldn't go, and Jill could not understand why her sister was so committed to living in misery. "You know where I am. The door will always be open."

And it was. Jill was always ready to welcome her sister to her home, but Maddie never took advantage of it, and through the years, the sisters communicated less and less frequently until Nate was killed.

In the past months, they had been trying to fill in the gaps in each other's life with phone calls but when Madeline explained why she'd been away from her home for so long, Jill came to see her.

Jill had been at Madeline's for two weeks when her son called and wondered if she was ever coming home because his dad was missing her. She laughed and told Maddie that meant they had finished off the last of the food she'd prepared and left in the freezer for them.

"I'm going home and you're coming with me," Jill told her. "No arguments. Now call your friends. Tell them where you're going, and that I'm going to keep you for a while."

Sam and Jesse came to see the sisters take their leave.

"This will be easier, you know, while Michael and Fi are gone," she told Sam.

"Have either of you talked to Fi?" Maddie wondered.

"Just once, and just long enough to know she's fine," Jesse said.

"Is she really?"

"She sounded like herself, Maddie. What else can I say?"

"They'll be back, Maddie. Mike's got to do what he's got to do, and Fi just needs some breathing room. We'll keep track of her," Sam assured her.

"Still no word from Michael?"

"No, but that's not unusual for the type of stuff he's probably doing." Sam tried to sound reassuring, but Madeline wasn't willing to be reassured.

"The trip will do you good," Jesse suggested. "Go, have a good time, do the family thing. We'll be here when you get back."

And after nearly three months visiting with Jill and her son and husband in Savannah, Maddie wasn't sure she wanted to come home. She hadn't heard from either Fiona or Michael, and Sam and Jesse, though they called a couple of times a month, were involved with projects at SecuriCorp they couldn't talk about.

There really didn't seem to be much reason to rush back to Miami, and Savannah was lovely.

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Sam set a bag of Chinese food cartons on the conference room table and took off his jacket and put it over the back of a chair. "Damn thing."

He still hadn't adjusted to the dress code for the corporate work environment, but Elsa seemed to like coordinating his shirts, ties and jackets.

"Food in the conference room, Sam? Really? And you didn't bring any for me?"

Sam opened the bag and set cartons and chopsticks in front of Jesse. "Ginger chicken and brown rice or grilled shrimp and sticky rice, take the one you want."

Jesse reached for the ginger chicken. "I can see Elsa's expanded your palate."

Sam patted his middle. "That's not all that's expanding."

"Told you, come to gym with me. Stay in shape."

"That used to be easier when we were running around with Mike. What'd Pearce say?"

"She has no idea where he's at or what he's doing, but she's still sorting through Olivia Riley's stuff. She wanted to know about Fi, too."

"When's the last time you talked to her?"

"About a week ago."

"Yeah, I called, too."

"Sam, I thought you weren't going to do that."

He closed the lid on the remaining rice and shrimp and put it in the carryout bag. "It's been more than three months, Jess. She still doesn't want to talk to me."

"I've been thinking I might make another trip there."

"Greyson's brother left Key West and hasn't been seen recently, or so say my cop buddies. Hey, when you go down again, take a picture, okay? It's gotta be weird, seeing her without hair."

"She didn't shave her head, Sam. She cut her hair and gave it to that organization that makes wigs for people who have chemo."

Sam cocked his head and looked at Jesse.

"Yeah, it's still weird seeing her without hair."

"Thought so. Still got that itch between your shoulders?"

"Yeah."

"You?"

"Yeah, and it's getting worse. Maybe you should go check on her."

Jesse grinned. "I've got the perfect excuse." He pointed chopsticks back toward his desk on the opposite side of his office. Got that package from Maddie today. There's was another package inside it—something Mike sent to Fi."

"Did you look at? Where was it mailed from?"

"He mailed it from Miami. It's kind of beat up. It looks like it got lost in the mail then got forwarded to Maddie's sister's address in Savannah. Maddie sent it here and told me to make sure Fi gets it."

"I bet she's not talking to Maddie, either. Yeah, you got go, Jess."

"Are you still keeping track of her?"

"Yeah."

Despite what he told Fi, both phones he gave her had some new high tech trackers inside. Even if she took them apart, there was nothing visible in the battery, memory card or camera areas to indicate it was a highly locatable phone.

Sam grinned.

"Thing is, she's not doing much. It looks like she spends a lot of time at the house. When she leaves she goes to the grocery store. Or to the Hogfish Bar and Grill. The longest trip she makes away from the house is to the library, and once in a while she goes to another restaurant. If someone's looking for Fiona Glenanne, then Kimberly Harrison isn't going to any of the same kinds of places Fiona would go. "

When Jesse's cell rang, he reached for it, glanced at the caller and raised an eyebrow. "This is Fi."

"Hey, lady, how you doing?

"Uh-huh. Yeah. Sure. No problem. Okay, will do. I'll be there in a few hours then."

Listening to the one-sided conversation, Sam waited for the explanation.

"She says she was just at a seafood market and there was some guy following her. He called her Fiona, and when she didn't respond, he approached and said 'don't I know you?' She told him he must have her confused with someone. Hey said, 'no you're Fiona.' She told him her name was Kimberly, and he followed her out of the market. She noticed a car was tailing her, but she said she lost him and got back to Elsa's okay."

"Yeah. Leave now."

Jesse put his empty container in the takeout bag and tied it shut. "Let's not over react, Sam."

"You think that's what I'm doing?"

Jesse turned and looked back at Sam. "No."

#

#

#

Jesse made the drive down the Overseas Highway to Mile Marker 5 in record time.

He pulled into the drive and parked his Porsche next to an older model Ford sedan.

A quick survey told him whoever was driving it was probably not a threat. The back seat was full of books and boxes of books. A wad of Florida lottery tickets were clipped to a sagging sun visor, and the window decals—I heart FLA, Keep Calm and Chomp On, Miami Heat and Florida State Fac/Sta—made him think whoever was here probably wasn't a threat.

"Kimi, you home?" There wasn't a doorbell so he rapped on the door.

The door suddenly opened and Fiona blinked up at him. "Jesse. Hi."

His eyes met hers, then he looked down. "Oh."

She wouldn't meet his gaze and when he looked inside the house, that's when he saw an older man standing behind her, smiling and obviously interested in his arrival.

"Uh," Jesse started. "You have company."

He walked into the house when Fi opened the door a bit wider to let him in.

Fiona didn't have a chance to introduce them because the older man stepped forward with a smile on his face. "I'm Nick. Kimi's been doing some translating for me. She's been very helpful."

"Ah, yeah," Jesse said. It seemed safer to let Fi take the lead on this one. "Nice to meet you."

She introduced him without explanation. "This is Jesse."

Nick smiled and held up a couple of CDs. "Thanks for these, hon. I'll be going now. You two probably have a lot to talk about. Nice meeting you, Jesse."

"Ah, yeah. You, too."

Nick smiled again on his way out the door and when he left, Fiona went behind him and locked it.

"He thinks," Jesse started to say.

"I noticed that." Fiona said. "That's probably a good thing. Do you want something to drink? I just made some tea."

"Uh, Fi . . . "

"Don't, Jesse. Just . . .don't."

"I think we should talk about this."

"I don't."

"Mike might like—"

"No."

"You're going . . ." he started but paused and changed directions. "Have you talked to Maddie?"

"I don't plan to."

Fi had yet to look at him squarely, so Jesse stepped around in front of her and gently held her shoulders between his hands as he had three months earlier before she left for the Keys. "I'm not going to do anything you don't want me to, but I know enough to know you will need help."

"I'll be fine."

"Fi . . . "

"I know." And then she leaned forward to rest her forehead on his chest for a moment.

Awkwardly, he patted her back. She pushed away a moment later and he let her go. When he heard the clink of ice cubes in a glass, he followed her into the kitchen.

She still wouldn't make eye contact. She set a glass of tea on the table for him and poured another one for herself.

He pulled out a chair so she could sit first. "It's going to be okay, Fi."

She sat and used both hands to clasp her glass, as if holding on to it would keep her upright. "I know. I'm . . . adjusting."

Jesse pulled out a chair next to her and sat down. "Tell me about this guy who knows who you really are."

"I don't know where he is."

Jesse reached over for her hand, and when she gave it over to him so easily, he squeezed it gently. "I don't, either, Fi."

.