Part IV: The Aftermath

Chapter 39

Jennie

Two weeks after our arrival home, Lisa deems it safe for my parents to return to Oak Lawn.

"I'll have extra security around them for a few months," she explains as we walk toward the training area. "They'll need to put up with some restrictions when it comes to malls and other crowded places, but they should be able to return to work and resume most of their usual activities."

I nod, not particularly surprised to hear that. Lisa has been keeping me informed of her efforts in this area, and I know the Sullivan's are no longer a threat. Utilizing the same ruthless tactics she employed with Al-Quadar, my wife accomplished what the authorities have been unsuccessfully trying to do for decades: she rid Chicago of its most prominent crime family.

"What about Frank?" I ask as we pass two guards wrestling on the grass. "I thought the CIA didn't want any of us coming back to the country."

"They relented yesterday. It took some convincing, but your parents should be able to return without anyone standing in their way."

"Ah." I can only imagine what kind of "convincing" Lisa had to do in light of the devastation we left behind. Even the cover-up crew dispatched by the CIA hadn't been able to keep the story of our high-speed battle under wraps. The area around the private airport might not have been densely populated, but the explosions and gunfire hadn't gone unnoticed. For the past couple of weeks, the clandestine Chicago operation to "apprehend the deadly arms dealer" has been all anyone's talked about on the news.

As Lisa speculated in the car, the Sullivan's had indeed called in some serious favors to organize that attack. The police chief—formerly a Sullivan mole and currently bloody goo swimming in lye—took the information the Sullivan's dug up about us and used the "arms dealer smuggling explosives into the city" pretext to hurriedly assemble a team of SWAT operatives. The Sullivan men joining them were explained away as "reinforcements from another area," and the entire rushed operation was kept secret from the other law enforcement agencies—which is how they were able to catch us off-guard.

"Don't worry," Lisa says, misreading my tense expression. "Besides Frank and a few other high-level officials, nobody knows your parents were involved in what happened. The extra security is just a precaution, nothing more."

"I know that." I look up at him. "You wouldn't let them return if it weren't safe."

"No," Lisa says softly, stopping at the entrance to the fighting gym. "I wouldn't." Her forehead gleams with sweat from the humid heat, her sleeveless shirt clinging to her well-defined muscles. There are still a few half-healed scars from the shards of glass on her face and neck, but they do little to detract from her potent appeal.

Standing less than two feet away and watching me with her piercing green gaze, my wife is the very picture of vibrant, healthy.

Swallowing, I look away, my skin crawling with heat at the memory of how I woke up this morning. We might not have had intercourse since the miscarriage, but that doesn't mean Lisa has been abstaining from sex with me. On my knees with her cock in my mouth, tied down with her tongue on my clit . . . The images in my mind make me burn even as the ever-present guilt presses down on me.

Why does Lisa keep being so nice to me? Ever since our return, I've been waiting for her to punish me, to do something to express the anger she must feel, but so far, she's done nothing. If anything, she's been unusually tender with me, even more caring in some ways than during my pregnancy. It's subtle, this shift in her behavior—a few extra kisses and touches during the day, full-body massages every evening, asking Ana to make more of my favorite foods . . . It's nothing she hasn't done before; it's just that the frequency of these little gestures has gone up since we came back from America.

Since we lost our child.

My eyes prickle with sudden tears, and I duck my head to hide them as I slip past Lisa into the gym. I don't want her to see me crying again. She's had plenty of that in the past couple of weeks. That's probably why she's holding off on punishing me: she thinks I'm not strong enough to take it, afraid I'll turn back into the panic-attack-stricken wreck I was after Tajikistan.

Except I won't. I know that now. Something about this time is different.

Something within me is different.

Walking over to the mats, I bend over and stretch, using the time to compose myself. When I turn back to face Lisa, my face shows nothing of the grief that ambushes me at random moments.

"I'm ready," I say, positioning myself on the mat. "Let's do this."

And for the next hour, as Lisa trains me how to take down a two-hundred-pound man in seven seconds, I succeed in pushing all thoughts of loss and guilt out of my mind.

After the training session, I return to the house to shower and then go down to the pool to tell my parents the news. My muscles are tired, but I'm humming with endorphins from the hard workout.

"So we can return?" My dad sits up in his lounge chair, distrust warring with relief on his face. "What about all those cops? And those gangsters' connections?"

"I'm sure it's fine, Alejandro," my mom says before I can answer. "Lisa wouldn't send us back if it weren't all taken care of."

Dressed in a yellow one-piece swimsuit, she looks tan and rested, as though she's spent the past couple of weeks on a resort—which, in a way, is not that far from the truth. Lisa has gone out of her way to ensure my parents' comfort and make them feel like they're truly on vacation. Books, movies, delicious food, even fruity drinks by the pool—it's all been provided for them, causing my dad to admit reluctantly that my life at an arms dealer's compound is not as horrible as he'd imagined.

"That's right, she wouldn't," I confirm, sitting down on a lounge chair next to my mom's. "Lisa says you're free to leave whenever you want. She can have the plane ready for you tomorrow—though, obviously, we'd love it if you stayed longer."

As expected, my mom shakes her head in refusal. "Thank you, honey, but I think we should head home. Your dad's been anxious about his job, and my bosses have been asking daily when I'll be able to return . . ." Her voice trailing off, she gives me an apologetic smile.

"Of course." I smile back at her, ignoring the slight squeezing in my chest. I know what's behind their desire to leave, and it's not their jobs or their friends. Despite all the comforts here, my parents feel confined, hemmed in by the watch towers and the drones circling over the jungle. I can see it in the way they eye the armed guards, in the fear that crosses their faces when they pass by the training area and hear gunshots. To them, living here is like being in a luxurious jail, complete with dangerous criminals all over the place.

One of those criminals being their own daughter.

"We should go inside and pack," my dad says, rising to his feet. "I think it's best if we fly out first thing tomorrow morning."

"All right." I try not to let his words sting me. It's silly to feel rejected because my parents want to return home. They don't belong here, and I know it as well as they do. Their bodies might've healed from the bruises and scratches they sustained during the car chase, but their minds are a different matter.

It will take more than a few hours of therapy with Dr. Wessex for my suburban parents to get over seeing cars blow up and people die.

"Do you want me to help you pack?" I ask as my dad drapes a towel around my mom's shoulders. "Lisa's talking to her accountant, and I don't have anything to do before dinner."

"It's okay, honey," my mom says gently. "We'll manage. Why don't you take a swim before dinner? The water's nice and cool."

And leaving me standing by the pool, they hurry into the air-conditioned comfort of the house.

"They're leaving tomorrow morning?" Rosé looks surprised when I inform her of my parents' upcoming departure. "Oh, that's too bad. I didn't even have a chance to show your mom that lake you were telling them about."

"That's okay," I say, picking up a laundry basket to help her load the washer. "Hopefully, they'll come visit us again."

"Yes, hopefully," Rosé echoes, then frowns as she sees what I'm doing. "Jennie, put that down. You shouldn't—" She abruptly stops.

"Shouldn't lift heavy things?" I finish, giving her an ironic smile. "You and Ana keep forgetting that I'm no longer an invalid. I can lift weights again, and fight and shoot and eat whatever I want."

"Of course." Rosé looks contrite. "I'm sorry"—she reaches for my basket—"but you still shouldn't do my job."

Sighing, I relinquish it to her, knowing she'll only get upset if I insist on helping. She's been particularly touchy about that since our return, determined not to have anyone treat her any differently than before.

"I was raped; I didn't have my arms amputated," she snapped at Ana when the housekeeper tried to assign her lighter cleaning tasks. "Nothing will happen to me if I vacuum and use a mop."

Of course that made Ana burst into tears, and Rosé and I had to spend the next twenty minutes trying to calm her down. The older woman has been very emotional since our return, openly grieving my miscarriage and Rosé's assault.

"She's taking it worse than my own mother," Rosé told me last week, and I nodded, not surprised. Though I'd only met Mrs. Park a couple of times, the plump, stern woman had struck me as an older version of Sorn, with the same tough shell and cynical outlook on life. How Rosé managed to remain so cheerful with a mother like that is something that will always be a mystery to me. Even now, after everything she's been through, my friend's smile is only a bit more brittle, the sparkle in her eyes just a shade less bright. With her bruises nearly healed, one would never know that Rosé survived something so traumatic—especially given her fierce insistence on being treated as normal.

Sighing again, I watch as she loads the washer with brisk efficiency, separating out the darker clothes and placing them into a neat pile on the floor. When she's done, she turns to face me. "So did you hear?" she says. "Bambam located the interpreter girl. I think he'll go after her after he flies your parents home."

"He told you that?"

She nods. "I ran into him this morning and asked how that's going. So yeah, he told me."

"Oh, I see." I don't see, not in the least, but I decide against prying. Rosé's been increasingly closemouthed about her strange non-relationship with Bambam, and I don't want to press the issue. I figure she'll tell me when she's ready—if there's anything to tell, that is.

She turns back to start the washer, and I debate whether I should share with her what I learned yesterday . . . what I still haven't shared with Lisa. Finally, I decide to go for it, since she already knows part of the story.

"Do you remember the pretty young doctor who treated me at the hospital?" I ask, leaning against the dryer.

Rosé turns back toward me, looking puzzled at the change of topic. "Yes, I think so. Why?"

"Her last name is Cobakis. I remember reading it on her name tag and thinking that it seemed familiar, like I'd come across it before."

Now Rosé looks intrigued. "And did you? Come across it, that is?"

I nod. "Yes. I just couldn't remember where—and then yesterday, it came to me. There was a man by the name of George Cobakis on the list I gave to Jackson."

Rosé's eyes widen. "The list of people responsible for what happened to his family?"

"Yes." I take a deep breath. "I wasn't sure, so I checked my email last night, and sure enough, there it was. George Cobakis from Homer Glen, Illinois. I noticed that name originally because of the location."

"Oh, wow." Rosé stares at me, mouth open. "You think that nice doctor is somehow connected to this George?"

"I know she is. I looked up George Cobakis last night, and she came up in search results. She's his wife. A local newspaper wrote about a fundraiser for veterans and their families, and they had their picture in there as a couple who's done a lot for that organization. He's apparently a journalist, a foreign correspondent. I can't imagine how his name ended up on that list."

"Shit." Rosé looks both horrified and fascinated. "So what are you going to do?"

"What can I do?" The question has been tormenting me ever since I learned of the connection. Before, the names on that list were just that: names. But now one of those names has a face attached to it. A photo of a smiling dark-haired man standing next to his smart, pretty wife.

A wife whom I'd met.

A woman who'll be a widow if Lisa's former security consultant gets his revenge.

"Have you spoken to your wife about this?" Rosé asks. "Does she know?"

"No, not yet." Nor am I sure that I want Lisa to know. A few weeks ago, I told Rosé about the list I sent to Jackson, but I didn't tell her that I did it against Lisa's wishes. That part—and what happened after we learned of my pregnancy—is too private to share. "I'm guessing Lisa will say there's nothing to be done now that the list is in Jackson's hands," I say, trying to imagine my wife's reaction.

"And she'll probably be right." Rosé gives me a steady look. "It's unfortunate that we met the woman and all, but if her husband was somehow involved in what happened to Jackson's family, I don't see how we can interfere."

"Right." I take another deep breath, trying to let go of the anxiety I've been feeling since yesterday. "We can't. We shouldn't."

Even though I gave Jackson that list.

Even though whatever's going to happen will be my fault once again.

"This is not your problem, Jennie," Rosé says, intuiting my concern. "Jackson would've learned about those names one way or another. He was too determined for it not to happen. You're not responsible for what he's going to do to those people—Jackson is."

"Of course," I murmur, attempting a smile. "Of course, I know that."

And as Rosé resumes sorting through the laundry, I change the topic to our newest guard recruits.