GONE, BUT NOT FORGOTTEN

After Pax fell asleep for the second time, Donovan placed a kiss on her shoulder before leaving her alone.  He had actually never seen her so exhausted before.  Pax heard the soft click the door made as it thumped closed behind him.  She sighed and settled into the covers a bit more.  It had been quite some time since she had felt so relaxed.  She once thought she could never sleep past three or four hours, but that theory was shot to hell.  She would sleep for hours, stay in bed all day if the witless fuck would allow her to do so.  Pax pressed her cheek into the pillow and sighed deeply.  She was going out, and down, down, down. 

*  *  *

Before she became "Pax," she was often referred to as "Jonella."  The reason she hated it so to this day was because he often called her that.  She hated the bastard.  She would allow a man to betray her one time before she picked him up and tossed him in the garbage, but this one was different.  Jonella had started her career in covert operations for the CIA before she knew a man named Frank Donovan existed.  As would happen with Donovan, she was partnered with a young man, a more experienced agent.  It was sometimes common practice to do so when the agent in question was a rookie, and especially so if the agent had a hair trigger.  Jonella Paxton was both.  The first day she met her partner, she wasn't very damn impressed, nor was he.  Or so she thought.  Her senior agent was about five or six years older than her and he was just as close mouthed and moody as her future partner.  She rarely ever spoke his name in her present life, but she often heard it in her dreams.  Keith.  He was known [God only knows why] as "Edge" and he preferred to be called by his nickname.  However, Jonella was never one to do as someone asked.  Even then, she enjoyed pushing buttons and she never referred to him as anything other than Keith.  In turn, he never called her anything but Jonella, and she fucking hated her name.  If she had the means and the time, she would surely change the fucker to something else.  Oh yes she would. 

On the outside, Keith was a fairly hot looking guy.  He was tall, broad shouldered, and dark.  His hair was a dark shade of chocolate brown and his eyes were deep ebony.  Rumor had it that he was half Sioux Indian, but she had never gotten that confirmed or denied.  He was often stoic and cold [Her sleeping mind couldn't help but notice that he fucking had a lot of qualities that Frankie did], and most of his personal information had to be pried out of him with a crowbar.  On her fourth or fifth day of being his partner, she discovered that he had a wife and two children at home.  She would rather stab herself in the eye than admit how much that news crushed her.  She fucking refused to fuck around with a married man.  Ha.  As if he'd want to fuck around with her anyway.  Who would?  She was taller than average, thin, but wiry, and kept her ash blonde hair brutally short.  It was difficult working covert operations with long hair.  Actually, it was pretty fucking close to impossible.  Her face had plain unexotic features and she often thought her neck was too long.  She was no damn beauty, she knew this, and she had always had a hang-up about her gawky body.  It had followed her through childhood and on to her adult years.  She had been the tallest fucking girl in school, and had gone to her senior high prom alone.  Her feelings of inadequacy doubled when her close-mouthed partner finally showed her a picture of his wife.  She was a perfect blonde goddess with an hourglass figure and flawless skin [Goddamn it.  The fucking princess all over again].  Even after popping out two children, she kept her figure.  It was pretty damn sickening.  Although she didn't give a ripe fuck one way or another, she asked Keith what his goddess' name was.  Riva [Another damn "R" name].  Amazing.  Oh well.  It wasn't like she had a chance anyway.  Not only that, but it was a bad fucking idea to mess around with one's partner.

What came about that changed it for them?  What was it?  What was the gentle little nudge?  Maybe it was the goddamn vodka again.  She had loved that shit all her life and carried it wherever she went.  This assignment was no exception.  Unlike her time with Frankie, they weren't thrown together in a tent.  Instead, they were set up in a temporary shelter out in the middle of a fucking field.  She didn't remember what country they were in.  They had been to so many.  The US, France, Germany, and the Soviet Union.  This time, she thought they might have gone to a middle-eastern country, perhaps Iraq?  No, not Iraq.  What the fuck did it matter anyway?  The two of them had been thrown together for three or four weeks straight.  Keith was her only outside connection to the world, and she was his.  Every man [or woman] has a weakness, and Keith's was confinement.  Rumor [Oh yeah, the CIA was a regular fucking rumor mill] had it that Keith was captured once by the Colombians and thrown into a hole.  She heard he had been starved for days.  His only saving grace was the climate.  Every night it had rained, and he had been saved from death by that simple fact.  He hadn't seen his wife in two months and was paranoid that she was seeing someone else.  Nothing she said did any good.  He was completely convinced that his goddess was fucking around on him.  He was bitter about that, angry almost.  He vowed that after this particular assignment, he was leaving the agency for good.  She had never seen a man freaking out like he had.  It was weird watching a strong stoic man fall apart.  In normal Pax style, she approached Keith and slapped the shit out of him, commanding him to snap out of it.  His ranting and raving was driving her batshit.  At first, he was offended by the behavior and his black eyes were fixed murderously on her.  If she survived through the night, it would be a complete miracle.  Keith grabbed her wrist and came mighty damn close to punching her lights out, but he released her quickly.  She had overstepped some type of boundary.  It didn't take a genius to realize that.  She gave him her vodka flask and he took it gratefully.  Unlike her future partner [Funny how he fucking invaded her dreams, even when the subject wasn't him], Keith enjoyed a shot of vodka now and again.  He took it and drank deeply, nearly draining the flask.  He needed it.  He needed it to calm down and stop the paranoid thoughts from entering his mind.  She sat back and listened to him.  His Riva was good, she was faithful, their children were beautiful, and on and on.  It was enough to make her sick.  She knew she couldn't have Keith, but she damn well didn't want to hear him fawn ceaselessly about his fucking wife.  Eventually, she screamed out for him to shut up.

Startled, Keith held the flask up to his lips and gazed curiously at her.  He had never heard an outburst such as that, not from Jonella, not directed at him.  Like Jonella, Keith was a button pusher.  She often wondered if she had learned the technique from him.  He goaded her, picked at her, and humiliated her, until she literally begged for mercy.  There was no fucking way she would tell him what she thought about him.  She wanted to keep her fucking job.  He picked and poked until she screamed at him again.  She threw another punch, aiming for his handsome face, but it was misguided.  He stopped it easily, grasping her fist in his large paw [Hmmm…do I see a pattern here].  He shoved her back and she nearly fell on her skinny ass.  He was casting her away, or at least trying to, but the stress of the situation was getting to them, driving them both crazy.  Jonella didn't have anyone waiting for her at home, but she fucking hated isolation.  Before her body hit the floor, he jerked her back up to her feet.  Within seconds, he was kissing her.  At first, she fought him, beating at his chest, his face, and trying to reach his groin, but nothing she did worked.  He was strong, stronger than her, and he completely had the upper hand.  It wasn't a situation she liked being in, no fucking way.  She couldn't drive out his invasive tongue or beat away his exploring hands.  Why was he doing this to her?  Why was he fucking around with her like this?  Two minutes before, he had been bawling over his wife, and now he was kissing another woman.  She knew he didn't want her, not really.  He was driven forward by loneliness and isolation.  He had been without his wife far too long and it was getting to him.

Before too long a time, Keith had her thrown down on the floor, his heavy body pinning her down.  For the first few minutes, she denied him, fought at him, and demanded he let her up, but nothing was reaching his brain.  He was ripping at her clothes, tearing at them, and she kept trying to get through to him.  What the fuck did he think he was doing?  Hello!  You have a goddess and two children waiting for you at home.  She didn't fuck around with married men.  Once some of her flesh was exposed, her fight and protests died as soon as he touched her.  He didn't go for her face or her breasts; his hand fell immediately on the mound of flesh between her legs.  She was very young and inexperienced, had never felt anything like this before.  She winced a little when his finger entered her.  It didn't matter, she didn't care.  She had wanted this, she had longed for it.  He was making commands to her, commands in a language she didn't understand.  She had been exposed to many languages since joining up, but nothing like this.  It should have been her first cue that something was amiss, but she couldn't exactly think straight.  She didn't know what to do for him or what to say.  Goddamn it.  Why didn't he just speak English for fuck's sake.  She'd do anything he wanted if she could just fucking understand him.  When she didn't follow his commands, he seemed to shake it off.  It was as if he were a different person altogether.  How did a fucking nut job end up in the CIA?  Nut job or no, he knew what he was doing and he did it well.  She wanted to take charge, wanted to do something, but he was dominating her, not allowing her to move at all.  She didn't like that shit.  Didn't like being treated like a second-class citizen.  When she moved just the slightest, his hand clamped down on her shoulder, and he uttered an impatient 'no.'  At that point, she was ready to go, ready to argue, but she didn't really have time to think about it.  Without warning, without hesitation, he frantically worked his pants open, shoved them down, and entered her roughly.  Oh goddamn.  He was so big.  She supposed she should have told him she was kinda/sorta a virgin, but it hadn't seemed important at the time.  He felt the resistance of her flesh, the tightness, and it drove him forward harder and rougher than before.  She gasped in pain with each hard, invasive thrust.  How long did it take?  Minutes?  Hours?  When he met his release inside her, his body jerked almost convulsively, and he whispered something in his strange language.

When his body collapsed on top of hers, she felt the horrifying sensation of being smothered, but she wouldn't dare ask him to move, not just yet.  She liked this, liked this side of him, a side she might never see again.  Although she thought she had died and gone to heaven, she felt incredibly awkward.  What would happen to them after this?  How would she face him?  How could she look at him?  She would never see him in the same light again, that was for damn sure.  He whispered something to her in his strange language:  De De' ang. en jomfru [You're a virgin].  She had no idea what the hell he said.  He repeated his statement in English and Jonella answered as only she could:  No shit.  He laughed a little.  It wasn't an intimate laugh shared between lovers, it seemed mocking.  However, Jonella shook it off.  Perhaps she was only being paranoid.  When she thought about it later, she often wished she had listened to that little voice.

What happened after that was not expected.  The day after, Keith acted coolly around her, didn't give one indication that he had fucked her brains out the night before.  At first, she was hurt by that, but then understood.  He couldn't give away shit, not with a goddess and children at home.  Goddamn she felt like shit.  They mostly worked night moves, so daytime was actually spent briefing their superiors.  Every now and then, Jonella would spot Keith speaking quietly over a scrambled satellite phone.  She had also seen him typing away at an odd looking keyboard of some sort.  She never confronted him with this, and it would wind up being another mistake.  She had been a drippy ass bitch in love and she wasn't thinking clearly.  Of course, she had no idea that was what Keith had planned all along.  It had taken three or four days for Keith to approach her again.  He had taken her down to the floor yet again and made love to her just as roughly as he did the first time.  However, her body seemed to accommodate him this time, and she actually got some enjoyment out of it.  He wasn't tender by any stretch of the imagination, but tender had never been her style either.  Their off color affair had gone on for several weeks and Keith made no mention of his wife and children.  Jonella was grateful for that, she couldn't take the guilt.  When the assignment ended three or four weeks later, Jonella was no longer considered a rookie and she was given charge of her own assignment.  She saw Keith occasionally after that, and he made visits to her now and again.  She never issued any ultimatums, never made demands.  She took what she could get.  However, her life changed abruptly, unexpectedly.  She would never forget that day as long as she lived.  The words rang true and clear in her head, even today:  I can assure you that you haven't contracted a virus, Ms. Paxton.  Nausea and vomiting is very common among women who are pregnant.  Jumping Jesus on a fucking camel.  Pregnant?  What the hell did he mean pregnant?  She couldn't be pregnant.  Shit like that didn't happen to her, couldn't happen to her.  She was the girl nobody wanted.  A baby.  Goddamn it.  A fucking baby.  What the hell?  What was that she felt?  Shock or happiness or a mixture of both?  Whatever the case, she had never felt this way before.  Her next thought lingered on Keith.  How would he react?  Could she even tell him?  As it turned out, she didn't get a chance.

Jonella made her way back toward headquarters.  There were a few things that needed to be settled, and she would have to talk to Keith.  She didn't want anything from him, she wasn't sure she even loved him, but he needed to know about the child, because she wasn't sure what she was going to do about it.  By the time she set foot in her superior's office, the room was buzzing with activity.  She heard snippets of information here and there, heard the word 'infiltration' mentioned more than once.  What the hell was going on?  She held her breath when the name "Keith" was brought up.  She first thought he had been murdered, but as she listened, she realized that it wasn't the case at all.  "Keith" was a Norwegian double agent sent by a mid-eastern governmental organization.  There was no blonde goddess wife or children.  It had all been a setup from the very beginning.  Everything about Keith was a lie, including his fucking name.  Jesus.  She had played right along with his game, had been banged harder than a drum.  He had used her, had gotten her pregnant, and now he was gone.  Vicious rage entered her heart and she went into a seek and destroy type mode.  She immediately requested to be put on the retrieval team.  Her superiors balked at first.  She was still green, had been trained by the enemy, and they weren't sure they could trust her.  However, they took a chance and allowed her the opportunity.

They had determined that Keith left just a few short hours before sunrise, likely on foot, and they figured he was traveling by night and sleeping by day.  It was only a matter of time before they found him.  Yet, it took longer than they anticipated.  In fact, they never found him.  He slipped away to whatever country sent him and it was the end.  Jonella was put under the lights for three days, interrogated mercilessly.  The upper brass was certain that she knew more than she was letting on.  She didn't.  She had been fooled as much as they.  Couldn't they see that?  She didn't mention that he had been her lover, had in effect gotten her pregnant.  If they discovered that, she would be thrown out on her ear.  She didn't want to be thrown out just yet.  She wanted the time and the opportunity to hunt "Keith" down and make him pay for what he had done to her and the agency that had trusted him.

Feeling low, cheated, and like a used piece of shat on toilet paper, she sat and wondered how she would get herself out of her predicament.  She was carrying the child of a double agent, someone she now hated more than she hated anyone.  Abortion?  Adoption?  What could she do?  She couldn't have the child, could she?  If she had it, would she ever love it?  She put it completely out of her mind and pushed on.  She didn't think about the baby for several days, even while leaned over the toilet bowl puking her guts out.  She hid from it, didn't deal with it.  Slowly, Jonella Paxton was becoming "Pax," transforming into a hard-edged, gruff bitch who never wanted to be liked or touched or cared for.  Fuck everyone.  Fuck them all.

By the time she made her decision about the baby, it was too late to do anything else other than have it.  Five months pregnant, pregnant enough to feel the child move inside her was a turning point of sorts.  She wasn't the mothering type, had never had an inkling or a desire to breed, but it was stunning to feel the movement, the slight tickling ripple.  She cried at night, wondering why the baby's father was such a prick.  She wanted to keep the baby, she did, but it wasn't practical with her job.  Then again, she didn't want to resent it because of "Keith."  God.  Why was she so stupid?  Why had she given in so fucking easily?  Why had she laid all her trust in that fucker?  All along, he played her, he knew exactly what he was doing, and he did it well.  Uh uh.  She would never let a man do that to her again.  Never.  She would keep the ball in her court.  If she couldn't, the game wouldn't be played at all.  Fuck them.  Fuck them all.

When it became obvious that she was pregnant [at six months, she had begun to balloon like hell], her superiors forced her to take leave.  It didn't slip by them that her pregnancy coincided perfectly with the amount of time the double agent had been missing.  Whispers began to drift up to her ears.  She began to feel the same sense of distrust that she had experienced when they discovered the bastard's secrets.  They had never seen her with any other man.  It was blatantly obvious that "Keith" had fathered her child.  Quiet discussions of how they could get rid of her began to spring up.  It hurt, but what the fuck?  She didn't care.  Fuck them.  Fuck them all.

The baby was born a bit late and seemed completely and totally healthy.  However, Pax was not.  The moment the baby was born, Pax began to hemorrhage.  She was losing blood at such an alarming rate that it made her pass out.  She knew nothing, heard nothing but the shouted commands of hospital personnel.  When she awoke, she was laid out in a recovery room with a young nurse attending.  As soon as she regained consciousness, the nurse left the room to retrieve the doctor.  It was then that she was given the bad news.  The bleeding couldn't be stopped without a complete hysterectomy.  They expected her to throw a fit, to bawl, squall, and rage against it.  Instead, she took the news as if they had just told her she had an ingrown toenail.  The idea of never being able to have another child didn't disturb her.  She actually hadn't wanted children, hadn't wanted this child.  She was too fucking selfish for that.  It was depressing, of course, but not something that would send her into a complete suicidal state.  When asked if she wanted to see her baby, she answered with a firm 'no.'  Pax didn't want to hold the infant, didn't want to see it.  All she wanted was to sign the adoption papers and have done with it.  However, the young nurse refused to honor Pax's request.  She brought the baby to her anyway.  Pax cried a little.  Why the hell had they done this to her?  Why had they shown her the baby?  She couldn't give it up after seeing it.  Goddamn.  Why?  She had given birth to a boy.  It was too soon to tell for sure, but she saw the skin tone and the thatch of hair on his head.  He would look like his father, but she didn't care.  He was hers.  He belonged to no one else.  She named her son Leathan.  Motherhood was a struggle, a challenge, but she had never backed down from anything, and she wouldn't back down from this, not for a second.

Alone, she raised her child, making many mistakes along the way, but she loved her boy, and never made any connections with his father.  It was true the boy looked like him [with the exception of his eyes], but he was sweet and loving, without a selfish bone in his body.  She had no idea where he had inherited that particular trait; it certainly didn't come from her.  When Lee turned two, Pax was sent on a special assignment.  Her superiors had yet to find a way to fire her, but they always gave her the shitty jobs, perhaps waiting to see if she would quit on her own accord.  She brought her son along.  He had no one else.  It would prove to be another fatal mistake, one that would haunt her forever. 

During her night moves, she and a dozen other agents were watching a group of arms dealers.  They were to break up the operation and take as many men alive as possible.  She watched with a gaped open mouth as two men came out into the clear.  One of them was Keith, the other an Iranian immigrant.  Dear God, she hadn't thought of Keith in over two years and he was right in fucking front of her.  She thought of her son and knew that she would have to get back to him quickly.  If Keith heard of the child, she didn't want to think about what he'd do.  They followed their orders and broke into the group, having a fatal shootout, killing several bad guys and losing three or four good agents.  Pax ended up in a face-to-face showdown with Keith.  He smiled when he recognized her.  Jomfruen [the virgin], he had said.  She trained her gun on him and was readying to pull the trigger when a sudden sharp pain stopped her.  Goddamn.  She'd been hit.  A bullet from Keith's buddy had embedded itself in her leg.  He was moving to blow to her brains out until he was cut down by a semi-auto blast.  Keith took off running, the fucking coward that he was.

Patched up, Pax returned to her hotel room, to the comfort and love of her little boy.  His face lit up at the sight of her.  She knew no one would ever love her as much as her son.  She hugged him to her gently and carried him to the sofa.  There, they fell asleep together.  The startled cry of her son was what awakened her a few hours later.  She came awake suddenly, fighting, but a harsh right cross caught her in the jaw.  When she recovered, she noticed that her attacker was Keith, and he had her son.

"Do what you want to me, but don't hurt him," she shouted, ending her words with a plea.  She cringed at the way Keith was holding the boy.  He was holding him loosely in his arms as if he were a sack of potatoes.  "Please, Keith, take me instead.  Put my son down."

He glared at her through his hard, cold black eyes.  "Your son?  Isn't he our son, jomfru [virgin]?  Very beautiful boy he is.  Cries too much."

"Don't take him, you fucker," she shouted.  "Take me."

"I did, and I want no more of you."

He left with her screaming child and for the first time, Pax felt helpless.  Goddamn it.  What had her sweet little boy done to deserve this?  She ran after them, down the stairs, into the lobby, and out of the hotel.  Keith ran into the busy traffic with the boy in his arms.  Pax screamed when she heard the screeching of tires and saw Keith freeze.  Saving himself, he tossed the baby out and over, as if he were a large football.  She heard the thud his little body made as it hit the pavement.  Keith escaped as a car barreled down on her son, putting his light out forever.

Jonella Paxton had a complete mental break after that.  She was useless to everyone around her for many, many months.  She took time off to heal and to get her shit together.  It took longer than she ever thought it would.  She would go to bed at night and hear the screeching tires, the screams.  After she had taken all the solitude she could, she requested a transfer and another assignment.  Her superiors were reluctant, but they granted her request after extensive psychological testing had proven her mentally fit.  Her first assignment after the death of her child was one in the far reaches of the South American jungle.  There was no way she could ever run into Keith again, not in that setting.  It wasn't his style.  She met her new partner, another senior agent, who actually hadn't had that much time in himself.  Frank Donovan.  When she saw him, she wondered if she were being tested.  There were differences, of course, but the man resembled Keith.  Witless witless fuck.  She would hate this man, make his life hell, and do it on purpose.

Two days in the jungle, and their orders had been handed down.  Drug smugglers.  Petty shit.  Routine stuff, shit that shouldn't even be CIA related.  However, there was talk of governmental officials being involved.  Whatever.  She was with her new partner, who turned out to be nothing like Keith.  He was a pushy fuck, domineering her, acting as if he were her father.  It wouldn't be hard hating this fuck, even if she liked his eyes and his funky accent.  He was fun to play with, fun to goad, and the distraction kept her mind off other things.  He wasn't half bad, but she was leery.  She had trusted a man before, but she'd never trust another.  Once they had their sights on their targets, Pax began to check them out.  She made out three or four figures, Colombians from the looks of them.  When she picked up her binoculars, she gasped.  Donovan looked at her sharply, wondering what had emitted such a response from this cold ass heifer.  Keith.  Fucking Keith.

"I want the tall one, Spankie.  The tall one with the black eyes."

"Black eyes?  What the hell?  Stop the Spankie shit, please, it's degrading."

"Fuck you, Spankie.  You will let me have the one with black eyes.  Got it?"

As it turned out, no one got the tall one with black eyes.  From that day on, for the next two weeks, both she and Donovan had run-ins with this particular group.  Keith had come back to haunt her after all.  During maneuvers, both Pax and Donovan were surprised by unelicited gunfire from somewhere above.  The shots rang out, taking care of several members of Keith's gang, but not Keith himself.

"Fucking Death Angels," Donovan growled.

"Death Angels," Pax asked, intrigued.

Shit.  He had said too much, had given more than he should have.  The crazy woman beside him was still green.  "Assassins."

Assassins.  The word rang beautifully in her mind.  Keith was untouchable, it seemed.  They had discovered he was a government official in Bolivia; his ties had gotten him the power he craved.  If she were to become involved with that squad, would it help her seek the revenge she desired?  She wanted to see Keith's eyes as she blew him away.  "Who controls them?"

Donovan gave her an incredulous look.  "What the hell?  Pax, forget it.  It's not for you.  Now shut the fuck up and move."

She moved, but she hadn't shut the fuck up.  On her own, she found Robert Weizmulder.  Oh yes.  She was suited for it and she would do it.  She would do it for her son.