When Auggie saw Eyal's number pop up he had thought it was a good thing, but when he answered he got a distinctly different impression from the man on the other end of the phone.
"Auggie?" Eyal questioned sounding very disillusioned, like someone who had given up hope.
"Yes? I'm here, Eyal." Auggie replied. He must think we're not going to get Avi back, Auggie realized.
"I need you to do something for me." Eyal requested. He knew what he was about to do would break his heart but he thought it needed to be done. He needed to keep the two most important people in his life safe. Safe from him.
"What is it? You know we're going to get Avi back right?" Auggie was beginning to worry at how this conversation was going and where he believed it was headed.
"I want you to lose the address of this police station. Do not tell Annie where I am. I want you to put the two of them on a flight back to Israel and lose me in the correctional system. Do you understand?" Eyal practically whispered into the phone. This was probably one of the hardest things he had ever had to do in his life.
Auggie listened incredulously to Eyal's request. He was about to protest when Eyal broke in again.
"Look Auggie, I know you are close with her and that you care about her so please just save her. Save her from me. From the life we would lead together. I can't bear to see either of them hurt so I need them far away from me. I want them safe. I don't care what happens to me, I am a broken man. I don't deserve either of them." Eyal was defeated. He was giving up the two things he loved most. He was done. There was no life left to live but he knew he was making the right choice.
Auggie was shocked. He had never heard Eyal talk this way. This confident and cocky man was acting as though his life was over. Auggie knew that Annie cared for Eyal, he just didn't know how much, but he did know that this would tear her apart. He couldn't do it. Auggie knew he couldn't do what Eyal was asking, especially after he'd already told Annie that Eyal was hurt and in prison.
"Eyal, I think you need to let her make that choice. You know she doesn't take orders well, especially when they come to you." Auggie tried to jest but it was lost in the solemnity of his words.
Eyal pleaded, "Look Auggie this is for the best. I have never met my son and this will keep him safe, this is for his own good. And Annie, I love her more than my own life, but that is why I can't have her. She is too good for me, she deserves more."
Auggie was taken aback by what Eyal was sharing with him but he knew that if Eyal had said these things to Annie than she likely felt the same way and there was no way he was going to let Eyal just dump her because he thought it was better for her.
"Eyal, does she love you?" Auggie questioned trying to reach this man.
"Yes. And that is the problem. I don't deserve her. I can't give her the life she deserves. I can't be her everything. Don't you see Auggie? I can never be whole again, and that's not fair to her." Eyal was about ready to break down. He was done.
"Eyal…" Auggie was cut off by a police officer saying Eyal's two minutes were up.
Auggie heard the line go dead.
Well since he had made no declarations to Eyal he was free to make his own choices. And he decided to let Annie choose.
Just then his phone rang, it was Annie.
"Auggie?" he heard Annie's voice come though the headset.
"Please tell me you got him?" Auggie voice was laced with worry.
"Yeah, I got him" Annie smiled "but can you send some police and medical personnel to that address. They're going to need it.
"Sure. Now what's your next step?" Auggie questioned somewhat hesitantly.
"Go get Eyal of course" Annie scoffed.
Auggie quickly rattled off the address but added "Annie there is something you need to know".
"Oh my God Auggie?! Please don't tell me…" she let her voice trail off.
"No, no, no! It's not that. It's just…he doesn't want you to come for him Annie. He says he doesn't deserve you. He wants to keep you and Avi safe, wants you to take Avi home to Israel without him. Annie I've never heard him sound like that, so…broken and defeated. Like he had just lost everything of any value in life. That he didn't want to live anymore." Auggie threw it all out really fast.
Annie was already headed for the address Auggie had provided. "Don't sweat it Auggie I will work it out. He's not himself right now but I'll fix it." She said confidently.
Auggie smiled, he knew Annie would make her own choices. "And one more thing Annie, he said he loved you more than his own life, go get him girl, he's a keeper."
"Thanks Auggie." Annie replied ending the call.
Annie's heart swelled. Eyal may have been a spy from a competing agency that she had had reservations about in the beginning but he had surely wrapped himself around her heart now and there was no one she trusted more. She was going to get him back and knock some sense into him.
Now if she could just win the trust of the boy beside her all would be right with the world.