Six Months Ago…
Homeland Security Building
Crystal City
Arlington, VA
Nancy checked the clock on her desk. It was almost 10:00 p.m. Arching her back, she stretched, relieving the knot that had settled just below her neck.
She glanced out at the open common area where the night shift was quietly at work. Bleary-eyed, she read over the report on her screen, not making any sense of what she had written. After reading it over twice and starting it yet a third time, she sighed and decided to call it a night.
Nancy hated going home to an empty apartment. Ever since Grant had walked out, she found herself feeling out of sorts, not quite knowing how to act. When she divorced John, she was filled with an anger and a darkness that had consumed her life. Shortly following the divorce, John left for Afghanistan, and Nancy found herself feeling perversely betrayed, as if he had abandoned her—again.
Her confused feelings only served to sustain the growing fury inside her. These black emotions helped get her through the aftermath of the divorce and her miscarriage. She had "all-things-John" removed from the house in Tampa. But, despite everything, she missed him with an ache that frightened her. This only served to further fuel her anger and directed it at herself for showing weakness and at John whom she blamed for making her feel this way.
A few weeks after John deployed overseas, she put the house on the market and took the first low-ball offer she received. She was hesitant to sell it at first. It was the first home they had owned, close to MacDill AFB—and large enough to start a family. Their neighbors were other military couples she and John knew. When the men were on deployment, Nancy and the other wives would get together for coffee, luncheons, or just girl-talk. It had helped some, but it was still a lonely existence.
She had missed Virginia and her family and friends. Nancy hadn't wanted John to accept the transfer from Andrews AFB to MacDill. She had just secured a position with the Department of Homeland Security, but she knew John wanted to return to Special Operations. She secured a transfer from DHS to the local offices in Tampa, Florida. And really…as John said, in that positive, "the glass is half full" way of his, if she couldn't have what she wanted, then Tampa wasn't a bad substitute.
After John left, Nancy was hurting and lonely, and she couldn't bear to stay in the big, empty house a minute longer—to look at the room she had planned to turn into a nursery. She told herself that it was because it held too many bad memories. The truth was that it reminded her too well of how much she loved John and missed him—of what she had thrown away. But she couldn't go back to their former life and the agony of waiting for a phone call informing her John had been killed.
It was easier to insist that they had divorced because John spent more time on secret missions during their marriage, than he had spent at home, sleeping in his own bed. Besides, she felt that if he had ever really loved her, then he would have made an effort to be assigned to a regular Air Force unit and not a Black Ops team.
Or, as Patrick Sheppard often demanded, resigned altogether and started working for his father along with his brother at Sheppard Industries.
At least, that's what she told herself. And as any good lawyer worthy of her law degree, she said it so many times that she finally grew to believe it. More to the point, she convinced herself that she didn't love John anymore. She requested a transfer back to D.C. The move required her to take a pay grade cut and the loss of two promotion steps, but she jumped at it. Unfortunately, her ghosts refused to remain behind and continued to haunt her...
In contrast, Grant's absence felt almost like an abstraction. There was no fire, no passion—nothing. It just was.
Straightening, Nancy felt as if she'd arrived at a major crossroads. She'd been staying away from the apartment in Georgetown because she was afraid that she would be assaulted with unhappy memories of her marriage and perhaps feelings of guilt over Grant's unhappiness and disappointment in her.
Nancy realized that if she felt any guilt at the moment, it was directed at how she had treated John all those years ago. As far as divorcing Grant was concerned, she felt as if a great burden had been lifted from her shoulders. She no longer had to keep up the pretence that she really loved him. She wondered if she ever had.
Grant, she was able to admit now, had been a physical barrier that she put up to keep out the true love of her life—John...
"Director Stephens!"
Nancy looked up at the intelligence analyst who had interrupted her private musings. "Yes…Doctor Allan, isn't it?" The analyst nodded. "What is it?"
"We just got a call from the Agent in Charge of the warehouse take-down," Allan said excitedly.
Nancy's Homeland Security division of cyber-cops and intelligence analysts had decoded several phone intercepts between a known al-Qaeda operative in Pakistan and a Fairfax County Department of Motor Vehicles employee. The DMV employee had allegedly supplied the terrorist cell with valid driver's licenses, facilitating their ability to transport several truckloads of weapons and explosives close to Washington, D.C.
"The Fairfax SWAT breached the warehouse and took down six hostiles. FBI, ATF, DHS, and local fire and rescue are on the scene." Allan gave her a measured look. "So…wanna go down there and evaluate the situation on the ground?"
Nancy gave him a bright smile that instantly transformed her previously exhausted appearance into one of excitement. Without speaking, she walked to where her oversized wind breaker hung on a wall hook. The letters DHS were displayed prominently on the back.
"I'll take that as 'yes,'" Allan said amused.
oOo
