As you will soon see, I really depart from orthodoxy here.
Ghosts That Haunt—42
It wasn't supposed to end this way. He had given everything, everything, to serve his country, and now he began to see exactly how much he had sacrificed—and might still have to sacrifice. It wasn't the first time he had questioned whether his personal sacrifices were worth it, but it was the first time his answer was an unequivocal no. Before Riah, before Victoria, it would have been easier to dismiss the facts, easier to dismiss Kathleen and Alex. He loved his wife, and he would give his life for her and for their daughter, and that contributed to why he couldn't stop thinking about Kathleen and her daughter.
It might have helped if Riah hadn't gone, hadn't disappeared. Walker finally told him Riah had been deported. That pissed him off on a level that surprised him. She was an American citizen, and they had taken that from her because of him. She was his wife, and they had taken her from him. She hadn't tried to contact him, and he didn't even know for certain where she was.
He missed her, especially at night. He took to sleeping in Riah's old room, unable to face Victoria's empty crib and their empty bed. He snorted. The bed was about the only thing they had left him besides his own clothes. Anything the government had paid for had been removed.
In his less charitable moments, he assumed they had taken his wife because they had provided her to him as well. Every time he opened the closet to get dressed, her clothes stared back at him. Gave him a cold, empty shoulder might be more appropriate, he supposed, eyeing his favorite of her dresses. He ought to pack them up, find a way to let Ellerby know she could come and get them, send them to Riah. Contacting Ellerby, though, would raise a red flag for whoever had been detailed to watch him, and the last thing he needed was any suspicion that he was in contact with the Canadians. He should have sent them with V. H. Sending them, though, would have been the same as admitting it was over. Casey wasn't certain whether it was or not, and at the moment, he couldn't quite deal with that part of the clusterfuck.
Chuck had come over that night, the night Beckman discharged him, stripped him of his career and his rank. He had told Casey it wasn't too late. He knew the kid had meant it wasn't too late to establish a relationship with Alex, possibly her mother, but Casey had no intention of doing that, not now, probably not ever. There were still many things Chuck didn't know. Even Casey had been surprised to learn that his NSA file was so incomplete, that several key pieces of information were missing, and he couldn't help but wonder what that meant, especially since Beckman knew the truth.
She had told some very interesting lies to Walker and Bartowski about him, about his record, about his files. The lies probably protected them all, but it infuriated him that he couldn't set the record straight, couldn't explain to his partner, the kid, or his wife what the actual truth was.
There had been an Alexander Coburn once. The kid had been green as grass. He was one hell of a shot, though. It was one of the few things he was capable of doing without screwing up. He'd grown up in the mountains in West Virginia, had hunted from an early age. Casey had the impression the kid had done so of necessity rather than for sport. When he'd landed under Paul Patterson's command with Casey, though, it had been left to him to break the kid in. Casey sighed, remembered how he'd gotten the kid killed.
Coburn had never been away from home before he went to Parris Island and was then assigned to an installation. He had been to college, but that had been at the University of West Virginia near his mountain home. Casey wasn't sure why he had tapped the kid for the Costa Gravas mission, but he had. Well, he did. The kid was an uncanny shot, and Casey had missed several years earlier when he had gone after that commie bastard who ran the country. He had the go to try again, and Coburn, like Chuck did for spying, lusted after the idea of being special ops. He had decided to give the kid a taste.
He got the kid killed.
There were a lot of if-onlys Casey could trot out from that mission. It was the first and last time he had been directly responsible for the death of one of his men. Being young and stupid weren't good excuses, though he had certainly been both of those—Coburn even more so. He hadn't prepared the kid for what they were getting into, and he hadn't made sure the kid knew the basics, had, instead, assumed he did. As a result, it didn't take long for the Costa Gravans to know there was an American Marine there. It didn't take much longer for someone to apprehend him. Casey's rescue attempt had resulted in the kid catching several bullets. It had been cold comfort that he, Casey, had lived and escaped unscathed.
A year or so later, Paul Patterson had approached him. Casey was just back from his second actual try at Goya. This time he had tried a bomb but had only managed to kill the bastard's dog. According to Patterson, the Marines had a rogue unit they needed to contain. It was led by a Colonel James Keller. Keller was in Honduras, and he had previously worked with what remained of the Contras who were supposedly fighting Ortega's government. In the U. S., the trials related to the Iran-Contra scandal were still underway, and government attention was turning from the lost cause of Nicaragua to Costa Gravas. Casey wasn't sorry. Despite his antipathy for the Marxist government of Nicaragua, he couldn't say he admired the Contras and their appalling human rights abuses. They focused on soft targets rather than government targets, and Casey wondered sometimes if they had an entirely different agenda than the one they had sold the American government.
Costa Gravas, though, was a different story altogether, though Keller was overstepping the bounds there, even for a black op, and Patterson and others above him thought there was something more sinister going on. "You've seen Apocalypse Now. The Brass think Keller might be another Kurtz gone native. It happens."
Patterson handed him a file. Coburn's file, Casey noted. "Congratulations, Lieutenant Coburn. You've miraculously risen from the dead. Captain Casey died in Costa Gravas." He went on to explain that Casey would be sent to a new base as Coburn. His skills matched the kid's, and since he looked younger than he was, since he and Coburn could have passed for brothers if no one looked too closely, he could easily step into the dead man's boots. When Casey had objected that he might meet someone who knew either him or the real Coburn, Patterson assured him they had carefully selected a unit to avoid that.
It wasn't Casey's first trip to California, but it had been a lot of years since he'd first gone to Twentynine Palms. He managed to act like the kid, for the most part. He tried not to be too skilled, too knowledgeable, but he slipped now and then. Still, it got him noticed, and it got him a slot on the alleged training mission to Honduras.
He'd been noticed outside the job, too. He'd met a pretty girl, Kathleen McHugh. She was originally from back east, and he'd fallen in love, so much so he asked her to marry him. He'd bought her a ring, one nothing like the ring he'd given Riah. Its stone was more chip than diamond, all he could afford at the time. He went home with her on leave to meet her family before he had to leave for Honduras, and he planned a trip to Niagara Falls where he intended to propose to her. He'd longed to tell her the truth, tell her that he wasn't Alex Coburn but was really John Casey. Until this was all over, though, he couldn't. He had told Patterson he wanted to marry her, but the General told him he was not to ask until he was finished with this particular assignment. When he admitted he'd already done so, he had been ordered to stall the wedding until the rest could play out.
Who knew the weird twists his life would take from there? Keller had taken note of the kid. He had manipulated the results so that Casey—or Coburn—washed out. He had then made his pitch—the Tic Tacs, the chance to be what he really wanted to be. The irony was that Casey had found himself pretending to be himself. Keller had chosen his real identity to be his false one, shrugged away the age difference and pointed out Captain Casey had been in Costa Gravas with him, so if anyone recognized him, it could be written off as confusion, mistaken identity. Somewhere, Casey was certain, God had laughed at him. He gave him back his name and set him on the path Casey had always thought he wanted, but He had taken Kathleen away from him.
It hadn't taken long to confirm Keller was dirty, had become more mercenary than soldier. Casey found himself playing a very dangerous game, but at the same time, he reveled in it. He reported out to Patterson about Keller's activities at the same time he worked the black ops job Keller promised him. Before long, he was fighting with the revolutionaries trying to overthrow Goya in Costa Gravas. Casey figured he was taking a little revenge for the real Alexander Coburn—and a lot for John Casey. El Ángel de la Muerte was born.
Everything eventually came to a head, though. Keller went several steps too far beyond his orders, and the Colonel and most of his men found themselves dishonorably discharged. Many of them wound up in prison, some in Costa Gravas; quite a few wound up dead, executed by Goya. Keller disappeared, and newly starred Brigadier General Diane Beckman approached Casey about a lateral move to the NSA. She had poached him from Patterson for several jobs before, including two of the attempts on Goya. Her offer meant he would keep his rank, could continue to serve the Marines, but his primary mission would be with the little-known agency to which he had ostensibly been recruited by Keller. He had taken the job and rarely looked back.
Once in a while, though, he would see a pretty brunette, and she would remind him of Kathleen. On those occasions, he sometimes broke, spent the night with a bottle of scotch, the ghost of Alex Coburn, and his regrets. After the hangover, he moved forward again. As the years passed, they became less frequent, and the time came when he had to look at those photo booth pictures to remember her face clearly.
He'd made a life for himself, a career, and if it was more career than life sometimes, he was comfortable with that. He had a spook shrink tell him once he was the job because he had nothing else in his life. The idiot had told his boss Casey needed hobbies and interaction with humans who weren't connected to the job. Casey used his copy of the evaluation summary for target practice.
Casey had something else now, though. He had Riah and Victoria. Evidence indicated he had Bartowski and the assorted barnacles that came with the kid. Only he didn't have Riah and Victoria. As the days dragged out, they didn't come home. Riah didn't call. Her father had come to see him, though, very shortly after Walker had taken Casey into custody.
V. H. had asked if what Beckman had told him was true. Casey was stuck. If he told the other man the truth, he would reassure Riah. Riah, he had come to realize while he sat in his cell and waited to learn what would happen to him, was the key to his survival in this particular game. She had to be genuinely upset, had to think his defection was real, because he was certain she was being watched every bit as much as he was. If she wasn't worried, if she wasn't upset, the assumption would be either that their relationship had been a sham—which would possibly work for her but not for Casey—or that they were both up to something. Casey was, but he didn't need anyone to know that. He told the lie that wasn't completely a lie and confirmed that he was Alexander Coburn for his father-in-law. Adderly's dark eyes went icy-cold. "You know, they've told my daughter you're no longer her husband."
Casey had frozen. "I am her husband."
"She married John Casey, and you're not him. From what I've been told, that makes Riah's status pretty murky."
"Riah was already an American citizen," he protested, not realizing then what V. H. had been trying to tell him.
"I know," Adderly said in the dark, dangerous voice that said he was angry. "They've taken that away from her, though. They've taken everything away from her except Victoria—her career, her American bank accounts, her American citizenship," and he paused a moment before adding, "her husband."
"Where is she?" Casey asked, and he hated the moment of weakness that made him do so. If she was gone, she was out of it, and she had a good chance of remaining safe. It had belatedly occurred to him that she and Victoria, not Kathleen, should have been Keller's target. That meant his former commander had somehow missed his marriage to Riah, but that made no sense to Casey. Everyone seemed to know he had married and to whom. Perhaps Keller had thought it a sham, had known Riah was sent as his cover—which was possible if Keller still had people inside the NSA. Still, Casey had married her; they had a daughter together. Surely even Keller knew that was taking orders and a cover beyond reason. Regardless, Casey was worried that she—or Victoria, or both—would be a target.
"Safe," Adderly said, "and I intend to see she stays that way." V. H. opened his mouth to say something more, but then he apparently changed his mind. "If something happens, I'll make sure you know, but I hope you understand if I don't keep you posted."
Casey nodded. It was the best he'd get from V. H., and he knew it. He wished he could explain, could tell him exactly what he was in the middle of, but he couldn't. V. H. wouldn't be able to stand watching his daughter's misery; he'd tell her.
It bothered him, though, that he hadn't heard from his wife. Because he wasn't sure what else to do besides maintain the cover, he did exactly that, down to going out on Thursday nights so that Ellie didn't begin asking questions. That, though, turned out to be futile. It wasn't long before the female Bartowski came over and in typical Bartowski fashion talked her way into the apartment he'd shared with Riah. She'd come to ask after his wife, but as she looked around at the semi-empty living room and kitchen, she had put a hand on his arm and said, "I'm so sorry, John."
"So am I," had come sadly out of his mouth before he realized she didn't mean she was sorry about his job.
Ellie had wrung her hands, wet her lips and offered, "I could go with you to the meetings—if you like."
He damn near asked her what meetings, but he caught himself in time. "That's kind of you," he said, thinking rapidly for a way to head her off, "but I'm fine on my own."
She chewed her lower lip. "I'm sure Chuck would go with you if you'd prefer." Before he could respond to that, she went on, told him, "You know Mariah loves you, John, and I'm sure she'll come back when you have this under control."
Casey didn't know whether to be outraged or relieved at the conclusion she'd drawn, but then he realized it didn't matter. Riah had, essentially, left him. It didn't matter that it wasn't because he was a drunken exhibitionist. What mattered was that his wife was gone, and as the days dragged on, it seemed she wasn't coming back. It also meant he had to be gone for several hours on Thursdays to keep up the illusion. He rotated bars, ironically, nursed a scotch or two, and hoped he didn't run into Ellie again when she might smell it on him.
After a few weeks, he thought surely Beckman had lifted the deportation order. Walker wouldn't say when he finally gave in and asked, but she had given him a look of absolute misery. He found himself giving her the other version of the talk he'd given Chuck—Bartowski was a good guy, better than Shaw, and she could win him back. He suddenly realized he didn't want them to make the mistake he'd made, wanted them to come to the conclusion it had taken him so long to realize: family life and spy work didn't have to be mutually exclusive. It had been surprisingly easy when it was with someone who knew the business.
He got a new phone. He considered calling Riah, but before he could screw up the courage, one afternoon Bartowski dragged him off for a private talk. Chuck told him they had taken hers, and then he told him she had called Casey more than once. He handed Casey a disk. "I transferred the messages to this," he said. "You might want to know that she flew to Los Angeles but was intercepted and escorted back to Canada." There was more. Casey could read it in the younger man's face. He kept his own face carefully neutral. He waited. Bartowski would tell him sooner or later. "She's gone back to work for ISI. Beckman's having a cow—two cows—but Adderly told her the deal was off when she had Mariah deported and your marriage nullified."
That's when he cracked. "What?" Casey could feel the color leach from his face. How could they invalidate the marriage? He remembered then what V. H. had told him in the cell, the part he had failed to process.
Bartowski sighed. "I don't understand all the legalities, but apparently you weren't who you said you were, so that made the marriage invalid."
Casey wanted to protest that he was exactly who he claimed to be when he married Riah, but he couldn't and he knew it. There were still several layers of deception, misdirection, and he had no authority to peel them back and expose what was underneath. By the time they parted ways, he supposed he ought to be glad Bartowski hadn't persisted in telling him as he had every time they spoke that he should contact his daughter Alex. Casey had heard that enough, and he still believed it was kinder to her and to her mother to remain dead.
After he fortified himself with scotch that evening, Casey played the messages Chuck had retrieved for him. Riah sounded shell-shocked in the first one, so rattled, in fact, that beyond saying his name and then saying she didn't even know what to call him, she had said nothing. The second was simply businesslike: She was in Ottawa, had been deported, had her passport taken, and would like her phone back. She had also given him her private number in Ottawa. The third, fourth, fifth, and sixth messages simply asked—begged—him to call.
And now he had another temptation.
He rubbed a hand wearily over his face. They were stuck. He had a sneaking suspicion that if he left the country—something Beckman had privately warned him not to do—he would find himself in legal limbo. V. H. had not been happy to have his daughter treated as she had been, but Casey had had no choice but to let the man believe he had betrayed her as well as his country. As a result, he couldn't turn to his old friend for help. Riah and Victoria couldn't come to him, either, apparently, so for now they had to remain apart.
Casey gave some hard thought to how his private life was so easily controlled. Keller had forced him to leave Kathleen behind, to lose that chance and to lose his older daughter. Beckman was repeating the pattern, only this time he knew the daughter he was separated from. He worried about Victoria, worried about her mother, worried they would become targets of whatever might be left of Keller's operation. They were far more real to him than Kathleen and Alex, and as a result, he resented this more.
It wasn't his choice. He wasn't choosing country over family. His country was asserting its authority.
With few options, he brooded over more scotch, missed his wife, missed his daughter, considered calling Riah to hear her voice, and he replayed the messages several more times to keep himself from doing so. He told himself he didn't want to wake Victoria, but the truth was he wasn't ready to try and explain to Riah yet, especially since he had a feeling the NSA would take special interest in intercepting any calls he made, especially any calls outside the States. He wanted Riah home, wanted them both home, with every fiber of his being.
The worst day was their anniversary, their real anniversary in April, because he couldn't call her, couldn't see her, couldn't even send her any damn flowers. Ellie saw him drunk that night, thanks to Bartowski, and the next morning she brought him aspirin and reassurances about his ability to rebound from this little setback.
Since contacting Riah directly was not possible, Casey set up a complex computer search that would flag anything that turned up on the Web about her. He knew it was unlikely, knew her father would probably keep her out of the public eye, but he did it anyway. Without the NSA's resources, it was the best he could do. He had always had the power to find Kathleen, but he had chosen not to. He had considered it a test of will. He was no longer young, and perhaps he'd recently given evidence to the contrary, but he was also no longer stupid.
Ironically, his first hit was a small piece in the gossip column of a Canadian newspaper about Riah attending a charity event with her father. That was followed a few days later by a photograph of her with him at a political event. In the pieces he saw over the next two weeks, he wondered what V. H. was thinking letting her be that publicly noted. Not once was she referred to as Mariah Casey, and not once was Victoria mentioned. The piece that cut, though, was the photograph of Riah in a slinky black dress on the arm of an RCMP officer at a state dinner. The man was handsome, dark-haired, blue-eyed—Riah's type, he knew—and clearly besotted with Casey's wife.
Perhaps he wouldn't have minded if she had been at the event with V. H., but the article made no mention of her father. She was, apparently, there on her own—if he ignored Dudley Do-Right. It was small consolation that she didn't look happy, and it infuriated him that his wife had apparently decided to date.
After three days during which his fury didn't abate, Chuck came over and bluntly asked what the hell was going on. Casey had pulled up the image, flung a hand at the screen, and walked away. He went upstairs. Chuck never ventured upstairs, so Casey knew he wouldn't have to listen to the moron try once more to get him to chase after a woman who apparently no longer wanted him. He nearly headed into their bedroom, but he made himself go into the empty room at the end instead. He had bought paint the previous weekend, intending to do what he and Riah had talked about, paint it for Victoria. The cans sat unopened. He had moved Riah's rocker in there, and now he took a seat in it.
Civilian, he sourly thought. He was supposed to be a civilian now. He couldn't find out what was really going on, couldn't call in any favors, couldn't have her put under surveillance to find out what was going on between her and the Mountie, and he couldn't have her taken and brought home. His second second chance, Beckman had said. Little did she know he had had a few more of those than she might suspect. Maybe he should contact Ellerby, maybe he should see if she could get Riah and Victoria home, see if she could get him to Riah.
Weak, he thought. He was weak. He had nearly ruined his life several times, and there had been a woman at the bottom of it each and every time.
Paul Patterson.
Casey stood up. Paul Patterson. He should have thought of it before. He wouldn't be able to get on the base, and he wouldn't be able to call him.
But Chuck could.
He nearly ran down the stairs. Bartowski still sat at Casey's computer. "You know, Casey, despite the fact you're sort of cyberstalking Mariah, this is a pretty slick little program you wrote to mine information."
"I learned something from my days at Cryptocity," he growled. For a moment, it felt like old times. "Need a favor, Bartowski."
The younger man got the scared rabbit look he wore when he thought Casey was going to make him do something that would piss Walker off. It would likely not only piss off Walker but Shaw, too. Beckman, if she found out, and V. H., as well, for that matter. Casey went to the kitchen, picked up the pad of paper Riah used for the grocery list, and rapidly wrote a set of instructions followed by a telephone number. He ripped the sheet off and handed it to the kid with a gruff, "Pick up a few things for me before you come home from work."
Bartowski's eyebrows nearly shot off the top of his head as he read the message. "I can do this."
"Great," Casey said. "Get the hell out."
The wait nearly did him in, and when Patterson was almost an hour late, Casey knocked back the last of his scotch and signaled for his tab. Either Bartowski had failed to do as he'd asked, or Patterson decided to leave him hanging. Just as his bill arrived, a man slid onto the barstool next to him. "Leaving already?"
Casey turned to look at his former commander. "You used to be punctual as hell."
Patterson grunted a response then ordered scotch for both of them from the bartender. "I've been threatened by some of the very best Diane Beckman could send after me. She has her way, and I'm going to be put out to pasture."
Shock jolted through Casey. He hadn't expected the fallout from his slip to go so far afield. Riah, he supposed, was understandable, though what his wife could do that could harm the NSA or the CIA, Casey wasn't sure. She knew things, sure, but she wasn't the type to expose secrets or cause public trouble. He had finally figured out her deportation had more to do with keeping her safe or, possibly, punishing him than any fear Riah would do something that would have a negative impact on either of the American agencies. Still, Beckman was apparently neutralizing anyone and everything she reasonably could who might be in a position to either help him or disprove their theory of his crime.
He sighed. "Alexander Coburn." That name was a curse.
Paul nodded. "God bless the green, naïve, little son of a bitch." He drank again. He shrugged. "From Diane Beckman's point of view, your little bit of treason got rid of two thorns in her backside." Casey stiffened. Paul snorted. "Not you. You were always her fair-haired boy. I'm talking about your pretty little girl," he frowned at his glass, "and that charming child of yours." Before Casey could respond to that, Paul said, "Let's take this somewhere a little more private."
They went to a corner table. "You know, I turned down Diane's job. They offered it to her when I said no. Maybe I should have taken it."
That was news to Casey. His former commander had never said a word about the NSA approach. Casey wasn't sure he'd be in any better position if Paul had taken the job. "You're better off without it."
"And it's remarks like that which will put a target on your back."
Casey lifted his glass. "You're assuming there isn't one there already."
"I do have a few friends in interesting places," Paul said. "Right now, you're target-free. Keep your nose clean, and you'll stay that way." He leaned closer. "John, for a lot of people's good, I need you to go along, get along, on this. Play civilian—"
"I am a civilian," he cut in, surprised by the level of the anger that surged through him.
Patterson gave him an all-too-familiar look. "Temporary, if you do this right. The Ring is floundering, John. They're obsessed with Daniel Shaw, which is proving to be a bit of an operational distraction for them in Los Angeles, anyway, and Keller's attempt to draw you in set you up neatly for a recruitment attempt. The plan stays the same: play coy, make no promises, give nothing away, and learn all you can. I can arrange to keep you alive on this end if you remember the rules."
Casey lifted his glass thoughtfully, took a small sip. "I do my job. You of all people know that. This has cost me, cost me personally in ways I resent, but I will do the job. You do yours."
The last was said with a particular bitterness that surprised Casey. He had agreed to this, had agreed to let the scenario with Keller play out. He was the one who had agreed to do what had to be done, but he had never expected Keller to hunt down Kathleen. He had worried about Riah and Victoria, and when he had been told his wife had been deported, a brief moment of relief had been quickly replaced with cold anger. He had nearly confided in V. H., had nearly told him the entire story, but, sadly, he remembered one of the psychological profiles of Adderly, the part that said his father-in-law often couldn't make decisions to leave someone behind or cut them out of the equation even when it was in his best interest. Casey, on the other hand, was all-too-good at that. If Riah was bereft, especially for too long, and if her father knew the truth, V. H. would tell her things weren't what they appeared.
"Your pretty little girl may turn out to be a problem," Paul said gravely.
Casey shot a glance at the other man. That was uncomfortably close to what he'd been thinking.
"She's asking interesting questions in interesting quarters," he said.
Lifting his brows, Casey asked, "What and where?"
Paul studied his scotch. "I'm not sure what all and where all, but she's approached at least three intelligence agencies and asked for what they know about Alexander Coburn and John Casey. She's asked for information covering a period from 1982 to 1992."
A decade, most of which covered Casey's early career and also covered the very brief career of Alexander Coburn. He found his greatest curiosity was why she stopped at 1992. He puzzled over that. If she was hunting something in particular, he would have thought she would be thorough, ask for it all. She had often said she preferred to work from an overabundance of data when she worked as an analyst. "Who were the three?"
"Not surprisingly, CSIS, but the other two were interesting choices: the Czechs and the Hondurans."
The Hondurans would have little. The Czechs would have a lot—if someone connected the dots carefully and thought outside the two names. It hadn't taken Casey long to move from Latin America to Eastern Europe during the death throes of the Soviet Bloc. He closed his eyes. Riah could muddy the waters, depending on what she was trying to do. "Are you trying to tell me she's going to be dealt with?"
Paul shook his head and finished his scotch. "No," he said. "We'll let her run. I don't think she'll get very far, and I think her father and Major Clack will block anything that might help her figure out what's really going on." Paul laced the fingers of his two hands together and rested them on the tabletop in front of him. "She made a phone call."
There was something about the General's grave expression that told Casey this was definitely not good. "To whom?"
"Family practice attorney here in California," Paul told him. "The lawyer's firm does some work for us. Your girl asked about her marital status, about whether or not the government had standing to nullify her marriage. The attorney explained the law and how a marriage could be invalidated and agreed to help her pursue that."
Casey went cold. She was going to ask for a divorce.
Paul must have read his mind again. "She won't need to divorce you. She can claim fraud on your part since you, apparently, weren't legally who you claimed to be. They'll essentially give her an annulment but extend some of the same rights she would have in a divorce—property, custody of Victoria, those kinds of things." His former commander drew in a deep breath and let it out. "She told the attorney she was more interested in figuring out how to set aside the impediments to the legitimacy of the marriage."
He had to think that through before he understood what Paul was saying, mainly because he had also been running through scenarios to convince Riah not to end their marriage, to give him time, without having to explain the truth to her yet. He sagged with relief, closed his eyes, and gave thanks that she wasn't giving up that easily. "Are you telling me to get her to stop what she's doing or to see how it plays out?"
Paul considered. "It might be worth seeing what she's really made of."
Casey frowned, wondered what that meant.
"Your tracks have remained surprisingly well hidden. I don't think anyone could put all the pieces together, and I don't think she will get much cooperation if she tries. It might be a good test of how deeply someone could penetrate your record, your history, and your covers."
"My wife as informational trace cell," he said flatly.
Paul shrugged. "We all know we have breaches. It might show us where some are."