Actual Stop (18 page)

“Yeah, well, Joanna looks better than everyone,” Jamie mumbled, seeming for all the world like a schoolgirl dreaming of her first crush.

“Careful, Jamie. Folks are going to start thinking you’ve gone soft. They might actually mistake you for a female! You know, with mushy feelings and stuff.”

Jamie ignored my quip and turned to give Allison a dark look. “What the hell are you doing to her, Reynolds? Did I or did I not explicitly tell you to take care of my girl? She’s not making any sense, and she looks like a zombie.”

“Hey!” I dropped her hand and took a step away from her.

“What? You do. Your skin is all pale—well, paler than normal—and you have huge bags under your eyes. You’re a mess.”

“I do not look like a zombie!”

“Ryan, you look terrible.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“No offense.”

“You’re an asshole.” I laughed, thoroughly enjoying the banter. “Hasn’t Joanna taught you that you’re always supposed to tell a woman she looks beautiful? You don’t have to say everything you think, you know. Filter, woman! Jesus!”

“I said, ‘No offense.’”

“How the hell am I not supposed to be offended by something like that?”

“I dunno. You’re just not. Look, I’m trying to yell at Allison for you. Do you mind? Stop interrupting. You’re distracting me. My tirade is losing some of its strength here.”

“I’m a big girl. I’m perfectly capable of yelling at Allison myself.”

At that declaration, I shifted my attention from our good-natured bickering to the woman in question. I opened my mouth to draw Allison into the fray but stopped.

Allison’s expression had shuttered completely, and she was holding herself stiffly. All business, she ignored our mock squabbling and retrieved the packets of paperwork we’d compiled. She handed Jamie one packet and stepped into the doorway to get Robert’s attention, so she could give him the other.

“Everything’s in there. You should be all set.”

Jamie blinked, obviously startled, and glanced at me, seeming puzzled. But when I shrugged, she merely accepted the offered paperwork without comment.

Jamie and Robert flipped through the surveys. They nodded, which I took to mean everything was in order, and relief flooded me.

“Your handwriting hasn’t improved,” Jamie couldn’t resist pointing out.

“Yeah, well, we zombies aren’t terribly concerned with mundane trivialities like good penmanship.”

“Any changes we need to know about?” Allison’s voice was borderline brittle, and I frowned.

Jamie and Robert shook their heads in unison, but it was Jamie who actually spoke. “If I think of something, I’ll let you know.”

“Sounds good. Have a great night, guys. Get some sleep.” Allison turned her back, clearly dismissing them.

Now Jamie frowned, and she glanced from me to Allison and back again. I could see the questions swirling behind her eyes, but I probably wouldn’t have been able to answer them even if we’d been alone and able to speak freely. I was just as confused as she was.

“Are you headed back to the hotel?” Robert wanted to know, clearly not picking up on the tension in the room.

Allison shot me a guarded glance. “That was the plan. Why?”

“Think we could hitch a ride?”

Allison looked at me again, and if I didn’t know better, I’d have sworn she was annoyed and disappointed. I shoved that thought away. I must’ve imagined it, projecting those emotions onto her because that’s what I’d felt at the question. No way were those her feelings. Damn, I was tired! Why else would I be seeing things that weren’t there?

“You mind?” Allison asked me.

I shook my head. “Nope. Let’s go.”

The ride back to The W was unbelievably uncomfortable, at least for me. Allison and Robert remained absolutely silent the entire time. I suspected Robert was simply too exhausted or distracted to even attempt conversation. Allison opted to stare out the windshield. I returned to mentally reviewing all the moving parts of the upcoming visit, reassuring myself once more that we had everything covered, while trying to chat idly with Jamie so the car wasn’t completely quiet.

I pulled up in front of the hotel, and Robert mumbled his thanks as he tumbled out of the car. Jamie leaned forward between the seats to give me a hug and a kiss on the cheek, both punctuated by meaningful looks, before hopping out herself. Allison hesitated. She turned to look at me, the expression in her eyes unreadable.

“Oh-five-hundred?”

I nodded, and a slight flutter of nervousness tickled my diaphragm. I really hoped I hadn’t overlooked some vital detail. “Oh-five-hundred.”

She studied me for a long moment. “It’s going to be fine. We didn’t forget anything.”

“How the hell do you do that?”

“How do I do what?”

“Read my mind like that? It’s spooky.”

Allison smiled at me and opened her mouth, but just then Jamie yelled at her from the sidewalk. “Allison, are you coming or what?”

My eyes cut to Jamie for an instant before they locked back onto Allison, and my cheeks burned. I’d completely forgotten about Jamie the second she’d stepped out of the vehicle. No surprise, really. No matter what else might be going on around me, Allison had a way of contracting my world until it encompassed only her. I sighed.

“Good night, Ryan,” Allison said as she exited the car. “Sleep well.”

“Good night, Allison,” I whispered.

“Thank God,” I breathed as the wheels of Air Force One lifted off the ground. All the tension I’d been carrying around fled at once, and I sagged with relief. Letting out a contented sigh, I watched the plane disappear into the wild blue yonder. It was finally over. The man had been in, done what he’d needed to do, and left in the same condition in which he’d arrived. We’d had no major setbacks or even minor ones. I couldn’t have asked for a better visit.

A throaty chuckle sounded over my shoulder, and I turned to see Allison grinning back. “Glad that’s behind us?”

“You have no idea.” I reached for my phone so I could make the required calls to let everyone know that Harbinger was on his way home.

“Oh, come on.” Allison chided me playfully, bumping my shoulder with her own. “It wasn’t that bad.”

“Nah.” I brought my phone to my ear with one hand and released my hair from its confinement with the other, then held up one finger to stall the conversation as someone picked up on the other end. I imparted the necessary information and hung up, replacing the phone in its holster without looking. “Not bad at all, actually. Just a little stressful.” I started walking back toward the cars.

Allison and I briefly made some additional notifications and took care of logistics regarding the motorcade cars and the people still on the ground before resuming the conversation back in my vehicle.

“So that was stressful for you, huh?” Allison said.

“Shit, yeah, it was!” I exclaimed, half laughing. “You may be accustomed to shouldering the responsibility for the president’s physical safety on a daily basis, supercop, but I’m not.” I pointed the car toward the airport exit as I checked the time on the dashboard clock. “At least not to that degree. I’m not built for that type of pressure.”

“Well, you’d never know it.”

I eyed her suspiciously. Was she messing with me? But something in her expression stopped the sarcastic comment I had locked and loaded before it passed my lips. “Really.”

Allison beamed at me with something close to pride. “You did a fantastic job, Ryan.”

“Even when your boy mentioned that he wanted to make an unscheduled stop at Hurricane’s apartment, and I almost had a heart attack?”

Allison laughed, and the sound washed over me with an almost warming physicality, making a great many parts of my body tingle. “Yeah, you didn’t look happy about that. Although I don’t know why. We did discuss the possibility of him wanting to see his daughter while he was here.”

“I know we did, but I still would’ve had to get the streets shut down for our trip over. That would’ve been a nightmare.”

“Oh, come on. You could’ve handled it.”

“Could’ve? Yes. Wanted to? No. I was thrilled to hear Hurricane was out of district.”

She laughed again. “I could tell. But you got yourself together. Eventually. In the end. That’s all that matters.”

I backhanded her lightly on the arm. “Thanks, smart-ass.” I grinned at her. “You did okay yourself. I mean, not up to my standards, but who is, really?”

Allison chuckled again and ran her fingers through her thick, black hair, tousling it. “Absolutely no one.”

“So, where to now?” Standard operating procedure would’ve been for her to catch the afternoon shuttle back to D.C.—that’s what Jamie was doing, I’d already found out—but Allison hadn’t brought her bags with her when I’d picked her up at the hotel that morning. I knew what I wanted that to mean, but, frankly, I was afraid to hope.

“Back to the hotel, if you don’t mind.” Allison tilted her head to one side and watched me almost speculatively, as if gauging my reaction.

“Will you need a ride back to the airport later?”

One side of Allison’s mouth twitched like she wanted to smile. “My flight out isn’t until tomorrow.”

Damned if my heart didn’t soar. “That’s unusual, isn’t it?” I attempted to tamp down my considerable glee. Part of me was yammering that I really needed to examine the why behind my sudden bout of happiness, but most of me was telling that part to shut the hell up. “Shouldn’t you be going back today?”

“Trying to get rid of me?” Allison’s tone was teasing, but I caught the barest hint of strain underlying her words.

I laughed. I couldn’t help it. But when I glanced at her again and noticed her gorgeous features slipping into that cold mask she wore when she was angry or hurt, something inside me seized. Impulsively, I reached over and took her hand.

“You know I’m not,” I said quietly, giving her fingers a squeeze. The jolt that shot through me at the barest brush of her skin against mine was more than I could handle. I let go abruptly, not needing to prolong that sensation. No good could come of it.

“I’m on day off tomorrow,” Allison told me. “I figured there was no reason to rush back.”

“Oh, that’s nice. You’ll have time to catch up with some people before you go back.”

A sly grin stole over Allison’s features then, and her face was alight with barely restrained mischief. “Actually, I’d planned to go to the wheels-up party.”

“What wheels-up party?”

Allison laughed and treated me to a playful swat on the arm. “Yeah, peddle that malarkey somewhere else, Irish girl. I used to be a New Yorker, remember? I know exactly what goes on the night after a PPD visit. The entire detail does. We’re always pissed because we have to miss it.”

“Maybe we’re celebrating your departure.”

“Maybe you are. Tonight, I plan to confirm it.”

“You mean you’re going to spy on us and report back to the rest of your PPD buddies.”

“Uh, yeah. I thought that was pretty clear.”

“Hmm. Guess I’d better warn the guys not to talk shit about the detail then, huh?”

“Damn straight. I don’t want to have to throw down, but I’m not afraid to kick a little ass if it comes to that.”

“Good to know where your loyalties lie.”

“Hey, you know I’ll always be a New Yorker first.”

“Uh-huh,” I murmured sarcastically. “Well, I’ll tell you what, oh loyal New Yorker, I have to go back to the office and get some things done because some of us get paid for more than looking stunning in a business suit. So, if you think you can behave yourself and stay out of trouble for the rest of the afternoon, I’ll drop you off at your hotel and then pick you up around five. Sound good?”

“Is the staying-out-of-trouble part negotiable?”

“Nope.”

She heaved an overly theatrical sigh. “Fine. I’ll do my best. But I make no promises for later tonight. Once you pick me up, all bets are off.”

Something might have been lurking behind her eyes or beneath the tone of her voice as she said those words, but I was too distracted by the racing of my traitorous heart to be the least bit objective on the subject.

“Deal,” I told her, more than a bit giddy at the prospect of what the evening might hold.

Oh, yeah. I was toast.

I’d just barely pulled away from the curb in front of The W when my work phone rang. I huffed. Couldn’t I have just five freaking minutes to relax and decompress?

“O’Connor.”

“Where are you?” Mark’s gruff voice demanded.

I gritted my teeth against the urge to snap at him. We’d just had a wheels up, for crying out loud. What did he expect me to do? Beam myself back to NYFO?

“Manhattan.”

“Are you planning on coming back to work today?”

“Technically, I’ve done my eight hours, Mark. I could go home now if I wanted.” Okay, arguing about my hours with my boss was probably not my best plan. But clearly I was all about doing the exact opposite of what was good for me these days.

“Not planning on working your LEAP today?”

LEAP stood for Law Enforcement Availability Pay. All gun-carrying federal agents get paid a little extra over and above their base salary to work what amounted to a fifty-hour work week rather than a forty-hour one.

Our HQ tracked LEAP by the quarter rather than the week, so as long as I had enough total hours to cover three months’ worth of work, no one looked very closely to see how the hours were distributed. In some agencies, I knew, agents crammed all their LEAP in at the beginning of the month or the quarter, depending on how theirs was accounted for. And I also knew agents who procrastinated and put it off for as long as possible, which usually resulted in them scrambling to pack in an astronomical amount of hours in a few weeks.

I was the kind of girl who preferred to shoot for a weekly target of at least ten LEAP hours, though I’d often have more than that. I liked having that cushion to fall back on. It was almost like putting hours in the bank on the off chance that something would prevent me from working my required hours on a day here or there. I didn’t get paid extra if I worked more LEAP, but I also didn’t get in trouble.