Love or Justice (32 page)

Laurie could hear more commotion from downstairs. There was a long wait after that, as she imagined the intruders going from room to room downstairs, looking for her. Her blood roared in her ears and she was breathless. Without even thinking about it, she placed a protective hand over her unborn child. She wished she at least had a gun to defend herself with. She felt around in the closet, but came up with only a broken coat hanger. Laurie wished Gabriella had a broken lamp in here. She cursed the universe for making her go through this again.

Armed with her tangled weapon, she felt footsteps begin to make their way up the stairs. Gabriella and Emma tensed. Laurie steadied herself. She felt calm, ready, even as adrenaline flushed her face and neck. Laurie didn’t care what came through that door—it was not going to kill her. She was going to do everything in her power to protect herself and her baby. She was going to fight like mad.

As the two intruders entered the room, she prayed for everyone she loved: Dante, Gabriella, Emma, Bob, even Albert, and most of all, the unborn child she carried. Then the room erupted into gunfire and strangled cries.

CHAPTER

TWENTY-ONE

Dante

Dante hurled himself through the door of the plane into the cold Nebraska morning. His leg throbbed like mad. The frigid air wasn’t much of a distraction from it. Bob had flown them all night, only stopping to refuel once. Albert and Dante didn’t sleep at all. They twisted and turned in their seats for hours, waiting to land.

“I know he was lying,” Albert had said to Dante somewhere over California. “No one has the faintest idea where we live. Kaimi wouldn’t even know where to start.”

Albert still fidgeted in his seat, to the point that Dante was ready to tie him to it. Dante held himself in check, knowing he was worried and exhausted. Instead, he passed the dreadful hours with dull tasks, redressing his wound, checking his gear. It all kept him sane long enough to make it to their final descent.

The three men jogged into the small airport. The same teenager sat at the counter as before. Albert told him what truck he owned, and the boy charged them a large sum for their parking. Albert paid without hesitation. Then they picked up their bags, racing to the door. They piled into the cold truck. The leather and plastic interior felt like ice. Albert didn’t wait for the engine to warm up, instead, he peeled out of the parking lot onto the road.

Snow had fallen, dusting the broken corn stalks of the landscape with a crisp, white shield. It blurred in Dante’s tired eyes as he stared out into the distance. He drummed his fingers on the pack settled in his lap. He ran his hand through his hair several times. The drive took much longer than he remembered, and with every passing minute, the nightmares in his head grew stronger, more insistent.

It wasn’t quite an hour before Dante spotted the farmhouse in the distance. Albert raced the truck the last half-mile up the road and down the driveway, bouncing on the pitted holes as they went. They pulled up to a quiet house. Nothing stirred or rippled at the windows as they pulled in.

“Let’s just be careful here. Be ready for anything.” Albert turned around, looking at Dante. “We go in like it’s hostile.”

“Well, with Emma in there, for you it is hostile.” Bob took his gun in hand.

Albert glowered at him.

“Oh, I was just lightening the mood. Why does the CIA have to be so damn serious all the time?” Bob rolled his eyes.

Dante half-smiled in spite of the tingling sensation at the nape of his neck. He didn’t like the fact that no one greeted them; he had had a fantasy in his head of Laurie running out to the truck so he could breathe a sigh of relief and sweep her off her feet. That dream crumbled under the weight of each passing minute.

The men slid out of the truck, leaving the doors open. They approached each vehicle, checking for occupants before moving onto the house. When they reached the front door, Dante choked on the frigid air when he saw the slit in the screen, and the scratches along the doorframe. Albert saw it too, his eyes narrowing. They positioned themselves beside the door. Dante reached over, turning the knob.

Albert barreled into the house; Bob and Dante followed. All was quiet. No one was downstairs. They moved from room to room. The house was a mess. The boys had left homework and video games out; the kitchen had dishes piled in the sink. No one was there. Then they moved up the stairs. Dante saw the bullet holes in Gabriella’s open door, and he froze. He swallowed hard, as Albert, seeing the damage, moved passed him, into Gabriella’s room.

There were more bullet holes, laundry was everywhere, and a large pool of blood was on the floor of the bedroom. Someone had smeared the blood out into the hallway, where the trail disappeared altogether going down the stairs. Dante clenched his jaw, trying to hold onto his sanity. He would not breakdown until he knew where Laurie was and what had happened. Nobody, no person was in the room to tell them more. So they continued into Laurie’s and Emma’s bedrooms. There was no one there either. Something had happened, and then they had all just disappeared.

“The barn,” Albert ordered.

Bob and Dante nodded. They avoided each other’s gaze as they moved down the stairs, staring at the banister or their gun. They didn’t want to see their own waning hope reflected back at them.

They moved out of the kitchen door into the sun, then jogged across the snow-coated grass, running to their last hope. They moved up alongside the barn door. Albert reached over and opened it.

Dante charged inside. He heard the surprised screams of the boys, before something hit the back of his head. He dropped to his knees, his ears ringing.

“Dante?” came a breathless voice. The voice rang crystal clear in his head; Laurie was alive.

“Laurie!” he exclaimed, turning. His vision blurred, and the pain escalated. The world swam before his eyes, but the joy bursting in his chest made him reach for her.

“Oh, God! Oh, thank God it’s you!” Laurie threw down the rake she used as a weapon.

Dizzy and disoriented, Dante lunged for Laurie as best he could. He nearly knocked them both off balance, before he caught himself. He leaned into the wall, with his love wrapped in his arms. Against his will, the tears that had been burning the back of his throat all morning filled his eyes. She was alive. She was alive, they were together again, and that was all he cared about.

“Thank God you’re alive,” he said repeatedly as she cried into his shoulder. He kissed her, holding her tighter until she told him she couldn’t breathe. He laughed and loosened his hold just a little bit. Then he kissed her again, sweeping his tongue into her mouth, desperate to taste her.

“Laurie, where are Emma and Gabriella?” Albert demanded through their haze. He shouted the question at them, since they ignored him for the past three times he asked.

Dante broke off the kiss with a soft groan of dismay. His eyes focused on his father’s face. Albert looked drawn and pale in the morning light.

“Oh, um.” Laurie turned her head to look at him. “Something happened last night and they had to take care of it. They should be back soon.”

“What happened?” Bob took a step forward.

Laurie looked at the boys, who were now clinging to their father.

“You were attacked?” Albert lifted his hands in frustration. “What happened to the men who attacked you? Where did they go?”

Laurie looked unsure for a moment. Then she gestured to the rack of yard tools beside her, which had an empty space where two shovels should rest.

“They wanted me to bring the boys out here to wait while they…” Laurie waved her hand in a circle. “Emma and Gabriella left a long time ago. They should be back soon.”

Albert looked at the rack for a moment, then visibly relaxed. Bob hugged the boys tighter, his worst fears relieved.

“I’ll wait at the door, so they know we’re back. I’m sure my wife will have some choice words for me that shouldn’t be said in front of the boys anyway.” Albert headed for the door.

Laurie and Dante smiled. Dante brushed her hair back from her temple. Then he kissed her, tasting her lips in a gentle caress. He kissed her forehead, her cheeks, and her eyelids. He pulled her closer, until her body pressed against the length of his.

“God, I’m so glad you’re all right. When we saw the blood, I thought…” Dante began his sentence, but he just couldn’t finish it. He buried his face in her neck instead.

“Why did you leave?” Laurie gripped his jacket. “Why did you have to leave like that?”

“I had to protect you. He wasn’t going to stop searching for you until they caught him.” He squeezed her as he murmured against her neck.

Laurie leaned back, cupping Dante’s face in her hands.

“You should have told me.” Pain flickered in her eyes. “Why didn’t you trust me?”

Dante winced, looking away.

“It’s not that I didn’t trust you. I just thought you’d try to stop me, or that you’d demand to go with me, and I just couldn’t let either of those things happen. I needed to protect you.” Dante ran his hands over her hair.

She stared up at him, looking hurt and angry.

“I’m sorry.” He rested his forehead on hers. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t ever do that again. I worried the whole time, not knowing when I’d see you again. I can’t handle that.” Her voiced cracked with emotion. He nodded against her head in a nuzzling caress.

“I promise,” he told her. “I won’t leave you like that ever again.”

Laurie breathed in for a moment, and she stopped shivering. She pressed her cheek to his chest.

“Did you find him? Do you know where Kaimi is now?” She nuzzled him.

“Yes, we got him. You’re safe now.” Dante let out a sigh of relief.

Gabriella burst through the barn door. Disheveled, with dirt covering most of her clothes, she ran to her husband, throwing her arms around him. From outside, Dante could hear his mother yelling at his father.

“Albert, how dare you! How dare you just up and leave in the middle of the night!” Emma yelled.

“Now, just wait a minute. Just wait a minute—” Albert defended.

“No, you listen to me! You’re not in the CIA anymore. You’re retired—” Emma hissed.

“I know I’m retired. I—” Albert interjected.

“Do you? Do you? Because I don’t think,
retired
men get up in the middle of the night to go hunt down a mob boss. In fact, I think that’s the one thing retired men don’t do!” Emma yelled.

“Our son needed my help. Laurie needed my help. Kaimi wasn’t going to stop looking for her,” Albert argued.

“You put me, Laurie, Gabriella, and the boys all in harm’s way!” Emma huffed.

“I knew you could handle it, and you did. You did just fine without me,” Albert pointed out.

“No, I didn’t. I was staring down the barrel of a gun. If Laurie hadn’t choked him with a coat hanger, I would be dead right now!” Emma screamed at the top of her lungs.

“Really?” Dante looked down at Laurie. She nodded. Dante started laughing.

“Did you burst out of the closet and attack him?” he asked.

Laurie nodded sheepishly. Dante threw his head back and laughed, deep down from his stomach. He leaned against the wall. He laughed for several long minutes. It felt so good; he couldn’t remember how long it had been since he laughed that hard. Certainly not since he left Laurie’s side.

Laurie laughed with him now too.

“What is so funny?” Emma came inside the barn.

“Well,” Dante tried to get himself under control. “When I first took Laurie into custody, we were attacked, and she leapt out from the closet at the gunman. With a lamp. She used a lamp that time.”

Dante and Laurie started laughing again. Dante gripped Laurie harder as they shook together. Laurie tried to bury her face into Dante’s shoulder as if to hide herself from Emma’s gaze.

Emma tried hard to stay angry, but the sight of them together and happy—genuinely happy—made the struggle hard. She fought a smile. When she was able to keep a straight face, she ordered them all inside, out of the cold.

Dante slid his arm around Laurie’s waist and they walked together toward the house.

Once inside, the boys sat down next to their father and mother at the kitchen table. They begged for the details of their trip. Dante and Laurie sat down opposite them.

Emma began cleaning the kitchen, ordering Albert to make them all a late breakfast.

Laurie clung to Dante, wrapping her arm around him and laying her head on his chest.

Dante heeded the pleas of the two young boys. He told them about their trip to Hawaii. He started with the hike to the abandoned safe house, and pouring through the old CIA files on Kaimi. He told them about Albert going under cover as the gardener, and the meeting plans they overheard between Kaimi and his informant inside the Marshals Service. He glossed over the meeting back at the safe house, to only say that the informant died, but Albert and Dante captured Kaimi, tied him up, and left him for the police.

“Cool.” James bounced in his seat. “Did you have to shoot the bad guys?”

“Yeah, we did.” Bob rustled his hair. “We had to make sure they couldn’t hurt anyone else.”

“But who was Kaimi’s informant?” Laurie looked up at Dante.

Dante hesitated, taking a deep breath.

“Cheyn. It was Cheyn.” Sadness twisted its way down his spine. Laurie gasped.

“No! It couldn’t have been.” Laurie covered her mouth with her hand, her eyes widening.

“It was. He admitted it to me.” Dante shook his head.

His heart grew heavy. He ran his hand through his hair, as his eyes dropped to the table. Laurie hugged him.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” she whispered in his ear. He held her for a minute, kissing her cheek. Then he tucked her back under his chin. He could smell the floral scent of her shampoo, and it made him feel at home. It couldn’t quite fill the ache in his heart, but almost. Almost.

“We’ll have to post watches tonight.” Albert tried to balance the plates in his hand as he walked over. “Just in case.”