Navy Justice (Whidbey Island, Book 5) (21 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY

S
UMMER
’
S
END
WAS
nowhere in sight in San Antonio, Texas. Joy’s blouse stuck to her skin, and sweat rolled down her forehead. Couples ambled by along the River Walk as she tried her best to people-watch from her seat at the outdoor café. Helen was due here any minute, but waiting for her felt more like a lifetime than an hour as she sipped the best iced tea she’d had in years.

Iced tea was a Southern secret, she’d learned during many permanent and temporary tours of duty, TDYs, south of the Mason-Dixon Line. The San Antonio version included a huge wedge of lime instead of the more customary lemon.

A couple holding hands, not paying attention to where they were going, halted when the man nudged Joy’s table, moving the wrought-iron top into her belly.

“Oof.”

“Sorry!” The woman giggled and tugged her man away, oblivious to Joy’s discomfort.

Joy didn’t care; she was focused on a different, more potent and intangible punch to her gut. Her memories of Brad.

She wished he was here. That
they
were the couple strolling along the River Walk—without any demons chasing them. No enemy and no mission to control where their relationship might go.

Returning to their hotel room whenever they wanted...

Stop it.

“Joy!”

“Admiral.” She rose, and since Helen was also in civilian clothes, gave her a hug. Helen squeezed Joy back, whispering in her ear.

“It’s so good to see you. But you’ve got me worried, Joy.”

Joy pulled back. “I know, and I’m sorry for chasing you down like this. I couldn’t talk on the phone.”

Helen’s gray eyes narrowed, and Joy knew that lunch was going to be intense. She had one chance, one conversation to convince Helen to do some digging for her. For Brad.

No matter. She needed a friend she could count on, at any cost.

And Brad needed her.

* * *

A
FTER
TWO
LARGE
plates
of delicious tortillas and carne asada, Helen wiped her mouth with her napkin and leaned back.

“I never pegged you as an outlier, Joy.”

Oh, crap. Here it comes
. Helen was about to lay down the law and blast Joy for her attempts to help Brad out by digging up old case files.

“I know. I’m certainly not playing by the rules the Navy taught me, or legal school, either. But you were always big on staying the course, following my intuition. Above all, you’ve taught me to do what’s right, regardless of the consequences.”

“And that’s what you think you’re doing, breaking every Navy regulation, federal, military and local law, lying to your new employer?”

Helen Bolling looked every inch the Navy admiral, even in her casual blouse and linen skirt. She was the one woman, besides her mother, Joy would never want to disappoint or worse, betray.

In that moment the truth with a capital
T
shone clear to her in the bright Texas sun, which glinted off the narrow San Antonio River as it passed by them like a slow smile.

“I’m doing what’s right, I’m sure of it.”

Helen regarded her closely.

“It’s more than that, Helen.” She called her friend by her first name when they were in private, but always remained aware that Helen was an admiral. “I’m afraid the bad guys are very close to making their big move, but the red tape at the higher levels of government means catching them in time will be too difficult.”

“This might be a terrible, deadly mistake, Joy. Do you realize how emotionally involved you are? Are you doing this as some kind of misguided attempt to show Brad how much you care?”

“It isn’t only about Brad. It’s about making sure I’ve done my duty. That I haven’t missed anything I should’ve handled while I was still in uniform.”

“Well, that was going to be my next point. You aren’t in uniform any longer, and it’s not your war to wage. Don’t you think General Grimes and most other officers sometimes wish they could go back in time to tie up loose ends? No operation is ever perfect. The same goes for legal cases.”

“Maybe, but there’s nothing wrong with doing a little cleanup.”

“I met Jerry years ago. Didn’t you say he helped Brad out, gave him his car?”

Hearing Helen refer to General Grimes as “Jerry” was a bit unsettling. She knew him?

“Yes, he did. Do you know him well?” Joy fiddled with the lime in her iced tea. Grimes
had
been generous.

Helen’s gaze was steady. This was why Joy had taken the time to come here. She needed Helen’s strength and wisdom.

“I worked with the man for months on the most important case of my career, right after 9-11. Nothing passed between us during the case. He was still hung up on his deceased wife and was raising his daughter at the time. And I was too busy with my career to make any effort at a relationship.” Helen’s eyes misted. “It’s funny how quickly life goes by, how soon a career is over. Then we’re all faced with ourselves.” She blinked back the tears and cleared her throat.

Joy wasn’t the only one who had feelings for a man she’d worked with during an intense case.

“Tell me, Joy. The FBI agent, the former SEAL—how deeply are you involved with him?”

Joy looked Helen in the eye with no hesitation. “I’m drowning.”

She braced herself for one of the tongue-lashings Helen was famous for. Helen had taken her to task more than once during that first tour, and each time Joy had sworn she’d felt every caustic word as a physical blow. Helen was the Navy’s best lawyer because she’d earned it, case by case, command by command.

Helen laughed. “Good girl.”

Shock jolted Joy, and she clasped and unclasped her hands under the table. “What?”

Helen grinned. “Honey, it’s clear to me that this Brad is more than just a colleague or former shipmate you’re willing to go the distance for. We all stick our necks out for our shipmates, more than once in a career. But what you’re facing here, it’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience. You get that, right?”

“Yes.”

“A woman will fight to the death for her children and for the man she loves.”

“Whoa, Helen, I’m not talking about
love
here.”

“You might not be talking about it, sweetie, but you’re living it. Admit that much to yourself, if to no one else.”

Joy rolled her sweating glass of iced tea on her cheeks. They were as hot as if Helen had slapped her.

Because she had. Helen had verbally slapped the truth into her.

She loved Brad.

The groan that came from her throat surprised her and made Helen smirk.

“You haven’t come to terms with it yet, I take it?”

Joy shook her head. “Not...completely.”

Helen leaned back and signaled the waiter, who immediately came over to the table.

“Two margaritas on ice, with extra shots in each.”

“You took a cab, right?”

Joy laughed. “From the airport, yes. But I have a room in the same hotel as you. I can walk back.”

“Good. Don’t want you driving after we get done. When do you fly back?”

“Zero-dark-thirty tomorrow.”

Helen gave a low whistle.

“That’s my girl. Not wasting any time. Okay, let’s get to work.”

* * *

H
ELEN
SAT
ON
the sofa in her hotel room, where she’d invited Joy after lunch. She listened as Joy told her everything she could recall about the case.

Helen nodded. “Farid heard and knew more than he said during the trial, I’m certain. But that doesn’t make him a criminal, Joy. If he’s the man you believe him to be, he only stayed quiet to save more lives.”

Tears stung her eyes. “What he stayed quiet about could’ve killed Brad. It still could, if some crazy mastermind is behind all this.”

“You can go forward with a clear conscience, knowing you did all you could to help. And I agree that there’s someone bigger behind this, or the domestic terrorists wouldn’t have been able to smuggle in a SAM.”

“So you don’t think I’m crazy.” Exhaustion tickled her eyelids and weighed on her chest.

“No, I’ve never thought you had
crazy
in you, Joy. You’re a bit of a control freak, I’ll grant you that. That’s why you’re such a great lawyer. The JAG Corps is less without you.”

“So now you’re making me feel guilty over my resignation?”

“You know I’m not.”

She leaned her head against the back of the settee. “I could end up incriminating Brad and General Grimes, if Farid has information that Brad and General Grimes were aware of at the time, too.”

“That’s unlikely.”

“You don’t have any connections in the Witness Security Program, do you?”

Helen shook her head.

“I’ve worked with them on some cases, of course, but a mere mortal like me can’t pick up the phone and find out where a protected witness is.”

“Damn.”

“You were hoping to get to Farid, get him to tell you what he might have left out of his testimony?”

“Yes.”

“You’re not going to like this, Joy, but none of it’s your concern any longer. Even if I could get the Intel you want. You were a JAG, for God’s sake. Not intelligence! You need to forget about the Norfolk trials. They’re over.”

Helen’s words burst through Joy’s denial, and her hopes sank like the fishing boat in the explosion on Monday morning. Had it really been less than a week?

“But I have to make sure—”

“Stop being such a damned perfectionist. You’ve got to accept that you did your best at the time, Joy. No remorse, no regret. You’re not responsible for anything the terrorists have or haven’t done, just like you’re not responsible for any testimony Farid didn’t give. You had a client to represent. You did it flawlessly. Farid’s safe in WSP, and Brad’s just broken apart an ugly domestic cell that may or may not have a connection to the bad guys from Farid’s village.”

Helen was right; she was always right. More important, Joy respected her and needed her counsel. But...

“I’ll never be able to live with myself if I walk away now and something awful happens later.”

“What’s your worst fear?”

“I’m afraid—” She stopped. Her first thought, her instant reply, scared the hell out of her.

“Joy?”

“I was going to say I’m afraid that another SAM will reach its target on our soil. That
should
be my biggest fear.”

“But?”

“My biggest worry is...Brad. I’m afraid an unnamed terrorist is still trying to get him for what his SEAL team accomplished during the war.”

Helen nodded. “Now you’re talking. That’s a valid, if rather inflated, fear.”

“I just wish I’d had the foresight during the case to see this as a possibility in the future.”

“My colleagues who were there to see you work said that your handling of the case was exemplary.”

Joy ignored the praise, although praise was something Helen didn’t dish out randomly or excessively.

“I was trained by the best—you. I’m not fishing for compliments. I’m trying to keep Brad alive. God, I don’t know what to think anymore, Helen.”

Her inner turmoil muddied everything. So this was what caring more about someone than herself or her career actually meant. That none of it mattered the way it used to, the way she expected.

Only one thing mattered—that Brad was safe and alive.

“You’ve got excellent instincts, Joy. Let’s go with them on this, and I’ll see if I can connect with some of my contacts, see what I can stir up, within reason. In the meantime, I suggest you go sit in the hotel spa and use the time to chill out. You look like you could use it.”

Joy stood up. She didn’t think anything except nailing whoever had that SAM shipped to the US was going to ease her agitation. But far be it from her to argue with Helen.

“That sounds good.”

* * *

S
ITTING
IN
THE
spa’s thermal room, where rainforest sounds and soft music echoed about the cavernous space, filled with plants Joy had never seen before, Joy tried to let go of her racing thoughts.

Perspiration dripped from every pore, and she wiped her face with the thick, soft terry towel to no avail; the sweat was pouring out of her and wasn’t going to stop as long as she sat here. That was the point of a spa, wasn’t it? To detoxify?

She’d tried to call Brad but had been switched directly to his voice mail. He’d given her his number and had texted her several times since she’d left his place yesterday morning. She hadn’t answered, because she didn’t trust herself not to spill the beans on what she was trying to accomplish. Now
he
was incommunicado.

He’d likely gone in to work and would get back to her later.

She hated feeling so needy but in only five days, it seemed, that was what she’d become. Needy. For Brad.

No, it was more than five days. It was almost two years of feeling emotionally attached to the man.

Is this what real love feels like?

No matter how long she sat in the spa she wasn’t going to find the answer to that here.

* * *

B
ACK
IN
H
ELEN
’
S
room two hours later, as they sipped iced tea with lime from fancy hotel glasses, Helen’s phone chimed, indicating she had a message. Her eyes widened, and a smile lit her face as she read it.

“Bingo, Joy. We’ve got a lucky break.”

Hope surged, and Joy tried to quell it. If the result was disappointing, it wouldn’t be just a lost case.

It was Brad’s life and at this point hers, too.

“What do you know, Helen?”

“Have you ever read the unclassified accounts of the Taliban’s reach?”

“A few, but it’s not my usual area of interest.” Not until this past week.

After a few quick taps on her phone, Helen looked back up. “We’ll read it together.”

“How are you getting this information?”

Helen winked.

“I told you that you should’ve stayed in and come to work for me in DC. This job has a lot of extra perks, the biggest being the sources I can draw from when needed.” Helen ran her fingers through her silver strands, the chic bob falling perfectly back into place.