Chapter Thirteen

"I t wasn't your fault." Boone clasped her hand. "You're just as much a victim of that night as Daniel."

Her mouth twisted. "It doesn't feel that way. I can't help but keep thinking if I'd done one thing differently none of this would have happened."

He didn't understand. "What do you mean?"

"The day of the meeting Daniel became anxious. I've never seen him like that. He told me he had a bad feeling and that he thought we should call off the meet." She had been the one to push for the go-ahead. "I should have listened to Daniel. If I had, his asset's body would have been found and we would know something had been wrong."

"Or you might not have found the body until much later." Boone brought her hands together in his. "You can't go back and second-guess things, Ellie. Believe me, I've done my fair share, and all it does is make life miserable. You did what you thought was best."

He kissed her hands and let her go.

"Thank you." Ellie touched his cheek. "I've lived on my own for so long it's easy to stay inside my head and only see things from one perspective."

Boone smiled down at her. "I've been there. But you're not alone anymore, Ellie. You have people who care about you. I care," he added softly, and her heart did a crazy little flip.

"I care about you too." She hadn't said those words since Daniel. The thought of her former fiancé brought the seriousness back into focus. Daniel had died because of whatever was contained on that drive. And the enemy wanted it.

The basement door opened, drawing both Ellie and Boone's attention.

Ellie could tell from Declan's expression things were bad.

"The dock's completely under water," Declan said as he and Eli hurried down the steps. "So far the water hasn't reached us but it's only a matter of time."

"What can we do to help?" Ellie recalled Declan mentioning sandbags.

"Grab as many bags as you can. We'll put them in front of the cabin as a barrier. There are more in the storage shed."

Carrying two of the thirty-to-fifty-pound bags of sand was a challenge to get up the stairs.

Declan directed them where to place the bags. Once the sandbags from the basement were in place, they used the ones from the shed.

By the time they'd finished, everyone was drenched with rain.

Declan surveyed the wall of sandbags. "Let's hope it holds." Flashes of lightning split the sky. "We've done everything we can. Let's get back inside."

Ellie retrieved towels to dry off. "I'm going to make some coffee to warm us up."

Rounds of gratitude followed her offer.

"I'll help." Boone hunted around the cabinets until he found the coffee while she poured water into the pot.

"I'm going to move everything upstairs. If the water breaks through those bags, the basement will flood," Declan told them. "We can't afford for everything on the drive to be destroyed. He turned to Eli. "Give me a hand?"

Eli nodded and went along with him.

"I can't believe this is happening." Ellie shivered. "You think those bags will hold back the water?"

Boone wanted to be positive for her. "I don't know. I sure hope so. It sounds like the water level is rising quickly."

Ellie cast a troubled look toward the door. "This is the last thing we needed to happen."

The corners of his mouth lifted into a smile. "You're right, but we'll get through it." Yet he wasn't so sure.

Eli and Declan carried laptops upstairs and placed them on the table.

Once the coffee finished brewing, Boone grabbed a tray and placed cups, cream, and sugar on it. Ellie poured the hot liquid into cups and carried the tray over to the kitchen table, where Eli watched the screen over Declan's shoulder.

"Something happen?" Boone set the tray down and went over to look.

"We have the first look at what's on the drive, and it isn't good." Declan pointed to the screen, which showed what appeared to be surveillance photos taken at night.

Boone didn't recognize the man, but he was leaning against a car smiling at a woman.

"That's Gideon." Ellie pointed to the man on the screen.

Boone shot her a look. "Really? He looks different. Who's the woman?"

Ellie shook her head. "I have no idea. It's not Gideon's wife, Seraphina."

"Maybe he's being blackmailed," Boone concluded with a frown. "But if so, then the information we have here is only a copy. Someone would have the original in a safe place."

Ellie told him maybe. "Gideon was once one of the best agents Mossad ever had. What if he figured out the identity of the person blackmailing him and destroyed the information?"

"Then how did it get on a drive in your ring?" Boone faced her and could see she was trying to work it out and couldn't.

"I don't know."

"What about Daniel?" He hadn't wanted to bring her dead fiancé into the conversation, but it was suspicious that blackmail information would be found in the engagement ring Daniel gave her.

Her eyes sparked anger. "He wasn't involved. Daniel wouldn't blackmail Gideon. They were close."

"Unless he didn't have a choice," Eli said quietly. "It's possible he was a pawn in whatever game is playing out."

Ellie wasn't ready to believe it yet. "Then why kill him?"

"He could have tipped Gideon off." Boone watched as more information appeared on the screen. "Who is that?"

Declan blew the next photo up. "That's the current prime minister." The man appeared to be meeting with someone covertly.

"Do you recognize that person?"

Ellie leaned forward. "I don't."

"What is going on here?" Boone couldn't understand what he was seeing.

"While the program continues decoding, I'm running facial recognition on the woman and this new person." Declan copied the female's photo and then popped it into the facial recognition program. It didn't take long to get a hit and Declan sat back in his chair. "Whoa. She's a spy . . . or at least she was a spy. Meet Neesa Aberman."

"I can't believe I didn't see it before," Ellie said with her eyes glued to the screen. "Neesa's a legend. She and Gideon were partners back in the day. After he became director, she kind of did her own thing. But she supposedly died while on a mission in Iran almost twenty years ago."