Chapter 8

Alicia had just finished cleaning up the dishes from breakfast when Dee walked in with a frown.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

Dee nodded. "I'm fine, but you didn't have to do that."

Alicia blew out a long breath. "I have to do something. I might go mental if I just sit here."

She smiled. "I understand that. Drives Micah crazy that I can't always sit and just be. I've been working since I was seventeen. I was put on bed rest with my last pregnancy. Micah was ready to tear out all of his beautiful hair. I couldn't help it. I felt so lazy. I knew I needed to be there, but still."

Alicia nodded. She completely understood that. "My father always said time spent daydreaming was wasted time."

"Well, I wouldn't go that far. A little bit of dreaming can be a good thing." Dee shook her head. "I didn't daydream for a really long time. Not while I was on the run."

"You mentioned something about that last night."

She motioned with her head to the table. Alicia followed her and sat across the table from her.

"Well, my father tried to have me killed. Devon too."

Alicia blinked. For a second, the words didn't compute, when they did, she opened her mouth once, then closed it.

Dee laughed. "Yeah, everyone has that same reaction."

Alicia sat down. "Your father tried to kill you?"

She nodded and rested her hand on her belly. "I overheard him having a man tortured, then killed. We didn't know it, but Dad was Mafia."

"You had no idea your father was in the Mob?"

"I take that back. We had an idea he was connected. I mean, a lot of our friends had fathers involved in some way." She shrugged. "Devon was always gone to some nerd camp, and I had…well, we were teenagers. What were you doing at seventeen?"

"My father had me along with him on a job in…" She paused trying to remember where they had been. "Thailand. I liked Thailand."

"Wait, your father took you on jobs when you were in high school?"

"Yes. After my mother was killed, he didn't like leaving me with anyone. I went along."

There was a look of horror on Dee's face.

"What?" Alicia asked.

"I can't imagine going on spy jobs at that age."

She shrugged. "It was good training. I learned a lot."

"You did this from the time you were twelve?"

"Part of the reason was safety. The other part was learning from my father. He knew they would pull him from the field very soon and I needed to learn from the best."

Dee studied her for a moment, then shook her head. "Anyway, I was hiding in my dad's office. I wasn't hiding to begin with, but I wasn't supposed to be there. Heard my dad, then hid in the closet." Dee shuddered. "So, I went to the FBI. Dad ended up finding me though and I went on the run for years."

Alicia worked through all the information. "That was when Devon was at the CIA camp."

Dee snorted. "I guess we can call it that. So, tell me more about your father."

Alicia sighed. "He was all I had in the world after my mum died."

"You were close?"

She thought back to their time together, then further back, before her mother had been killed, before the paranoia had set in. She remembered the three of them, a unit. They had been careful and she was sure there were measures her parents took to ensure her safety. Still, it had been a normal childhood. There were vacations and fun times at holidays, then everything had been destroyed in a matter of seconds.

"We were. My mum was killed by a terrorist bomb. Not really directed at her. Just wrong place, wrong time. Dad never really got over it."

Dee nodded.

"And then, I went into the business. I know that he watched out for me, but did not meddle. He believed that I should make it on my own."

"And you did too."

She nodded. "I was getting rather good…then it just sort of went to shit."

"But you have Bridget."

She thought about her daughter and smiled. "Yes. I have her."

Dee opened her mouth, then hesitated.

"Go on."

"I just want you to understand Devon. He was always kind of…I don't know broken."

"You're twins. He was broken but you weren't?"

"Things happen for a reason, right? Or that's the way I always looked at it. But, for us, it was so damned horrible. I had to go on the run after someone from the FBI sold me out. I didn't let anyone close for a really long time. It was too dangerous. Trusting someone could put their life in danger or mine. I just couldn't take the chance."

"And Devon? Didn't you trust him?"

"I thought he was dead. There was an accident…thanks to my father. Devon survived, but he lost his girlfriend."

That put a different light on his disappearance. Following the timeline in her head, it would have been around the time the CIA went into panic mode looking for him.

"We were so young at the time, but I know that he has always felt he was the reason she was killed. Dad thought he was in the car. So, Devon disappeared."

"Oh." Everything made a lot more sense now. When she had read his file and the case studies of his character, there was nothing that would convince her he had been selling secrets.

"So, he's probably going to be horrible with you two. Just know where he is coming from."

Alicia frowned. "What do you mean?"

Dee sighed. "He'll do anything to keep you safe. And it means he is going to be a pain in the ass. I just wanted you to understand why."

She crossed her arms beneath her breasts. "I can take care of myself and Bridget."

Dee chuckled. "Don't be getting your panties in a bunch. I know that, and to an extent he knows that. But he has a history, and just keep that in mind. I don't want you to kick his ass and make him cry like a girl."

Alicia smiled. "You think I can?"

"I'm pretty sure you can. What do you train with?"

"Some boxing."

"Me too! Well, until I got pregnant."

"You're having two so close together."

"I want to have a ton of them, but Micah wasn't happy at first. He didn't do so well during the last pregnancy. He declared we wouldn't have any more children after the incident in the delivery room."

"What incident?"

"He almost passed out. As it was, he got woozy and his stomach didn't handle the miracle of birth that well."

She thought back to the stoic Native American and joined in the laughter.

"Now that I might have paid to see."

Micah and Devon pulled into the Ali's driveway and found that nothing had been disturbed. There was a bit of fog hanging around the bushes that lined the walk.

"It's fucking eerie, man," Micah said.

Devon nodded. There was something oddly quiet that coated the area with a thick layer of menace. It left a knot in his stomach. There was something very wrong about the house.

They both silently slipped out of the car. He watched his brother-in-law scan the area. Devon knew he was good at things like that. He'd been trained by the CIA, even if it was just preliminary training. Years of avoiding his father and brother had made him cautious. But Micah, he'd made a living at it. When he had gotten out of the business, he'd been more well-known than Dog the Bounty Hunter. Add in his rough upbringing, Micah was probably one of the most perceptive people he knew.

Micah nodded, indicating that he didn't sense anything and Devon could go in. As they walked, Micah continued looking around them. Devon approached the front door and found it locked. He used the key Ali had given him, and then walked in carefully.

It looked exactly the same. No windows were broken, nothing was damaged. In fact, he would never have guessed someone had been there that night. They walked around carefully, checking things out. It was the oddest kind of crime scene. He knew the people who had shown up last night had been sent to at least retrieve Bridget. When Micah joined him in the kitchen, he looked at Devon.

"It's like last night didn't happen," Devon said.

"Makes me think someone didn't want anyone to notice what was going on. And, maybe they think she's on her own. If so, that's good. They'll assume that she's on her own."

"That makes sense with the report that Ali got this morning. The cops went by last night, nothing looked out of place."

"Let's check out the bedrooms."

They came to Bridget's first. Again, nothing was disturbed. The covers were pulled up over the pillow, but other than that, it looked natural. They made their way down to the master bedroom.

They slipped in and it looked the same. Ali had been dressed, but her bed was in the same order. The quilt had been pulled up over the pillows. Micah looked in the bathroom and came out shaking his head.

Devon pulled the bed linens and found the pillow had a bullet hole in it.

"Fucking hell," Micah muttered.

Anger pumped through Devon as he spun around and strode down the hallway to Bridget's room again. He grabbed the sheets and yanked them down. The pillow had one small bullet hole in it. Micah stepped into the room.

"They weren't sent here to gather information or even to capture her," Devon said.

Micah walked around the bed, and Devon raised his gaze to meet his brother-in-law's.

"You're right. They were sent for one thing."

His rage grew. "Assassination."