Chapter 35

Case went to the safe house. He couldn't be trusted out in the wild, not until he got his head screwed on straight. Nyx left him all kinds of messed up. Luckily, the place was empty. He settled on a green plastic chair on the back patio.

The space was cramped. If he stretched his legs out all the way, he could practically rest them against the adobe wall towering over him. It left the entire area shaded, with no chance of the sun lighting the few feet to the house. At least someone had picked up the debris that had littered the back patio.

"What the hell are you doing here?"

For a split second, Case thought it was the captain before he recognized the voice. Oz. "Dude, don't you have something to do?"

Ignoring the hint, the Wizard came over and took the other chair. "Nah, Vargas fired me, remember?"

Scowling, Case went back to staring at the wall. The last thing he wanted was to encourage a conversation.

"Are you mooning over your woman leaving?" Oz asked, interrupting Case's thoughts.

"No." The word was hard, but Oz wasn't easily deterred.

"Do you have what's left of the rebels on your ass?"

Case shook his head. "I don't know. I'm playing it safe, though."

"Smart choice. They're probably not too happy about Ramirez being taken out. If they're still functioning as a group, you might be rebel enemy number one."

He grunted and went back to ignoring the Wizard.

"Did your Fireball give you the old heave-ho when you took her to the airport?"

His patience cratered. "What the fuck is with all the questions? Leave me alone and go bother someone else."

"So she did tell you to take a hike."

"No, she did not," Case growled before realizing he'd been baited.

"If she didn't dump you, why are you in such a shitty mood?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Bullshit. If you didn't want to talk, you'd walk away. It's clear you need the advice of someone older and wiser."

Case gave Oz a glare. "You're three years older."

"Like I said, older and wiser. What happened with the Fireball?"

He put his hands on the arms of the chair, prepared to push himself up and walk away as his teammate suggested, but something stopped him. Maybe because it would be faster to get over her if he talked about it. Case was on an op. He had a pivotal role, a dangerous role, and if he fucked up, he could lose his life. Or worse, one of his teammates could lose his life. If talking about Nyx got him to focus on the job, then it was worth the discomfort.

"She lied to me."

In his peripheral vision, Case saw Oz's eyebrows go up. "Really? She struck me as a straight shooter. What did she lie about?"

For a moment, he hesitated, but he was committed now. "She didn't tell me she was my buddy's little sister."

"Nyx isn't exactly a common name," the Wizard said without inflection.

"D-Ro always called her Pickle. He never used her real name."

"Pickle?" Oz sounded amused. "I bet she hates that."

That's what he commented on? But it was a reprieve from the conversation, so Case went with it. "She does. She almost didn't tell me because she was worried I'd use it instead of Fireball."

"I'm guessing there's no family resemblance, but you knew her last name. Why didn't that get you to start asking questions?"

Case grimaced. "Her mother was married three times. D-Ro was fathered by husband number two, the Fireball by husband three. Different surnames and they look nothing alike."

"So she knew who and what you were from almost the beginning and she didn't tell you she knew? Do I have that right?"

It felt like a trick question. Case shifted his chair to get a better look at his teammate, but Oz gave nothing away. "Yes," he said, drawing out the word.

"You were aware the suite was bugged, correct? You would have cautioned her."

Now he knew where Oz was headed. "I didn't expect her to tell me who she was while we were under Vargas's thumb. I even warned her that I might have missed a microphone when I was pulling the spy gear, but she had opportunities to tell me later after we escaped. We walked through the rainforest alone together. We were in a hut for hours before we walked again. There were multiple chances."

"Yeah, sounds like it. Why do you think she didn't use any of those openings?"

He stayed quiet.

The wizard answered for him. "Why don't we start with the fact your walk through the rainforest was at night while you were escaping from Vargas's estate."

Case grunted.

"Let's add that the rebels were coming over the wall of the compound and she had no way of knowing whether any were hiding in the rainforest surrounding the area. She's also smart enough to realize there could be enemies around and she wouldn't know they were there because she was blindly following you." He paused and waited, but Case remained quiet. The Wizard asked, "What about the hut?"

"You have all the fucking answers. You tell me."

Oz scowled. "I can guess one of them. She probably slept for a while. How'd I do?"

Nodding, Case said, "She was down for a little over three hours."

"Clearly, she could have told you after her nap."

Closing his eyes, Case grimaced. "I was edgy when she woke up. My spidey sense was tingling, and I was going from window to window."

"What you're saying is you were intense and not hiding it. If you were in her position, would you have said something then?"

Reluctantly, Case admitted, "No. She would worry about distracting me, but she did talk with me after we left the hut while we were walking again."

Oz nodded. "She should have told you then."

Except they'd talked about why Nyx was still a virgin, about her mom's life choices influencing her, and then they'd talked about his mother and her drug addiction. Those conversations seemed more important than her telling him she knew who and what he was. "We talked about other stuff, and then the rebels captured us."

"And she couldn't tell you while you two were in the encampment for the same reasons she couldn't talk while you were Vargas's guests. Right?"

He nodded.

"But she could have told you last night. Unless you were busy doing something else."

Oz sounded innocent, but Case knew better. He shot his teammate a hard look. He wouldn't let anyone— anyone —talk shit about Nyx.

"Fuck," he muttered as the Wizard's maneuvering became apparent.

"From what you told me, it doesn't sound as if there was much chance, and the few times there were openings, the two of you were focused on something else."

"Yeah." Case drew the word out again as realization dawned. He hadn't given Nyx the benefit of the doubt. Because of his past, he'd immediately assumed the worst of her and he'd been an ass. And he managed to piss her off. His Fireball was no one's doormat.

"I have one other theory for you to mull over," Oz said.

"What's that?"

"If she did deliberately stay quiet—and I'm not saying she did—maybe it had something to do with what was building between the two of you. As soon as you learned she was your buddy's sister, you would have friend-zoned her. Maybe she wanted more than friendship."

Case shook his head. He knew Nyx. She would have flat-out told him and dealt with whatever happened between them because of it. She hadn't stayed quiet because she was a liar. It wasn't her nature to be devious. He knew that. He knew her.

"D-Ro is going to kill me for sleeping with his sister, and I didn't realize I was breaking the bro code."

"Dude, you would have slept with her even if you were aware of who she was. Everyone on the team knows how you feel about her." Oz paused. "Well, maybe not Rusty, but everyone else."

"I never should have judged her by the other women I've been burned by. I reacted. I didn't think."

"It sounds as if you're done being a dumb fuck," the Wizard said.

"It looks like it."

"Good. Now how are you going to fix it?"

Case shook his head. "She's in the air, on her way to Lima."

"You're going to lose the woman you're in love with because she's a few hundred miles away?"

"I don't know what hotel she's staying at."

"BD ordered you to have her call Archer immediately. You let her use your phone, didn't you? Archer knows where she's staying, right? So call him and ask where she is."

"The captain will lose his mind if I take off for Peru in the middle of an op. If I can even get over the border and into the country."

"If you can't make it to a hotel in Peru without getting caught, you need to find a less challenging career. This one is over your head."

This time, he recognized the bait and avoided it.

Oz took a different tack. "You're too scared to go after your woman? After you killed a man to keep her safe? You're that big a chicken shit?"

You're too scared.

Case was scared Nyx would tell him he blew his chance with her. That she couldn't forgive him for the things he said. "What if she tells me to go to hell?"

"You're already in hell. Chasing after her, apologizing, telling her you love her can't make anything worse." When Case hesitated, Oz added, "She's in love with you. I could see it in the way she looked at you yesterday."

Case headed for the house. "Tell the captain?—"

"Don't worry, I'll cover for you. Go fix things with your woman before she leaves for the States."