Every Last Secret by Christa Wick & C.M. Wick

Author:Christa Wick & C.M. Wick
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Christa Wick

16

Maddy

"You have your go bag ready?" Emerson asks as he takes the headphones off and casually tosses them onto his desk.

I rub at my eyes then nod. It's a little after two in the afternoon and the only sleep I managed since leaving Sutton's bed is a twenty-minute cat nap—sitting upright on a stall in the ladies bathroom. I was supposed to leave the field office yesterday evening and sleep before starting my surveillance shift.

Either Emerson doesn't notice my zombie-like posture or he's ignoring it.

"Your sister and the kid going to be fine?" he asks. "You want an agent to take your car home so she can use it?"

"Delia and Caiden will be fine." I use their names, perhaps even stubbornly because Emerson has taken to referencing them only by their roles in my life. "She has her own vehicle."

"Suppose Sutton could always race up here if she needs a ride."

"She has her own vehicle," I repeat.

He continues as if I said nothing. "Well, make sure your go bag is ready. We should have a flight out by…"

He pauses to hit enter on his keyboard, then waits for the screen to refresh.

"Two hours."

With a nod, I rise from the chair alongside his desk. "I'll be ready."

My first stop is the bureau car assigned to me when I'm on duty. I open the trunk, my phone to my ear as I call Delia.

"Hey, sweetie," she chirps. "Everything okay?"

As far as Delia is concerned, I've been on the clock over thirty hours. She doesn't know I spent part of the evening in Willow Gap because I haven't been home and am in no rush to tell her what happened.

"I don't have much time," I say. "I have to catch a flight to Seattle in two hours and there are preparations to make in the meantime."

"Your boss is insane! You've been going at it for more than a day. You might as well be in the military. Hell, even SEALs get some downtime."

I don't respond. I don't like lying to Delia and, well, I suck at it.

"Caught some sleep and a shower here. About to grab some food and I'll catch a little sleep at the airport and on the plane." This is a mix of the truth and best intentions. Knowing Emerson, he will work on the plane, which means I will also work on the plane.

"Will I be able to contact you?"

From the trunk, I unzip the go bag and inventory its contents as I assure Delia my phone will be on most of the time and remind her how to reach me in an emergency by contacting the field office.

"Have to go," I say before adding a perfunctory, "I love you."

"You really do, you know…"

Just like that, after I utter three monosyllabic words backed by a lifetime's context between us, Delia goes from being irate at my "toxic" boss to weepy.

I ignore her attempt to convince me I'm not really a robot.

"Give Caiden a hug for me."

"A tight one," she agrees.

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