I lifted my arm, pain rushing through me, but it rose higher than it had the last time I’d run through my exercises. Small improvements.

“You shouldn’t push yourself so hard,” Tracy said, patting my good arm gently. “It’ll heal when it heals.”

I glanced down at the heavy cast that covered the majority of my arm. “I’m ready for it to be healed now.”

“It’s been a month. These things take much longer than that. How long did the doctor say?”

I shrugged. “Eight weeks before the cast comes off. Another four weeks after that before I should regain full mobility.”

“Well, hell, you’ve got plenty of time to get full movement back. Stop doing those stupid exercises.”

“It helps.”

“For all you know, you’re pulling the bones apart. You could be setting yourself back months.”

I groaned, wanting to protest, but afraid there might be a small amount of truth to what she’d said.

I got off my stool a short time later and went outside. Time for my rounds. No one had bothered Alli’s in months, but we were still diligent. Maybe more diligent now that Alli was officially Stone Security family. She and Crispin were downright sickening the way they were always hanging on each other, like a couple of teenagers in heat. Made me want to go back on the painkillers they’d had me on after my surgery.

A little oblivion…

Jack found temporary offices for Stone Security, getting us each our own office. We had now expanded to ten operatives, including four brought in from Memphis and two that we’d all managed to agree would be a good fit for our little team. Since my injury was keeping me out of the field, Jack was training me for the promotion he’d promised when I wasn’t here at Alli’s. It was a dream job, good pay and interesting work that wasn’t all stuck behind a desk. But I felt like a fraud every time I walked into the office in my suit and this cast hanging out of my cut-up shirts. I’d lied to everyone about who I was.

I was a criminal, just like the people we were hired to protect our clients from. I shouldn’t be helping run this growing security firm. I should be in jail.

I couldn’t stop thinking about Kaapo. He didn’t deserve to die that way.

Jack found Kaapo’s hotel room before the cops. He’d been staying in a neighboring town, I suppose so that we wouldn’t run into each other on the street and have Briggs’s little secret get out before he was ready. I looked through his things, searching for some clue as to how he’d come to find me. All I found were letters from a man named John Smith.

It was an alias. We’d tracked the postage down to a post office box in Tombstone that led nowhere. The credit card used to pay for it was a prepaid, the address given an empty lot in the middle of nowhere.

Whoever had summoned Kaapo here was hiding his tracks. I had no idea why he’d done it, or if he was still coming after me. All I knew was that Kaapo was dead, and it was my fault.

I’d loved Kala, but all I’d done was lead her and her brother to their deaths.

And Rachel was gone. I hadn’t heard from her since that day in the hospital. She left a number with Jack, but it was disconnected by the time I was conscious long enough to try it. She didn’t want to be found—that much was clear.

I couldn’t really blame her. She’d been abused enough. She didn’t need it from me, too.

I’d finally come to the conclusion that Rachel was as much a victim in all this as anyone else. She might have lied to me, but she’d done it because she had no idea whom she could trust. By the time she came to trust me, it was too late. The lies were already out there.

I hoped she found happiness.

I hoped she found love.

 

 

Jack called me into the office early a week later.

“There a problem?” I asked, knocking on his doorframe.

Jack gestured for me to come inside. His office was a little cramped, his brand new furniture filling the room with the warm scents of sawdust and cedar. He was on the phone, so I took a seat, waiting for him to finish.

“So,” Jack said, leaning forward and watching me with a high level of expectation, “I’ve talked to the local cops. They’ve pretty much closed the case on Briggs Thomas. The guy he cut in that basement rolled over on all of them, confessing exactly what happened that night. You are completely off the hook.”

“That’s good.”

“Yeah.” Jack sat back again, interlacing his fingers and watching me over their raised tips. “Have you heard from Rachel?”

“No, but I don’t expect to.”

“That’s too bad.” He leaned forward again, searching through the paperwork on his desk. “This came a week ago, and I’ve been trying to remember to give it to you.”

He held the paperwork out across the desk, a small stack of papers clipped together. Expecting an outline of a new case or a report from one of the operatives, I was surprised to see my given name written in bold across the top. Most of the document was in English, but sections were in Arabic. Surprised, I skimmed it and then went back to read it slowly.

“What is this?” I finally asked, somewhat breathlessly.

“A pardon, basically.” Jack smiled widely. “I told you, I have friends in law enforcement all over the place. And this”—he gestured to the papers—“was a negotiation that took much longer than I anticipated. But it was in the works for more than a year.”

“You’re serious?”

“Yes. I started working on it not long after you came to work for us. I figured it would come in handy some day.”

“A pardon? For everything? The events in my village? My actions with Mossad?”

“Everything.”

I couldn’t catch my breath. “Do you know what this means? I can go home! I can visit my sister!”

“I know.” Jack laid a plane ticket on his desk in front of me. “I’ve already arranged it.”

I picked it up, my heart pounding so hard I thought it might burst out of my chest. It was an open-ended, roundtrip ticket to Israel.

I was going home!

“You have no idea what this means to me, Jack!”

“I can guess.” He stood up and came around the desk. “But you’ll notice it’s a roundtrip ticket. We’d like for you to come back when you’re ready, but there’s no rush.”

It hadn’t occurred to me not to come back, but it hadn’t occurred to me that I’d ever be able to go home again, either. A whole world of possibilities suddenly opened up to me.

I could do anything I wanted!

I couldn’t imagine how life could get any better than it was in that single moment.

But maybe fate could.