Cheating Justice (The Justice Team) (35 page)

“I’m glad the kid showed up. For Maria’s sake as well as ours.”

Caroline pocketed the phone. “I told her I’d keep her safe and I didn’t.”

The same guilt gnawing at Caroline ate at him too. He’d screwed up a lot of things in his life, but allowing Maria to be shot would always haunt him. It would haunt Caroline too. “We’ll do everything we can to help her recover, Caroline. It’s the best we can do now. Allowing the shoulda-woulda-coulda demon to set up residence in your head makes you crazy. Take it from me. It’s no way to live.”

“I know.” Her eyes were wistful. “I just wish I’d done things differently.”

“Me, too.” Enough of this hospital bullshit. “Tell Grey we’re heading out. Ethan can stay and keep an eye on Jesse to make sure the kid doesn’t take off before Connor Lane can get him in front of the attorney general or whoever needs to hear his testimony.”

Caroline didn’t try to stop him this time, but the curtain flew back and Donaldson blocked Mitch’s exit. “Where do you think you’re going?” he said.

As far away from you as I can get.

But that was the old Mitch and the old way of thinking. “I was about to come and see you. I’m turning myself in.”

“Huhn.” Donaldson reached into his coat pocket and drew out two sets of papers. He handed one set to Caroline. “This is for you.”

Mitch saw the agent in her come to life, the past few hours of stress and anxiety rolling off of her like rainwater off a duck. “What is it?” she asked, her fingers nimbly opening the folded papers to read them.

Donaldson lowered his voice. “The warrant we’ll be using to search the Deputy Attorney General’s house and vehicles. I figured you’d like to go with me and my team.”

Her eyes lit up. “You bet I would.” Then she glanced at Mitch and her face fell. “But I can’t leave him.”

Oh, bullshit
. “You don’t need to babysit me, Caroline,” Mitch said. “Grey can drive me to the Bureau and I’ll wait there like a good boy for
Special Agent
Donaldson to return.”

He emphasized Special Agent a little too hard, making it sound sarcastic—force of habit. Still, when Donaldson’s watery eyes met his in challenge, Mitch didn’t look away.

Donaldson held out the second set of papers in his hand. “Shut up before you make me change my mind and tear these up, you SOB.”

Mitch hesitated. There was something in the way Donaldson held the folded papers out to him that made his hackles rise. Was this a warrant for his arrest? “I told you I’m turning myself in.” He glanced at Caroline, and she smiled a sad, but proud smile at him. “I’m done running. I’ll take whatever consequences are coming my way.”

His old boss rolled his eyes. “Will you take the goddamned papers?”

For a half a second, Mitch’s pulse skipped a weird tempo. If it was an arrest warrant, Donaldson would be handcuffing him and leading him away, not holding the damn thing out to him like an olive branch.

Against his better judgment, he accepted the papers, unfolded them and started reading.

The moment his good eye skimmed across the words, “…
all charges dismissed…
” his knees went weak. He glanced up. “I don’t understand.”

“What’s there to understand?” Donaldson turned and motioned for Caroline to follow him. “I’m not going so far as to offer you your old job back, but I’m dropping the charges against you.”

He turned and looked at Mitch over his shoulder. “And I don’t ever want to see you in my office for any reason. Clear?”

Mitch stood completely stunned, watching as Donaldson walked past the nurse’s station and nearly ran over an orderly. Caroline was on her phone texting. Her phone beeped and she raised her head. “Grey’s on his way down. He’ll drive you.” She rushed back and kissed Mitch on the lips. “Isn’t this righteous? We’re taking down the Deputy Attorney General! We’re getting justice for Tommy.”

Justice for Tommy. All he’d wanted. Well, that and Caroline. His face hurt when he smiled, but he smiled anyway. He was a free man. Straling was going to face the music. Caroline loved him.

“Righteous,” he echoed.

Across from the nurse’s station, a TV in the waiting area showed a replay of the president on a news channel denying any knowledge of Operation Bulletproof.

Caroline followed Mitch’s gaze. She made a derisive noise in the back of her throat. “He didn’t waste any time distancing himself from all of this.”

“Don’t worry.” Grey was suddenly beside them, looking sharp as ever in a fresh suit. “He’s not above the law. One of these days, he’ll get what’s coming to him.”

Caroline eyed Grey suspiciously. “In what manner?”

Grey patted Mitch on the back and smiled at Caroline “Let’s just say, karma’s a bitch.”

As Grey led the way out of the emergency room doors, Mitch followed, ignoring Caroline’s questioning looks. He paused for a moment in the sun, taking a deep breath, even though it caused him pain.
I’m free
.

Caroline blew Mitch a kiss before jogging off after Donaldson. “I’ll call you later.”

Grey’s Challenger pulled up alongside the curb. Mitch eased himself into the passenger seat.

“Quite a girl you’ve got there, Roe.”

“She’s the best,” he said. “I don’t deserve her.”

“No, you don’t, but then, you always were a lucky bastard.”

“Lucky?” He snorted at the irony. “I lost my career, the girl, and my friends. I was on the run for months and accused of murder, and you think I’m lucky?”

Grey shrugged. “You have me.”

Even though it cost him, Mitch reached over and punched Grey’s arm. Not hard, just a friendly guy punch. Sort of like a hug, but not. “Damn right I do.”

Grey grinned and Mitch grinned back. “Shall we?”

Mitch held up his get-out-of-jail-free papers. “I’m a free man. How about we get a beer?”

Grey put the car in gear. “
A
beer? Hell, after all of this, I’m buying you a whole damn pitcher.”

Lucky. Mitch stared out the window as Grey pulled away, tasting the warm, familiar bite of homesickness inside him.

But now, he welcomed it. This was his new life. With Caroline. With Grey. With a world of possibilities stretching out in front of him.

“I
am
lucky,” he muttered, and held out a fist to Grey. “All for one, and one for all?”

Grey looked a little confused, but fist-bumped him anyway. “You’re coming to work for me officially now, right?”

“Only if you’re paying me. This volunteering shit is over. And none of that stupid election fraud case.”

“Even if the fraud goes as high as the president?”

Mitch hiked a thumb back toward the hospital. “Is that what you were talking about back there?”

“Karma’s a bitch, or in this case, the Justice Team is.”

Mitch laughed. The president might be able to distance himself from the blowback over Operation Bulletproof and his Deputy Attorney General, but in the end, he would get what was coming to him. “I’m in.”

“The Justice Team rides again,” Grey said.

“Really? A western theme?”

“You just quoted The Three Musketeers.”

“You’re right. The Three Musketeers are so yesterday.” And the past needed to stay in the past. “How about The Avengers? Brice would like that.”

“Brice? Is he joining our team too?”

Mitch thought about it. “Might not be a bad idea. We have to break him out of jail first.”

Grey sighed. “Of course we do.”

Chapter Twenty-five

Two days later, Caroline sat on a counter stool in Grey’s kitchen staring at the stainless steel double oven while this puzzle of a man—who knew he had such fancy taste in appliances—poured her a club soda. He wore track pants, a plain grey T-shirt and his hair was damp from an obviously recent shower.

Having never seen him in casual clothes, Caroline wondered if he wore his suits like she wore hers. The armor that kept them focused on the work and only the work. Protection from emotional entanglements.

She glanced down at her jeans. No armor tonight. For once, it might be a good thing. “Sorry to interrupt your evening.”

He slid the club soda in front of her and propped his hands on the granite countertop. “You didn’t interrupt. What’s up? Everything okay? Monroe driving you batshit?”

She laughed at that. On any given day it could be true. Just not today. “As crazy as it is to believe, no.”

Then again she hadn’t spoken to him today. As of last night, he planned on apartment hunting all day. Mitch Monroe, back on the grid. Maybe now they’d actually manage a normal relationship. Not that either one of them knew what the heck normal would be.

A drip of moisture rolled down the side of her glass and she ran her finger over it. Stalling. Really? When had she become such a wussy-girl? She slugged half the club soda.

“You sure you don’t need a scotch?” Grey cracked.

Not a bad idea. “I have a favor to ask.”

“Sure. Let’s hear it.”

As if changing the course of her life were that simple. Sharp tingles zipped down her arms and she threaded her hands together. “Well, uh, okay, but feel free to say you can’t do it. It’s fine.”

“Caroline?”

“Yes?”

“You’re pissing me off. Spit it out.”

The tension wracking her body vanished. Just poof. Gone. She snorted. No wonder he and Mitch got along. “I feel better now. Thank you.”

“Whatever it is, let’s talk about it. If I can’t do it, I’ll say it.”

She believed him. One thing about Mitch, his ability to read people was spot-on. If he trusted Grey, it meant something. That’s all she needed. “I talked to Donaldson this morning.”

Grey tapped his fingers on the counter. “My favorite person.”

“I know. Which is why I’m here. He said I’m not fired.”

Grey boosted himself to a sitting position on the opposite counter, settling in for a chat. “That’s good, right?”

A few days ago—heck, yesterday—she’d have thought so. Now? After all they’d discovered, she wasn’t sure. All she knew was she wanted to do good, to serve the people of her country and, as cliché as it was, put the bad guys in jail.

Somehow, the circumstances surrounding Tommy’s death didn’t give her hope that her role with the FBI would achieve those goals.

She shook her head. “I should have been thrilled and I wasn’t. It’s been a long few days. I’ve learned more than I wanted to and the lessons weren’t necessarily good.”

“I get it,” Grey said. “I was there myself not too long ago.”

“I know. That’s why I’m here.” A thunk sounded from the fridge. Ice cubes dropping into the tray. Something she’d heard thousands of times in her apartment, surrounded by the quiet of her No-Mitch life.

She slugged another gulp of her club soda and set down the glass. “I’d like a job. On your team. As crazy as the New Mexico trip was, I came alive while we were there. I liked playing outside the lines. Mitch is a rebel. Always will be. He’s used to being a pain in the ass. I’m always the obedient one. At least until New Mexico. We may have broken the rules, but it was for the greater good. That’s what I want. And I think your team does that.”

“What team?”

Okay, so he was going to play hardball. Make her work for it, even though he knew she was aware of his current assignment for the Bureau. “The Justice Team. I know what you do and why. I know you and your team are ghosts and that’s the way you want it because that’s how you get things done. But you stand for something that’s very real. Justice. I want real.”

Grey scratched the back of his head and stared out at the darkening sky beyond the wall of windows and glass doors lining the kitchen. “It
is
what we do. I’d love to have someone like you on my team.”

“But?”

He shrugged. “You need to be comfortable doing the work and getting none of the credit. Being a ghost isn’t easy or fun. It’s messy and dangerous.”

That she knew. She’d heard the rumors about the team, but no proof could be found. Anywhere. They kept big secrets, worked under the radar, and covered their tracks. “I’d be okay with that.”

“What about S.W.A.T.?”

For a second, she held her breath.
You didn’t consider that
. If she went to work for Grey, she’d have to give up S.W.A.T. All her training and hard work—not to mention the respect—would be sacrificed.

“Caroline, you’d have to walk away. Think of this as WITSEC. No one can know. You can’t talk about it to anyone outside of team members.”

The FBI had their own version of the Federal Witness Protection Program, and suddenly she wanted to give up everything for it. “I know and I’m ready for that. After I got done with Donaldson, I stopped at my desk for a few minutes. Nothing about it felt right anymore. Knowing what I know now, about Tommy and the politics and how he died, I’m questioning everything. And I can’t work like that. I need to trust the people around me.”

“What’d you tell Donaldson?”

“I thanked him and went back to my desk. What could I say? Go screw yourself? I couldn’t do that after he’d helped us find Zachariah.”