HARD FAL (28 page)

Know that I will always be with you both. Know that you are loved, deeply and completely. Know that you are not alone.

Be happy.

Your loving husband.

As I read Seth’s farewell, holding our baby as she slept, surrounded by his family, our friends, and knowing that they were all now my family, I knew he was right.

I don’t know my real birthday, I still don’t know my real name. Although I now know who my mother and father were, I only have the birthday and name that were given to me by strangers.

But I know when my life began. And it was the day two strangers knocked on my door and entered my empty life. The day I found a reason to enter the world, a reason to believe there was something worth fighting for, something worth living for.

The day I met Seth and became the girl who is June Unknown. The girl who does more than endure or survive, but who has learned how to speak up against evil.

The girl who has learned how to live. And, finally, how to love.

Chapter 39

MONDAY MORNING AT
9:04 Lucy marched—well, okay, hobbled, but in her mind she felt as if she were marching—into the Assistant Special Agent in Charge’s office. John Greally was already behind his desk, peering into his computer monitor, a cup of coffee down to its dregs beside his elbow.

Lucy slid the piece of paper that she’d spent all night working on across his desk to him, then stood at attention, using the cane to keep her upright. As soon as this was finished she planned on going home, collapsing, treating herself to an hour long soak in the whirlpool at the rehab clinic, collapsing again, then scheduling an appointment with her surgeon to let him yell at her for jeopardizing his precious creation—aka her ankle and foot—and probably returning to another hell-month of physical therapy and rehab.

She was looking forward to it. For the first time in two months, she felt in control of her life.

Greally glanced at the letter on his desk but not at her. He closed down his monitor, changed to his reading glasses, picked up her letter, and stood to read it. His face remained expressionless as he scanned it once, then again. Finally, he strode over to the credenza lining the wall beside him and slid her carefully crafted resignation letter into the shredder.

Then he turned to face her, brushing his hands together and giving her the same look she’d seen him give his teenager when she acted out. “What the hell was that?”

“My answer. You asked what I wanted. I’ll print you another copy.”

He shook his head and sank into his seat—his administrator’s chair behind the desk, not the chair beside her. “Sit down.”

“I’d rather stand. Sir.”

He glared up at her. “That’s an order, Special Agent Guardino.”

Lucy squinted at him, then shuffled to the seat beside her and lowered herself onto it. “You can’t refuse my resignation. Sir.”

“I can and I will. Because you’re not resigning.” She opened her mouth to protest but he silenced her with a raised hand. “You’re separating from the Federal Bureau of Investigation on a medical pension. There’s a big difference. Trust me, Lucy, all these years behind a desk have taught me how to navigate this maze of red tape. Folks like Ms. Carroll want you to get angry and resign because it saves them time and money.”

“Carroll can go—”

“Now, now. People like her can be useful. You just have to understand the game.” He turned to his computer and clicked a few keys. “I see here that you have twenty-six days of unused vacation time. We can’t even begin the separation process until that’s used up. And then we’ll have to get another complete medical evaluation, documentation of the degree of disability, Carroll will need to have it signed off by DC, then there will be the separation interviews and final paperwork…all told, we should have you free and cleared by the end of May.”

“May?” she protested. “What the hell am I supposed to do until May?”

He raised an eyebrow. “Did you miss the part about vacation?”

“Carroll will never—”

“You let me handle Carroll and her winged monkeys. As for how you fill all those empty days…” He opened his desk drawer and removed a stack of paper clipped pink message forms. Leaning forward, he dealt them out like poker cards. “These came while you were gone the past two months.” He snapped down one group of messages. “Requests for interviews, book deals, and speaking gigs.”

Lucy leafed through them. Major network TV, New York agents and publishers, a famous true crime author. “What the—”

“These,” Greally dealt her another stack of pink paper, “are teaching positions, honorary degrees, non-profit board positions, and these,” a third stack, “are private consulting and security firms.”

“You’ve got to be kidding.” Lucy looked up stunned. He smiled back.

“Face it, Lucy. As many enemies as you’ve made in the Bureau, you’re the public’s ideal of a kick-ass FBI agent. Of course people are going to want you to be the face of their company or non-profit or guest commentary. And they’ll pay good money for it.”

“I’d basically be a paid shill. No way, we don’t need the money that bad.”

He slid another smaller stack of messages out from the desk drawer. Dealt them one at a time in front of her. “I saved the best for last. These are non-profits that don’t want you as just another name on their letterhead; they want you to join them. Full time advisor, part time private consultant, whatever you want. But they’re out there, boots on the ground, getting the job done when local law enforcement doesn’t have the resources and we can’t make it a priority.”

She scanned them more carefully than the previous slips. National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. The Polaris Project. NAMUS. She’d worked with all of them. While not certified law enforcement agencies and with no arrest powers, they did good work—more than the public knew, since they shared all their investigative results with law enforcement and it was the cops who got all the credit.

But these guys, this was where the real work was being done. They saved lives every day, even though they didn’t carry badges or guns.

“Who’s this one?” she asked. “The Beacon Group?”

He leaned back in his chair looking smug. “They’re relatively new, but their funding is solid and so are the people behind them. They’re looking to build a high-quality staff of investigators. Their focus is cold cases, missing persons.”

She nodded. Pretty much where her talents lay—and her interests.

“As of today you are officially on vacation. Once those twenty-six days are up, I’ll start the medical pension paperwork. Should give you plenty of time to investigate your possibilities, talk with Nick and Megan, decide where you go from here.”

Lucy was still staring at the slip of paper. Beacon Group. She liked the name, the idea behind it. Lord knew, after the past several years of working sex crimes, she could use some light to steer her clear of the abyss she’d found herself lost in.

She pushed to her feet with her cane, pocketed the pink slips of paper, then reached across the desk to take Greally’s hand.

“Thanks, John.” She never called him by his first name, not here at work.

He clasped her hand. “Thank you, Supervisory Special Agent Guardino. The Bureau is grateful for your years of service and dedication. You will be missed.”

As soon as she cleared his door, she slid out her cell phone.

“How’d it go?” Nick said when he answered.

“They’re going to force me to take vacation,” she answered with a mock groan. “Twenty-six days. Can you believe it?”

“Cruel and unusual punishment. But perfect timing. Next week Megan’s school is out for spring break—”

“And it’s her birthday. Let’s get out of town, go someplace warm and sunny.” She stopped, turned to the wall, hiding her face from any prying eyes. After months of feeling numb, pushing away her emotions, she suddenly had a hard time stopping tears. How crazy was that? “Someplace where we can be a family.”

“Any thoughts about what you want to do after this so-called vacation?”

“I think Megan had it right. I don’t have to carry a badge to do the job I want to do.”

There was a pause. “And you’re okay with that?”

“Yes.”

His voice dropped, low and intimate. “We good?”

This time she didn’t dodge the question. She stood straight, trying in vain to pour the depth of her feelings into the cell phone. Tears warmed her cheeks but she didn’t turn away from a stray secretary who passed, staring at her with a disdainful arched eyebrow.

She finally had an answer for Nick. Without him she never would have survived any of this. “We’re good. We’re on our way to being great.”

And she meant every damn word.

<><><>

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New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of twenty-seven books, former pediatric ER doctor CJ Lyons has lived the life she writes about in her cutting edge Thrillers with Heart.

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STAY TUNED! Lucy will be back with a new adventure in BAD BREAK, coming Spring, 2015

NEW! Join CJ as she returns to her medical thriller roots with a Novel of
Fatal Insomnia:

In the chaos of the ER, functioning without sleep is a prized skill. But even Dr. Angela Rossi will admit that five months is far too long, especially when accompanied by other worrisome symptoms: night sweats, tremors, muscle spasms, fevers. Then a dead nun speaks to her while Angela is holding the nun’s heart in her hand.

“Find the girl,” the nun commands—although no one else in the trauma room can hear, the words drilling directly into Angela’s brain. “Save the girl.”

Falling into catatonic states where she freezes in the middle of a resuscitation and hears dead nuns talking to her? Not good. Maybe she should check herself into her own hospital…except a lost girl’s life depends on Angela.

Because the girl IS real. The threat to her is deadly.

Aided by a police detective fallen from grace, Angela searches the midnight catacombs beneath the city, facing down a ruthless gangleader and stumbling onto a serial killer’s lair. Her desperate quest to save the girl leads her to the one thing she least expected to find: a last chance for love.