Page 45 of The Rough Ride

“Let me put Ollie down, and I’ll come turn out your light.”

It only took him a few minutes to get Ollie in a fresh diaper and t-shirt. The bruiser was exhausted. It was hours past his usual bedtime.

On the way to Natalie’s room, he texted Liz.

Won’t make it back to your place tonight. Had an incident here. No matter what you see on the news, everyone is alright. Love you.

He found Natalie sitting among five teddy bears in her bed.

“You think you’ll be able to sleep in the middle of all those stuffed animals, kiddo?”

She smiled. “Uh-huh. They’re my night-night friends.”

“Okay. I’m going to turn out the light now.” He reached for the bedside lamp.

“Can I hug you, Mr. Nick?”

What?“Yeah, sure.” He sat on the bed and leaned in, patting her back. “Now go to sleep, you little monkey.”

But Natalie hung on to his neck and kissed his cheek. The kiss was soft as a rabbit’s foot.

“I love you, Mr. Nick,” she whispered.

The breath whooshed from Nick’s body as he held her. No combat zone, counseling, not even Liz could’ve prepared him to hear that short phrase for the first time from an innocent small child. He closed his eyes when they filled and bit his bottom lip to keep it together.

He’d actually taken care of two kids for a full day withouthurting them. Could he possibly be a sort of stand-in dad to Liz’s Ella? His heart skittered for several beats.

“Do you love me too, Mr. Nick?”

Was that what he felt?He’d thought it impossible, but it was somehow—right.

“You’re easy to love, Natalie. Get some sleep, honey.”

27

The next day, Liz cleared security and met Major Chan at the elevator.

“Thanks for coming in on a holiday, Liz. Neither of us wants to be here today, but we don’t have a choice. I need your input once we get upstairs.”

“Not a problem, Major.” But a colossal inconvenience, for damn sure. The last thing she’d wanted to do was leave Ella with Vera for what could end up being a long day, but she hadn’t had an alternative with Arlene away.

They walked the quiet hallway in eerie silence to her office. The lights were already on, and the minute the major unlocked the door, the scent of brewing coffee hovered in the air.

“I brought the coffeepot in here. Figured we’d need some.” The major locked the door from the inside and pulled an extra chair up to the computer.

Liz sat, put on her screen glasses, and logged in.

The major poured two mugs of coffee and joined her. “The first thing you should know is that we’re being recorded.Every word, every facial expression. It’s protocol, and the only way I could avoid calling someone else in to act as witness. Got it?”

“Sure.” Liz had nothing to hide. She didn’t appreciate the cloak and dagger approach but years of government work had trained her to ignore the hidden microphones and cameras and be herself. Liz logged into her social media profiles. “What’s our objective?”

The major scrolled to Dottie Ryan’s page.

“As you are aware, the dark web crew works twenty-four-seven on holidays to monitor any new threats, posts, etc. Dottie Ryan’s profile had a few concerning entries yesterday. They notified me as soon as the messages came in. We’ve already removed Marion Trent’s profile because of the breach last week over the flowers comment. Whoever compromised Marion Trent didn’t stop there. Take a look.” She scrolled and leaned back.

Liz scanned the screen and found the post.

What kind of flowers are your favorite, Dottie?

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