Page 88 of Turn the Tide
“Ellery had lunch with MoneyPenny.” An old nickname that Penny had never found amusing. “I hear you’re retiring. But this situation presents an opportunity for us to help one another.”
This was an ambush, long in the making—Ellery had lunch with Penny a month ago—and he’d walked right into it. Foolish Ashley had unwittingly provided Lee a golden opportunity.
“The president wants someone so fluid with black ops they know when to use a scalpel and when to bust out the sledgehammer. He wants a meat-eater,” Lee said, a term referring to a person with Special Forces experience on missions that’d been violent and bloody. “It’s a lot of power, enough to corrupt the wrong man. A solid moral compass is a prerequisite. The president and Ionlytrustyouto handle it. We get the thumb drive,andyou agree to five years running the Gray Box. Groom a successor, maybe Knox. I’ll convince the president to spare your guys.”
After Sanborn lost his son, he’d tried to fill the hole with the brave, honorable people under his charge. Those closest to him knew his ferocious loyalty to his team.
Lee knew.
Sacrifice came with the life Sanborn had chosen, but five years to save them—hell, six months—would snip the tenuous strings of his marriage.
“She’ll leave me,” he said. “If I don’t retire in June, she’ll divorce me.”
“MoneyPenny will stick by you.” Lee, twice divorced and on his third wife, waved a dismissive hand. “I’m offering you an empire. Handing you a crown. What you’ve always wanted.”
Lee was too blind to see the difference between wanting the ability to get a tough job done and being power-hungry. Sanborn had never wanted to rule an empire, only to safeguard the nation and keep his people breathing, something that had always taken priority over Penny.
She’d given him twenty-three years and a beautiful boy killed serving his country. Endured his sudden vanishing acts and his double life filled with secrets he couldn’t share. In return, he’d given her sleepless nights worrying if he was dead or alive, the chore of caring for his team, the burden of holding a spouse’s hand as they arranged funerals, the heartache of attending their kids’ birthday parties reminding her she was a mother who no longer had a child.
They were supposed to travel the world, start a new chapter that they defined together.
“Penny bought a house in St. Barts.”
Lee gave him an incredulous stare. “What the fuck are you going to do in St. Barts? Go stir-crazy after a week? If Penny leaves you, maybe it’s for the best.” He waved his glass around as if conducting an orchestra. “You need a woman with a job and life of her own who won’t bust your balls out of boredom. Not a debutante who was born with a silver spoon in her mouth and thinks charity work is real work.”
Penny always suspected Lee was jealous of him. Envious he’d earned a full scholarship to Harvard, made monogamy an idyllic inspiration, kept his former commando physique in defiance of age, and had a skill for this dark art others sought to use. There were plenty of wheeling-and-dealing privileged Lees in the world, but only one Bruce Sanborn.
She’d warned him one day Lee’s benevolent acts and platitudes would come back to bite Sanborn on the butt. Well, that day had arrived.
“You have a gift. A scary, crazy gift for covert ops.” Lee’s cheeks were beet-red from the alcohol and proselytizing. “Talent such as yours is a terrible thing to waste. Sayyesto the kingdom I’m offering. Be the hero and save your folks. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? To save them?”
Sanborn’s gaze fell to the tumbler locked in his death grip. Astonishing the crystal hadn’t shattered. He set the glass on the desk, scotch sloshing. Slipping his hands in his pockets to keep from throttling Lee, he went to stand in front of an oil painting, but only saw the face of Penny. They’d fallen head over heels for each other so fast.
Lee was still wheedling in the background, but Sanborn heard Penny’s lilting laugh, saw her smile brighter than sunshine.
The days they’d never share, the promises he’d never keep, the dreams they’d never fulfill together—the nights she’d spend comforted by another—stretched inside him like a yawning grave.
“I need you.” Lee’s voice was sharp with urgency. “Someone I trust, who’ll do the right thing with the Gray Box. Your conscience would be the compass with full authority to deny any mission. Think of the good you could do free from the Agency. I know how displeased you’ve been with them since you lost your boy. Such a shame, real tragedy what happened to him.”
On his son’s first CIA mission, fresh out of college, wet behind the ears—
No.Don’t think of it. He wouldn’t let Lee use his son’s death against him too.
“I have the ear of the president and Howe on speed dial. I can fix this situation for your people likethat.” Lee snapped his fingers. “It’s a no-brainer.”
Penny never faulted him for channeling his fatherly affection onto his team. She would understand why he had to make this choice. Even forgive him for it. And she’d leave nonetheless to have a life with someone who’d put her first.
“If my people are spared…I’ll do it.” His heart sank into oblivion.
“Fantastic!” Lee’s boisterous enthusiasm was a slap in the face.
Sanborn looked over his shoulder. “Allmy people, including Ashley.”
“Of course.” Lee’s eyelid twitched as he nodded. The son of a gun was lying. “I’ll speak to Howe—I mean,Helmutwhile he’s playing this role—but anything that may have already happened doesn’t nullify our agreement.”
“I’m getting on a plane to Berlin and bringing my team home. If anyone gets in my way, I’ll put two bullets center mass and one in their forehead. Do you understand?”
“Sure, I get it.” Lee’s eyes darkened. “Guys like us, we’ve got to do what we’ve got to do. Right? But let’s not forget we’re friends.”
Friendscrashed through Sanborn, tumbling in his gut. The contents of his stomach curdled.
“If you ever interfere with any of my operations again, or deign to send a whitewash team after my people without notifying me first—with justified cause—you and I will not only cease to be friends…” Sanborn let that dagger dangle for a breathless moment. “But I’ll make it my life’s mission to ruin you. Turn you into fodder for the vultures of the media and watch them pick your bones clean.”
Lee flinched, his tan, red face blanching. He gulped the rest of his scotch like it was a glass of courage, met Sanborn’s gaze, and nodded.
