“We’ll find a place where they can turn a hose on both of us,” Nicholas said, and gave her a wink.

“May I also suggest you put some ice on that shiner?” Zachery said. He patted her shoulder once again, shook Nicholas’s hand, then set off to talk to the firemen at the triage center.

“Get the chemical ice pack out of the first-aid kit in the boot, Mike. It’s quicker than stopping off for a bag of peas.”

She quickly found the ice pack since all the pool cars had the same equipment. She broke the pack as she climbed into the front seat, pressed it against her face and leaned her head back against the headrest, and felt the blessed freezing begin.

She said, “You don’t have any sleeves. Dare I ask what Nigel will have to say to you?”

He laughed, and it felt good after this nightmare of a night—well, at least for a moment.

He fired up the Crown Vic and headed back for the bridge.

Mike lifted off the ice pack and pulled down the passenger mirror. She really didn’t want to look, but she had to. Oh my, not good. At that moment, she saw her mother staring at her, horror clear on her face. She lightly touched her fingers to her cheek. Bruises galore, and a lovely plus—her skin was lobster-red from the few minutes with the ice pack. She groaned and slapped the visor closed. She looked over at Nicholas. Sure enough, he was smiling, a brow arched. “I shouldn’t have looked. The truth doesn’t always set you free. Sometimes it terrifies.”

He laughed. “You do look like you went rounds with Lord Queensberry himself.”

“Isn’t Queensberry one of your grandfather’s swanky friends?”

“Possibly, though a few generations removed. He’s a famous British boxing enthusiast. You’ve heard of Queensberry Rules?”

“Yeah, yeah, it figures it would be a Brit who decided the proper, most civilized way to go about killing each other.”

He reached over and lightly touched his fingers to her cheek. “Even though you look a bit rough, Agent Caine, all those men you rescued tonight would agree an angel saved them. The ice pack should help.”

She said, “When I’m done with it, you can use it. You’re a bit on the edge yourself.” She paused, then, “And they’d say you’re an angel, too.”

He shot her a grin with a raised eyebrow, his teeth shiny white against his soot-black skin. “Have I ever told you you’re fierce?”

She gave a small laugh. “You want to tell me what you mean by that?”

“Let’s say if you were my mom, I’d know to my core you’d keep me safe.”

She felt a warm glow all the way to her belly. “Thank you.”

Once over the bridge, he said, “What’s the fastest way to your place?”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“Well, yes, of course. Despite the three agents, we’re going to make certain Mr. Hodges is safe and sound and hasn’t thought of anything else useful. But if Zachery finds out, I’m telling him it was all your idea.”

10

PAWN TO D5

Richard Hodges’s house

Bayonne, New Jersey

Nicholas retraced their steps to Bayonne. Mike, her face set, stared back at the burning refinery.

“We weren’t in time, Mike, but we did good. Are you all right? No broken bones you’re keeping from me?”

“No, nothing,” she said, still staring back.

“I ask because you’re practically vibrating.”

Mike gingerly pressed the ice pack back to her cheek. “Yeah, I guess I am. I’d like to hit something. I hate what we saw tonight. So much death, so much destruction.”

He gave a humorless laugh. “I feel precisely the same way.”

She turned to face him, drawing her legs up on the seat. “I’m sorry, of course this would remind you of your past as well.”

Some things were better left unsaid, so he simply shook his head. “You’ve seen this kind of destruction before?”

So he didn’t want to talk about the huge betrayal in Kabul. She knew enough. She said, “My dad was in Oklahoma for work when McVeigh bombed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. I was ten. I spent hours watching it on television, and when he came home, he showed me some of the pictures his team had taken, not of dead children, of course, even though I knew of their deaths, just as I knew he’d taken out many of the really bad photos, but it was still too much. All of it brought about by a misguided madman.

“I was sixteen when Nine-Eleven happened.” Her voice rose, and she smacked the dashboard with her closed fist. “These sons-of-bitches and their bombs and attacks, it still makes me so mad I knew if I had them in front of me, I’d blow off their worthless heads.” She sucked in her breath, knew her blood pressure had spiked to the stratosphere. “Sorry, but it really pisses me off. Unlike you, I haven’t ever been in the middle of it, but I’ve seen enough.”

“Is this why you became a copper?”

“Not really. You know my dad’s a cop, so I knew the life, knew I wanted it. Dad was all for it. But my mom, do you know she’s still known in Omaha as the Gorgeous Rebecca? Yes, Nicholas, unhoist your eyebrow. Mom was a beauty queen, Miss Nebraska, as a matter of fact. My mom the beauty queen had great plans for me, her only daughter. She wanted me to be some sort of model or maybe a movie star, although I could never act my way out of a paper bag, or maybe marry a rich guy and have beautiful kids. But even as a bratty teenager, I never gave her vision of my future serious thought.” She paused. “When I was accepted to Yale, she decided maybe a highfalutin education would be just the ticket. She saw me marrying some eastern politico, I think.

“But she’s come around, likes to talk about her daughter, the FBI special agent who lives in New York City. She and Dad come to town at least once a year and see an endless round of Broadway shows and eat at fancy restaurants where all the waiters gawk at my mom, and my dad just sits there, shaking his head, and grinning.”

“You look like your mom?”

“Ha. In my dreams, but I guess I look like her more than Dad. And she still looks like my older sister.”

“And then there’s your younger brother, Timmy, who also lives here in New York. You said he’s a wannabe actor, right?”

Where were all these coming from? To distract her, Mike realized. He was good, she had to admit it. “Timmy—well, he’s another matter entirely.” And she shut it down, as he had before.

Nicholas saw that she was relaxing, that she was rebooting, getting back her balance. “And then you went to the FBI Academy and blew everyone away. Yes, I read your dossier. You made the New York CID office at twenty-six, one of the youngest agents to fill such a position. From personal experience I can add that you’re pretty hot stuff, Agent Caine.”

Hot stuff? She’d rather be fierce. “How in the world did you get ahold of my personnel file?” She smacked his arm, his bare arm, which was as black as his face. “You and your hacker talent. Don’t whine, you deserved the punch.”

“Well, that, plus your instructors in Quantico loved to talk about you. I think you might have broken a couple of hearts. Believe me, I grilled them, since no way I wanted to be partnered with a slacker. They said you were pretty good, Agent Caine. Actually, Mr. Filbert, the shooting range supervisor, said I’d have to bust my butt to keep up with you.”

“Those instructors, Mr. Filbert especially, they’re jokers, experts at spotting gullible marks, plus you’re the freaking Brit who rescued the Koh-i-Noor diamond. They figured you had to be full of yourself and wanted to cut you down to size. Trust me, they were putting you on. Now, talk about making his bones at the Academy, you walked away with an award or two yourself.”

“Only one.” That got him a smile. At last.