Jaimie: Fire and Ice (The Wilde Sisters 2)

“You can take the night off.”

John nodded again. That, too, was part of the ritual. Far as he could tell, his employer never went anywhere the day or the evening he returned from these infrequent trips. Often, the next morning, there’d be take-out boxes in the trash from a little Thai restaurant, maybe an empty bottle of Johnny Walker Blue or Macallan 25, though he’d never seen his boss drunk.

Come to think of it, he’d never seen him out of control at all. No highs. No lows. Just, on rare occasions, an almost frightening stillness.

“John?”

“Yes. Thank you, Mr. Castelianos, sir.”

“It’s Zach.”

“Yessir.”

Zach rolled his eyes. John flashed a rueful smile.

“I’ll see you in the morning. Sir. I mean, Zach.”

Zach nodded. His hands were already wrapped around the steering wheel; his foot hovered over the clutch. His impatience to set the car free was almost palpable.

“Watch out for the cops, boss.”

Both men grinned. Then Zach checked for traffic and the Porsche shot away from the curb. He shifted the gears, throttled down to a more reasonable speed and headed for the Van Wyck Expressway.

Damn!

Traffic was always bad on the roads leading into Manhattan from Long Island, but it seemed worse than usual this evening. Cars were lined up as if the Expressway were a giant parking lot.

He got off after a couple of exits, wove through a maze of side roads until he hit an area filled with factories and empty streets. He shifted, put his foot down on the gas pedal and took the Porsche to a speed that was still well below what he knew it was capable of doing. The momentary burst of speed, however abbreviated, had been what he needed.

He could feel some of the tension ease from his muscles. The long flight, its cramped confines, and the rush of adrenaline and endorphins that had accompanied him the past ten days had all taken their toll.

He needed a change. Something different. A couple of weeks of doing nothing.

He needed more than that. He needed to believe in something again.

He had, once upon a time. He’d believed in his country, right or wrong. In his heart, he still did. The problem was that the people who made the decisions that ruled his country seemed increasingly intent on making them for their own gain.

Talk about philosophizing…

Zach eased his foot off the gas and pulled into the debris-littered parking lot of an abandoned factory building. He turned off the engine and scrubbed his hands over his face.

Something wasn’t working in his life. You didn’t have to be a man who gazed into your own navel to realize that.

He had a lot of money. He had a home in the sky. He had medals and ribbons and commendations. He accomplished things people said were important, even vital. And…

And there it was, that nagging question he’d been trying to avoid.

So what?

He’d seen a shrink one time. A couple of times, actually, after a particularly intense operation he’d led when he was still in Special Ops. His commander had thought it might be a good idea.

The shrink had listened to him talk. Tried to listen, anyway, but Zach had not talked. Not about anything more than his lack of desire to do so.

“I’m not someone who spills his guts,” he’d said. “I don’t unload on others.”

“Is that what you think connecting with another person is?” the shrink had said. “Unloading? Spilling your guts?”

Zach had shrugged.