Night Fall (The Quantico Files #1) - Nancy Mehl Page 0,13
one would even know it was the same place. Except for the basement. He hadn’t changed anything down there. He was also the only one allowed to go downstairs.
Adam’s arms itched. He scratched them, but it didn’t help much. Maybe it was this wool sweater Sally bought him. He didn’t want to hurt her feelings, but he might have to stop wearing it.
“You’re still itching?” she asked. “This has been going on for quite a while.”
He nodded. “Not sure why. Just dry winter skin, I guess.” He paused a moment before going downstairs to get what he needed. “You’ll read to the kids before they go to bed?”
She stopped making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and looked at him. “Of course. We’re getting close to being halfway through The Book. I’m so glad we have your father’s copy. He taught you well. And I think it’s time to tell the children their daddy is called to bring destruction to a third of the earth, don’t you?”
Adam smiled slowly. “Yes. I think you’re right.”
Sally took a slow, deep breath, and her eyes grew shiny. “They’ll be so proud. I know I am.”
“Thank you, dear,” he said as he unlocked the door to the basement and prepared to step into his destiny.
With the threat of a possible deadly pathogen being released on the public, FBI’s Critical Incident Response Group sent a small plane to get Alex and Logan to Wichita as soon as possible. Monty took the plane Alice Burrows ordered to Kansas City.
The Kansas Bureau of Investigation had been alerted to the situation and requested permission to approach Alex’s aunt themselves given concerns about time. Their request had been denied. Alex made it clear she had the better chance of getting Willow’s copy of The Book quickly. They were sending an agent from the resident agency in Wichita to pick them up at the airport. Hopefully, Alex and Logan wouldn’t have to deal with bruised egos with any agency, the FBI or otherwise.
To be honest, Alex wasn’t convinced she’d be able to get The Book either. She hadn’t talked to Willow for years. She’d forced herself to call from time to time, but Willow rarely answered her phone, and her landline wasn’t set up for voice mail.
As their plane approached Wichita, Alex’s stomach tightened, and she began to feel nauseated. She was disgusted with herself. She was a trained behavioral analyst with the FBI. She’d faced the worst the world had to offer. Murderers, rapists, child molesters. Terrorists intent on killing large groups of innocent people. Human traffickers. She’d looked into the eyes of evil many times and had learned to control her reactions. But since seeing words from The Book painted on the sides of train cars, the fear she’d overcome in her twenties was trying to make a reappearance. It was silly. She was afraid of a woman in her sixties who had never hurt anyone that Alex was aware of. Was she being unfair? Was she taking her pain out on Willow?
An incident she’d almost forgotten flashed in her mind, making her wonder if Willow really was harmless. Suddenly Alex wasn’t so certain. Maybe that was why she was so apprehensive about seeing her again. She pushed away the memory and instead thought about the day she first met Willow—her mother’s only sibling. She knew her mother had an older sister with whom she’d once been close. But her mother told her they’d simply grown apart. That Willow was sweet but had “emotional problems.” They’d never visited her aunt, and Alex never thought much about her.
Then her mother died.
The caseworker assigned to Alex must have realized that her aunt was nuts as soon as they arrived at the house. Living in dirty, messy surroundings and dressed like some kind of hippie from the sixties, Willow LeGrand was clearly living on some other planet. One Alex had no desire to visit, let alone stay there until she was eighteen. But the caseworker had just dropped her off and walked away, even though Alex had pleaded with her not to leave her there. It was obvious the woman couldn’t have cared less. Just another case checked off her list.
It took Alex weeks to get the house clean and figure out how to feed both of them. Willow had been existing on candy bars, chips, and pop, but she gladly gave Alex money from her disability check so she could go to a neighborhood grocery store and buy food. Within three