“Let me cook. Can you handle it up here? Maybe a half hour more this heading and then we can either turn south or just cut the engine and drift a bit, get ready for the sunset.”
“Of course.”
He stepped aside. “The helm is yours.”
“Bri?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you.”
“Love you too.”
40
Caribbean Sea
The boat was at rest.
The sky rich with stars, the whole galaxy unfolding.
Whatever happened tonight, she needed to remember just how unimportant she was. How unimportant her life was, in the grand scheme. As long as the kids were safe.
Not that she wanted to die. She didn’t. She had no intention of dying. But she knew she might. She wasn’t sure what Brian was planning. But she saw the position he had put her in. The slow, steady moves he’d made. Separating her from her gun. From witnesses. From police. Anyone who could help, anyone at all. Getting her drunk.
Though she wasn’t quite as drunk as she seemed. She’d had her share of the first bottle, but since he opened the second she’d only nursed a glass. She was afraid of getting dehydrated because of her leg, she told him. He joked a couple of times about her not keeping up, but he didn’t push.
He stopped the Chris-Craft in time for them to watch the sun disappear over the horizon, the sky above turning from blue to black. Somehow, without talking it over, they decided to stay out for the night. He finished making dinner, cracked the lobsters, tossed a salad. She set the table, poured them water and champagne. The low companionable work of marriage. Maybe if she’d been home for more dinners. Maybe they would have been stronger together, loved each other more. Maybe Brian wouldn’t have grown so lost.
Or maybe not. Maybe he was who he was. Maybe they would just have bored each other sooner. Nothing more useless than trying to guess how a mythical past might change an impossible future. Becks knew she wasn’t much of a romantic. Even before she joined the FBI, she’d never been a unicorns-and-flowers girl. Brian wasn’t particularly romantic either, though he could fake it.
Seemed he could fake almost anything.
* * *
She was standing near the front of the Chris-Craft now, looking into the blackness, the boat rocking on the chop of the waves. She didn’t have to be an oceanographer to know that they’d headed into open, rougher water. Maybe it wasn’t the Atlantic, exactly, but it wasn’t the Caribbean either.
Brian was still in the kitchen, washing the last dishes.
Only he wasn’t. He was behind her. His hands on her shoulders. “Gorgeous, huh?”
“Gorgeous.”
“I’d forgotten what it’s like to be so far from anything.”
“It feels good.”
“Becks. You ever wonder what our life would have been like if we’d had kids later? If we’d traveled more?”
“Not really. No do-overs, right? Only one ride on the coaster. Anyway, soon Tony will be in college and we can start again. Have all those things.”
“Yeah.” He sounded unconvinced.
She turned to him, looked into those blue eyes of his. Thought of the first time they’d said I love you, how she’d wanted the world to stop forever in that moment.
But the world didn’t stop, did it? It whirled like a centrifuge until it revealed every truth. Back then she’d thought his eyes were perfect. Flawless. Now they just looked cold.
If it’s going to happen it’s going to be now.
Still she had to be sure. She would rather die than not be sure.
He kissed her.
“Can you play through the pain?”
“I’m sorry, Bri. But—”
She dropped to her knees.
* * *
The sad truth: Kira had given her the idea when she’d told Rebecca about what had happened with Rodrigo. I knew the best way to distract him was putting his cock in my mouth. Works every time. Men, right?
Jesus, Kira.
Yeah, that’s pretty much what he said. She’d laughed, a cold laugh that reminded Rebecca of no one so much as Brian. But then Kira was half Brian, wasn’t she? She’d make a great FBI agent. Or a great criminal.
* * *
Brian responded immediately. And vigorously. And he didn’t need long.
“Oh God. That was. Wow.”
She wiped her mouth, looked up at him. “Where’s the champagne.”
He handed over the bottle.
She took a pull. Felt it hit her right away.
He looked her over. A gleam in his eyes. Hard. Unsettling.