Junkanoo is like Mardi Gras in a fever dream.
The festival began in the afternoon with live music and dancing and has stretched into evening. Now we’re gathered with the swarming throng on downtown Main Street as the parade starts to pass.
Like everything here, the costumes worn by those in the procession are shockingly bright. They wear bikini-inspired attire in neon pinks, greens, and yellows with bell-edged sashes, jewels, gold-encrusted cuffs and collars, and feathered headdresses that would make any Vegas showgirl look underdressed. Their goat-skinned drums pound away a constant beat, and trumpets blare out melodies that fade into one another as the people dance through the street, stomping and twirling, their glittering makeup a riot of sparkle and flash.
The only parades I’ve attended are the kind with kids tossing Tootsie Rolls and horses pulling tractors. The heady atmosphere of Junkanoo, with its wild colors and even wilder dancing, is a cultural shock.
Normally I’d have been in awe, but I’m a bit numb. Ever since the call to Barry this afternoon, I’ve felt cold inside. I just wanted to help, to clear Damon’s name any way I could. Instead I made things worse.
Damon didn’t question me about where I’d been when I staggered back to the shack this afternoon. I was fuzzy with shock, not hearing him or Carmella as they spoke to me, not seeing where I was going. He just guided me back to the chaise and wrapped a moth-eaten blanket around my shoulders. We sat for a long time, his arm circling me, not speaking. I knew he sensed that whatever I’d set out to do, I failed. So he just held me.
Now we do exactly what Carmella said. We show up and hope for
the best.
A girl dances by me in a diamond bikini and brilliant blue plumage, and I shake my head. “How did this get started?” I shout to Carmella above the noise. “Do you know?”
“Slavery,” she says. “Back in the day, slaves on Bahaman plantations would celebrate the winter holidays with costumes and dancing.”
“Wow. It’s more exciting than my family’s Christmas. And there’s a lot less green and red Jell-O.”
Carmella looks at me out the side of her vision while still watching the throng. “You’re like a kid in a candy store. You always like this?”
“When stuff is cool.”
She cocks her head in my direction. “There’s something so . . . weird about you.”
“Yeah, I get that a lot.”
“Where’s it come from?”
A tiny smile touches my mouth. “Belief, probably.”
Carmella groans. “Uggh. Don’t get religious on me. I’m still armed.”
“If you don’t want the truth, don’t ask.”
Now she looks at me head-on. “You really believe in God? Like an actual man hiding up in the clouds?”
“Not exactly in the clouds. But yes.”
“How can you believe something like that? You’re a disaster but not an idiot.”
“Well . . .” I shrug. “I’ve seen too many miracles in my life to doubt.”
Damon, off doing recon at the meeting spot, swims his way through the horde back to us. “Rod should be to the location by now.”
“How did you contact him?” Carmella asks.
“Borrowed a phone from a tourist, called the secure line we’ve been using on the ship. He and Sully have been back and forth to shore all day, but he was there when I called. He thinks he can get away from Sully long enough to come to the meeting.”
“How’d you convince him to come?”
He blows out a breath. “Just asked. I told him if he showed up and watched quietly, he’d see something that would interest him. And if not, then he’d be able to arrest me after.”
“So win-win,” I say weakly.
“He obviously sees it that way.” He looks over at Carmella. “When is McNair showing up?”
She checks her watch. “About ten minutes, if Bembe comes through. Just enough time to get there and set.”
Ten minutes.
“He’s going to recognize me,” I blubber. “McNair is totally going to recognize me—”
“Don’t get hysterical now,” Carmella moans. “We don’t have time—”
“Hey.” Damon catches my face. “Look at me. Look at me,” he says until I finally drag my eyes to his. “You’re going to be fine.”
Desperately I grasp his arms. “How do you know that?”
He looks briefly slowed. “The same way you know I’ll be okay every day I go out on the job. Right? How do you know?”
I feel like a kid as my eyes well with tears. “Because I pray.”
Damon softens. “Exactly.” He’s cupping the back of my head, keeping my focus on him. “I’m praying. That’s how I know it’ll be okay.”
“Praying doesn’t guarantee that.”
“But it does guarantee whatever happens is what’s best for us. Right?” When I try to look away, he gently draws me back. “Right?”
Hesitantly I murmur, “Yes.”
“Then, we take this step and see what happens.” Tenderly he traces the curve of my jaw. “You taught me that. I’m still trying to learn it. But I have a good teacher.”
“We have to go,” Carmella reminds us.
“Just a second.” Damon draws me away a few paces. “Listen, Jack. You were right—you were right about everything.” He’s almost manic with urgency now. “When you said it, I thought you were wrong. I didn’t want to admit it, not even to myself. But you were right.”
“I was?” I’m not used to being right about things. It’s unsettling. “About what?”
“About me and my dad and this whole stupid operation.” He steps closer. “I was trying to prove something. To myself or to him, I don’t know. I think I’ve been trying to prove for years that I’m nothing like him. That I could handle everything and everyone and never flinch. And you were right.” Damon takes a breath. “They could’ve done this op without me. But I campaigned for the job; I really went after it. There’s something I haven’t told you.”
Oh no. He’s married already. He and Lela have five kids and a condo in Florida . . .
“After the Vegas operation I went to Russia.”
I blink, shocked. “You went to Russia?”
“Yes.”
Still I’m blinking. “Like, the country?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you . . . often go to Russia?”
He smiles a little. “This was a first. A couple of the dealers we collared in Vegas used to be muscle for the trafficking operation in Kiev. They gave us enough that our office in Moscow was able to go in and shut down two of the trafficking midway stations. They told us when the raid for the first house was happening and let me on the team of agents that went in.”
I picture him rushing into one of those places with terrifying Russian guys, all of them armed . . . It makes me shudder with nausea. “Why did you go?” I ask.
“I wanted to see the Solokov family’s original operation.” He swallows, and for a moment his eyes look so haunted I feel a chill. His voice is hushed. “I’ve never seen anything like it, Jack. I’ve been with the Bureau long enough; I thought I’d seen some dark things. But what was happening there . . . I don’t think I’ll ever get those images out of my head.”
I’m instantly gripped with sympathy. I hate that he had to see all that. Irrationally I wish I (the girl who can barely handle when Nemo’s mom gets eaten by the barracuda) had been there to shield my agent husband from what he suffered.
“We were able to arrest eighteen guys between the two houses.” A tiny smile touches his mouth and is gone again. “And we recovered thirty-six women. But while I was there, looking into their faces . . .” Damon takes a shaky breath. “I think . . . something broke in me. I’ve always been able to separate myself enough from the job and not get lost in it. But I was there, and all I could think was that every face was . . . Sabrina and my mom . . .” His voice catches, tears in his eyes. “And you . . .”
I grab on to him, and he hugs me back so fiercely I can scarcely breathe. But I don’t want him to let go. I wish I could erase those pictures from his mind one by one. That I could knit that fractured part of him back together with the strength of my embrace.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper.
“No, I’m sorry,” he says. And suddenly we’re babbling apologies over each other.
Damon pulls back to look into my face, holding it in his hands. “I never meant to do this. When you said the Damon before never would’ve put you in this kind of danger, you were right. I never would have even considered bringing you into this kind of situation. But after Russia I was back in the States at a meeting with Interpol. We were discussing options for the investigation, and I kept seeing those faces. I thought of them sending more men into the country—the kind of men who could hurt you . . . and suddenly I was volunteering us for this. I don’t know why. I couldn’t see what I was doing.”
He brushes my hair back from my face, looking at me the way that made me first fall for him. “I didn’t realize I was jeopardizing the very thing I wanted to protect.”
Tears spill from my eyes over his fingers.
“Forgive me, Jack,” he says. I’m not sure who moves in first. But then we’re kissing in that urgent, weepy way you only kiss when you realize you could lose each other.
After a while he pulls back, his lips against my forehead. “I’ll make it up to you,” he promises. “Our honeymoon. I’ll make it up to you, I swear.”
“I don’t mind,” I say. “I’m with you. That’s honeymoon enough for me.”
Carmella is back at my elbow. She sounds a little regretful as she says, “We really have to go. We’re running out of time.”
“Yeah.”
Shakily I straighten the draped, sequined dress I changed into for the meet and secure the pins in my wig for the hundredth time. “How do I look?” I ask Damon.
He manages a tremulous smile. “Like a German bombshell.”
“Just don’t get too attached to the wig. This blonde is not having more fun.” I hold tight to him, and he kisses me once, twice, three times.
“I’ll be watching you,” he promises. “I’ll be close by. I promise.”
We kiss again quickly, chastely. Then I turn and tear myself away, following Carmella into the crowd.