“You sure Shannon won’t mind?” Sasha asked Trina as she rummaged through the closet of Trina’s friend to fill a suitcase. Dressing like herself would not be a part of the plan for the next several days. Only one skintight black outfit had been tucked into the bottom of the case for if and when she needed to disappear at night. All she was missing was a wig or two. Not something Trina had on hand. Neil had a couple of different styles en route to the airplane that would take her and AJ to the East Coast.
“We’ve already gone over this. Shannon thinks the world of you.”
Sasha wasn’t used to hearing things like that. She was pretty sure her expression showed her doubt.
Trina turned away, reached on a high shelf, and removed two more sweaters. “We all do. If you gave us half a chance, you might realize that.”
Sasha paused midstream, looked up from the suitcase. Her heart did a double beat and the feeling of blood rushing too quickly from her head had her sitting on the edge of the bed.
“I’m sorry . . . that wasn’t called for,” Trina said.
“No. It’s not uncalled for.” Sasha tossed a shirt into the suitcase and stared at her hands. Then, in Russian, she muttered, “I don’t know how.”
Trina set the sweaters down and sat on the bed next to her.
“I came to that conclusion a long time ago. I just thought that with time you’d realize that there are people here who care about you and that maybe you’d let us in.”
She wanted to say she was trying but knew that would be a lie.
“I remember when you texted me after Wade proposed. In fact, I took a screenshot of the message because it meant so much that you reached out to congratulate me.”
Sasha remembered that night. Wade had pulled his then girlfriend up onstage during a concert and then proceeded to propose to her in front of thousands of fans. Sasha had been in the wings, playing security without Trina even knowing she was there. Like everyone in the audience, she’d been stunned to see the open display of love and affection and more than a little moved by it.
“You deserve happiness,” Sasha said.
“So do you. From where I’m sitting, you deserve more happiness than any of us. You’ve touched the lives of everyone here. You were a big part of helping Reed and Lori, keeping her away from your fath—Ruslan.” Trina stuttered on the word father. Ruslan Petrov may have been the sperm donor, but he wasn’t her father.
“You’ve gone into battle with Neil and his team. You stopped Ruslan from destroying all of our lives. You helped Avery find and chase away her demons, and you even flew all the way to Barcelona just to tell Shannon to stop being selfish and think of others before flying halfway around the world to escape her problems. Now you’re helping that poor girl and AJ, a man you’ve only known a few weeks.” Trina stopped long enough to stare.
Sasha took a deep breath.
“You help everyone. We trust that you’ll be there. When will you trust that we will be here for you?”
“The moment you trust someone to be there is when they leave,” Sasha muttered.
Trina squared her shoulders, placed her hands on her knees like she was going to stand. “You can’t say that about anyone here. You trust us all, right now, just by being here. Now all you need to do is open the door a little wider and realize people love you.”
She flinched.
Trina grinned and stood. “So, what is your disguise going to be? The Valley girl housewife or something completely different?”
The change of subject put Sasha at ease. “I haven’t decided yet. Depends on what will throw AJ’s father off the most.”
Trina removed a long coat, tossed it on the bed. “I hope for AJ’s sake his father isn’t involved in any of this.”
Not likely. “I agree.”
“You know, I didn’t quite see you with a guy like him.”
Okay, now they were moving into completely uncharted territory. Sasha stood, took a defensive position over the suitcase, and continued to pack. “I’m not with him.”
“That’s not how it looked to me.”
“He’s an itch.” Even saying it out loud felt like a violation.
Trina grinned. “Well, I haven’t seen you scratch anyone. I kinda always pictured a guy with more tattoos than suits and riding beside you on a motorcycle.”
She couldn’t stop her amusement. “I’ve scratched that guy a time or two.”
Laughing now, Trina nodded. “I knew it. AJ just seems so, I don’t know . . . normal. Not a rebellious bone in his body.”
Sasha thought of the night before, the way he held her down when he crawled on top of her. His occupation.
“Ohhh, I want to know what caused that expression,” Trina teased.
Sasha wiped the smirk off her face. “He knows when to be defiant.”
“I’ll remember that.”
The two of them finished packing a suitcase full of borrowed clothing and walked out of the room.
“And don’t worry about Claire. Between hoop jumping for Neil and helping me out with Lilly, we’ll keep her busy.”
“I wasn’t worried about Claire,” Sasha lied.
“Sure you weren’t. Just take care of you. No crazy risks.”
“I’ll try.”
AJ sat across from Sasha on yet another private plane, this time just the two of them and a plane that belonged to an oil company. Apparently there was no end to the wealth accumulated by her friends. They were an hour out from DC, where they had a rental car waiting.
Sasha was transforming. First the blue contacts went in, then the pale foundation that washed much of the color from her face. It was as if she were diluting her genes out of her system right before his eyes.
“Who is the one celebrity that you’d give it all up for to be with for one night?”
Her question caught up with his brain and he stuttered. “Ex-excuse me?”
“Celebrity crush. Who is it? Or artist. I’m not sure what blows your horn more.”
She lined her lips with pink, filled it in with a nude lipstick.
Two Jennifers came to mind. “Is there a reason for this question?”
She smacked her lips together, peered over her nose while she put the cap on the lipstick and placed it back in her makeup bag. “I need a name. Sasha isn’t going to work.”
Ohhh . . . “Jennifer.”
She held her breath, stared in disbelief. “Jennifer it is.”
He was starting to like this fantasy.
“Do your parents know where you’ve been or what you’ve been doing?”
“They haven’t known what I was doing since the seventh grade.”
“When was the last time you spoke?”
“At Amelia’s funeral. Wait, I did speak to my mom right before I flew to Germany.”
“Not your dad?”
“No.” He had made a routine of avoiding conversations with his father as much as humanly possible.
“Did you hint at flying overseas?”
AJ pinched the bridge of his nose. “I was angry he wasn’t looking into Amelia’s death harder. I was an ass . . . didn’t realize that she was grieving and wasn’t in a place to process anything other than the fact that my sister was gone.” The weight of that sat in his chest.
“Have you processed that?”
AJ glanced up, had a hard time meeting her eyes. “Probably not. It’s why I’m still functioning.”
“Falling apart later is a good plan,” she said softly.
He glanced over, found her studying her image in the mirror. “When was the last time you fell apart?”
AJ noticed her fists clench.
“Do you? Fall apart?”
He saw her go through a process . . . deep breath, relax her hands, ease her shoulders, close her eyes, and blow air out slowly. He’d seen this before . . . her reset button. He’d bet money she’d change the subject with her next words.
“You went to Vegas. Wanted to get lost in your grief. We met, spent the next several days consuming tequila and blowing money. You went back with me to LA. I rent a guesthouse in the Hollywood Hills. Not traceable. I wait tables. You’ve been footing the bill. My clothes, trip back home. You think I’m the one.”
AJ ignored her change of subject, smiled at the way her resolve and control centered her. Apparently later hadn’t come for her, and falling apart wasn’t an option.
“The one?”
“Yeah. Jennifer Stone. Waitress and insecure. Never graduated from college, wanted to be an actress. I’ll play it close enough to perfect to where they won’t dismiss me on sight but want to know more about me. When your mother . . . or maybe your father opens up, that’s when you start asking questions.”
AJ sat back, rested his ankle on his knee at thirty thousand feet. “What kind of questions?”
“About raising children . . . boarding school? I’m the one, you’re thinking about those things. How did your parents manage with your father working all the time? What was the goal? Did they regret anything? This is when you capture as much information as you can.”
Could he do that?
“Stay focused. Don’t fall down an emotional rabbit hole. Your sister’s death has made you reconsider a lot of things. And that’s what I want you to think about when we’re there. Amelia. Can you do that?”
“Explain to me why we can’t walk in there, show my father the picture, and ask what the hell is up?” Confront the question head-on. That was his way.
Sasha placed both hands on the table, stared with her lips in a thin line. “How well do you know your father? Do you know his friends, their friends? How about his time as the ambassador? How much were you aware of, living in the States while your sister was at Richter?”
Her questions were fired off so fast he couldn’t begin to answer them.
“If your father is guilty of anything, he won’t answer your questions with the truth.” She paused. “But you already know that. We stay long enough to gather information, for me to get into your father’s computer, see if there is any connection still lingering between him and Pohl.”
“I can’t fathom my father having anything to do with Amelia’s death.” He pictured his father’s face at the funeral. He’d aged five years that week. He said next to nothing to anyone at the funeral or the reception after. It was his mother who thanked everyone for coming and played hostess.
“He may have no idea. Before we leave, we’ll know one way or the other.” Sasha turned back to the mirror, picked up the dirty blonde bob cut wig and pulled it over her head. Within a few minutes she’d managed to tuck and comb away any sign that the hair wasn’t her own. She shook her head several times, fluffed the edges, and turned to smile at him. “What do you think?” Her question was said with her perfect American accent.
He walked over to her and touched the edges. Before she could protest, he leaned down and kissed her. “Not bad, Jennifer.”
Sitting in the passenger seat of an economy rental car while AJ drove them from the airport to Amelia’s condo offered Sasha the opportunity to watch his emotions. The closer they came to his sister’s place, the harder he gripped the wheel.
“You certain your parents haven’t gone in and cleared the place out?”
AJ shrugged. “I told them I’d do it. My mom wasn’t in a place to do anything when I left.”
“Your dad?”
“I never could read the man. Hopefully you’ll have better luck.” They’d picked up a dozen empty boxes that were in the trunk of the car. While they looked for any possible clue that Amelia may have left behind, they’d disguise their effort by packing some of her belongings.
He turned into a shared driveway and pulled into a parking space beside a compact car.
“Hers?” Sasha asked.
AJ nodded.
She placed her hand over his and squeezed.
“Ready?”
“Fall apart later, right?”
She could practically taste his pain. “That’s right.”
He faked a smile and pushed out of the car.
The second they were out, Sasha placed her hand in his and held on like a good girlfriend who was being supportive to her guy would.
They walked into the building and took the elevator up to Amelia’s condo on the third floor.
Bits of the police tape hung from the entry. Evidence that the condo had been through a police investigation started at the door. Black powder used for dusting for prints peppered the frame.
AJ hesitated, then pushed past the door, and walked inside.
Once they were secure, she let loose his hand and dropped the smile.
The condo looked like it had been overturned and then someone attempted to put it back together. Mail overflowed the box sitting by the mail slot.
Sasha started doing her thing. “How long did she live here?”
“Since she took the position at the UN. Five years. She wanted a place she could lock up and leave when she was traveling.” AJ picked up the mail that had fallen onto the floor and took it to the countertop separating the kitchen from the living room.
Clean lines, nothing fussy about the furniture. The monochromatic beige and shades of white reminded Sasha of the dorms at Richter. The only pops of color were two bright green pillows on the sofa and a framed picture hanging on the opposite wall. Sasha peered closer, recognized Amelia. “Do you know who is in this picture with your sister?”
AJ looked up from the mail. “No idea.”
The phone rang, piercing the silence in the room.
AJ and Sasha both stared at it. When he moved to answer, she held up a hand, stopping him. The answering machine picked up in three rings, a woman’s voice Sasha assumed was Amelia’s greeted the caller. “You’ve reached me, you know what to do.” A computer generated voice told Sasha that a solicitor, and not a person, was on the line. “This is the League of Disabled Veterans, we have you on file as a concerned patriot who has donated to our organization in the past. With the holidays fast approaching, we would like to reach out and—”
AJ moved to pick up the line. “Damn money sucking—”
Sasha stopped him before he could say more. “It’s okay, honey. They don’t know.” She adopted her Jennifer voice and placed a finger over her lips to shush AJ before he asked any questions.
The answering machine finished the recording, and Sasha pressed the playback button. “You have two unheard messages.” They listened to the first message, which was a series of tones, as if a fax machine had called in, and then the veterans call they’d just heard.
“What?” AJ asked.
Sasha picked up the phone, listened for the dial tone. Nothing.
“Does your sister have a radio? I think music will help us get through this, don’t you?”
AJ moved through the room, ducked into the hall, and returned with a portable speaker and proceeded to connect his cell phone to the Bluetooth. Within two minutes music drowned out the silence.
She moved closer to AJ, lifted her lips to his ears. “Someone has been checking and erasing Amelia’s messages remotely. We need to check for surveillance.”
He nodded. “I’ll go get the boxes.”
The moment AJ left, Sasha turned her attention to the space. Where would she place cameras, bugs . . .
The minimalist furnishings didn’t give her many options.
She removed her cell phone from her back pocket and moved through her built-in security and found the application she needed. Without being obvious, she turned on the scanner and walked around the room, pointing her camera at the walls, vents, and electronics. Sure enough . . . in the air return vent on the ceiling, a tiny red dot suggested a camera was watching. The question was who was on the other end, and if they were still watching. Turning her phone on mute, she started walking around as she pretended to be texting someone.
AJ walked back in, boxes overflowing his arms.
“We forgot tape,” AJ said as he dumped the boxes in the center of the room.
“Maybe Amelia had some.” Sasha knelt behind the counter and followed the glowing red lines on her phone, telling her there was some type of audio device close by.
“I don’t think she was planning on moving.”
“That doesn’t mean she wouldn’t have duct tape or some kind of thing like that. If not, we can just fold the boxes and tape them later.” She opened and closed the cabinet under the sink and kept moving. The red lights pegged out a small basket filled with pens and highlighters.
“The dust in here is starting to affect my allergies.” Sasha turned on the faucet and filled the kitchen sink.
AJ watched her from across the room, lifted a palm to the air, and questioned her with a silent lift of his eyebrows.
She pulled several sheets from the paper towels by the sink and proceeded to dunk them in the water and wipe off the countertop. She moved a wooden block filled with knives, cleaned up under them, shifted to the basket of pens, set it close to the edge of the sink, and dusted under it. “How about an outside storage? I bet there would be box tape—” Sasha moved quickly and the basket of pens, the one that held an audio bug, was dumped into the sink. “Oops.”
AJ walked up behind her, looked in the sink while turning off the water. “We don’t have to do this. It can wait.”
Sasha removed the pens that were not bugged and took her time with the one in question.
“No, we should pack up a few things and take them with us.” She picked up the pen, removed the cap, and knocked out the tiny microphone.
AJ stared into the sink, his lips pressed together.
Sasha turned into his arms, told him about the camera with a soft whisper in his ear. “Wash this down the sink, I’m going to check out the rest of the place.”
He kissed the side of her neck and she left the kitchen in search of the bathroom. After searching the bedroom, small office space Amelia had made out of a nook, and the bathroom, Sasha determined the only device left was the camera that they couldn’t disassemble without it being obvious that they had found it.
Not that it mattered, they couldn’t linger.
“Honey?” Sasha called AJ from the bedroom.
He walked in with a box.
She closed the door behind him. “What the hell?” AJ asked, tension filling his shoulders.
“We have no way of knowing if the camera is still in use. Or who was watching. Pack up her computer, grab her files and photographs. I’ll forward the calls from her phone to Neil, find out who is policing them.”
“You can do that?”
She patted his chest. “Are you taking notes?”
“Wouldn’t the police have found the camera and bugs?”
“The murder didn’t happen here. Looks like they went through the place, but it’s not completely trashed. And there is no way of knowing if these things were here when the cops came through.”
He offered a slight grin. “I don’t like this.”
“Me either. We need to get out of here.”
They doubled their efforts, filled three boxes, and then she pretended to start sneezing and they backed out of the house.