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  “If I believed you,” he said easily, “I wouldn’t be here.”

  She glared at him.

  He just smiled genuinely back at her.

  “Okay, enough with the in-house fighting,” Garret said.

  “My sister said she had information that might help find Garret’s brother, but she gave no details,” Astra said coolly. “I’ll forward the email to you.” She pulled out her cell phone, brought it up, and showed it to Jonas. Then she said, “Give me your email.” When Jonas supplied it, she forwarded the message to him. “That’s it. That’s all I have. Talk to Amy.”

  Jonas studied her for a long moment, then gave a clipped nod. “We don’t have any details or even a report about Gregg being missing,” he said. “But, now that we know she’s involved in something to do with him, that’s a whole different story.”

  “That’s quite a leap,” Astra said. “We don’t know that she’s involved in Gregg’s disappearance.”

  “Maybe not,” he replied, “but it’s a likely deduction.”

  “Possibly,” she admitted. Then she glanced at Garret. “I’m sorry. She didn’t give me any details, only that stupid email.”

  “Did you call her?”

  “Yes, several times, and I got nothing.” Just enough bitterness was in her voice that he was coming down on the side of believing her, and she could see it.

  “That’s why I flew over,” she said. “I was actually in France for a conference at the time.”

  “Are you in the government? Like, high up?”

  She gave a bitter laugh. “No,” she said. “I used to be.” She looked at Jonas. “Your intel’s a little outdated.”

  He shrugged.

  “I now work for a private security company,” she said.

  “Please tell me it’s not Kingdom Securities,” Garret said.

  She smiled. “No, it’s not them, and it’s not Bullard’s team either, or you would know.”

  He nodded slowly. “Not too many other big players. Legendary Security out of Texas being the other.”

  “Different kind of intelligence,” she said. “I’m working with an international cybersecurity company.”

  “Okay,” he said. “So you know about my brother being missing—your sister too—but have you done anything to find them?”

  “Outside of contacting you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Not a whole lot,” she said. “I’ve sent out some feelers, but I don’t have any answers at this time.” She looked back at Jonas. “So, as I said, I really don’t have anything more to offer you.” Then, adding an unexpected twist to the conversation, she asked Jonas a question of her own. “Do you have anything to offer me?”

  He shook his head. “No, we don’t.”

  She nodded., “In that case, I guess you can leave then, right?”

  “I guess so,” he said, frowning. He turned to the other two men and said, “I can give you a ride.”

  “No need,” Garret said. “We’ll be fine.”

  Jonas nodded and turned to leave. After a few steps, he stopped and did a half turn, looking back at Garret and Kano. “You will keep me apprised of your comings and goings, correct?”

  “Of course,” he said. “I’m here to find my brother.”

  “See that you stay in touch,” Jonas replied, and, with that, he walked out.

  Astra turned to Garret. “Do you want to go to the coffee shop or up to my room to talk?”

  “Upstairs,” he said immediately. “We also need to get our own lodging taken care of.”

  Kano nudged him gently. “I’ll go ahead and give Charles a call,” he said, already on his phone.

  “What room are you in?” Garret asked, as he turned to Astra.

  “Room 212,” she replied, then led the way to the stairs.

  Kano nodded to Garret, still on the phone, indicating he would join them soon.

  Astra walked up one flight of stairs, then turned to the left. Garret followed behind her. “Are you doing okay?” Astra asked Garret.

  “It’s been a rough few weeks,” he replied.

  She shot him a glance. “I heard about the plane crash. Are you really okay? The reports varied wildly from one side to the other. I didn’t know what to believe.”

  “I’m sure the intel was all over the place. I’m fine now though. A few extra metal pieces, some residual headaches, but I’m back to work.” He shrugged, as little could be done now but give his body time to heal. Too bad the bad blood between his brother, Amy, and Garret couldn’t heal quite so easily. He and his brother had barely spoken in the last three years. Same for Amy. “I wondered why my brother wasn’t there when I came out of the coma.”

  “I’m thinking he didn’t know,” she said. “And even Amy seemed shocked, when I mentioned the accident.”

  “Yeah, but that would imply that Gregg was in trouble even then.”

  “It hasn’t been that long, has it?”

  “Four weeks,” he said.

  “Should you even be back to duty?”

  “Good luck to anyone trying to tell me not to be,” he said, his voice hard.

  She nodded. “Understood.”

  “How are your parents?”

  “Both are deceased,” she said, her tone short. “It’s just Amy and me now.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “We’ve never been close as a family, but, after her split from you, there was a rift between all of us,” she said, with a shrug.

  “Understood,” he said. “You weren’t exactly happy about what she did, as I recall.”

  “No, I wasn’t,” she said. “I’ve tried to talk to your brother about it a couple times, but he won’t discuss it. He always has this kind of haunted look on his face.”

  “That sort of explains it,” Garret said, with a smile.

  “I think Amy took him by surprise.”

  “Yeah, she has that effect on people,” he said.

  “In all fairness to the two of them, I honestly think what they have is something that they may make work.” He looked at her in surprise, as she shrugged. “I know. I wasn’t happy about how they started their relationship without your knowledge, but, now that I see them together, I think it’s a better match than the two of you were.”

  “No doubt,” he said. “No way I want to be married to somebody I can’t trust.”

  “That always meant a lot to you, didn’t it?” she said, as she unlocked the door.

  He walked in behind her, as she tossed her purse and keys on the small counter, then headed to the small coffeemaker and set it up for a pot. She watched him as he surveyed the room. He was tall, dark-haired, lean, and looking a little stressed from everything he’d been going through. His color was a little pale, but, all in all, he looked almost back to full strength.

  His gaze suddenly pierced through her. “So, do I pass muster?”

  She nodded. “Sorry. I was just checking to see how physically exhausted you were. That was a major accident.”

  “Well, I can tell you one thing. Anger, outrage, and the need for revenge are great motivators,” he said. “I’ll make it through.”

  “I have no doubt about that,” she said, with a half smile. “No doubt at all.”

  Chapter 2

  Astra knew she shouldn’t say anything, but she’d never been any good at staying quiet. “That also doesn’t mean you should be putting yourself into more danger than you need to be.”

  “And I won’t,” Garret said, his tone cool. Then got to the point. “So you obviously wanted me alone. What is it you wanted to say?” She hesitated, and he shook his head. “I don’t have time for games here, Astra.”

  “None of us do,” she said. “It’s my sister too.”

  “Got it. We’re both in a position of having to look for our cheating siblings. Siblings that we’re currently on the outs with.”

  She gave a bitter laugh. “You could say that,” she said. “What I don’t know is what we’re supposed to do about it?” r />
  “All that drama aside,” he said, “we still have to figure out what’s going on and try to help them.”

  “I don’t even know where to start,” she said, raising her hands in the air.

  “Where has Amy been living?”

  “In Belgium was the last I knew,” she said, “but she was looking to relocate. I don’t know where. But the last time I actually saw her, she was in Paris.”

  “So maybe we need to go there,” he murmured.

  “No, that was a few years ago. I think she left Belgium because of some danger. I just don’t know what or why. She wouldn’t tell me,” she said.

  “Listen, Astra. I get that you’re frustrated, and God knows your sister has an exceptional ability to do that to both of us. But, if she came from Belgium, then chances are that’s where we need to start our investigation.”

  She frowned at him. “I don’t work in quite the same field as you, but I wanted to start tracking her online.”

  “What you mean is that you’ve already started, right?” he said, studying her carefully.

  She smiled. “You know me so well.”

  “In many ways I do,” he said. “For a while there, it seemed like I was spending more time with you than with Amy.”

  “I know,” she answered, trying to keep her feelings out of her expression. “So why the hell did you even keep waiting around for my sister?”

  “I don’t know. I should have seen what she was like from the beginning.”

  “What I think you should have seen was the attraction between Amy and your brother and the fact that they were hiding something,” she said.

  “Yeah, I know, but it’s hard to see that kind of stuff when you’re locked inside your own feelings,” he said. “I honestly didn’t see it.” Realization dawned on his face. “Are you saying that you did?”

  She nodded. “I did.”

  “Did you think that maybe you should have said something to me?”

  “Are you kidding? Nobody could tell you anything,” she said in exasperation. “Especially me.”

  He burst out with a laugh. “Well, that hasn’t changed. I’m still pretty bull-headed.”

  “Surprise, surprise,” she murmured.

  He just looked at her, as she shrugged. Then came a knock on the door. “I imagine it’s Kano.”

  At that, the knock continued with an odd pattern to it.

  Garret nodded and said, “Definitely Kano.” He walked over, opened the door, and smiled when he saw his buddy.

  “Good thing you’re still around,” Kano said. “I had visions of you getting a hot lead and taking off on me.”

  “Not yet, but we need to get some intel pretty quickly.”

  “It’s possible we could get some from Jonas,” Kano said, “and Charles is expecting us tonight.”

  “Good, at least we have that locked down.” Looking at Astra, he said, “So, outside of Belgium, what do you have to offer?”

  “I’m not even sure Belgium has anything to offer,” she said. “All I can tell you is that none of my sister’s credit cards have been used in the last twenty-four hours and neither has her cell phone.” Hesitating, she finally added reluctantly. “Your brother’s phone hasn’t been used either.”

  “You tracked it?”

  She nodded. “That was the easy part. After that, it gets much harder.”

  “That’s true,” he said.

  *

  Garret didn’t know what to make of Astra at this point. She was so different, and it was hard to see the young girl he recognized from before, yet she came out in little glimpses. He took a deep breath. “Why do I feel like you’re holding something back?”

  She hesitated and then nodded. “Part of the reason for Amy moving from Belgium to London was that she’d given your brother an ultimatum.”

  “Why?”

  She sighed, then shrugged. “Amy’s pregnant.”

  That news was like a punch to his gut. “Jesus,” he said. “Did my brother know?”

  “I don’t know if she told him or not. What I do know is that she wanted a different life, and it was important to her.”

  “So it’s my brother’s child?”

  “It’s your niece or nephew, yes,” she confirmed.

  He stared off in the distance, still getting his mind wrapped around it.

  “So, whatever feelings you may still have for her,” she said, “you probably need to walk away from them completely.”

  He waved a hand at her. “I walked away a long time ago.”

  “But I still get the feeling that you’re emotionally affected.”

  “Not by her but by her deception, her affair with my brother,” he said. “However, for my brother, a pregnancy would be a big deal.”

  “Any reason why?”

  “He’s always said he didn’t plan to be a father,” Garret murmured.

  “Plans change when the facts hit the fan,” she said, her voice cool. “I wouldn’t think he’d be somebody to ditch his responsibilities though.”

  “Oh, I don’t think he would either,” he said. “I’m not sure that we know what’s going on in their personal life, outside of the fact that a big change is happening.”

  “Exactly,” she agreed.

  “And, if my brother is missing and if it’s something suspicious, it would make sense that she would reach out to me through my team,” he said.

  “Why not the cops?”

  “Because of the type of work my brother does, which is very similar to what I do for Bullard—meaning we avoid local law enforcement at all costs and only communicate with the big agencies as a courtesy. Also we heard some suspicion or a theory that he might have had something to do with the plane crash.”

  At that, Astra looked at him in shock. “The plane crash you were in?”

  He shrugged. “I wouldn’t have thought my brother hated me that much, but honestly I don’t know. Maybe he does.”

  “I would say that he did not, but you’re right. We don’t know because we haven’t seen them in years,” she said heavily. “I do talk to Amy at times, but only because she’s called me to complain. And you have to take her words with a grain of salt.”

  Garret nearly growled.

  Astra nodded. “People change, but I would hope not to that extent.”

  “You and me both,” he said, with a hard look.

  She nodded and said quietly, “I get that you don’t like hearing about any of this going on between Amy and Gregg, but it’s still totally possible that Gregg had nothing to do with it. I’d like to believe he’s better than that. Especially as I heard he wanted to reconcile with you.”

  Garret was still dealing with the shock of thinking of his brother as a father. Gregg was younger, a little wilder, and didn’t have quite the reasoning ability that Garret had. But they’d always been close—until Amy came between them. And, for that, he would always hold Amy off to the side because she’d been the thorn that festered.

  Kano, quietly listening from the corner, joined the conversation. “That also explains why she may have disappeared now,” Kano interjected.

  “How so?” Garret asked.

  “Hormones. Pregnancy sets off a storm of hormones, and she may well be seeing things that aren’t there,” he said, “or interpreting them differently that she would otherwise. Or seeing her life as it is and wanting more. Needing maybe time alone to think.”

  Astra winced at that. “I get that whole raging-hormones thing with a pregnancy,” she said, “and I know my sister is on the border of being neurotic in many ways already. But I would hope that she’s erring on the side of safety, for the baby if not for herself.”

  Garret agreed. “I would say she’s definitely protecting the safety of the baby, no doubt about it. Probably in a manner that’s way over-the-top, knowing her.” That statement prompted a snicker out of Astra. “Now it’s a matter of figuring out how we find them,” Garret said.

  “Well, I’m doing what I can do,” she said. “But I
fear I’m in way over my head. My question is, what will you do?”

  “Get them back,” Garret said. “Let’s just hope we can do it before something bad happens.”

  Chapter 3

  On the heels of that statement, chaos reigned. Garret’s phone went off, and so did Kano’s. Astra went over to the counter and picked up her coffee cup, then walked to the window. She’d rented this hotel room because it was the same hotel her sister had been in. She hadn’t been allowed access to her sister’s room, and, as far as she knew, the police had been in, searched, and gone. She had yet to provide that room number to Garret though.

  As soon as they were off the phone, she said, “My sister was staying here, also on the second floor.”

  “You and I’ll head there now. Kano will stay here. Also I’ve got the team searching for whatever they can turn up, and I’ve contacted Charles.”

  “Who is this Charles?” she asked, as they walked to the door.

  “Somebody in town who works in our field.”

  “Good for him.”

  “No, he should have retired a long time ago. In fact, he has one of those jobs that you just never retire from.” He walked to the door, waiting for her to join him, then he shut it, as he walked out into the hallway with her.

  “What about Kano?”

  “Kano’s on his own mission to get information. We’ll pull as many threads as we can to get people on board.”

  “Do you have a team?”

  “A lot of team members,” he said, with a nod. “And we’re running with other teams as well.”

  She wasn’t quite sure what that meant but was willing to accept any help coming their way.

  “Had Amy been working?”

  “No, not in the last few weeks. She’d been doing contract work for art graphics. Websites, logos, branding, things like that. But, since she found out she was pregnant, things kind of went to pot for her.”

  “Again, those emotions boiling over,” he murmured.

  “And again, not necessarily all that there is to this,” she said. “I get that she’s not your favorite person at the moment. Yet, whatever is happening, she needs help.”

  “I get it and would hope that you still know me better than that,” he said. “But the bottom line is that definitely some aspect of her pregnancy is involved here, no matter what else is going on. Being pregnant makes everything different for her.”