Page 53 of Protective Phlox

“What do you mean,” I asked, my arm tightening on Cutter as thoughts of her leaving me flashed through my head.

“I mean, we need to get this threat stopped. I don’t care what you have to do. Find Cesare and force him to remove the hit. I’ll even hand myself over, but they can’t hurt Cutter.”

I sucked in a ragged breath. “We’ll talk about it when you get back, but you’re not handing yourself over. Don’t even suggest it again,” I ordered. “I found out Cesare has been in Vienna and Greece. No excuse for him not to call, but according to my sources, he is going to be back in a couple of weeks. If I have to sit on his doorstep, I will.”

“Can I talk to Mommy?”

“Yeah, here you go,” I said, handing Cutter the phone. Any other time, I would’ve smiled at how adorable he looked holding the phone, which was too big for one hand, in both of his. But my mind was swirling.

I’d lived with threats my whole life. I’d grown used to people wanting to shoot at me and having guards around at all times. When I was twenty-one, Goran took a bullet for me out at a club when a local cartel decided they wanted to make a mark by taking me out. Here I was, preaching to Savannah about safety, and meanwhile, I’d been too blasé about trying to reach Cesare, but no more. Just because nothing had happened yet and tonight was just balloons didn’t mean that someone wasn’t lurking around the next corner.

He would call off the hit, or I would start a war.

Chapter

Twenty-One

SAVANNAH

From what I’d been able to deduce, Samantha was not as stupid as she liked to make herself sound and, in fact, acted like that to purposely be a pain in the ass. For the last two hours while waiting to speak to Matthews, I’d watched her go from highly intelligent conversation to the raving ditz in a blink. It all depended on who she was talking to, and it made me wonder if Matthews had given her a list of people he wanted her to piss off, which was great since it meant that I was on that list.

Matthews’ door opened down the hall, and I could hear his booming voice as he laughed. He walked down the hall with another man in a suit, who, if I had to take a guess, was someone from NCIS. He glanced at me, his expression sobering.

I stood and walked to him as he reached Samantha’s desk. “Executive Assistant Director,” I said.

“Agent Freeborn, what can I do for you?”

“Nice to see you too, Sir.”

He narrowed his eyes. “My office now,” he growled. The tone of his voice would typically worry me, but there was freedom in knowing that it didn’t matter how pissed off he was. I never had to report to him again after today.

He closed the door. The click, once ominous, now made me feel nothing. I loved my job. I loved helping people and solving crimes. But I’d never loved playing politics, and I wasn’t cut out for keeping my mouth shut and falling in line.

“Why should I be happy to see you, Agent?” I opened my mouth, and he cut me off. “That was a rhetorical question. You’ve been a pain in my ass since the moment you got here. Now you’re finally a good agent and help with a major case, and you not only resign, but you marry a Mikhailov, which puts all your closed cases under a microscope. On top of that, I can’t even put you on the stand to testify in the Mancini case because of your connection to the Mikhailovs, which fucks us and all your work over since Marko is dead.”

I sucked in a sharp gasp and took a step back, my heart stopping as my gut twisted into a tight knot. I might not have been romantically involved with Marko, but he’d become family. Oh God, how did I tell Cutter? Grabbing the chair, I lowered myself down and stared into my boss’s furious gaze.

“So you didn’t know that?” I shook my head and closed my eyes to keep myself from bursting into tears. I was still an agent at heart, and that meant you didn’t show that kind of weakness.

“No, Sir, I didn’t.”

“I’m assuming your new husband doesn’t know either?”

“I don’t know, but Nathan wouldn’t go after Marko. He didn’t need to,” I said defensively.

“Says the woman who broke all our rules to marry into a notorious family. What the hell happened?”

I folded my hands in my lap and glanced around at the walls and the awards that I’d planned on one-day earning. That was all over. Was I sorry? No, I could never be sorry about my son, no matter what path it led me down.

“When I was on leave, I went to California to continue investigating my brother’s death,” I said, not sure how much he knew about him being held by Nathan.

“Jesus Christ, Savannah.” He smacked his desk. “I gave you a direct order to stay away from the case.

“I know, but I couldn’t let it go. That is when I met Nathan.” I cleared my throat but sat up straight, determined not to be made to feel dirty about loving him. “Cutter is his son.”

Matthews sat back in his chair and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Do you need witness protection?”

I shook my head. “No, I am staying with him willingly even if the initial marriage was not. It’s complicated, but I realize that I created this situation, so I’m going to do the only logical next step.” Opening my purse, I held out my official resignation. “There is a hit out on me and my son. I can’t tell you from whom, but if something happens to me, this document officially exonerates Nathan from having anything to do with it.” I grabbed my gun and badge and stared at them in my hand before placing them on the desk along with my access card.