Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 146417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 732(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 146417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 732(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
He'd spent years thinking his brother had died trying to save a group of young women from their jihadist kidnappers. He’d made his brother a saint in his head, and he was having trouble remembering Ezra had been human and flawed.
Ezra sat up straighter, as though the soldier was still in there somewhere. “We were supposed to pass off a package to a rebel leader in the area. I don’t know what was in it. It was odd, though. When we actually got there, the man we met with looked like an American. I didn’t hear him talk because I was standing in the back. I wasn’t feeling great.”
Because he’d been coming down off a high. Because his brother had been using drugs.
How would he have reacted back then?
“Solo, what had you been told about the op?” Alex asked.
“Not much. I’d been told it was highly classified and I wasn’t allowed to discuss it. I did not know who the original handler was. It was odd but not unheard of. It was stranger that Beck knew about the op. I should have gone straight to my boss and made a report, but I didn’t want to get my brother-in-law in trouble. That was my fault. If I had, we likely wouldn’t be in this position.”
“No recriminations are necessary,” Tag announced. “I think we can all agree that putting Solo on that headset was part of Levi’s plan at the time. He had to have known what was going to happen.”
“Like I said before, it was an ambush. He had to have planned it,” Ezra agreed. “I know at one point he argued with our CO. I think Green was worried we were about to turn on him. That’s the trouble with mutually assured destruction. It only works as long as one party isn’t willing to actually kill the other and set himself free of that worry.”
“According to Solo’s report, the communication system malfunctioned. How much did you actually see of that op?” Charlotte asked.
He hadn’t gone into the office with her that day. He’d spent the night at a cheap motel because of the fight they’d gotten into when she’d refused to call off the next day’s op. He hadn’t seen her again until he’d come home that night and she’d given him the news that Ezra was dead. He’d walked out and hadn’t seen her again for months. He’d shipped her divorce papers and refused to take her calls.
He hadn’t even considered her feelings. She’d cared about Ezra, too. She’d loved his whole family and he’d barred her from his mother’s funeral.
He’d been so fucking selfish, and he didn’t know if he could ever make it up to her.
“Did you know that day that Ezra was alive?” Liam asked.
“It doesn’t matter when she knew,” Beck said quickly.
A gentle smile turned the corners of Eve’s mouth up. “It does for our investigation.”
“I didn’t know until he called me two days later,” Kim admitted. “By then there had been a fire, supposedly set by the jihadist group that ambushed the unit. The whole area was considered too dangerous to go into for a week.”
“I got hit, but I managed to hide.” Ezra continued his story. “Like I said, I’d been a bit away from the group. There was a lot of confusion at the time. We really were in a bad area. One controlled by rebels. We were in unfamiliar terrain and when the shooting started, everything was confusing. I was hit and dragged myself behind a rock. I passed out at one point and it was all over when I woke up. Someone must have come out later and set the fires to cover what happened. I was found by some local who took me in, patched me up and hid me for days until Kim sent someone to get me out.”
His brother had come so close to death. “And who was that?”
“Brother Francis Bruno,” Ezra said, his eyes shining in the lights from overhead. “He was with a group of surgeons risking their lives in the area to help people. So many people risked their lives and their careers to help me. The brother got me through rehab. He helped me learn Italian. Between him and Kim, they got me the documents I needed to stay in Italy and go to seminary. Turned out, I was really good at that. I’m a better priest than I ever was a soldier. And that is all I know about what happened that day. I beg forgiveness every day for my cowardice, and I’m ready to stand up now.”
But if he did, he would lose everything. “You would likely go to prison.”
His brother nodded. “And there is good work to be done there, too.”
Emotion threatened to choke him because it was overwhelming. His brother was sitting right in front of him. Was he putting on some kind of act?