coward’s weapon. You are many things, Serena Tennyson, but you are no coward.”
Serena shook his head as the tears freely fell.
Sheridan said into the silence: “This has been stressful on everyone here. We have all sacrificed a great deal to get to this moment right here.”
“We have at that, Agent Sheridan,” Serena said in a shaky voice. “And we all have sacrificed so much, too much in fact. And you are right as well, Angel, I do have much to answer for. And I do have a story that needs to be told.”
And then Thomas watched Agent Prince raise his gun and step forward.
“And the first story that all of these good men and women want to hear is who is the Caretaker?”
“Agent Prince,” Sheridan said in a stern tone. “Stand down, Agent Prince, what are you doing?”
He didn’t answer Sheridan. Instead, Prince moved himself into a position that no one was between himself and Serena. The other agents tensed at the new development and trained their full attention and their guns on her as well. Sheridan was seething. Dr. Hicks Dupree was hugging herself. Thomas felt at his heart would pound its way through his chest and surface itself.
“I want her to say it in front of this room full of people well before she gets to court, Sheridan.” Chris said. “I want the world to hear it from her mouth right now before the courts and the judges and the lawyers get involved. Thousands of people have died over the past month because of this one question has gone unanswered for so long. Tell these people what you told me, Serena.”
“Agent Prince, lower your weapon right now. That is an order.” And then Thomas saw Sheridan react as he watched Serena lower her head. And somehow Sheridan knew the answer that apparently Agent Prince had already learned from Serena.
“Isaac Prince,” Serena said evenly. “Your deputy director Raymond Rice was not the only high level authorities’ figure who commanded Pandora’s ranks.
All of the air seemed to leave Thomas Peeper…and everyone in this room. Most in the hotel did not know Isaac Prince personally but they knew him as the founder of a House in Chains. They all recognized the name. He must have been Chris and Xavier Prince’s father.
“The Caretaker and Isaac Prince are one.”
Thomas watched Agent Prince mostly. As dumbfounded as he was, Thomas could only guess at how devastating this revelation was for the man nearly standing in front of him. The born investigator in Thomas had to admit that he’d considered the possibility once or twice…but he had always steered away from it being absolute. No matter how logical or reasonable this conclusion may have played out…the truth of Isaac Prince consciously handing his own son over to a known pedophile was a fact not bred in reality. Thomas own mother leaving her children as his father lay dying was terrible enough—
Dr. Dupree’s own anger at her friend’s unexpected belligerence was melting off of her face. She looked as if she wanted to drop everything and go to Agent Prince and comfort him. Serena had yet to look up. Thomas had studied this woman and her organization for years—and yet they were far and away more ruthless and calculating than he had ever given them credit for.
Sheridan had recovered from whatever emotions he was feeling. He stepped over to where his subordinate was standing. He put his hand over the top of Agent Prince’s and lowered both hand and gun in one motion. Working together Sheridan came out of the exchange with Prince’s gun in his hand. He turned his attention to Serena and offered his other free one to Serena to step away from the ledge.
She struggled to find it…but eventually she took his hand in her own.
As she stepped down, Sheridan cuffed her hands behind her back with as much human grace, dignity, and compassion as he could manage.
He began to walk her past Agent Prince but she halted her progress when she thought she was near where he was standing. The torn side of her face was the one visible to Thomas.
“I appreciate your restraint, Chris,” She said to him.
“Go to Hell, Serena,”
Serena tossed a blind look to where she guessed Thomas was standing. And then she turned back to Agent Prince.
“That chapter has already been written.” She refused to budge when Sheridan tried to get her moving again. “Your chapter has been written as well, Chris, but not in the script that you may have been nudged into believing.”
“Do you ever shut that mouth of yours, Serena?” Thomas was amazed that a man with such clear, dark skin could nearly turn a shade of red when angered. “What in the hell are you talking about now?”
“Your medical exam reports from a recent physical that you have taken,” Serena said patiently. “They were exaggerated…bogus…inaccurate. You may choose to use whatever terminology that you wish.”
“But my personal physician said—“
“You doctor said what he was instructed to say under constant stress and threat to his personal safety and that of his immediate family. Your mother’s illness and eventual demise was a far too convenient resource for me not to use at the appropriate time. In the end though, it was her disease and not yours.”
Thomas winced at Serena’s latest revelation. He stepped behind Sheridan as if this trained government law enforcement worker might need his help in restraining Agent Prince. Sheridan kept his look neutral as he forced Serena’s momentum forward.
“With the exception of the need to drop a few pounds, Agent Prince, you are as healthy as anyone else in this room.” She said as Sheridan pushed her through the door with his armed one armed contingency giving them over to another.
Thomas saw Chris biting back tears of what? Were they…were they tears of joy…were they tears of anger…
Thomas followed Sheridan and Serena out of the door as close as the federal agents would allow him to. Dr. Angel Hicks Dupree was even closer to Sheridan and his prisoner.
“I consider you my equal in every way, Doctor,” Thomas was unsure of how Serena knew that the other woman was marching with them. “In fact, for a short time I thought that you were my sister in arms, I thought you were my other wing that the Dragon had promised to reveal to me. You should have been. You were the one who could have aided Pandora to a glorious victory. With you at my side we could have avoided all of these unfortunate casualties. We could have avoided this Whirlwind that has been unleashed on the city of Atlanta.”
“I’m not like you, Serena,” Angel said, but she continued to hug herself. “I’m nothing like you at all.”
“Oh yes you are, Doctor and you and I both know this to be true,” Serena said as they approached the first flight of stairs on the long route to street level. “But that is not the reason that I pity you…Angel.”
“You feel pity for me?”
“Oh yes, Doctor. I don’t have any other word for the tribulation that you are now going to face. I have been lonely, Doctor. I know what it feels like. And I know that the only thing in the world that you are afraid of is being lonely. But you are headed for a season of loneliness like no other, a loneliness that will have you begging my flames to take you from your suffering.”
And then they left a stunned and visibly shaken Dr. Angel Hicks Dupree on that floor while they moved on.
On the ground level at last, Sheridan turned Serena over to yet another group of well-armed men who placed her in the back of a nondescript looking van of no color. There were two agents seated on either side of her, a driver, another agent with his gun pointed at her from the front seat and one last agent seated on the passenger side carrying a radio. He spoke into it as the both the side and back doors bolted in place behind them with audible clicks.
Sheridan shadowed the entire operation and Thomas Pepper from two steps behind him. The FBI agent looked at Thomas for a full minute and nodded at him once…but the larger man caught multiple messages in the simplest of gestures. He thought it said: You have been helpful to my agency that I serve and a country that I love, Mr. Pepper. I don’t quite understand the nature of your relationship with Serena Tennyson—I don’
t think that I want to know. It may have taken my people hours more to find her on our own. Your phone call to us telling us where she was may have saved lives today. You deserve a moment to say your goodbye to her.
And then Special Agent Nicholas Sheridan took one more step back into the shadows of the hotel. It was all the privacy that the two of them would be allowed.
Thomas thought that it would be enough.
“I don’t love you, Thomas,” Serena said to him softly and without preamble. “I can’t. I don’t know that I am capable of exhibiting that kind of emotion.”
Thomas nodded.
“I know, Serena. You don’t have to explain.to me. I’m unsure of what my feelings truly are for you as well.” He heard the hesitation in his own voice. “I came here to your hotel with the intention of somehow, someway…killing you for all of the pain that you’ve caused.
“I know, Thomas. I saw your feelings in my flames as well. Your moment passed. Like I said before, I’m not sure what to call the feelings that I carry inside for you. But for the first time in my life…for the first time I felt something that was not a fraternal love for men like Isaac Prince, Raymond Rice or my father of course. And then Danielle Rohm taught me what it was like to have a sister.” Serena paused in thought. “Perhaps that is why this final goodbye that we are sharing feels so sad to me.”
“I’m going to see you often over the next few