A Beautiful Lie (Playing with Fire #1)(127)

“Please forgive me, Agent Parker.”

Parker tried to ignore the obvious sarcasm in his voice, but it was impossible.

“As I informed you in two of my voicemails that I’m assuming you didn’t bother listening to, as an agent with the CIA, I am not privy to the whereabouts of a Navy SEAL. However, in the interest of putting this mission to bed once and for all, I made a few calls. As the leader of his SEAL team and the contact for all of the deceased members of SEAL Team Six, Lieutenant. McCarthy is being held under tight surveillance, along with the other three members of his team, until the trial date for all the parties involved in this scandal occurs. A gag order has been placed on all of them restricting them from having any contact with anyone outside of their immediate supervisors and lawyers.”

Parker heard the words he spoke and understood each and every one of them. She knew Garrett’s lack of contact wasn’t due to the fact that he suddenly had a change of heart. She knew without a doubt he would be there if he could. Knowing this information and coming to terms with it was a whole other matter. Not having Garrett there to hold her and keep the nightmares away each night was slowly breaking her down. Each day, even with Olivia’s attempts at friendship, Parker felt herself drowning in despair. Without Garrett’s smile or his arms wrapped around her, the memories of all she lost and everything she did were swallowing her whole. She didn’t care about her job. She didn’t care about the case…she didn’t care about anything.

Agent Charles was only there because he wanted something from her. He didn’t care that she was struggling to keep the demons at bay or barely holding on to her sanity. He wanted answers to what happened down in that basement. He wanted an explanation for why another agent with over thirty years of experience, her father, was shot to death in his hospital room. The morbid curiosity that lived inside of him wanted to know if Fernandez ever tried to sleep with her, if the rumors of her involvement with McCarthy were true, and if she was secretly thrilled at being the one to shoot her former fiancé in the head.

She knew his kind and had worked with entirely too many men just like him over the years. They laughed at the water cooler over crime scene photos: the dead individuals in the pictures that died by the hand of other agents, nothing more than fodder for the gossip mill. Parker knew they were doing that with her now: standing in elevators, conversing over coffee, placing bets about whether or not Parker smiled as she pulled the trigger to end Milo’s life, wondering if she’d been in on all of it with Milo the entire time and killed him just to keep him quiet.

“So, now that I’ve went out on a limb to get the information you’ve requested, it’s time for you to answer some of my questions,” Agent Charles stated, bringing her out of her thoughts.



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The first two weeks away from Parker were the hardest. Garrett didn’t sleep, he barely ate, and he snapped at anyone who tried to talk to him. He gave his statements, answered all their questions, and no one would let him have any contact with Parker. They were given an official order not to talk to anyone who didn’t have pre-clearance from the Navy. For the sake of the case and making sure nothing slipped through the cracks, they needed to follow their orders to a T. Garrett wasn’t even permitted five minutes alone with Brady, Austin, or Cole in case they were trying to change facts about what happened and throw a wrench in the case. They were each questioned separately for hours about what happened, and then once the lawyers were satisfied that their stories matched, questioned them together. They were never left alone to talk freely about anything.

Captain Risner managed to get a few messages to Garrett about Parker’s status, each one short and barely containing any real information.

“She’s awake.”

“She’s been transported to another hospital.”

“She has a long road ahead of her.”

Captain Andrews made sure Garrett knew just how grateful he should be that the Navy was allowing him to have even that little bit of information. They didn’t want Garrett to lose focus or forget his reason for joining the Navy in the first place. But most of all, they didn’t want anything to mess up one of the biggest scandals the Navy had ever been responsible for bringing to light.

Luckily for everyone involved, the chaos the Dominican Republic was plunged into with the sudden knowledge of their President’s activities and the unclear line of succession since he was removed from his position as head of the country, negotiations were handled quickly and efficiently. The Dominican Republic wanted the “problem” removed from the country as fast as possible so they could begin to rebuild their crumbling government. Having the former head of their country right under everyone’s noses was just a reminder of the mistakes they made by turning a blind eye on his illegal activity. They agreed to allow Fernandez to be transported to the United States for a trial since they had more immediate stability issues that needed to be addressed.

One week before the trial was scheduled to begin, Garrett was in a conference room with a representative from the Navy’s JAG office being prepped for testimony. Garrett was having a hard time concentrating since he knew today was the day Fernandez would be transported from the Dominican to a private corrections facility in California until the day before the trial. It was still hundreds of miles away from where he was, but having him on U.S. soil was enough to make Garrett feel murderous. An hour into the prep meeting and four ignored cell phone calls, the JAG officer finally excused himself to see who it was that kept calling.