When he’d been six, he’d discovered that he had a little brother. A boy only two years younger than he’d been.
His father had never believed in commitment of any kind. Gunner’s parents hadn’t been married, and when his mother had contracted a deadly strain of pneumonia when he was a toddler, his father hadn’t been willing to keep his son.
So his father had gone to the doorstep of Gunner’s shinali, his Navajo grandfather, and he’d just...left Slade there. Gunner had been two years old.
For a long time, he’d thought that his father would come back.
Then he had come back.
But only long enough to drop off his second son.
“His mother died in childbirth. You know I can’t handle kids. Let him stay here, with Gunner. They’re family.”
Those words still whispered through Gunner’s mind, as if they’d been said just yesterday, instead of over twenty-seven years ago.
His grandfather had been an honorable man. He’d taken in the second child, and, blood or no blood, he’d loved Slade.
They’d become a family. Gunner’s father had signed away custody of both his boys. Then he’d just...vanished.
Gunner had always been glad to have a brother. I wasn’t alone then.
But as they grew older, his relationship with Slade had changed. Slade had pulled away from their grandfather. He’d seemed to resent the small house, the sparse lifestyle that they led.
He’d seemed to resent Gunner.
And he hates me now.
The door opened behind Gunner. He looked back, too fast, thinking it might be Sydney because he knew she’d been called into the office, too.
It wasn’t Sydney. Bruce Mercer stared back at him. The light glinted off Mercer’s bald head, and his eyes, a dark brown, studied Gunner.
Not much was known about Mercer, if that was even the guy’s real name. But the man was connected to nearly everyone in Washington, and he knew exactly where all the bodies were buried. Figuratively and literally.
“I’ve been told that I have to investigate you,” Mercer said as he crossed the room.
Gunner stiffened. “If that’s what you have to do.”
“The thing is I don’t like being told what to do.” Mercer lowered himself into the leather chair at the head of the conference table. “I especially don’t like being threatened.”
Who would have been dumb enough to threaten that guy?
“Slade Ortez has said that if you aren’t taken into custody, he’ll go to the media and expose the EOD.”
What. The. Hell? Slade knew that secrecy was the only way that the EOD could get their missions done. If any of the agents currently out on missions lost their covers, the results would be disastrous.
“He still knows names and faces from his time as a freelance agent.” Mercer’s eyes narrowed. “He gave all of that intel to his captors, you
know.”
Yeah, he knew.
“Now he’s ready to tell anyone in the media who will listen to his story.” Mercer shook his head. “I can’t let that happen. You understand, right? I’ll take any steps—do anything necessary—to protect my division.”
Even if I get locked up?
Mercer’s fingers drummed over the manila file that he’d brought into the room. “Sometimes we think that we know a person, but it turns out we really don’t.”
“Sir, I don’t understand.” Was Mercer saying he thought Gunner was guilty?