Eoghan rolled his eyes. “Only to be expected. What is it?”
“He said that someone murdered his son—” Eoghan’s gaze sharpened at that. “—and he believes his granddaughter is alive.”
“The little girl,” he mumbled under his breath. “They said she died though.”
Aggravated, Star straightened in her seat, snapping, “Can we start at the beginning?”
Eoghan, in an eerie tone, recited, “I’d just been approached by MI6 and they sent me to this specialist training corp in Scotland of all places. Lockerbie. There’s a POW camp up there, Hallmuir, and it was used as a base. Anyway,” he muttered, rubbing his brow. “Long story short, it was a waste of time. I could have taught them shitbutthey had this interesting segment on how jobs had gone wrong in the past and how they wanted them handled in the future.”
“That’s a weird way of making sure mistakes don’t happen again,” Star pointed out. “Classified info being released unnecessarily—”
“The only way I’m getting out of MI6, Star, is with a bullet in my brain,” Eoghan said simply. “And they don’t have to fear me spreading the word of anything I’ve picked up because they’ll kill Inessa, Victoria, my brothers, their wives, and my mother if I even attempted to defectorto share classified intel.”
Star’s brow puckered. “That’s intense.”
“It’s an unusual division,” he dismissed. “I only shared this with my brothers because we’re a closed circuit. Or we used to be.”
Holding up a hand, Star promised, “I’ve been where you are. I won’t say dick. Anything you can share with me, I appreciate more than you know.”
He studied her then rumbled, “Just don’t hurt him.”
“I’m here, you know?”
Ignoring me, she bit her bottom lip. “I hurt everyone.”
Eoghan sighed. “Been there, done that. You can break the cycle, Star. You just need the right person.”
“Did you find your person?” she asked wistfully, and that wistfulness spread to her gaze. I saw it because she looked at me, a worrisome cocktail of hope and need, desire and love, buried deep within that glance.
It did things to me that I couldn’t even begin to describe. Mostly, I wanted to hug her. Other, less romantic parts just wanted to slide inside her and find my way home at long last.
“I did. My person came when I least expected it, at an age that still freaks me out, and she sure as hell isn’t what I’d have imagined for myself, but she accepts me,” he admitted. “Conor’s a good man. He’ll accept you. Flaws and all. If you let him.”
I flickered a look between them, well aware that Eoghan was probably doing more on my behalf in this one conversation than I’d managed in months of chatting with her.
Her head bowed in understanding, which prompted me to clear my throat. “She won’t say anything, Eoghan. This is too big.”
“You’re telling me. All our asses are on the line, Conor, if news spreads.”
Uneasily, I asked, “What if the agent who took out Kuznetsov’s son is killed as a result of this conversation?”
Eoghan pursed his lips. “Doubt it would be an issue. Everyone’s expendable.”
Star scoffed. “True dat.”
“I really hate that the government is supposed to be the good guys,” I muttered, pinching the bridge of my nose.
Eoghan took another sip of his drink then, seeming to have come to a decision, sighed. “Okay, the story is that this Kuznetsov was some kind of emissary for Russia. He was driving from Ohio to New York, allegedly, but before he could even leave the state, the brake lines the agent cut failed as planned, but the location of the crash was badly calculated.
“There was a collision but they limped away from it by the skin of their teeth. I’m thinking Kuznetsov thought it was sabotage, so he ordered the driver to put distance between them and the crash site, to reconvene somewhere safer.
“The agent behind the job had to go in and manually end them.”
“Meaning?” Star questioned.
“Chased them down a hill until they’d picked up speed and crashed again. This time, it caused a pile-up. The driver was killed, as was Kuznetsov. His wife was strangled, and the kid ran off into traffic. That’s where her story ends. My division looked for her in the hospitals and in social services, but they didn’t find anyone fitting her name or description.”
“That’s weird,” I pointed out.