Licensed to Kill

Chapter 25

I'd known about Brit's husband dying before their first anniversary, but that was pretty much all I knew. Brit had never talked about her marriage or what had gotten Dan killed, which I'd never found to be odd because it was reasonable that no one would want to talk about that. I didn't know anything about the mission he'd been on or any of the details of the case he was working. But I'd certainly never expected to hear that my father had been involved.

For most of my childhood in Sofia, I'd been under the impression that my father was the average blue collar worker with a semi-stressful nine-to-five job. He always worked long hours and I didn't get to spend a lot of quality time with him because of it. He wasn't a real social man anyway, though. I remembered seeing him closed up in his tiny at-home office, a repurposed den, with the doors locked so I couldn't interrupt his work, and he'd be typing away and making hushed phone calls. I didn't understand it back then.

As a young child, it hadn't crossed my mind that anything he was doing was suspicious, and my mother had never uttered a word to me about his job. Looking back on those days, I wondered how in the hell I could've missed such blatant clues. I should've asked questions. I should've tried to listen in more. Maybe if I had, I'd know more about the mission that killed Dan, as well as what lead up to my father's death so many years ago. To this day, I was still in the dark about the things my father had been involved in.

"How long was my father working with A.R.T.?" I asked Matt in an exhausted voice, though I suddenly felt much more awake after getting this new information.

He shrugged his shoulders and looked back and forth between Dallas and me. "I don't know enough about it right now, Tali, but I do know where you can find all the personnel and case files pertaining to your dad's time with us. I'll show you when we get back to headquarters."

"If we get back to headquarters," I corrected.

Without saying a word, Dallas got up, fumbled through his bag, and walked outside with a pack of cigarettes. The look in his eyes on his way out was like he didn't know how to respond to the new developments in our case. I was sure it didn't help that Matt was present and the two of them didn't get along.

"I'm going to go check on him," I told Matt and ventured outside after Dallas.

The chilly night air washed over me when I stepped out and I rubbed my palms up and down my forearms in attempt to soothe away the goosebumps.

"Are you okay?" I asked Dallas, who was now leaning up against the wall, smoking.

He shrugged, but said nothing, a blank stare on his solemn face. I watched him take another puff on his cigarette and toss it to the ground, stomping on it, and still not speaking.

"Dallas-"

"If your agency can conspire against you like that, after everything you've done for them, how can I be sure that I.D.A. isn't doing the same fucking thing to me?" he shouted, his voice echoing down the corridor of rooms and booming through the night air. "It was bad enough that they forced us to be apart for four goddamn years, Tali, but what am I supposed to think now? How can I trust my own agency anymore? How? Please tell me, because I don't have a fucking clue!"

I started to respond, but Matt opened the door and told us to lower our voices so we wouldn't draw attention to ourselves.

"He's right," I sighed, reaching out and touching Dallas's upper arm, moving my hand up and down in a calming motion. "We should go back inside, Dall."

Dallas said nothing, still fuming, but went back inside, making sure to bump Matt in the shoulder in the process.

"How 'bout you?" I asked Matt. "Are you okay?"