cure him. And it would, without question, destroy the quality of life he currently held on to. Jack wasn’t about to become a burden, to have his wife look after him every day as he withered, slowly losing his mental faculties.
Ryan advised him that he should stop work and that the growth of the small tumor in his brain might be slowed with some radical treatment so he could at least have some more of what little life he had remaining.
Wrapped up in conviction rates, trial victories, and landmark settlements, Jack had forgotten to live, to embrace the simple pleasures around him, thinking himself immortal. What scared him deep down was that he had never imagined himself dying so young, dying in such a way. Modern medicine, with all of its treatments, prolonging life no matter the quality, eking out the last breath from a mindless, useless husk before allowing the soul to be surrendered to the hereafter, didn’t seem modern at all. Jack couldn’t help wondering if that was progress or regression in the evolving history of man.
In so many cultures, there were good deaths. Death on the battlefield, the greatest honor in the Viking world, to be carried off to Valhalla by the Valkyries with a sword thrust through your chest; a samurai dying in the heat of battle, giving his life in defending the empire of his deity the emperor; the soldier giving his life to save his comrades.
But Ryan’s MRI and diagnosis made it clear: that wouldn’t be the case for Jack. There would be no sword in hand, no supreme sacrifice in the name of God, no glorious death on the battlefield. And so, as he pondered the words of the fateful tattoo on his arm, Jack wondered what death had in store for him. Would it be a good death or simply an uneventful, powerless demise that he had no way of preventing?
And, he thought, if there was any truth to the markings, he was running out of time.
With Mia gone, with her life in danger, finding her and saving her were paramount. Getting her back was not just about how much he loved her but how much the girls would need her once he was gone. Whether he was to die tomorrow or six months from now, everything was about saving the only parent his children would have.
Jack would do whatever it took to get Mia back, he would face whoever had attacked them on that bridge, and if he died in saving her, if he gave his life so she would live. It would all be worth it, it would be a good death.
CHAPTER 18
Mia Norris was thought to have grown up in a life of privilege, the girl with everything, but nothing could be further from the truth. While Mia was the stepdaughter of the successful businessman and former director of the FBI Sam Norris, she was born Mia Sullivan, daughter of Joe and Patricia Sullivan.
Joe was a lieutenant in the Navy-a SEAL in his twenties, a strategic analyst in his thirties-and as a result, according to her father, the world was their home. While the world may have been their home, where she laid her head at night was in constant flux-eighteen beds, thirteen different countries, in fourteen years.
In all of the eighteen homes she lived in by the age of fourteen, she was never bitter. When her father would arrive home and announce a new exciting assignment in some foreign land, she would feel a tinge of sorrow at being suddenly uprooted when she was just getting her feet wet, but at least they were together. So many children in the military wouldn’t see their fathers-and in some cases mothers-for six months or more at a time, and many of them kissed their parents for the last time when they left, not realizing that they would lose them on the battlefield. Mia was fortunate that her father had already spent ten years in serious combat around the world before she was three. His body proved it, dotted with scars from all types of minor wounds-except for the long not-so-minor squiggly one on his neck-with which Mia played connect the dots. Since becoming an analyst, he only endured paper cuts and jet lag, leaving the threat of dying for his country in the past.
Since Mia was a young child, she dreamed of flying, staring up at the soaring birds, riding the updrafts, the air current carrying them higher and higher, only to nose-dive back to earth. It was a child’s fantasy, one she shared with her dad on more than one occasion. They would lie in a field or on the beach, staring at the clouds and the birds flittering about. He would feed her fantasy, telling her to close her eyes and imagine the feel of turning to and fro in flight.
Her mother, Pat, would always admonish him for encouraging her, but her dad would laugh her off and turn to Mia and say what he always said when faced with adversity: “Remember, Mia, nothing is impossible.”
She loved her father. She loved that they shared a passion for junk food, candy, and chips; movies and early rock ’n’ roll; sports and puzzles. Joe Sullivan was handsome, broad, and tall, unlike most kids’ round-about-the- middle dads. He was sympathetic, knowing how difficult it must be for his daughter to sacrifice her childhood for his career. And so he compensated. His free time was not spent playing golf or cards, racing off to some hobby; his time was spent with Mia, teaching her to sail and shoot, showing her the cultures they dropped into for six months at a time. He taught her the value of being happy in your work, of the pain of sacrifice in pursuing your dreams, that the value of life was not in riches but in the richness of one’s existence, in loving someone, in putting others before oneself. Simple lessons that had been forgotten by so much of the world.
It was on a Friday that Mia turned exactly fourteen and a half. Her father believed in celebrating not only birthdays but half-birthdays, too, always saying one shouldn’t rejoice in someone only once a year. They had been back in the States all of three days, settling into a small two-bedroom house just outside of Naval Air Station Oceana in Virginia Beach, Virginia. It was a late-spring morning; school didn’t start for an hour. Her mother was busy unpacking and getting breakfast ready when her dad snuck into her room and kidnapped her for a day of fun.
With the windows rolled down, the radio blaring, and two bags of chips, candy, and waters on the seat between them, they escaped.
Arriving at NAS Oceana, they drove around a road crew repairing pavement near the front entrance and stopped at the security gate. Joe introduced the three guards to Mia and, with a wink and a smile, continued on to a large hangar. Without a word, her father led her inside. The cavernous space was filled with F-35 Lightning II’s, F/A-18 Hornets and Super Hornets, the greatest fighter jets the world had known, capable of speeds in excess of mach 1.8. Mia looked at her father with curious eyes as they walked toward a locker. He reached inside and pulled something out.
“Put this on,” Joe said as he handed Mia a flight suit.
“What are we doing?” Mia begged with a smile
“Just go into the ladies’ locker room and put that on.” Joe pointed to the door before turning into the men’s locker room.
Mia stared at the tan jumpsuit before looking at the two-seater jets and her heart began to race with excitement.
Three minutes later, Mia exited the locker room, but her father was nowhere to be found. She left the hangar, looking at the nearly vacant runway, seeing nothing but a 757 jet, its engines whining in anticipation of takeoff. She saw no fighter jets prepped and ready, no planes of a smaller stature that her father would be taking her up in.
Then, from the doorway of the 757, she finally saw her dad in his jumpsuit, his short dark hair blowing in the morning breeze, waving to her. She waved back, a smile on her face that expertly hid her disappointment. Being the daughter of a naval officer, she had been in the cockpits of large jets such as this one on too many occasions to count. She had gotten her hopes up for something exciting and new. But she would never let him know.
Mia climbed the stairs and entered what she realized was not a typical 757. The room she stood in was like a scientific lab; instruments and computers abounded. Four young officers stood when she entered the plane and nodded hello. Her father quickly introduced them as naval scientists who were studying the effects of spatial awareness in low-gravity environments.
Her dad pointed her to a door that led into the cabin of the jet, and they entered what looked like an insane asylum. There were no windows, and the walls and ceiling were padded. Against the walls were harnesses, spaced evenly apart. Along each wall, the ceiling, and the floor were ladder rungs affixed to the body of the plane, running the length of the large tubular room.
“Let’s strap in,” Joe said, smiling at his daughter.
