The two groups passed with a nod and kept going. Laurie watched them, feeling rather deflated. It was all anticlimactic really. Thirteen men out there plus herself, and somewhere in the area she knew Younger was watching. She didn’t know what she had expected, but this really wasn’t it. Why had she imagined the men marching would be like putting a veritable fence around the promenade?
“Hey!”
Laurie spun on her feet. It did not take long to see where the cry came from. At the very bottom of the courtyard where the cement was very close to the level of Lake Taneycomo, she spotted a woman pointing to three boys zooming past on skateboards.
“You bring that back!” the woman shouted.
One of the young men, the one boarding in between his two buddies, was now carrying an ice cream cone. The sight was absolutely comical in a sick way. Like a bit of a movie come to real life. Why would the kid steal a used ice cream cone if not for effect? The incident had certainly garnered enough attention.
“Hey, someone help me! That kid stole my ice cream!” The woman was now spinning in circles, hanging onto her purse with one hand as she began trotting after the young men on the skateboards.
People turned to watch. Laurie sprang into action. She could not allow this to happen, now while she was standing right there. Sprinting toward the three young men weaving their way skillfully through the crowd, Laurie was prepared to make a scene to get them to stop.
She needn’t have bothered.
Younger emerged from a shadow between an overhang and a shop entrance. With one fluid movement, he shoved his boot in front of the skateboard. The board stopped with a violence that was almost over exaggerated. The kid—not the one with the ice cream—stumbled forward and went down on his knees. His skateboard bounced off of Younger’s foot and started to bound away.
Before the teenager could even protest, Younger used his foot to smack the tail of the skateboard, pop it up, and then picked it up in his huge capable hand. He held it aloft and gazed down at the young man now crouched on the pavement looking a little dazed.
The other two skateboarders were circling, the one with the ice cream still eating his stolen treat as he attempted to go back for his fallen comrade.
“That was rude,” Younger told the teenaged boys. “I sure as hell don’t think your mama would approve of you stealing someone’s ice cream. No offense to the young lady you stole it from, but dude, do you want to risk getting something from secondhand ice cream? That’s gross. Do you tell all of your girlfriends that you will share tongue space with a perfect stranger? You should you know, in case any of them have standards.”
Younger’s comedic speech drew laughter from the crowd. They were now paying more attention to the young men on skateboards than to the fiery streams of water launching into the air. Younger waved the skateboard in his hand back and forth over and over again.
“You give that back,” the young man told Younger. He glanced right and left at his friends. “If you don’t, you’ll be sorry.”
“Why is that?” Younger raised his eyebrows and waited. “Come on now, son. I really want to know. Are you issuing a threat? I’m just wondering what you’re intending to do about it. You’re not even supposed to be here. I believe there are signs literally papering the walls of this promenade saying there are no skateboards or roller blades or bicycles allowed.”
“So what?” the kid said with a mulish expression. “I didn’t see no sign when I got on the promenade down by the lake.”
Damn. Laurie made a mental note to take Younger’s suggestion of more obviously placed signs at every entrance and exit. Whether or not the kid was telling the truth didn’t matter. Laurie now understood Younger’s point. There had to be no shadow of doubt on that score.
The other two boys had stopped skateboarding. The kid with the ice cream suddenly drew back and threw it at Younger. Laurie barely had time to suck back a gasp before Younger took the skateboard and used it like a baseball bat to fling the ice cream back at the boys.
There was a lot of laughter from the crowd as what appeared to be pistachio ice cream spattered all over the three young men and a few unfortunate bystanders who didn’t quite get out of the way in time. The kids were the ones yelping and cursing though. Their backpacks, raggedy hair, and their faces were now covered in the creamy treat.
“You son of a bitch!” the young man shouted. “I’ll get you! You got ice cream all over my board!”
Younger tilted the skateboard to get a look at the mess. “Me? Your idiot buddy was the one to throw the ice cream. Why would I just stand here and let it hit me so the three of you can keep pretending to be badasses when I could use this handy bat I took from you to keep myself from getting smeared with the stuff?”
The boys were looking at each other and their gazes were wary. It was obvious they hadn’t expected to be challenged in this way. Younger took this opportunity to get a little closer. He glared down at each one of the boys with such heat and intensity that they all took on the look of puppies that had just gotten their butts whapped with a rolled up newspaper.
“This behavior is not going to be tolerated,” Younger growled. “Do you hear me? There’s a new security plan in place and the whole lot of you will meet an unpleasant end at the juvenile justice center if you keep pushing it. Do you understand?”
The boys nodded. About that time, Laurie heard the cadre of security guys marching in their direction. She could tell that Younger heard it too. His head tilted in that direction. And then he smiled at the teenagers.
“You’re about to be escorted on foot to the end of the promenade. There you will go home and we will have no more of this nonsense behavior. Do you understand me? The next time, I won’t be so nice. And, you never know. Crashing on your skateboard might end with the board going into the lake—by accident, I assure you.”
The promise seemed to hold water. Laurie was busy flagging down her guys. She snapped her fingers and waved. Two young, broad-shouldered men peeled off of the regular column and came running. Their eyes seemed to bug out when they caught sight of the teenagers. Evidently, they’d been under the impression their magic sweep method had been working perfectly.
“You are to walk these young men to the end of the promenade,” Laurie informed the guards. “After that, they’re to leave the property. Is that understood?”
There was a lot of head nodding and then the young men were swept away in the tide of Josh’s patrol unit and the crowd went back to the fire and water show. That left Laurie standing awkwardly in front of Younger while she looked at the spatter of ice cream on the cement around the scene of the crime.
“So…” Laurie tried and failed to come up with something to say.
Younger beat her to it. “Sorry for the ice cream mess. I’m assuming there is some kind of maintenance crew around that can hose it down after hours?”
“The mess… Oh!” Laurie’s brain was going in so many directions at once that she’d hardly managed to process what he was saying. “Yes! They will just spray it with disinfectant and then hose it down. You know, so we don’t get ants.”
Younger held up the skateboard that he had kept. “This is technically stolen property.”
“I suppose it is.” Laurie grimaced. “I’m going to throw it in the trash the first chance I get.”
“No. You’re going to put it in your lost and found in the security office and you’re going to hang onto it until that underage owner can produce a parent or legal guardian to come sign for it.” Younger gazed at her for a long moment as though he was willing her to understand what he was suggesting.
Laurie frowned. “I don’t think we have a policy like that.”
“You do now,” Younger grunted. Then he gave her a look. “Come on, Laurie. Don’t you see what a great opportunity this is?”
“Opportunity,” Laurie repeated. She tried to imagine talking to the parent of this errant brat with the skateboard who had been terrorizing old ladies in an outdoor shoppi
ng mall and cringed at the idea. “I suppose you’re right. There’s always a chance the parents don’t know what’s going on.”
Younger was emphatically nodding his head. “Yes, or you have a chance to see if the parents are the sort of people who need pushing on. If they won’t do the right thing, you need to remind them that they are liable for their under aged offspring’s crime spree. We don’t know where these kids are coming from at this point, right?”
“Right.”
There was an urgency in his tone and words that shook her. Laurie hadn’t actually considered things like the origin of the little hoodlums. She had only thought about wanting them to stop. But what if Younger was right? What if she should really be thinking about where the little bastards came from? Did they have parents? Did their parents know what they were doing? Were these kids part of a gang? What a thought. A skateboard gang of teenagers purposefully causing distractions that allowed them to snatch purses or shoplift. It was like something out of a novel!
“You have a doubtful look on your face,” Younger observed stiffly. “Do you think I’m making this up?”
“No. No, it isn’t that.” Laurie tried to come up with a reasonable answer for him and almost could not. “I’m just… it’s a lot to take in. All right? I’ve just been so focused on keeping them out. Like we could build a wall or something.”
Younger’s expression turned somewhat cynical. Behind them, the fire and water show had lapsed into silence. People drifted toward restaurants and stores for relief from the late evening mugginess and the bugs. “Ah, but that’s not going to work. Is it? You can’t just keep them out. It’s not that simple. Believe me, I wish it was. I wish Josh’s plan was the answer.”
Laurie turned her back on Younger and walked toward the edge of the stairs that led to the sunken center of the courtyard. She stared off into the distance and thought about Josh. He was a good man. She’d been working with him for years now, nearly five years. He’d been hired about the same time as Laurie had been promoted. She could not have done this without him and yet right now she was really frustrated with him and with everything.
“Laurie, are you all right?” Younger touched her shoulder.
Laurie did not turn to look at him. She couldn’t. She felt ashamed somehow. Ashamed that her own team of security personnel—literally the entire team in this instance—was not enough when Younger had been able to handle this situation and turn it back all on his own simply by managing to be in the right place at the right time.
“What’s your last name?” Laurie asked him suddenly. “You said Younger is your first name.”
“Adair,” he told her quietly. “Does it matter?”
“No, Mr. Adair,” Laurie murmured. “I just wondered. That’s all. I think it’s been a long night. And I don’t think we will have any more issues with skateboarders tonight. The rest of my crew and I will clean up tonight’s mess. Shall we plan on meeting tomorrow to talk strategy?”
“Certainly.” His manner turned from concerned to somewhat stiff. “What time works for your schedule?”
“Oh, shall we say two o’clock again?” Laurie tried to make it seem brusque and businesslike. It was hard though, when what she really wanted to do was go home and hide under her bed.
“Two o’clock then.” He dipped his chin and gave her a long look. She had a tough time not squirming when it came to that look. Finally, he seemed to decide it wasn’t worth further discussion. He turned and started to walk away. “Okay, then. See you at two.”
Laurie watched him go. She wished fervently that this whole thing was just over. Younger Adair was… she didn’t know what he was. Amazing? That word came immediately to mind. The man was like… no. Laurie didn’t have words for what Younger Adair was. He was more. Yes. That was the problem. He was more than anything or anyone else that she’d ever come across in her life. He only looked like a redneck with a low IQ. It was a façade. The man beneath that surface appearance was a quick thinker, a problem solver, and had a certain practical intelligence that made Laurie feel the need to confront her own inadequacies. And at the end of the day, who wanted to do that?
Chapter Nine
Younger gazed out at the still surface of the lake and searched for the sense of calm he usually felt about this time of the morning. Six o’clock—the perfect hour. The sun was rising into the morning sky. The heat and humidity had not yet reached stifling levels and the water skiers and tubers were not out on the lake just yet. Nothing but fishermen, the kind that gathered at dawn to soak up the tranquility regardless of whether or not they caught any fish.
His line moved with the current, the red and white bobber gently tossed back toward shore with each wave that lapped the side of Younger’s boat. At some point, the bobber moved as though a fish were nibbling on the bait sunk into the lake below the little indicator. Normally, Younger would have been all over that by testing the line to see if he’d caught anything. But not this morning.
Younger pictured the fish chowing down on his bait, having a free breakfast, and growing overconfident only to get snagged by some other fishing line later in the day when the little bugger tried it again. But Younger was too distracted to focus on fishing. It was something that didn’t happen very often. He loved to fish. It helped center him for the day. The open sky, the soft and relaxing movement on the water, and the necessity of being in the here and now. That was what fishing offered to a veteran who had seen far too many other things.
But those other things weren’t what was consuming Younger’s attention at the time. He could not stop thinking about Laurie Talcott. There was something about her, something he could not put his finger on. Something wrong. She reminded him a bit of the younger enlisted officers who spent so much time and wasted energy trying desperately to prove themselves when the reality was they had nothing to prove. Nothing at all. And neither did Laurie Talcott.
A fish leaped out of the water just behind Younger’s seat in the boat. He swung around so quickly that the little flat bottomed boat shifted precariously in the water. How appropriate. Really. He began to draw in his fishing line. He was so distracted at this point that he was going to wind up in the lake if he didn’t go ahead and call it a morning.
What was it about Laurie Talcott that made him feel like she was hiding something? She had to be hiding something. Or was she just that insecure about her job or something? As Younger reeled in his line, he considered Colonel Josh Bentley too. Now there was a man with something to prove. The guy reeked of effort. The kind of effort that Younger could remember from his military days. The sort of effort that got good men killed because their commanding officer was so determined to prove something.
“Hey. I thought I might find you down here.”
Now Younger nearly did fall out of the boat. He was right next to the shore only a short distance from his house. But the tangle of trees and brush was perfect for fish and less so for foot traffic. Younger would never have thought of walking down there. It was better to go from the water side, which made Titus Holbrook’s presence a little curious.
“What on earth are you doing down here?” Younger asked Titus with a frown as he carefully secured his fishing hook at the base of his pole. “You nearly gave me a damned heart attack. I think you managed to scare off whatever fish I might have had a chance of catching this morning.”
Titus frowned. “You didn’t catch anything? That’s unusual.”
“Go back to the boat launch. I’ll meet you there,” Younger told his boss with a grunt. He didn’t want to talk about catching fish or why he hadn’t had any luck.
Carefully firing up the five horsepower engine on his boat, Younger put-putted his way back to his own natural launch. The private launch was actually a bit of an anomaly on Tablerock Lake and the reason Younger had purchased the property after returning home from his stint in the Marines.
The original slope had been widened and the grade had been smoothed and evened out by a number of residents over the y
ears. Someone had added some rocks. And of course, all of this had happened before the Army Corps of Engineers had taken over jurisdiction for such things. But now it was “grandfathered in” and as long as Younger paid his permit fee for the use of the expanse of shoreline between his house and the lake, he could continue using the little rock slide to push his boat in and out of the lake.
As Younger stepped out of the boat into the water lapping at the rocks, he grabbed hold of the side of the little craft and began pulling it onto the shore. With the motor prop in the upright position, it was possible to tie it and store it right there without a single bit of extra effort.
“Here, I’ll help with that.” Titus grabbed hold of the other side of the boat and pulled.
All of a sudden, the boat weighed less than nothing. It was as if there was no drag from the water or friction from the rocks. Younger looked over at Titus and frowned. “Dude, slow down! You’re going to throw it up onto the road. What’s your deal this morning? Did you take your steroids or something?”
“Oh. Sorry.” Titus looked properly abashed. “I supposed I just didn’t realize it was so light. I was expecting it to weigh a ton.”
It was an excuse of sorts, but Younger couldn’t help but think that it wasn’t the best one. Sometimes Younger got the feeling that Titus Holbrook was hiding things from the rest of his employees. It was just a feeling. But Younger was a man who had lived on his gut instincts for years. They had kept him alive. And while his instincts told him that Titus was a good man, they also told him there wasn’t something quite right about the guy.
But that was a conversation for another day. Younger climbed into the beached boat and took a seat. He gestured to the other seat with his hand. “I don’t have another option down here at the moment.” Younger thought of the Adirondack chairs at the Landing. “I think I found a chair I want to buy to put down here for relaxing. But I don’t guess that would do you any good since I was only intending to buy one.”
Rock Wolf Investigations: Boxset Page 54