by Jaime Lewis
“Morning,” she said, trying to snuggle closer to him. “What time is it?”
“Time for us to get up.”
“Noooo,” she whined and tried burrowing herself even more into his body. She had slept so well once she had fallen asleep. Knowing Ace was there and would watch over her probably helped her subconscious relax. “I’m comfortable, and you're warm and snuggly,” she whispered.
He snorted, “Well, that’s a first. I don’t think I’ve ever been called snuggly before. Come on, up you go.” He tried sitting up, but she wasn’t having any of it and latched onto him. She wrapped her arms and legs around him like a koala bear hugging a tree and laughed. They both got tangled up in the sheet and blankets, causing them to lose their balance, and they tumbled onto the floor.
Ace maneuvered himself, so he took the brunt of the fall landing on his back, with Alex sprawled out on top of him. Both were laughing hysterically when someone knocked on the door. Before they could blink an eye, the door swung open, and the team came strolling in, clearly amused at seeing the two of them on the floor.
Caught in a compromising situation, Alex buried her head in Ace’s chest as a wave of embarrassment flooded her. So much for keeping things between the two of them. She could feel Ace’s stomach shaking from his silent laughter.
She couldn’t see him but knew it was Irish that spoke, “Awe. Honey, don’t be embarrassed, at least we got here before the clothes started coming off because that would be embarrassing. Well, for you, that is. As for us, I think we’d all enjoy the view.”
At the sound of Ace’s low growl, she turned her head, so she could see the guys. Her lips lifted into a smile. “What if I tell you that I’m not embarrassed and that I’m just sexually frustrated that I forgot to put the chair under the doorknob, so we wouldn’t be interrupted.”
He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again. Meanwhile, the entire room erupted into laughter. She had apparently shocked Irish into silence.
With Ace’s help, she was up on her feet, even though her body protested, feeling a little stiff. She wished she could crawl back into bed with her new personal human heater.
Irish threw his arm around her shoulder. He stood around six feet, a tad bit shorter than Ace, and his blue eyes held a twinkle to them. “Are you sure you want him?” He asked, pointing at Ace only for Ace to flip him off. “He can be pretty bossy?” She knew he was teasing, so she played along and batted her eyelashes. “Maybe I like to be bossed around.” She threw a wink his way and grinned. He dropped his arm and stomped away, muttering something about Ace being a lucky motherfucker. She laughed and looked over at Ace, who was standing there watching her and Irish’s playful banter, trying to hide a grin. Oh, yes, he could boss her around all he wanted.
She looked him over, admiring his physique and handsome face. However, those weren’t the attributes that drew him to her. She considered those delectable features a bonus. What she admired about Ace was his character. He was attentive, caring, comforting, fun, and surprisingly easy to talk to.
Breaking from her thoughts, Ace approached her and put a hand on her waist. His other hand caressed her cheek, “I’m going to go grab a shower.”
She glanced over at the clock. It was a little after 8:00 a.m. Damn, they had slept in. “I need to get ready, as well.”
“I’ll come back over when I’m finished, and then we’ll walk over to base command.”
She nodded her head. He gave her another kiss, this time a quick one on the cheek, then turned and moseyed out the door into the morning sunlight.
As she watched Ace saunter out the door with his team following behind him, making comments about the two of them, she gathered her clothes and made her way to the bathroom to get ready for another day.
Chapter Thirteen
After a quick breakfast, Alex was in a rush to get over to base command. In the middle of breakfast, she had received an urgent text message from Bowman, saying she needed to check her email. Right now, it was just her and Ace. The others weren’t due to join them for another forty minutes.
She pulled up her email and found the one from Bowman. By the time she’d was finished reading the report, she had goosebumps on every single part of her body. She kept repeating to herself that the report was incorrect; it had to be. Leaning back, she kept re-reading the words on the screen, thinking that maybe she was missing words or adding her own, but that wasn’t the case. It was Ace’s touch to her arm that had her looking up.
“What’s wrong?” He asked as if he could read her mind.
She went to speak, but out of the blue, she heard Derek’s booming voice behind her. When both she and Ace turned, she was surprised to see him on the TV screen.
“Hey, what’s up?” She asked, knowing they weren’t due to connect with him until the team arrived.
Mason called and said I needed to connect with you. I’m assuming you got the message from Bowman?”
She nodded her head. “I have.”
“And?”
“And what I read concerns me.”
“Mason didn’t know the specifics on the language in there. Bowman’s still traveling, but when he got hold of the document, he called Mason. The problem was his reception was bad, and they got disconnected. But before he lost contact with him, Bowman said it was important that you saw this and for Mason to call me to connect with you. What is this all about? I see there are locations highlighted in the report that mention possible sightings of the hostages.”
Just as she went to continue, she was interrupted by a knock on the door. Before she could stand, the door opened, and Colonel Johnson strode in. Glancing at Ace, she saw he was just as surprised as she was to see him. Ace stood and shook hands with him; then the Colonel turned to address Derek.
“Derek, good to see you again.”
Derek? Why would the Colonel address him by his first name? Last night when they spoke on the phone, it was all formal speak. But as the two men conversed, it became clear to Alex that the two higher-ranking gentlemen knew each other well. No wonder the Colonel had firsthand knowledge about her background.
“Alex, when Mason called, I thought it was best to include Colonel Johnson. I trust him completely as you both should, too.”
Alex peered up at the Colonel, who was standing behind them with his arms crossed over his chest, leaning against the high-top table. She knew if Derek said to trust him, then she needed to.
She looked back towards the screen as Derek continued, “Alex, why don’t you fill us in on the details.”
She cleared her throat and began to speak. “Before we get into that, I wanted to follow up from our discussion last night. After the way last night’s mission went down, I’m strongly convinced the mission was compromised. With your permission, I’d like to create a list of individuals who have or had access to our files and information and start a process of elimination. That bomb was placed there intentionally and meant to kill us all. We were just lucky this time.”
“Yeah, thanks to your keen eye,” Ace said to her.
She smiled at him for the compliment. “Let’s also not forget the lovely souvenir I got the other night,” she said, pointing to her stitches, making all three men frown, so she kept going. “Now let’s talk about this report. What Bowman sent me outlines the information that was said to be provided by firsthand accounts. However, I call bullshit. That is unless dead people can talk.”
“What?” Derek asked, looking even more curious.
She took a deep breath. “The information stated in the files could’ve only been divulged by someone from my previous team or myself. And there are several reasons I know that didn’t happen. One, our Intel mysteriously vanished. Two, the actual flash drives were destroyed in the explosion, and, third, the only person alive and knows what was in those reports is me. So, I’m struggling as to how details from a past mission the government swears they never got, ironically made its way into Intel on a case that I am working on.” Now tha
t she said all of that out loud, it sounded ridiculously crazy, and she almost couldn’t believe it herself.
Derek leaned forward and cautiously asked, “You’re sure you didn’t provide that information when you were debriefed once you got home? You were going through a lot at the time.”
She shook her head, “I’m positive. I was so frustrated and angry that I stopped talking. They weren’t listening to me anyway, so I didn’t offer any further information. But I swear, Derek. This report mimics my accounts from two years ago. It is practically my words on there.”
“Can you elaborate on the information provided in the report?”
She looked at the Colonel. “It references certain locations we monitored. The only difference is that this report links our hostages to the locations. It is like whoever sent the info in is teasing me.”
“How many locations are we talking about?” Ace asked.
“There was a total of six, but only five of them are mentioned in the new report. However, our focus was on two of them more so than the others.”
“What made those two more conspicuous?” Derek asked.
“The two locations were close to each other, northwest of Kabul. We had informants at both locations, who had access to the buildings. They provided times, even photos of certain individuals coming and going. According to both, they saw crates of weapons being loaded inside. Over three days, we blended ourselves into the crowds in local markets, trying to get close enough.” She explained how one day she’d come face-to-face with Yaseen, Ashraf’s oldest son.
“Shit, what did you do?” Colonel Johnson asked.
“My job. I acted like nothing was out of the ordinary and was just a tourist on vacation doing some shopping. My colleague was meeting up with one of the informants at the other end of the market. We constructed a plan to catch them off guard and get to the hiding spot to secure the weapons and any of Ashraf’s men during their transport; however, the night of the raid, our informant went missing. Not wanting to waste time, we carried out the plan anyway, but by the time we got there, the weapons were gone. We realized that it had been a setup—the transporters suspected the informant was working with the government, so they told him about the warehouse to see if we would show up. When we did, they killed him. His body was discovered a few days later.”
She furrowed her eyebrows. “Now that I think about it, I’m curious as to why Ashraf didn’t order us taken out right there. It was the perfect opportunity.”
“Fuck…” Derek uttered and took a sip of water. “That doesn’t matter because it didn’t happen. Tell us about the sixth location? You said it wasn’t mentioned in the current Intel.”
“This one is complicated. Compared to the other locations, the building here was massive in size, like a warehouse, set at the base of the mountains in a valley. It was near a village but far enough away from prying eyes. In my opinion, it was a perfect spot if you wanted to hide something. I’ve wanted access to this one ever since it popped up on our radar. Wouldn’t mind still checking it out.”
“Why couldn’t you access it?” Derek asked.
“It sits just inside a green zone.”
“You’d have to get clearance to go in since it’s considered a non-combat zone,” Colonel Johnson said, tapping his index finger against his chin.
“Yeah, even with Intel flagging it, we got denied both times we requested. We were able to secure a spot from a nearby hillside and watch from a distance. People came and went, moving bags and boxes into the building. Most nights, someone stayed.”
“Maybe a safe house.” Ace stated.
Then Derek spoke up, “This is definitely noteworthy, and you’re positive the valley location was not part of today’s report?”
“Nope.”
“My recommendation is that we push forward and begin to eliminate these locations one-by-one. If we are lucky, we can locate our guys and maybe nab us a few terrorists in the process.”
While Ace and the Colonel were talking with Derek, Alex typed a few notes into her computer. The team would be arriving at any minute, and she wanted to be ready, so they could hit the ground running. Half listening to the conversation going on behind her, she heard Derek mention something about keeping a watchful eye, and it caused her to think back to the flashback she had last night. Her fingers slowed on the keyboard until they came to a stop, and she closed her eyes. She started replaying the night back through her mind. Slowly, the images started reappearing, the phone call, and the explosion. But those weren’t the ones she was searching for. She suppressed her memory, searching hard for the stranger she saw.
A light breeze blew through, sending a slight shiver through her. She took a step towards the house when she saw movement to her right. There, by the corner of the house. He was looking right at her. Williams? He had a hat pulled down low, obscuring his face, so she couldn’t positively identify him. She tried looking harder, but a noise distracted her, causing her to look away. When she looked back, he was gone, then everything else was a blur. She couldn’t breathe, her chest and throat constricted.
“Alex!”
Bert called her name. Wait…that wasn’t Bert’s voice; this voice was much deeper and rough.
“Alex!”
Ace! It was Ace’s voice. He sounded so close but still so far away. He would help her.
◆◆◆
Ace was in the middle of discussing some strategy options when he noticed something was wrong with Alex. Her eyes were wide open, but it was like she was stuck in a fog. When he heard her gasp for breath, he knew she was in trouble.
Reaching for her, he called out her name.
“Alex!”
He couldn’t shake her from whatever had a hold of her. He picked her up and placed her on his lap. The Colonel handed him a cold towel, and he put it on her forehead.
“What the hell happened?” The Colonel asked.
“I don’t know. When I looked over, she looked like she was in shock. Could’ve been a panic attack.”
Ace glanced at the screen. “Commander, do you know if Alex has panic attacks?”
Derek shook his head. “Not that I’m aware of. Is she okay?”
Ace turned his attention back to Alex and saw her breathing begin to even out. He used the towel to blot her flushed cheeks. When he heard her curse, he knew she was back with them.
“I think she’ll be okay.”
◆◆◆
“Shit!” She muttered when her brain finally caught up. The large hand pressed against her back reminded her she wasn’t alone. She opened her eyes and was met with Ace’s penetrating gaze. Feeling embarrassed, she tried to slide off his lap, but he held her still. Oh god, she couldn’t believe this was happening. She had done so well to hide the attacks these last two years. Why now?
She heard Derek’s voice calling her name. She didn’t want to turn around and face him. She never wanted him to see her like this and see what she had been dealing with.
“Alex, look at me, please.” When she turned, she only saw concern. “Are you okay?”
She nodded. “I’m sorry about that.”
The Colonel handed her a bottle of water, and she thanked him. He sat in the chair next to her.
“Alex, you don’t have to apologize. Trust me, sweetie, we’ve all gone through it. There’s no need to be embarrassed, especially not around us.”
She appreciated and respected his comment.
“Thanks. Not many people do understand.”
She looked up at Ace and could tell he was worried for her, but she needed to show him that she really was okay.
She tried once again to stand, and this time he released her. But in all honesty, she didn’t want to leave the confines of his hold, where she felt safe and protected.
She knew she owed them an explanation, so she may as well get it over with now. She took a few steps away before turning to face the three of them. When she started to speak, she was grateful they didn’t try to interrupt with questions. O
nce she finished, Derek surprised her by thanking her for being open and honest. They each asked a few questions, but it was two years ago, and without positive identification, she couldn’t very well just walk into the agency and say she saw a man.
Ace touched her elbow and turned her, so she was looking at him. “Alex, why didn’t you ever mention to me that you’ve been having flashbacks, especially considering I’ve stayed with you for the last two nights?” Alex couldn’t believe Ace’s slip up, and she knew he’d realized the mistake as well when he closed his eyes, probably wishing he could backpedal those words.
◆◆◆
Ace wanted to kick himself for that mental slip. He opened his eyes, and the Colonel arched an eyebrow in his direction. Derek’s face was void of expression but was turning red, and Alex sat there, hiding a grin behind her hand. Shit.
Thank god, someone’s brain was firing on all cylinders as Alex jumped in to save the situation from going completely south to the point of no return. She turned her attention to the TV but not before a faint smirk crossed those lips of hers, and she winked. She spoke quickly before Derek’s head exploded. She explained how both Stitch and the base medic felt better if someone had stayed with her the first night and then how he had stopped by to check on her last night and that she appreciated his concern, and that she asked him to stay last night because she was a little shaken up from the events.
The commander looked at Ace, “And let me guess, you just happened to be the Boy Scout and volunteer your services?” His voice dripped with sarcasm. Ace swore that behind Derek’s stoic look, he could see him trying to conceal a smile. And he wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. What did he expect him to do? Nobody else volunteered, although it wouldn’t have done any good because he would’ve overridden them.
Apparently, Derek’s question was rhetorical because he followed up with a question directed at Alex.