More Than Forever (Providence Series Book 2)

by Moore,Mary B

  I finished my coffee and put the cup on the table, shrugged on my suit jacket and then gathered up all of the files and paperwork that I was going to need for the day. Another effect that all of this bullshit was having was that I was spending long periods of time away from the office. And although I brought the work with me or my secretary emailed it all to me in Piersville, I was missing big meetings, so I had a conference in two hours with my department managers and my cousin Noah, who was my Vice President, to get filled in on what I’d missed. Before then, though, I had to sort through the paperwork that hadn’t been marked as urgent while I was away, but that still needed sorted through and I also wanted to see…no I didn’t. I wasn’t going to allow myself to go there. Women couldn’t be trusted because they were all out for themselves and for what they could get.

  Coleman hung up and filled me in on what had happened as we walked out the house to the waiting SUV. I was fucking pissed that it had been a bomb; it could have killed Luke and Isla. And what if someone had come in and decided to move it or it had been knocked off the desk by accident?

  Discussing the situation, I didn’t realize we were at my building until we stopped at the lights waiting to pull across the road that it sat on the opposite of. I took a second to take in the sight of it and as always felt the pride I got every time that my family had created this. Just as we went to pull forward, there was an explosion in the top of the building where my office was, and I watched as a ball of fire came out the glass walls, showering the road and cars below with glass and burning debris.

  “Stay in the vehicle,” Coleman barked as he jumped out of the car and started running across the road, dodging falling debris.

  No fucking way! Running toward the building, doing the same as Coleman had dodging burning papers and shit that was falling everywhere, I got to the doors just as people came pouring out of the stairwells and ran towards the glass doors of the building. I wove my way through them and got to the lobby just as I saw Coleman go through the stairwell doors. At that moment, a higher volume of people came rushing out, some of them covered in dust and covering their mouths and noses as they coughed. I was waiting for my cousin and for the other person that I’d told myself repeatedly that I had no interest in, though.

  I’d just said fuck it and was about to run toward the door when it opened and Noah came out covered in grey soot and coughing hard.

  “Noah,” I yelled over the noise of people screaming and crying and ran over to him. “Are you okay?” I checked him over and only saw a couple of cuts where he must have been hit by things caught in the force of the blast.

  “What the fuck, Brett,” he croaked before he started coughing again.

  “What happened?” I kept my eyes on the door begging for her to come running through them.

  “I’d just sat behind my desk and was waiting for Amelia to come to my office and the next thing I knew there was a roaring sound and then everything just exploded. I tried to check the floor to make sure that there was no one else left on it, but the smoke is so dark and thick that you can’t see jack shit up there.” I heard the sound of men yelling directions and turned around as firemen came running through the door and started towards the door that I’d reluctantly taken my eyes off of.

  Ambulances were pulling up on the other side of the road and the police were already setting up a cordon on the road so that only the emergency services could get through. It looked like a war zone outside, with debris from the office all over the road. Some of it had landed on cars that were driving by, and I could see people staggering across the road toward them, some with blood pouring from their heads or from other various injuries. Burning papers continued to fall, and the staff members that had already made it out were being led away from it all to the fire evacuation point designated by our Health and Safety department.

  Noah was wheezing, so I yelled for help and saw a member of Fire and Rescue running from the latest truck to pull up carrying a medical bag.

  Then it hit me what he’d said and I spun back round to face Noah. “Did you say Amelia was on her way to your office?”

  “Yeah,” he wheezed. “We had a meeting.”

  Fuck me, she was up there!

  I was running toward the door when it opened and I saw a fireman carrying her out with her head hanging limply over his arm.

  “Get a medic!” He yelled moving past me toward the door while I stood staring at her soot covered face. She had to be okay, she had to be.

  I walked over to Coleman, who stood staring grimly at the mess around us as he watched the firemen put the fires out on the street as smoke billowed out of the building. There were the sounds of hysteria all around us, but I couldn’t stop staring at the ambulance where they’d taken Amelia, she’d been so limp and there was soot all over her. Was she even still alive?

  “Sir?” A voice said beside us and we turned to look at the member of Coleman’s team called Ross who was standing there looking pissed off. “How the fuck did this happen?”

  “Get me the security footage and make a copy for the police. I want to speak to security as soon as fuckin’ possible, so find them. And I want you to go and get me anyone who was on that floor when this happened. Monitor what the police know and are being told and report back,” Coleman growled. “Oh and Ross, have two men follow Miss Logan’s ambulance, too, and report back on her condition,” he finished, turning to make eye contact with me, which didn’t surprise me, this guy knew everything about my life.

  I waited until Ross had walked away and then, with my eyes back on the ambulance which still hadn’t left, I asked, “Do you think it’s an inside job?”

  “I don’t know and I’m not counting out the police either. Someone had to be in on this and I want to know who.”

  “You and me both.”

  Chapter

  TWENTY-FIVE

  ?

  “You better have good news for me,” I said as I hit answer on the piece of shit burner phone.

  “I’m on my way back from Dallas.”

  “And?”

  “I did what you asked me to do.”

  Gritting my teeth against screaming at him for not just fucking coming out with it all and telling me the details without being asked, I took a deep breath in. I built my reputation on being calm and I wasn’t going to lose it all now.

  “Did you meet with the contact while you were there?”

  “Yes.”

  “So you’ll remember him and deal with him in the near future?”

  There was silence, and then he asked, “I never forget a face. You want rid of him?”

  “I definitely will do soon, but not yet.”

  I was just about to hang up when I heard his voice using a tone I hadn’t heard before. “What the fuck was the shit in Piersville about? I thought you said you wanted me to withdraw from the Montgomery’s.”

  This time my teeth ground together audibly. “It appears that we have two outstanding lose ends that are a bigger problem than we assumed. When you return, I want them found.”

  “Mr. Lewis”

  I was fucking sick of this asshole. If it wasn’t for Red, I’d have off’d him and left the contract after those two bitches hired a drunk to off Isla Montgomery. Maybe I should have felt surprise when I met the contact in Dallas, but I’d seen and done too much shit in my life to get surprised by shit like that anymore; it was almost a cliché.

  This was my last contract, though, after this it would be me and Red and I’d never have to do this shit again. I had enough money to see us living more than comfortably for the rest of our lives, but before that I had to make sure that I tied up my own loose ends, starting with that incompetent fuck. The news about the bomb in Piersville fucked me off, it meant that I was going to have to keep my head down for longer, which I could do easily, but it meant that it was going to take longer to get the job done and start again with my Red.

  Picturing her smiling face and how she always gave me that special look when I we
nt to visit her calmed me down.

  “I’m coming home for you, baby.”

  Chapter

  TWENTY-SIX

  Luke

  It had been two days since the bombs went off here and at Brett’s offices, and we were all sitting facing Mom, Dad, and Ren’s parents Jack and Colette, alongside his grandparents Hurst and Linda.

  “Why didn’t you tell us about this shit before?” Jack ground out.

  “Dad,” Brett replied for us. “You already knew shit was going on?”

  “Oh yeah, we knew shit was going on, but you’ve been sitting on information that we didn’t fucking know,” he yelled.

  “Honey, don’t swear,” Colette said grabbing his hand. “And calm down a bit, it isn’t good for your heart.”

  “Fuck that, Colly,” Hurst took over. “I know y’all think you’re hot fucking shit, but you’re not. I fought in Vietnam.” We all took a deep breath and all got comfortable as we waited for one of his ‘during the war’ stories that dragged on for hours and got bigger each time he told it. “I went for days without communications with our base, days in a jungle surrounded by spiders as big as your head and snakes that can kill you like that,” he clicked his fingers. “There were bugs that if they touched you you’d drop dead and we were surrounded by the Viet Kong so we couldn’t even take a piss the whole time. I could have helped you with this shit dammit, I can shoot a fly off your hand and you’d never feel it.” I’m sure the expression on my face mirrored the horror on everyone else’s, including Jack and Colette’s seeing as the last time the old dude in front of me picked up a gun to shoot it, it got jammed so he banged it off his knee to ‘shake shit free’ and it shot through the outside of their kitchen window two feet away from where Linda was washing dishes and watching him. He was not to be trusted with weapons of any form.

  “Dad, sit down.” Jack said, and I saw him mouth over to his Mom, Does he have any more guns? And then breathe a sigh of relief when she shook her head, then stopped to think about it, then shook her head again. I hoped he had made a note to go and double check before the old guy killed one of us by accident.

  Then it was Dad’s turn. “What have the FBI said?” Aside from the women, we all chose different spots around the room to look at including Baz. “Tell me you’ve at least contacted the FBI?” he growled.

  Deciding to fill him in before he made a phone call that could end up in a ton of shit for us all, I rubbed my face tiredly because I was fucking exhausted and started. “We can’t. We picked up the shooter and the decoy and questioned them before the police did,” I paused before I told him the worst bit, hoping that one of the others would do it instead, but they didn’t. Bunch of pussies. “And we had to use means that the FBI might not like.”

  “What the fuck does that mean?”

  I wasn’t going into this in front of Isla and the other women, so I made eye contact with Dad and said, “Just what I said.”

  He stood staring at me and then looked back at Jack who gave a small shake of his head. I had an inkling that maybe he knew more than he was letting on, but then Dad turned back to us and sighed. “So where do we stand?”

  Coleman came in at that moment. “I think this conversation would best be had without the women present, especially two pregnant women.”

  They protested, but in the end moved through to the kitchen with two of Coleman’s security team, and he closed the double doors to the living room behind them and then turned to face the room.

  “My bomb tech examined what was found at Brett’s office yesterday and has just looked over the debris from the bomb delivered here.” The tone of his voice had us all sitting straight up. “I’ll start with Luke’s bomb - the bomb was one of the types commonly found in the ‘how to’ manuals online and was made from easily obtained materials, very unlike our previous bombs. The one in Brett’s offices was different from the ones found in Luke’s house and Isla’s car. Traces of an odorless accelerant were found in various locations in his actual office and in a trail leading toward his door.” He’d been pacing as he recounted these facts to us, but sat down letting out a pissed off sigh before continuing. “Fuck, there was a tiny incendiary device like a flare that was wired to a timer that was set to go off so that it would ignite the accelerant. If we didn’t know what to look for given this assholes MO it might have been missed because whoever did this knows what the fuck they’re doing. We have samples of the accelerant and it’s being run as we speak. But my guy says he thinks it’s a chemical that was created by the military six years ago, so he’s also going to make inquiries into whether or not any of it has gone missing.”

  We all sat digesting the information, but I had to ask the question that worried me even more now. “So, they’re not the same person?”

  “The bomb left for you wasn’t as high tech as the previous bombs that they found after the office fire, in Isla’s car, and Luke’s house,” Coleman clipped. “This one was definitely one of those crude homemade bombs which makes it even more fucking lucky that nothing happened coz those fuckers are unstable and anything could have tripped it.”

  “So, could that mean that it’s someone else or did they just try something new?” Dad asked.

  “Bomb makers are proud of their craft so it’s unlikely that it is the same guy,” Coleman replied. “There’s more.”

  “Fuck it, I should have made some popcorn,” Cole huffed until we all looked at him. “Sorry!”

  Coleman was the last to look away from him, giving him an extra glare for good measure. “Two bodies were found today in a motel almost three hours away. The identification found near them had Isla’s stepmother’s and stepsister’s details on them.”

  “Fuck me,” I whispered sitting back in shock as everyone else muttered their own versions of that statement.

  “C.O.D?” Baz asked.

  “Unknown.”

  “Probably the special fucking Kool-Aid,” Cole joked, again earning glares from the other occupants of the room. “What? You have to admit; it would be fucking likely knowing those twisted cult bitches.” He had a point!

  “So where does this leave us?” Jack asked.

  “There are a few possibilities. Firstly - it’s possible that Mrs. Banks and Ms.

  Brennan hired someone to set the professional bombs in the three locations and then acted irrationally and created a bomb themselves using online directions. If this was the case, it would be two different parties. Secondly - it could be different people creating the bombs, but bomb makers again tend to work alone unless you’re in organized crime or terrorism; so this is highly unlikely. So with this option again, it would look like it was two different parties. We can’t completely rule out that it’s only two parties, though, as there are exceptions to the rule. But having heard all of the findings, it would seem most logical that the high tech bombs were made by one person as they all contained some of the same government made components…” he was cut off by his phone beeping in his pocket and pulled it out and read it, his lips tightening into a thin line. Typing a quick reply, he placed it back in his pocket and looked at all of us. “It would appear that security footage shows Ms. Brennan buying some of the materials required to make the bomb that was delivered to you, Luke.”

  “Jesus Christ,” Adam said from beside me. Until now, my brother had been quiet, but his oath was followed by everyone else’s.

  “So, does that mean that if they’re dead by the ‘special Kool-Aid’ that we won’t have any more issues?” Cole queried.

  “At this moment, it wouldn’t be a good idea to assume that the threat to you all is over. We haven’t found anything to confirm that they did hire someone to do this, but we’ll be looking into it. So, for the time being, security will remain tight and we will all continue to be vigilant of what’s going on around us.” He looked around the room at all of us making it clear that the ‘us’ included everyone in the room so we all nodded. “We still have to find the bomb maker and don’t know if he was paid t
o plant more devices in the future or not.”

  I don’t think I was the only one who was struggling to get my head around what we’d been told, because we all mumbled confirmation that we understood, but looking up I could see the same confusion on everyone else’s faces that I knew was on my own.

  “The weddings will go ahead as both Miss Price and Mrs. Montgomery, Christie Montgomery,” he looked over at Dad and clarified, “have made it clear that there will be no cancellations under pain of death. I assume this counts, too.” Shaking his head, Dad muttered under his breath as the rest of us sniggered. “Security will be tight at the venues at all times. For now, we continue as we are.”

  I needed to get up and see my wife, and Dad, Jack, and Ren appeared to be thinking the same thing as they got up and followed me through to the kitchen. I skidded around the corner and came to a stop as I took in the sight in front of me. Maya was mixing something in a bowl, Mom and Linda were measuring out more ingredients and tipping them into bowls, Colette was taking a couple of trays of cookies out of the oven, and Isla was cutting shapes into a dough in front of her. When I was sixteen, I remember going into our kitchen and seeing Mom and Isla baking, and from that moment, one of my innocent fantasies had been to see Isla baking with our kids. At this moment, that dream was almost a reality - we just had to wait for Thing One and Thing Two to be old enough to bake.

  Hurst was the one to break the bubble. “What are y’all making in here? Damn, it smells good!” He walked in sniffing the air and tried to reach for one of the cookies, that were now cooling, but Linda moved quick and smacked his hand hard making us all laugh.

  “No, you’ll wait.”

  “Dammit, woman,” he said scowling and shaking his hand. “Stop hitting me!”