“You don’t like it.” She heard his voice and it pulled her from her contemplative thoughts long enough to sign, “I love it.” His lips turned upward in a proud smile.
“You obviously gave this some thought.” She gestured to the position of the loving couple, the man tucked beneath her, the look of love and desire painted in his eyes and an expression of sheer pleasure painted on the woman’s face—on her face.
“Since I first saw you.”
She giggled. “Wow. That is amazing. You’re not going to put that out there for everybody to see are you? It could jeopardize my life in an undercover assignment.” If she was able to get any undercover assignments again. She was well aware that Candice seemed to be aiming towards keeping her in the Special Conditions unit until she was ready to move her—not to mention the fact she was just on camera as Colt’s girlfriend. Well, at least her cover wasn’t blown there. They didn’t suspect she was the agent assigned to protect him because they didn’t have proof that he was the witness.
“This is for me, and you,” he stroked a finger over her lips. “Only for us. I hope when all is done here, I hope that you will spend many nights with me here.”
“Like this,” not that she would mind that at all, but was he just attracted to her because of her position?
“Like more than this. Like the dinners we have shared, lunches, breakfast, conversations and our morning runs. I like this with you.” He looked at the painting. “I like that with you too,” he smiled devilishly.
She laughed. “Me too, to all of it. But first things first—I keep you safe. Once this is all behind us we can focus on more of this and that,” she winked as she looked back to the painting. He was really good. She loved the shades of emeralds and sapphires. The colors were striking, the detail amazing, and the total painting was something she would hang on her wall in a heartbeat. “I really do love it, Colt.”
He pulled her into his arms and placed a soft kiss on her forehead. She allowed them to remain like that for just a little while longer before pulling back. They had to go for their run, and then come back to breakfast and a shower. After that he would go into his painting cave and she would do what she did keeping watch on the grounds and making sure he was safe while still trying to handle business at the office from afar. Maybe this setup wasn’t so bad actually. Other than pulling double duty, she rather liked working from home—even if it wasn’t her home she was working from.
She secured her weapon, put on her running shoes and the black sports jacket that would help keep her warm and she and Colt hit the trail around the back of his property. She would swear that today he was making this a race because he was moving out, as her good friend Forester would have said. She kept pace with him, but his longer legs made his effort less than hers. What was he running from—or to? By their fifth mile she needed to slow it down. She caught hold of his arm and gave enough squeeze to let him know she needed him. He slowed his pace until he stopped completely. When he turned to her she smiled at him and signed, “I need to stop. Sorry,” she laughed.
She placed her hands on her thighs and tried to catch her breath. He just seemed to be running faster and faster while by mile three she was thinking of how great it would be if he slowed down a little. She didn’t want to ruin his workout, but she had to catch her breath. She was used to running, just not his kind of running. Plus she was still trying to completely get back up to where she was before she had gotten shot. She was doing well, but she wasn’t sure to be joining any marathons any time soon.
“Wow,” she felt her breathing starting to settle. The great thing about being in shape was that she didn’t have a slow recovery time. She wasn’t back to normal, but she wasn’t feeling her heart pounding against her chest either.
“Sorry,” he signed to her and she laughed.
“No problem. You are moving out today. What’s going on?”
“I was thinking about getting back so we can shower.” He looked her sweat soaked pull over up and down. “Together,” he added. Well now she could understand why he was trying to get back in a hurry. She liked the idea of showering together too. She stepped closer to him.
“You know,” she smiled. “We could always cut this—” She felt the body that felt like a brick wall slam into her like a linebacker going after an opposing team’s man. She hit the ground hard and so did Colt. The hit knocked them apart so Colt wasn’t within her area of protection.
She saw the man approaching Colt. He wasn’t wearing a ski mask which told Autumn that the man didn’t plan on leaving any witnesses behind alive. She didn’t think about the pain from hitting the ground. She got up and went after him before he could reach Colt.
She managed to hit him, but he recovered swiftly, pulling a long steel blade from behind his back and lashing out at her. She evaded as much as she could, but he caught her across the back of her right forearm, splashing blood across her face. He kicked her hard and she fell backwards. She saw Colt trying to get to her. She needed him to stay put. She needed him to stay down or this man would kill him.
She didn’t have time to hesitate. She went for the weapon she had secured to her ankle, pulled it, released the safety, aimed and fired, not one shot, not two, but six until the man went down to the ground. She aimed center mass as her training had dictated, but she took the last shot high just in case he was wearing a vest. She wasn’t thinking about saving the tax payers money by saving them a trial. She was thinking about saving Colt from having this guy come back after him later. She wouldn’t have him live the rest of his life in fear, not when she could take the definitive kill shot and set him free.
Colt was by her side so swiftly, checking her arm, tending to it while peeling his sweatshirt off his body, pulling his t-shirt over his head and wrapping her arm.
She tried to sign to him, but he seemed more concerned with seeing to her than paying attention to her left handed signing. She kept trying and he kept swatting her hand away so he could make sure she didn’t bleed out on him. The cut wasn’t that deep—well, it was deep she had to admit that, but she wasn’t in any danger of bleeding out—at least she didn’t think so.
She gave up trying to sign to him. She pushed against his shoulder and got him to move so she could get her phone from the strap she had it in around her other ankle. She called in her team first then put the call in to the local police. Procedures were important and while she was there on official business she knew pissing off the local cops would tie her up in paperwork for the next three months. She knew that because they were just those kinds of guys who were big on not letting the Feds rain on their glory.
She looked up into Colt’s eyes realizing he looked broken with fear—fear for her. “This wasn’t your fault,” she signed before placing the palm of her hand on his cheek. He turned his head, leaning into her touch. He leaned in and placed a soft kiss on her lips. She had been through worse. She had almost died, but she wasn’t going to tell him that—not right now. He looked devastated enough as it was.
She heard sirens approaching them and she knew their relatively peaceful moment was about to move back into the realm of chaos. She was prepared for that; he wasn’t.
As the police officers moved around and two members from her team showed up, York and Huck, she handled giving her statement and translating for Colt’s statement. Of course they wanted another translator, a separate one, but one call from Candice and the waters turned friendly—relatively friendly anyway. There was still so much to find out. They still had to know the reason behind this guy’s murderous spree, but that wasn’t her job, or her team’s job. They were just supposed to protect the witness, not lead an investigation into the why of the situation.
News reporters weren’t too far behind and neither was the media whore, at least that’s what all the guys called Dillon MacAfee. Dillon was one of the federal press agents who would spin things in the federal favor and he was spinning this event expertly. “Our agent,” he had said. “A special unit worth
every dime,” he had added. That alone told Autumn they were looking to get more funding. Hey, they had just taken down a serial killer. While there would be some lunatics who would probably get their shorts in a wad and protest over the inhumane aspect of the killer’s death, most men would breathe easier.
Colt had refused to stray too far from her side even when she told him she needed to work. She had work to do because this wasn’t just some civilian in a self defense situation; this was a federal agent firing her weapon and killing somebody. She had to go through the proper procedures not just with the cops, but with her agency as well. Normally she would be placed on paid leave for a week while she got herself cleared for continued duty, but this wasn’t normal. She was working two cases—keep Colt safe, which was not looking like a main concern anymore and the second case was finding their traitor. That took priority for everybody, especially Candice, over making sure Autumn was mentally stable enough to keep serving.
Autumn laughed at the words Candice had given her. Candice was right; she would be cleared to return without an issue. She had discharged her weapon and killed before, but that didn’t mean she felt any ease at having to do it. This time the situation was different. Thinking back on it she could have put a bullet lower by trying to shoot out a knee cap—which wasn’t as easy with a moving target as civilians seemed to think it was. She could have tried a different way to neutralize the threat. But a part of her wanted to make sure Colt would be safe and that part of her didn’t worry with taking precious time, time she didn’t have much of, to come up with a different way to stop this guy. She took the shot, and while she wouldn’t change that at all, the week of downtime would give her time to process her actions before going back to work. She didn’t need it, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t have wanted it.
“When we’re through here, boss,” York stood in front of her. “We’re going to need you in the office. We have something, and I think we can proceed with what we started.”
We, she liked the sound of that. They were working together. She wasn’t alone in trying to fish a piranha out of their calm waters.
“No,” Colt bolted upwards. He had read York’s lips.
York’s lips turned upward. “Tell him not to worry. Candice wants you to stay on him,” he smirked and Autumn rolled her eyes. “Would look bad in the media if we abandoned him just because we have the guy.”
Autumn nodded and signed to Colt just in case he missed anything. Colt looked satisfied with the answer. Wait, how was she supposed to go handle the other portion of her job if she had Colt with her? As if reading her thoughts York looked at her and shrugged. “She says you can put him somewhere in the office part of our unit. Somebody will stay with him while we take care of what I need to show you. I think I’m right. I think we have our traitor, but I’m not sure this is a one person job, Autumn. I’m not sure this is the end of it.”
In those words she heard his concern and she would agree. The men and women lost to this weren’t people she knew, but that didn’t change the fact that she cared. However, for them these were their friends, their family basically, and the death of one member of that family was devastating enough, but to have several men and women lost and because of one of their own was unforgivable and unshakable. Even if there was only one person on the inside, that didn’t mean any of them would ever fully trust each other again. Trust was broken, and once that happened there was no going back.
Chapter Ten
“Betsy, we have you on camera, we have the audio and we know you’re our mole. We know you betrayed this unit.” Autumn stood there with York and Candice beside her. Huck was blocking the door just in case Betsy thought she might get a chance to run out of their makeshift interrogation room.
“The money was good while it lasted,” she chuckled. “I should have known.” She shook her head. “I told him we should have left the first woman alive so we could push the blame off on her.”
“You had Gracie killed?” York’s shoulders were tense and Autumn could tell his anger could reach the tipping point.
Betsy shrugged. “I needed more access to these files without her looking over my shoulder. The family that died with her was just a casualty basically. We needed her to die so they had to die with her. I got her job and uninhibited access to all of your files.”
York stepped forward and Autumn grabbed his arm trying to hold him back.
“I should kill you,” he snarled. “She was a good woman.”
Betsy laughed. Her pearly whites and soft toned face made her the perfect traitor—nobody would suspect her at first sight. That was the problem with judging people based on how they looked—it wasn’t an accurate assessment of their character.
“You think killing me, or jailing me, is going to change anything. Anybody can be bought, York, anybody.”
Autumn could tell from the way York’s muscles were contracting beneath her hand that he was near losing it completely.
Candice opened the door to the agents she had called in to handle the detainment. “Get her out of here.”
Betsy laughed. “He won’t let me stay in jail. He’ll get me a lawyer to get me out. You won’t win.”
Candice was the one to laugh this time, causing Betsy’s eyes to widen. “You’re not going to jail, Pumpkin,” Candice laughed.
“Where are you taking me?”
“This is a case of National Security Breech…at least I say it is. You’re going someplace where not even the angels can save you.”
The tall and thin federal officer manhandled Betsy into cuffs before placing a black sack over her head. She struggled and yelled until one fist to her face silenced her. Autumn felt herself shiver. She didn’t feel sorry for Betsy. She had made her choice to betray and now she was going to have to live with it, but the thought of what men like that would do to her just to find out if a more imminent threat was upon them made her shiver. She knew what would happen. She had worked the special ops division of Homeland Security. She knew exactly where they were taking her. Candice was right—where she was going, what she would go through could make the stories people spun about water boarding look like a game of Candyland.
“Where are they taking her?” York mumbled.
“You don’t want to know.” She assured him.
“Take her out the back. I wouldn’t want that piece of man toy Autumn has in the office to accidently see you carting her out.” Candice grinned at her as the two men took Betsy away, dragging her more than carrying her. “I know everything,” Candice assured her. “Nobody ever gets to hide anything from me. Just don’t make a habit of bedding the witnesses,” she winked at her.
“I was thinking now that we have this solved I could go back to Homeland, to the team I was with.”
Candice laughed. “Oh I’m sorry, honey. You thought I was bluffing when I said I was keeping you,” She laughed hard. “I meant what I said. You’re mine, and you’re here to stay. I have plans for you, sugar. You don’t get to ruin my plans.” And on those words Candice left her standing there with Huck and York staring at her with shock and what she would say, pity, in their eyes.
“Sorry, Huck. I really thought she would let you have your slot back.”
He shrugged. “Seems to me that you got the short end of the stick, Autumn. You’re allowing me more freedom here to do something that makes me feel like a valued member of this team. When I…well, let’s just say I haven’t felt really needed in a long time. You let me feel that here even without my position being my position. You, on the other hand, had to leave your family. I would have hated to leave mine and I thought I would be discarded. Candice told me you fought for me to stay on.”
She had. She hadn’t told him that, but when Candice spilled the setup to her, Autumn had gone to bat for Huck. She didn’t know the man; she just couldn’t stand the idea that she would be the reason he lost his job and took a cut in his pension.
“Thanks for that.”
“You deserve to be here.”
“You can go home; we’ll take care of this. Your man toy,” York repeated Candice’s words, “is waiting for you.”
Autumn backhanded York against his stomach. He flinched. “Ouch, you pack some power in that little hand.”
“And I was pulling it,” she winked at him. “How did you know? About Colt, how did you know?”
He shrugged. “It wasn’t you. It was him. The first time I saw the two of you together he looked at you like a man who wanted you. I figured he would make a move and he’d either win or lose a few digits in the process. Then I saw him today, and he looked at you like a man who had you and knew he wanted to keep you. The man is in love with you—not lust. That look in his eyes is love.”
She contemplated his words. He might be right. Things had changed between them. She had seen his initial reaction to her and she knew he liked what he saw, but today had been completely different. What she saw in his eyes went beyond lust, beyond sex, he did love her.
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