Kevlar to My Vest
Page 8
We’d been all each other had growing up.
We’d lived in Germany, France, and so many states that it was hard to name them all when we were young.
Dad went where the Navy sent him, and we dutifully followed.
The Spurlock boys always had each other’s backs, and God help anyone that tried to pick on one of us, because the other brothers wouldn’t let you forget whom you fucked with.
I could always count on them.
Always.
“Sure, I have to run by Viddy’s apartment tomorrow because I’m having an alarm installed, but Max and Gabe should be there fairly early, so after that we’re free to go.” I said just as Viddy stepped up onto my porch.
Viddy’s mouth was pursed, making me barely contain the smile that wanted to overtake my face.
Viddy wasn’t happy that I’d paid for the materials and labor to have the alarm installed.
My argument was that I’d been the one to hire the most expensive men in the Ark-La-Tex, so I was going to pay for it. End of story.
She’d not had anything else to say to that. My guess was that she didn’t want to fight with me over the matter. She’d figure out a way to pay me back eventually. She was devious like that. I’d have to be on the lookout just in case she tried to start slipping me bills in random spots.
“Who’re Gabe and Max?” Miller asked.
“They run a modern day Underground Railroad for ladies that are trying to escape abusive situations, along with three other men. James, one of the members of Free, is married to Sebastian’s sister. Sebastian and Sam, another of the members, are brothers. Silas is their father. They have different mothers though. They put up the capital, and together they erase her identity, and give her a new one. They send her on her way with a nice bank account, a new name, and ensure she’s safe.” Viddy explained jovially.
As if it was the most awesome thing in the world, what they did.
I blinked at her, surprised that she knew that much stuff about them. The men of Free were pretty tight lipped about what they did. They had to be, or the women they helped would be in danger.
“How’d you know all that?” I asked suspiciously.
“People tend to talk around me. For some reason they see the blind girl and assume I’m too stupid to realize what’s going on. That and I tend to blend into the background in most situations.” She shrugged.
“So what else have you learned?” I asked worriedly.
She smiled cryptically. “Oh, not much. Well, a little bit. You’ll have to take me out to see a movie before I tell you, though. I haven’t been able to do that in years.”
With that cryptic comment, she left, walking back inside, not even sparing us another glance.
Taking half of my heart with her.
“Oh, she’s dangerous.” Miller laughed.
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, now you know why I have to keep some distance between us until I know if she can handle my job or not.”
“Yeah, good luck with that.” Miller said as he tossed the rest of his beer back. “Now, let’s go eat some of that fried chicken she cooked. It smells fucking amazing.
Chapter 6
Boys will be boys, and men will be…whiney boys when they don’t get what they want.
-Life Lesson
Trance
“What the fuck is that?” Foster asked as he pointed to the piece of equipment that Max had in his hands.
Max was a big fucker.
Tall with shoulders like a linebacker. He was my height with close-cropped hair and one fuck of a scar on his face.
Him and Loki were two peas in a pod in the scar department.
“This,” Max said as he held up the newest gadget he was installing in Viddy’s place. “This is my newest acquisition from my old CO. It’s a prototype that we’ve been begging to use. It only took the right circumstances. See, his baby sister is blind, too. He knows all the hardships that they go through. He sent extra.”
His grin was positively devilish.
Gabe was busy giving Viddy a run down on how to work her new system. What to do and not to do. What features she had in case she ever needed them. Right then he was busy putting a remote key chain into her hand.
Except he lifted her wrist, used his fingers to open her hand, and then curled his hand around hers to make her clasp the gadget, which made my blood boil.
It was irrational.
I knew Gabe was very happily married with three kids, one of which turned nine months old last week. I’d even seen him showing off pictures of his baby when he arrived.
However, my mind didn’t care that he was married. All that kept screaming through my head was that some man had his hands on her.
“What the fuck?” Max exclaimed.
All of us turned to where Max was standing near the closet, and what I saw made my stomach flip.
No, it wasn’t the arsenal of guns that Viddy had in her bedroom closet. Nor the N’Sync poster she had hanging up on her closet door.
It was the tiny little camera about the size of my pinky finger that Max pulled out that elicited that reaction.
Gabe, who saw the little camera from all the way across the room, pulled Viddy out by her elbow before she could see anything, leaving my brothers, Max, and me behind. All staring at the camera.
“Is it live?” I rasped.
The words felt raw in my throat.
Using a red bandana he had in his back pocket, Max took the camera down carefully, being doubly sure not to smudge any lasting prints.
“Got a light?” Max asked with a raised eyebrow.
Miller was the first to hand him one out of his own pocket. It was a little Mag-Lite the size of a pen.
Shining it up into her closet, he found wires leading to a small battery powered box.
“Whatever it is, he has to come back in here to check it.” Max said as he showed us the box he ripped down from the ceiling.
We all gathered around, staring at the innocent little piece of equipment that probably captured many of Viddy’s private moments.
“That asshole boyfriend of hers is going to die.” Foster declared from beside me.
I glanced over at him. “Dying is too good for him. I vote sending the fucker to jail and setting him up for some services in the system for a while.” I said as I pulled my phone out of my pocket and made a few calls.
After talking to Loki and getting his confirmation that he’d send a team out to dust for more prints and bring the evidence in, I declared, “Viddy’s going to go with us. Do you guys mind staying here till my boys get here? We leave her here much longer and she’s going to figure out what happened. I want to be sure it was actually him before I tell her what’s going on.”
“Absolutely.” Max agreed instantly.
The same couldn’t be said for the woman in the other room. She was like a rabid beast when it came to her independence.
After I assured her that I would tell her later, she agreed. Reluctantly
***
Viddy
I’d never been fishing before in a boat. Nor hung out with a bunch of men that’d been drinking.
However, that said, it was the most fun I’d ever had in my life.
When we’d first arrived, Trance backed the trailer expertly into the water with Foster and Miller already on the boat.
They’d even gotten it off the trailer completely before anybody realized that they’d forgotten to put the plug in.
The plug, Trance explained, was a little device that you have to screw in at the back of the boat to keep the water out. Once you’re finished, you pull the plug out, and any water that collected in the boat would drain out.
With all the goofing around and name-calling, each of the men had forgotten in their playing that none had done the usual check to make sure they had everything they needed.
They didn’t forget their cooler full of beer and cheese, though.
Or the earth worms and little baby minnows that they’d be
fishing with.
After the fiasco of putting the boat in the water and then trying to get it out again before it sank to the bottom of the boat ramp, they set out on the lake to do some brother bonding time, with me in tow.
Something had happened at my apartment, but of course they tried to protect me from everything. Each and every man in that room looked at me like I was a poor, pitiful, little disabled woman.
I’d reluctantly gone with Trance, Miller, and Foster, leaving the other two men at my apartment that I’d only met once before. They looked trustworthy, though, which was why I left them. Even with murder in their eyes that they’d had the moment I’d walked out the door.
“I can’t believe you forgot the fish basket.” Miller grumbled for the eighteenth time.
“I’ve got a fuckin’ live well! Put them in there, you stupid son of a bitch!” Trance yelled.
I giggled, yet again, as they started arguing like little boys.
“How am I supposed to keep mine separate from yours? If I put them in yours, then I won’t be able to gloat about whose is bigger!” Miller growled.
The giggling turned to full out laughing my ass off.
“What does it matter?” Foster asked seriously. “Viddy was the only one who caught what we were absolutely sure was a keeper.”
That was true. They’d forgotten to bring a tape measure, which meant that the fish they were catching might or might not be legal, so they’d ended up tossing them back. Mine was the only one in the live well at the moment, much to each of the men’s annoyance.
“I tried to offer my dick as a measuring tool, but you wouldn’t let me with Viddy here. Although she said it’d be all right.” Miller provoked.
Trance’s eyes turned cold and hard as they took in his older brother.
“Your dick better stay in your pants at all times. I’m not sure what four inches would do us anyway. We need twelve inches. You’d have to stack your dick three times to get what we needed.” Trance goaded.
Trying to stop the inevitable argument before it got to shoving, I distracted Trance by asking Trance about his name.
“You know, Trance, it’s really weird that both of your brothers are named after beers and you aren’t.” I said as I looked at his face.
Today my vision had returned to the better than normal, as opposed to last night, where it dwindled down to barely anything again. After a quick call to Dr. Morris this morning, he said that it was possible that it would always do that when I got tired, and to just get used to it.
It proved to be more annoying than anything. I didn’t know when, at any given time, it’d decide to stop working again. So I was always on edge, waiting for it to leave.
“Trance isn’t my real name. That’s just the name I was given when I joined The Dixie Wardens. Killian Red Spurlock is my real one...” Trance said distractedly.
He had a fish on the line, making him lose the conversation in the middle as he battled with a fish on his hook.
I was worried it’d slip off like it had the last three times, but this time he got it all the way to the boat, and Foster used the net to capture the slippery creature and bring it onto the deck.
“My God, that thing is the ugliest, most nastiest thing I’ve ever seen.” I said, walking over to it and crouching down so I could see it more clearly.
“What is it?” I asked as I ran my finger up the side of its slimy body.
“Buffalo. They’re big fuckers, but we don’t usually keep them. They don’t taste very good to us.” Trance said as he removed the hook from the fish’s mouth.
“What was mine again?” I asked.
“Channel cat.” Foster said.
“Mine’s prettier.” I decided.
“Yeah, Channel Cats are pretty.” He agreed as he tossed his line back into the water.
Reaching forward, I cracked open a bottle of Bud. “I guess it’s good that your parents didn’t like Bud Lite. Foster, Miller, and Killian have a much better ring to them.”
They snorted. “Our father owns a bar now that he’s retired. At the time each of us was born, he named us after the beer he’d been drinking the night before.”
That was explained by the youngest, Foster.
“That’s nifty and a lot like my parents’ explanation. My mom and dad named us after songs that they’d heard on the radio when we were born. They fought like cats and dogs for the entire nine months of the pregnancy. The first one was Vidalia.” I smiled wistfully at the retelling of the story. “My daddy liked to say that he had to change the station just in case Jolene came on. Sweet Adeline was the first one that came on the oldies station the minute after Adeline was born.”
“Our parents sound like they would’ve gotten along, honey.” Trance said softly, running his smelly fish fingers across my cheek.
I was so enamored with his words, and the smile on his face that revealed those beautiful dimples that I didn’t even care about his fish fingers. I just smiled and leaned into his hand, thankful that I was experiencing the moment.
Being technically blind left me with many regrets as to what I would never get to experience.
But during the next five hours on that boat, it was the best of my life.
Why, you ask?
The three men that surrounded me.
Weather in Louisiana was hot, regardless of the time of year.
It was mid-September, and only a mere eighty-nine degrees out. Although on the milder side of the heat index, it still meant that sweating was inevitable.
Add to the heat, the humidity, and you had a nice little feeling of baking going on. By mid-morning, all three men in the boat with me had shed their shirts, and all stood bare chested and glistening.
My mind had never been so full of perfection before.
All three men had tattoos. A lot of them.
Trance, however, was the one with the least. His chest and back were only partially covered, whereas Foster and Miller barely had a free spot on their torsos. Their arms were free of any identifying tattoos, which I suspected was due to their status as SEALS, rather than personal preference.
The sweat on their bodies dripped down, pooling in the waistband of their underwear, which rode up just slightly over the belt of their jeans. Funny enough, they all three wore the same brand. Fruit of the Loom.
Each man wore a hat, concealing their eyes and faces, and I couldn’t stop thinking about how well they could sell a calendar.
Each man was ripped.
Each man had scars scattered over their bodies, but Trance’s was the one I was most interested in.
His chest had a large bruise just above his chest bone from being shot the day before. Or I suppose nearly shot was more appropriate. It was purple, blue, yellow, and putrid green.
The slice on his temple was just as bad. It was inflamed and red, with the black of the stitches sticking out against his tanned skin like a shining beacon.
He had what I’d guessed were a few knife wounds, one gunshot wound that went from a point on his right belly to the back of his right flank.
A jagged scar that went from his left trapezius muscle at the top of his back to his right lower shoulder that bisected an eagle tattoo that dominated the upper portions of his back.
“What are you doing?” Trance asked me in alarm.
I had my phone up and I was snapping pictures of the three men standing shoulder to shoulder at the back of the boat.
Each man hadn’t even sat the entire four hours we’d been there, leaving me the comfy captain’s chair all to myself.
“This is a Kodak Moment, I figured I’d capture it for the women of the world.” I said happily.
Trance rolled his eyes and turned back to his bobber.
“Hey, send it to my mom. She’d like it.” Foster said offhandedly. “She doesn’t get very many of the three of us.”
“What’s her number?” I asked as I pulled it up into a new message.
Miller rattled off the number, and I hit send.
The reply to my picture message came instantly.
The boys’ mommy: Oh, My God! They are so adorable! Tell them to turn around and take one from the front.
I did so, and each man glared at me as I snapped another shot.
All three of them flipped off the camera.
I hit send, snickering the entire time.
The boys’ mommy: Tell them I’ll beat their asses. Tell them to smile this time.
“She says to smile or she’ll spank you.” I said jovially.
They turned reluctantly, not smiling, as I captured the picture and sent it off.
The boys’ mommy: Thank you. Who is this, by the way?
Me: I’m friends with Trance. My name is Viddy.
The boys’ mommy: My name is Sloan. It’s nice to meet you. Tell me about yourself.
That was how I spent the rest of my time –catching fish, listening to the ribbing of the brothers, texting with Trance’s mom, and watching the man candy in front of me.
It was one hell of a fishing trip.
***
Trance
“Your girl’s asleep.” Foster said from behind me.
Glancing into the rear view mirror, I took in Viddy’s sleeping form slumped against the window.
“Mom likes her.” Miller said as he read something on his phone.
We’d been getting messages from our mother ever since Viddy sent the picture of us, and I damn well knew my mother liked her.
In fact, she’d told me to marry her.
And she hadn’t even met Viddy.
“Yeah,” I said.
My phone rang through the speakers of my truck. Without even thinking about it, I hit the answer button on the steering wheel.
“Hello?” I answered.
The background noise of the bullpen of the precinct filled the speakers as Loki greeted me. “Hey, man. Got the prints lifted from the camera. They were Paul Russo’s all right. I have a team heading to Russo’s place right now to arrest him and search his place. Gabe and Max found two other cameras and a recording device in the guest room of her place.”