Harvey shoved around his cut-up meat bits for a moment, studying their patterns. Or maybe studying the depths of the ocean that he’d ridden over for those long hours alone.
“No one ever made a meal for me. Just for me.”
“All I did was cut up your prime rib.”
“My first memories were microwave dinners and bar food.”
“Get a grip, Harvey.” And the first thing she was going to do was cook him a real dinner. She’d learned from one of the best private chefs in Charleston, South Carolina. She hadn’t learned more than the basics, but hanging with Chef Claude had made a good escape from her parents’ pre-dinner social drinking. “You were talking about Death, not quite the same as a cut-up slab of beef.”
Again he raised those dark eyes. “I knew that if I gave in for even a second, the ocean would swallow me up as if I’d never been.”
Vivian couldn’t suppress the cold chill that ran up her spine despite the warmth of the bar.
“I also knew that even if it didn’t kill me, I could never face you if I gave in for even a moment.”
“Me?” She felt suddenly breathless.
“Top of the class. Best lover a man could ever ask for. And,” he stabbed up a piece of meat and held it out as proof, “kindness. A guy has to do a lot to deserve that. Women like you don’t exactly grow on trees, Vivian.” He nodded over to pilots’ table where the flirting was fast moving into far more dangerous waters than they knew.
Vivian hadn’t realized that Harvey was aware of what was going on around him. But he was a rescue swimmer. Except for that one brief lapse on the Bayliner, he had intensely trained situational awareness.
“No, we women, ah…” How was she supposed to answer a compliment like that?
We’re like hothouse flowers. Except that was her mother—carefully cultivated and very well-tended, perfect as long as she was in her own little world.
We’re few and far between? Was she? She’d never thought of herself as special. Not before Harvey anyway.
So…what?
“You’re going to pick me from the tree.”
“Thought I made that clear.”
“Not very. What are you talking about?”
In answer he pointed behind her. She scanned the bar over her shoulder but didn’t see anything unusual.
He pointed again, directly at the four aged regulars slouched together over their beers. They were wearing hats with two faces inside a sparkly red heart. They were working their way through Queen’s “Crazy Little Thing Called Love” that was almost in the right tune—as if maybe they’d even rehearsed it a couple of times.
That’s when she spotted the date on the Budweiser calendar hanging on the wall. The picture was a stout and a pilsner in a red heart. It only took her a moment longer to realize today was the fourteenth, Valentine’s Day.
But there was something more going on here.
Vivian felt an odd, floating feeling. There was something familiar about the graybeards’ pink hats, though she couldn’t imagine what it might be. In a daze, she rose from her seat and moved up to the bar, to where she was close enough to see their hats clearly.
Close enough to see the photos of the boy and girl inside the red heart. One was her. Not some glamor shot or official photo. It was her wearing her full kit, including her helmet and grinning at the camera—grinning at Harvey who had just told her that he loved her moments before a standard patrol flight two weeks ago. It had been one of the best moments of her life.
The other photo was Harvey plunging out of a helicopter: etched against the blue sky in his black fins and International Orange neoprene, going in to battle Death man-to-man. Someone on a sailboat had snapped the photo as Harvey had jumped in to airlift a heart attack victim to shore. The head-on shot was a powerful statement of “Help is on its way.”
On the graybeards’ hats, there was a small set of wings below the hearts. They spread wide from a circular center which contained crossed swimming fins—the Rescue Swimmer emblem.
The old guys were grinning wildly at her as their harmony swayed and clashed more violently than a storm-tossed sea.
A moment later Harvey’s good arm slid around her waist from behind and pulled her tight back against his sling and chest.
“You’re having them propose to me—for you?”
“Pretty romantic, huh?” Harvey laughed softly. “That’s what I decided out there facing Death.”
“What exactly?”
“So that we may live,” he whispered in her ear as he reached up to tug on that one curl of hair he always toyed with.
He wouldn’t be getting any argument from her.
Off the Leash
If you enjoyed this, you’ll love the White House Protection Force series
Off the Leash (excerpt)
White House Protection Force #1
“You’re joking.”
“Nope. That’s his name. And he’s yours now.”
Sergeant Linda Hamlin wondered quite what it would take to wipe that smile off Lieutenant Jurgen’s face. A 120mm round from an M1A1 Abrams Main Battle Tank came to mind.
The kennel master of the US Secret Service’s Canine Team was clearly a misogynistic jerk from the top of his polished head to the bottoms of his equally polished boots. She wondered if the shoelaces were polished as well.
Then she looked over at the poor dog sitting hopefully on the concrete kennel floor. His stall had a dog bed three times his size and a water bowl deep enough for him to bathe in. No toys, because toys always came from the handler as a reward. He offered her a sad sigh and a liquid doggy gaze. The kennel even smelled wrong, more of sanitizer than dog. The walls seemed to echo with each bark down the long line of kennels housing the candidate hopefuls for the next addition to the Secret Service’s team.
Thor—really?—was a brindle-colored mutt, part who-knew and part no-one-cared. He looked like a cross between an oversized, long-haired schnauzer and a dust mop that someone had spilled dark gray paint on. After mixing in streaks of tawny brown, they’d left one white paw just to make him all the more laughable.
And of course Lieutenant Jerk Jurgen would assign Thor to the first woman on the USSS K-9 team.
Unable to resist, she leaned over far enough to scruff the dog’s ears. He was the physical opposite of the sleek and powerful Malinois MWDs—military war dogs—that she’d been handling for the 75th Rangers for the last five years. They twitched with eagerness and nerves. A good MWD was seventy pounds of pure drive—every damn second of the day. If the mild-mannered Thor weighed thirty pounds, she’d be surprised. And he looked like a little girl’s best friend who should have a pink bow on his collar.
Jurgen was clearly ex-Marine and would have no respect for the Army. Of course, having been in the Army’s Special Operations Forces, she knew better than to respect a Marine.
“We won’t let any old swabbie bother us, will we?”
Jurgen snarled—definitely Marine Corps. Swabbie was slang for a Navy sailor and a Marine always took offense at being lumped in with them no matter how much they belonged. Of course the swabbies took offense at having the Marines lumped with them. Too bad there weren’t any Navy around so that she could get two for the price of one. Jurgen wouldn’t be her boss, so appeasing him wasn’t high on her to-do list.
At least she wouldn’t need any of the protective bite gear working with Thor. With his stature, he was an explosives detection dog without also being an attack one.
“Where was he trained?” She stood back up to face the beast.
“Private outfit in Montana—some place called Henderson’s Ranch. Didn’t make their MWD program,” his scoff said exactly what he thought the likelihood of any dog outfit in Montana being worthwhile. “They wanted us to try the little runt out.”
She’d never heard of a training program in Montana. MWDs all came out of Lackland Air Force Base training. The Secret Service mostly trained their own and they all came from Vohne Liche Kennels in
Indiana. Unless… Special Operations Forces dogs were trained by private contractors. She’d worked beside a Delta Force dog for a single month—he’d been incredible.
“Is he trained in English or German?” Most American MWDs were trained in German so that there was no confusion in case a command word happened to be part of a spoken sentence. It also made it harder for any random person on the battlefield to shout something that would confuse the dog.
“German according to his paperwork, but he won’t listen to me much in either language.”
Might as well give the diminutive Thor a few basic tests. A snap of her fingers and a slap on her thigh had the dog dropping into a smart “heel” position. No need to call out Fuss—by my foot.
“Pass auf!” Guard! She made a pistol with her thumb and forefinger and aimed it at Jurgen as she grabbed her forearm with her other hand—the military hand sign for enemy.
The little dog snarled at Jurgen sharply enough to have him backing out of the kennel. “Goddamn it!”
“Ruhig.” Quiet. Thor maintained his fierce posture but dropped the snarl.
“Gute Hund.” Good dog, Linda countered the command.
Thor looked up at her and wagged his tail happily. She tossed him a doggie treat, which he caught midair and crunched happily.
She didn’t bother looking up at Jurgen as she knelt once more to check over the little dog. His scruffy fur was so soft that it tickled. Good strength in the jaw, enough to show he’d had bite training despite his size—perfect if she ever needed to take down a three-foot-tall terrorist. Legs said he was a jumper.
“Take your time, Hamlin. I’ve got nothing else to do with the rest of my goddamn day except babysit you and this mutt.”
“Is the course set?”
“Sure. Take him out,” Jurgen’s snarl sounded almost as nasty as Thor’s before he stalked off.
She stood and slapped a hand on her opposite shoulder.
Thor sprang aloft as if he was attached to springs and she caught him easily. He’d cleared well over double his own height. Definitely trained…and far easier to catch than seventy pounds of hyperactive Malinois.
She plopped him back down on the ground. On lead or off? She’d give him the benefit of the doubt and try off first to see what happened.
Linda zipped up her brand-new USSS jacket against the cold and led the way out of the kennel into the hard sunlight of the January morning. Snow had brushed the higher hills around the USSS James J. Rowley Training Center—which this close to Washington, DC, wasn’t saying much—but was melting quickly. Scents wouldn’t carry as well on the cool air, making it more of a challenge for Thor to locate the explosives. She didn’t know where they were either. The course was a test for handler as well as dog.
Jurgen would be up in the observer turret looking for any excuse to mark down his newest team. Perhaps teasing him about being just a Marine hadn’t been her best tactical choice. She sighed. At least she was consistent—she’d always been good at finding ways to piss people off before she could stop herself and consider the wisdom of doing so.
This test was the culmination of a crazy three months, so she’d forgive herself this time—something she also wasn’t very good at.
In October she’d been out of the Army and unsure what to do next. Tucked in the packet with her DD 214 honorable discharge form had been a flyer on career opportunities with the US Secret Service dog team: Be all your dog can be! No one else being released from Fort Benning that day had received any kind of a job flyer at all that she’d seen, so she kept quiet about it.
She had to pass through DC on her way back to Vermont—her parent’s place. Burlington would work for, honestly, not very long at all, but she lacked anywhere else to go after a decade of service. So, she’d stopped off in DC to see what was up with that job flyer. Five interviews and three months to complete a standard six-month training course later—which was mostly a cakewalk after fighting with the US Rangers—she was on-board and this chill January day was her first chance with a dog. First chance to prove that she still had it. First chance to prove that she hadn’t made a mistake in deciding that she’d seen enough bloodshed and war zones for one lifetime and leaving the Army.
The Start Here sign made it obvious where to begin, but she didn’t dare hesitate to take in her surroundings past a quick glimpse. Jurgen’s score would count a great deal toward where she and Thor were assigned in the future. Mostly likely on some field prep team, clearing the way for presidential visits.
As usual, hindsight informed her that harassing the lieutenant hadn’t been an optimal strategy. A hindsight that had served her equally poorly with regular Army commanders before she’d finally hooked up with the Rangers—kowtowing to officers had never been one of her strengths.
Thankfully, the Special Operations Forces hadn’t given a damn about anything except performance and that she could always deliver, since the day she’d been named the team captain for both soccer and volleyball. She was never popular, but both teams had made all-state her last two years in school.
The canine training course at James J. Rowley was a two-acre lot. A hard-packed path of tramped-down dirt led through the brown grass. It followed a predictable pattern from the gate to a junker car, over to tool shed, then a truck, and so on into a compressed version of an intersection in a small town. Beyond it ran an urban street of gray clapboard two- and three-story buildings and an eight-story office tower, all without windows. Clearly a playground for Secret Service training teams.
Her target was the town, so she blocked the city street out of her mind. Focus on the problem: two roads, twenty storefronts, six houses, vehicles, pedestrians.
It might look normal…normalish with its missing windows and no movement. It would be anything but. Stocked with fake IEDs, a bombmaker’s stash, suicide cars, weapons caches, and dozens of other traps, all waiting for her and Thor to find. He had to be sensitive to hundreds of scents and it was her job to guide him so that he didn’t miss the opportunity to find and evaluate each one.
There would be easy scents, from fertilizer and diesel fuel used so destructively in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, to almost as obvious TNT to the very difficult to detect C-4 plastic explosive.
Mannequins on the street carried grocery bags and briefcases. Some held fresh meat, a powerful smell demanding any dog’s attention, but would count as a false lead if they went for it. On the job, an explosives detection dog wasn’t supposed to care about anything except explosives. Other mannequins were wrapped in suicide vests loaded with Semtex or wearing knapsacks filled with package bombs made from Russian PVV-5A.
She spotted Jurgen stepping into a glassed-in observer turret atop the corner drugstore. Someone else was already there and watching.
She looked down once more at the ridiculous little dog and could only hope for the best.
“Thor?”
He looked up at her.
She pointed to the left, away from the beaten path.
“Such!” Find.
Thor sniffed left, then right. Then he headed forward quickly in the direction she pointed.
Clive Andrews sat in the second-story window at the corner of Main and First, the only two streets in town. Downstairs was a drugstore all rigged to explode, except there were no triggers and there was barely enough explosive to blow up a candy box.
Not that he’d know, but that’s what Lieutenant Jurgen had promised him.
It didn’t really matter if it was rigged to blow for real, because when Miss Watson—never Ms. or Mrs.—asked for a “favor,” you did it. At least he did. Actually, he had yet to meet anyone else who knew her. Not that he’d asked around. She wasn’t the sort of person one talked about with strangers, or even close friends. He’d bet even if they did, it would be in whispers. That’s just what she was like.
So he’d traveled across town from the White House and into Maryland on a cold winter’s morning, barely past a sunrise that did nothing to warm the day. Now he sat
in an unheated glass icebox and watched a new officer run a test course he didn’t begin to understand.
Keep reading at fine retailers everywhere:
Off the Leash
About the Author
M.L. Buchman started the first of over 60 novels, 75 short stories, and an ever-growing pile of audiobooks while flying from South Korea to ride across the Australian Outback. All part of a solo around-the-world bicycle trip (a mid-life crisis on wheels) that ultimately launched his writing career.
Booklist has selected his military and firefighter series(es) as 3-time “Top 10 Romance of the Year.” NPR and Barnes & Noble have named other titles “Top 5 Romance of the Year.”
He has flown and jumped out of airplanes, can single-hand a fifty-foot sailboat, and has designed and built two houses. In between writing, he also quilts. M.L. is constantly amazed at what can be done with a degree in geophysics. He also writes: contemporary romance, thrillers, and SF. More info at: www.mlbuchman.com.
Also by M. L. Buchman
* also in audio
White House Protection Force
Off the Leash*
On Your Mark*
In the Weeds*
The Night Stalkers
Main Flight
The Night Is Mine
I Own the Dawn
Wait Until Dark
Take Over at Midnight
Light Up the Night
Bring On the Dusk
By Break of Day
White House Holiday
Daniel’s Christmas*
Frank’s Independence Day*
Peter’s Christmas*
Zachary’s Christmas*
Roy’s Independence Day*
Damien’s Christmas*
and the Navy
Christmas at Steel Beach
Christmas at Peleliu Cove
5E
Flying Beyond the Bar Page 4