“Like a family.”
She met my eye. “Exactly.”
“It’s like that in the military.”
“Yes. Most of our people are from the military.” She chewed on her bottom lip a second. “I wouldn’t be here if it hadn’t been for David and one of the Gray Wolf operatives. So, we treat our people like family until they give us reason not to.”
I was suddenly overwhelmed with emotion. I dragged my fingers through my hair, tugging a little in an attempt to keep the tears at bay with the pain.
“Ingram never really had family until he and I…”
“I know. We’ve been watching out for him.”
I nodded. “Thank you.”
Ricki came over and gave me a hard hug. “It’s going to be okay. Whatever this problem is, we’ll help you work it out. Okay?”
“Thank you,” I mumbled again.
She stepped back after a second and smiled, wiping away her own tears.
“Go take a bath. I’ll check on your boys.”
When she was gone, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I stood in the middle of the room, my head spinning with all that had happened these last few days. I finally pulled myself together and went to check out the bathroom. I couldn’t resist that big tub. I played with it for a minute, figuring out how it all worked. Then I settled in the hot water with the jets shooting through the water, massaging my back and my legs and all the sore places that needed some TLC. I lay back and closed my eyes, sighing as this sense of peace rolled over me.
I don’t know how long I was there. One second I was settling in, the next Ingram was next to me, running his fingers through my damp hair.
“Are you hungry?” he asked. “I brought you an omelet from the kitchen.”
I smiled up at him. “I feel so relaxed, I’m not sure I can move.”
“Then let me help you.”
He grabbed a towel and scooped me out of the water, wrapping me up like a baby in a blanket. He carried me to the bed, rubbing the soft cotton of the towel all over my body, drying me before he grabbed a bottle of lotion and began to rub it gently into my skin. I sighed, the feel of his hands on me so erotic—and relaxing. I felt better than I had in such a long time it almost brought tears to my eyes.
He curled up on the bed beside me and fed me the eggs with his fingers, scooping it up and slipping it into my mouth. It was the most delicious thing I’d ever tasted. I sighed when it was gone, rolling into him and pressing my body hard against his.
“Thank you,” I whispered.
“Get some sleep, Bailey.”
“I should go check on Adam.”
“Adam’s fine. Ricki’s got him in the nursery with her boy, Chase. They were fast friends.”
I wanted to thank him, to tell him that was great news, but my eyes were drooping and my jaw didn’t want to function. I felt his lips against my forehead and then I was gone, drifting out of consciousness in the arms of the only man I’ve ever loved or will ever love.
This was pure bliss.
Chapter 13
Ingram
I lay with Bailey for a while, then I slipped away, too restless to sleep now. I found David out on the back porch, drinking a glass of red wine and watching the clouds play over the stars.
“Looks like we might get a little rain from that storm.”
I turned a chair around and straddled it, facing him.
“Thank you for this. I really appreciate it.”
David glanced at me. “You’re already thanked me.”
“I know. But you can never be too grateful, can you?”
He picked up his glass of wine and studied it a second, chewing on his lip as he did.
“I used to resent my brother, Ash, for saying things like that. But time and maturity made me see that he didn’t mean to mock me or to tease me by saying it. He really meant it.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. David glanced at me, a smile appearing as he read my expression.
“Ricki tells me that I assume too much about people because I try to see everyone the way I see my own experiences. She says I need to realize that not everyone grew up the way I did. And I try… I guess I’m just too stuck in my own ways.”
“Well, I don’t mean to mock you. I’m just not used to people doing things for me ‘just because’.”
“I know. But you should know that we see you and Alexander and Elliot and Tony as family.”
I inclined my head, deciding that was a better response than another thank you.
“So…” David swallowed the last of his wine and turned to me, leaning on his knees as he studied my face. “You want to tell me what’s going on?”
I hesitated, not sure what to say or where to start. It all seemed so complicated. But David was watching me with expectation, so I knew I had to tell him.
“You know about my court martial,” I began.
David nodded.
“We read excerpts from the transcript when we hired you.”
“Bailey was the woman that Lieutenant Carmichael was touching that day in the bar. I saw them come in, and I saw his hand touching her, and I just sort of lost it. I punched him—just once—and shattered his jaw. He was in the hospital for two weeks.”
“Bad break.”
I snorted. “Yeah, in more ways than one.”
“Why didn’t Bailey testify on your behalf?” David frowned, sitting up again. “I believe I read that she testified that you interfered in a private conversation she was having with her boyfriend.”
“Yeah, she did. But only because one of the other men there that night threatened her.” I stood because I couldn’t sit still while I told this ugly story. Pacing, I dragged my fingers through my hair and stared out over the compound. “There were three of them all together—Carmichael, James, and Philips—and they had this plan to drug her and take her upstairs to have their way with her. And this was not the first time they’d done such a thing. Bailey has since talked to several women this happened to.”
“And they threatened her?”
“Philips told her he would have me killed in the brig if she didn’t cooperate.”
“What if her testimony had gotten you out?”
“I would still have gone back to the holding cell. He could have done something then. And he was threatening her career, her safety, her chance to leave the Navy with an honorable discharge. She was pregnant and frightened and…”
“I see,” David said.
“After the court martial, Bailey spoke to a woman who gave her a list of names. She began interviewing these women, recording their testimony. Somehow, Philips or Carmichael or James found out what she was doing and decided to stop her.”
“How? How did they find out?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. There must be someone who slipped them the information, or they’ve just been watching her closely. I think maybe one of the women who didn’t want to cooperate told one of the men.”
I was still struggling with that part of things myself. I didn’t understand how Carmichael would know that she was supposed to be on Galveston before the storm. Or how someone knew she was supposed to be the one helping out that client the night her father was killed. Had they thought it was Bailey they were setting up that night? Or had they known somehow that she’d switched with her father? And if they knew it was Laurence who would be there that night, why would they go through with it? Why kill him?
I shook my head, trying to knock my thoughts loose.
“Her father was killed in a gun accident. The shotgun he was teaching a client how to use misfired, the barrel exploding and killing him. Just before he died, Laurence was in Austin. We ran into each other in a coffee shop I go to quite often. I think now that he’d known I would be there and he ran into me intentionally.”
“Why?”
I pulled the letter I’d been carrying around since yesterday out of my back pocket and handed it to David. I watched as he read it, waiting for a reaction I never
got.
“Do you think he knew his killer?”
“I don’t know. I think it’s possible.”
“What about Bailey? Does she know why her father was killed?”
I took the letter back from him, carefully folding it and sliding it back into my pocket. “It didn’t even occur to her that it wasn’t an accident until Carmichael blew apart the front of the lodge on Galveston and tried to hunt her down.”
“Carmichael was there?”
“He was. He set a small explosive outside the lodge and blew a tree over. I guess he was hoping it would crush her and look like it was a side effect of the storm. When that didn’t work, he came into the lodge with a gun.”
“Where’s Carmichael now?”
“In the morgue. I shot him outside the cabin with one of Laurence’s shotguns.”
David stood. “That’s the same man you spent five years in the brig for hitting.”
“It is.”
“The police will know that.”
“I know.”
David looked out over the property the same way I’d been doing for the last few minutes. I could almost hear the wheels turning in his head. Then he turned to me, studying my face.
“We need to prove that he was there to hurt Bailey. We need to find these other two guys and get them to turn on each other.”
“That’s kind of what I was thinking. But I don’t want to drag Bailey any deeper into it.”
“Of course not.” David turned to look up at the house. “Bailey and Adam are safe here. Karen, too. We just won’t tell them what we’re up to until it’s all over.”
David slapped my shoulder with a heavy hand before leading the way inside. I followed him to his office, watching as he booted up his fancy, multi-monitor computer system.
“We can find just about anything with this software.” He pulled up something called PeopleFinder and glanced at me. “Do you know their full names?”
“Rear Admiral Carl Philips and Captain Jackson James.”
I watched as David typed the names in. A wagon wheel began to spin on the monitor as the program worked. Within a minute, it came back with information.
“Captain James is out to sea,” David said. “But Rear Admiral Philips retired three months ago after a brief scandal that suggested he’d acted inappropriately toward a young woman assigned as his personal aide.” David continued to read for a second, and then he tapped the screen. “He’s living in Bastrop. That’s not far from here.”
I’d already noted the address, memorizing it before David even saw it.
“Great. I can go talk to him.”
“Maybe that’s not a good idea. I could send Tony or Elliot.”
I shook my head. “This is my problem. I need to fix it myself.”
“Ingram, we’re a family here. Families take care of each other.”
I nodded, thinking about my wife asleep in a bed upstairs and my son whom I’d only known for all of twelve hours. It was my job to protect them. That’s exactly what I was about to do.
But I didn’t have to tell him that.
“Okay,” I said. “Just, could you give me a few hours? I’d like to go tell Bailey what we found, let her know what we’re planning on doing. And then I’d like to go with whomever you send.”
David thought about it for a moment. Then he inclined his head.
“But you stay back and let Elliot take the lead, okay?”
“Yeah, okay.”
“We’ll make the arrangements in the morning.” David clapped his hand on my shoulder. “We’ll have you out of this mess in a matter of hours.”
“Thank you.”
I watched David leave the room. He’d shut down the computer, but I didn’t need to look at it. I knew who was behind this, and I knew why he was doing this to me, to Bailey. All I needed was proof, and I was going to get it.
I searched through David’s drawers, looking for something I knew he kept there somewhere. I found it and slipped two in my pocket. Then I headed upstairs to see my family one last time.
Adam was asleep in the narrow little bed he was sharing with Chase. One dark head was at the head of the bed, another at the foot. I watched them for a long time, trying to imagine what my son would be like when he was older. Would he be defiant like I always was, or would he be his mother’s dream, a respectful, kind, and caring child? Would he like sports, or would he be more into academics? Would he go to college, or would a tech school be more his thing?
He would be better than I ever was, I knew that. He wouldn’t be breaking into cars by the time he was twelve. He wouldn’t disrespect his teachers when the truth was that he couldn’t read properly and that’s why he refused to do the homework. He wouldn’t run away more than a dozen times before his social worker finally figured out that he was being hurt by the kind old woman that everyone, including her own children, thought was a saint. He would be so much better than I was because he had Bailey and he had Karen and he had the family I never had.
I went to him and touched his cool forehead.
“Sleep well, son,” I whispered as I studied his little face and saw so much of myself in him. I had a son. And he was perfect.
I went down the hall to the room where Bailey was asleep. I stood beside the bed just as long as I’d stood beside Adam, watching her breathing, wondering what she’d looked like when she was big pregnant. I’d bet she was one of those women who only got prettier as she swelled with new life. I’d bet she was miserable but she never complained because she was so excited about the new life growing inside of her. And I’d bet she wasn’t one of those who grew hysterical in the birthing room because she was a trained naval officer, a woman who’d been taught to be calm under pressure. But I knew her. She would have been a mess just under the surface.
I knelt and brushed a piece of hair out of her face.
The night she got pregnant with Adam, I knew it was a possibility. I had known she was ill…that was part of the reason I’d gone to her that night. And I knew she’d missed a few of her pills. She was always missing a pill here and there. She was incredibly organized in her work, but her personal stuff tended to be utter chaos. I knew the chance we were taking that night. I heard her protests dying on her lips as she made some very valid points. If we’d gotten caught that night, we both would have been out on our asses. If we’d gotten caught, she would have been the one facing court martial. But I didn’t care. She was my wife and we’d only managed to spend one night together as husband and wife. Maybe a part of me had wanted her to get pregnant so that she would have to leave the service and we’d have to start our lives as husband and wife. Would that have been such a bad thing?
So maybe I knew. Maybe I did it on purpose. And maybe that was one of the many things I didn’t regret about this whole thing.
I kissed her forehead, letting my lips linger for a moment. It was hard to push myself up to my feet and leave her. But I did because I knew this was the best thing I could do for her now.
I crossed the back lawn to my cottage, checking and loading my 9mm pistol, my .35 handgun, and my rifle. I shoved it all into a bag with the two things I’d taken from David’s office, throwing in a few clothes before heading out in Laurence’s pickup.
I had to protect my family.
Chapter 14
Bailey
I don’t think I’ve slept past six in the morning in a very long time. When I rolled over and realized it was nearly ten, I felt a slight panic in the center of my chest. I quickly dressed and rushed downstairs only to find Adam happily playing on the back porch with Chase. Karen was sitting in a chair a few feet away and Ricki was on a laptop at one of the tables. She smiled when she saw me, gesturing to a tray that held a small coffee pot and a few cups.
“Have some coffee. It’s decaffeinated, but it still tastes pretty good.”
“Thank you.”
I poured myself a cup and settled beside her. It’d rained a little during the night, leaving puddles on the concret
e walk leading to the backyard.
“I guess our little hurricane made its way up here.”
Ricki nodded. “Not a bad rain. Just enough to water the grass.”
I glanced at her, curious about this woman who’d been so generous to my family and me.
“You’re not from Texas, are you?”
“No. I was born and raised in Illinois. And then I settled in Massachusetts for a while before going out to California.”
“Massachusetts? Interesting choice.”
“That’s where MIT is.”
My eyebrows rose. “Impressive.”
“Not as impressive as Annapolis.”
I snorted, a little laugh following. “How do you know about that?”
“We do very thorough research on our prospective employees.”
“I’m not your employee.”
“No. But you’re married to one.”
I glanced at her. “This business must be a tricky one, making you a little paranoid of the people around you.”
“Not paranoid. But cautious.” She sat up a little. “Ash, David’s brother, began Gray Wolf as an outlet to give him and his friends some way to handle their adrenaline addiction after they left the military. He really didn’t think it would take off the way it has. But, not only did the security firm take off, it attracted trouble that almost left Ash and his wife dead. So…we’re careful.”
Ricki must have seen how startled I was by the expression on my face. She picked up her coffee cup and took a careful sip before she began to explain.
“Ash’s team crossed paths with the Russian mob during a case involving a man who owned a shipping company. He had refused to run cargo for this mob and they came after his little girl, forcing Ash and one of his operatives, a woman named Joss, to take out the mob boss. And then, sometime later, the mob boss’ son had a girlfriend who was pregnant and frightened. She sought out Ash and he took her in. That led to this big showdown with the mob that ended badly. For the mob.”
“Wow.”
Ricki nodded. “Ash married the girl—Mina—and they have two kids now. But that might never have happened if he didn’t treat his team like family and if they hadn’t had his back in all that. So, when David decided to open this branch of the security firm, he did it with the same idea. We’re family. We have each other’s backs.”
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