Page 11 of Embattled Return

The guy with the dog had seemed like a spook. He’d dealt with enough SEALs over the years to recognize them.

There was another guy sitting in one of the chairs to his left and the gleam of metal peeked from beneath his pant legs. Both of them. He clattered on a laptop like he was looking for state secrets or something.

The men appeared to be a group, but with individual little factions. Different shifts, maybe?

A flash of green caught his eye. A woman wearing a thick, hunter green sweater stood on the other side of the crowd, deep in conversation with Shannon. She was leaning over the shorter woman, nodding her dark head at something Shannon was saying, the tail of a braid hanging over her shoulder. As he watched, they tipped back their heads and laughed. For a moment, the young woman’s gaze met his, and stuck. Logan waited for the moment when her face would crinkle up in disgust, but it didn’t happen, and he was left wondering if she had actually seen him, or just glanced in his direction. Blinking, he forced himself to turn away, but the afterimage stayed on his mind. The woman had been beautiful, with wide-set greenish eyes set in a pale oval face. She seemed tall and strong, and even a little protective as she stood next to the much smaller Shannon.

There were other people milling about the room, and they obscured his view. It didn’t matter because Palmer called him down a hallway. He couldn’t help but glance back, looking for a final glimpse of the woman.

“Sorry about the crowd out there,” John said, waiting while Logan crutched his way through the doorway to a chair. “We have a big meeting planned for today and it gives the guys a chance to catch up with their buddies.”

Logan blinked, frowning, rethinking his deductions. “Did you all serve together?”

Palmer shut the door, blocking out the noise, and moved to a small fridge in the corner. “Nope. The only two that served together are Duncan and Chad, the guy that rode with us earlier. The three of us created Lost and Found after we got out of Walter Reed and had no fucking idea what to do with ourselves. Actually, Duncan created it, we just helped with backing. Water? Coke?”

Huh.. that was interesting. “I’ll take a water. Everyone I saw was...”

“Wounded. Disabled. Yeah. We like to say combat modified, too.” John said, handing him the bottle. “We prefer to hire other vets that can’t find a spot anywhere else. Businesses say they like to have people with military experience, but they don’t always realize how much a wounded vet has to deal with every day. We do. And we position them in jobs they’ll excel at.”

“That’s...really something.”

Logan’s mind was roiling with all the possibilities. What a great idea, building a company to suit your own, and those of your workers’, abilities.

Palmer rolled the wheelchair around behind a desk littered with electronic equipment and stacked papers. “So, let’s get some background information on your family and we’ll see what we can figure out.”

He pulled out a tablet and swiped through a few screens. “So, tell me what you do know about the family left behind.”

Logan related the details he was sure about first, but there weren’t very many. His family name had been Vance, he believed, but there was also a family name of Walter in their history as well. He’d had a grandfather by that name, or maybe a great-grandfather. Logan knew that his father was one of four boys, but he thought the others had died, one at childbirth and the others later.

He knew his grandmother, his father’s mother, had owned some kind of restaurant or something. Or maybe she’d just worked there. And his grandfather had been a mechanic. It was hard to remember all the details because his father very rarely spoke about his Colorado roots.

“Okay, hold on a minute.”

John started pounding on the keyboard of his desktop, looking back and forth between the two screens. Logan appreciated the break in activity. His legs were aching like a mother fucker and he didn’t look forward to getting up again. Tipping the bottle of water back, he drank it down.

It was just a few minutes later when John looked up, scowling. “I thought this would be an easy search, but I’m not finding anything right off. Where are you staying?”

Logan rubbed his forehead. “I haven’t really decided yet. I’ll find a hotel or something.”

John handed over a business card. “I’m going to have to dig, Logan. Text me when you settle. Do you have a ride?”

“No. I can grab a taxi or something.”

John snorted. “Not out here you can’t. This is the industrial park.”

He dialed a number on the phone beside him. “Can you come in here a minute?”

Within seconds the woman in the green sweater Logan had seen earlier was standing in the doorway, pushing squarish-framed glasses up on the bridge of her narrow nose. Damn, she was something to look at. Her skin, something he was very aware of now, was flawless, milky perfection.

“Marigold, do you think you could drive Mr. Vance to wherever he needs to go?”

The young woman made a face at him. “I’m not an Uber.” She glanced at Logan, and he felt the direct look hit him hard. She had very green eyes under those lenses, almost the same deep green of her sweater. “Sorry. No offense.”

“None taken,” he murmured, quickly turning his scarred face away.

Logan hated feeling defensive with women, but when you saw even the nurses wince at your appearance, you learned to look away from the reaction to salvage your pride. Something had made him stare at the young woman, though, and he glanced at her again. She was significantly younger than most of the other people he’d seen, but she didn’t seem out of place here.

“I know this isn’t in your exact job description,” John said patiently, “but I would appreciate it.”

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