Page 31 of More Than Meets the Eye

“Brigadier General Barstow.” I dropped the name like the bomb it was.

Lucky’s smile instantly disappeared. “Let me get Mickey and the Fox brothers. That is a really bad guy, Jack. You should stay clear.”

“I’m trying to, but he doesn’t seem to want to let me,” I said grimly.

Dallas, Austin, and Mickey joined us at the table and all tore into sandwiches while they listened.

The Fox twins were both former Army Rangers and computer geniuses. They specialized in cyber security in their consulting business, but they were also part owners in the airboats.

Dallas and Austin turned identical faces toward each other when I said Barstow’s name.

“Very bad news,” Austin confirmed, his dark eyes serious. “He ran Special Forces for a while.”

“Ashortwhile,” Dallas said. “Luckily for his people.”

“That bad?”

“Worse. He was a seething ball of ambition, only thinly covered with a veneer of political savvy. He was directly responsible for more deaths in the ranks than anybody who ever ran Special Forces before,” Mickey replied, his hands clenched into fists on the table. “Friends of mine died because of him.”

“Then why is he still at the Pentagon?” I watched Mateo expertly dock the boat and a group of sunburned tourists disembark.

“Because he has money and connections,” Lucky said. “Jack, I’m really not happy that he knows your name. That he knows Tess and where she lives and who lives next to her? Nothing about this is good.”

“A giant cluster?—”

“Hey! Look at that enormous crocodile!” one tourist shouted, standing perilously close to the edge of the dock.

Mateo yanked the guy away from potential death by foolishness and herded the clueless clients off the dock. After some chat, the tourists climbed back into their giant air-conditioned tour bus and drove off.

Mateo walked over to us, cracked open a beer, and downed half of it. “These people! I tell them, stay away from thealligators, and do they listen? No, they do not. One of those women was hanging halfway off the boat trying to get a selfie with a ten-foot gator!”

“On the bright side, the rest of them would have had killer videos of a gator eating a tourist,” Mickey said, handing Mateo a sandwich.

We filled Mateo in, but he had nothing to offer, other than: “If you need us, we’ll be there.”

The others added their agreement to that.

“I appreciate it.”

I stood to leave, but Lucky put a hand on my shoulder and pushed me back down. “Not so fast, lover boy. We have thoughts on your proposal.”

I groaned. “You would not believe some suggestions people have hit me with so far.”

Mateo grinned at me through a mouthful of chicken sub sandwich. “So, we get some champagne and candles, and then we set up a really romantic airboat ride, and?—”

I cut him off. “Aromanticairboat ride?”

Everybody laughed.

“Okay, hear me out,” Mickey said. “You get the clowns to do it.”

He meant actual clowns. Tess and I had helped a troupe of clowns once, and Mickey’s girlfriend was part of the act.

“No. No clowns.”

“Wait! They can all parade into the pawnshop, playing their ukuleles, and do a singing proposal! Like, Tess, will you marry Jack, but singing, right?”

I was going to need a really big tractor to run all these people over.

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