Page 51 of Protecting Silver
“First, I have no clue who you’re talking about. Second, I don’t give a god damn who you date. Third, if other women are leaving you, don’t you think it might be you, and not them? I left you, because you hit me. No man will ever hit me again. You’re the asshole here, Eddie, not me.”
Before anyone could do anything, Eddie lunged forward, and later, Silver wouldn’t be able to testify in court what had happened, because it had occurred so fast, it was all a blur. One minute Eddie was lunging toward Silver with his hand formed into claws, like he was going to claw her face off, then next he was flat on his back with two females putting a set of handcuffs on him. They lifted him by his cuffed hands, and as they did, one of them began barking out.
“Eddie Alexander Freedman, you’re under arrest for seven counts of assault and battery, and attempted murder. I’m Agent Tamara Babcock with the Chicago FBI office.”
“Yeah,” the other woman crowed. “We’re therealFBI.” She produced her badge and shoved it into Eddie’s face. “I’m Agent Jackie Mann, we’ve got a plane waiting to take you back to Chicago to face charges.” She lifted his arms as high as they would go, and Eddie ended up walking on his tiptoes back to the car they had arrived in. Before putting him inside, Agent Babcock patted him down, and removed all of his items from his pockets. Three guns, four knives, the fake FBI badge, his regular Chicago PD badge, and a set of handcuff keys, along with the key to the vehicle he arrived in. Jackie opened the back door, and shoved him inside, not bothering to warn him, or hold her hand out to guard his head. When he hit it, she only shoved him harder. After he got his foot inside, she slammed the door on him. She came back to the others, and grinned as she dusted off her hands.
“I want to thank you,” Jackie said. “We didn’t know Freedman was on his way here until we talked to Sheriff Bronson earlier today. If you hadn’t said his name, I personally would have thought he was an actual FBI agent. Thank you for identifying him.” She then turned to Patch. “And thank you for taking him down. Are you okay?” She pointed to his cracked knuckles, and that’s when Silver realized that Patch had punched Eddie in the face when he’d tried to attack Silver.
“Thank you,” Silver said, and wrapped her arms around his waist. She lifted his hand and kissed his bruised knuckles.
“We’d like to get your statement, if we could,” Agent Babcock said. Everyone watched as Hector went over to stand by the vehicle holding Freedman when he started yelling and swearing through the closed window at them, after watching Silver being intimate with Patch.
For the next hour, they stood and took Silver’s statement as to what had happened on the night she’d been attacked at the club, and about her recovery. They then turned to Patch, and after only two minutes, the two female agents shook their heads, looked at each other, then grinned. Agent Babcock pulled her phone and held it up to take a picture of Patch, but suddenly Silver’s hand covered his face.
“Why are you taking a picture of my hot-as-hell boyfriend? Don’t you think that’s rude, especially without asking permission. He didn’t do anything wrong that would allow the FBI to have interest in him. He was only protecting me when he hit Eddie.”
“Oh, we know. It’s just that I can’t wait to get back to the office, and tell our director that his brother helped take down our suspect. I was going to snap his picture to prove it to him that we had help, otherwise the director wouldn’t believe us.”
“I don’t have any brothers,” Patch said as he frowned at the agents. He looked at Silver and when her eyes went wide, he looked back, and nodded. “Go ahead, take my picture. You say I look like your boss?”
“You could be his twin, and I’m talking like identical.”
“What’s his name?” Silver asked, and took the pen Ronnie handed her. The other woman had joined them once Jackie had shut the door on Eddie locked in the car. They would later find out that she had a red laser pen in the barn that she’d play with the barn cats with. She had aimed it at Eddie’s chest to make it look like someone had a bead on him from a gun.
“SSA Daniel Atwater. The initials stand for Supervisory Special Agent, but I don’t know what his middle name is.”
“Oh, can’t be Douglas’ brother then, his name is Douglas Michael Atwal. Two totally different last names, and Douglas doesn’t have any family. He grew up in the foster-care system.” Silver nodded and spelled the names as Agent Babcock wrote them down.
“I’m sorry to hear that, but I’d stake my next paycheck on the fact that you and SSA Atwater are related.” Tamara sighed, then turned to leave. “Oh, a couple other things. Will you be willing to testify in court against Freedman for what he had done to you?”
“Give me the time and location, and I’ll be there.”
“We both will,” Patch said as he wrapped his arm around her.
“Okay, one last thing, then we’ll get out of your hair. Who did that report that Sheriff Bronson showed us?”
“It’s a guy I know through a guy, through a guy,” Patch admitted. “The only thing I know about him is that he’s former military, and is good with computers.”
“Well, whoever they are, about three quarters of his information was spot on.”
“And the other quarter?” Silver asked.
“Information we had no idea existed. I’m sure once we get back to the office and investigate, it’ll all prove to be true. Whoever did your report, he’s good. Very, very good.”
“Thank you,” Patch said, and watched as the two agents went to their car, climbed in, and pulled out, with Amos hot on their tail, but not before telling them that he would follow them to the airfield where they had a plane waiting.
“Well, that was interesting,” Ronnie said into the silence after the others had left. They looked at the car Eddie had arrived in, and before anyone could say a word, Finn’s phone rang. He answered and grinned, and nodded a few times. After he hung up, he looked at the others.
“That was Amos, he’s calling for a tow truck to come get Freedman’s car. Before they board the plane, he’s going to ask the agents what they want to do with it.”
“Why?” the farm hand asked. “Isn’t it a rental?”
“It has Illinois plates on it, it might be Eddie’s personal car,” Silver said as she looked over at it. “We were together for three years, and in that time, he had two new cars. He leases them, and every two years like clockwork, he trades it in for a new model.”
They stood around, and Patch looked at Silver. “You ready to go home?”
“I am. As much as I enjoyed the camping adventure, and feel a sense of relief that Eddie’s been caught, I suddenly feel dirty from being around him, and I want to go home and shower.” She turned to Finn and Ronnie. “Thank you for sharing your meadow with us. Sorry we didn’t see any horses up there, but I’m sure there will be some sometime.”
