Page 52 of Astrid
“We can.” Griff answered after looking at the other two and receiving a nod. He looked back at them and nodded. “Mason told us we needed to take some vacation time because he didn’t want to keep paying us overtime. That’s why we were at that restaurant for lunch the other day, and why we can meet you on a Saturday. He said something along the lines of it being the calm before the storm.”
“Okay then,” Morgan said and stood. “We’ll let you go for now, but know this...” She scowled as she looked each of the three men directly in the eye. “We will be verifying the information you gave us tonight. Don’t think we won’t, so now’s your chance to change anything you told us.” She paused, and when the men continued to stare at her without retracting anything she said, she nodded once, then turned to the women. “Ladies, you ready to go home?” Without a word, they rose, gathered the information they’d written down, and followed Morgan out.
“How will we get back to our vehicle?” Griff asked after the door closed behind them.
“I’ll take you,” Carl said as he gathered his papers. He looked at Tom with a raised brow.
“I’m on duty until eleven. I took the late shift today to take care of this. Once you guys leave, I’ll call the ones on patrol, and tell them they can come back to the station.”
It only took ten minutes to gather everything, and the four men walked out the door. Everyone was silent on the entire ride to the bar, but as Carl parked next to the truck Griff had pointed out, he held up his hand when they started to open the doors.
“Just a friendly word of caution.”
“Which is?”
“Don’t fuck with those women you met tonight, nor the others Morgan has coming in to work for her.”
“I don’t understand.”
“They’re good at their jobs. If you decide to do any research on them, you won’t find much. Trust me, I did the same thing, and each of them have at least ten years military experience each. Their files are so blacked out, that the only thing you’ll read is a letter with a date on the top of it. I can’t confirm this with anyone, and frankly, I’m too scared to ask them, but my gut is screaming that they were black ops.”
“Shit,” Griff said as he stared at him in shock. “Can you at least tell us what teams they were with?”
“They were and are called the EWMs. Which stands for Elite Women Marines. As they mentioned, they were recruited the day of their boot camp graduation, but they were judged and handpicked from the day their boots landed on the ground on Parris Island. The people Morgan is recruiting are the best of their teams when they were in. Each of them has only been out from anywhere from two months to two weeks.”
“Shit, so they’re still fresh from the military.”
“Yes, and though it might look like Morgan’s lax in her duties, she runs a tight ship.” He grinned at them, and chuckled. “Hell, she has six brothers, and though she’s the middle child, all she has to do is lift one finger and they toe the line.” He shook his head and laughed. “And to think I’ll be living there come tomorrow night.”
The men didn’t say a word until Paul opened the back door, and called out. “See you on Saturday.” They climbed out, and Carl waited until they got into their truck before he left them.
On the ride home, the men from Canada were silent, until Griff let out a deep breath. “I think this is going to work out for us. After what Carl said, I don’t think we can run the women’s names, but it won’t hurt to try.”
“Already on it,” Harry said from the back seat. “We should know something before we meet with them on Saturday.”
“And if what Miller said is true?” Paul asked. “That their records are blacked out, what then?”
“Then we trust our guts and work with them,” Griff said with finality, and they settled in for the drive back to their apartment, each lost in their own thoughts.
CHAPTER23
The women weresilent on their way home with Morgan behind the wheel. It was better for her to drive since she had the keys already, and Joyce just climbed in the back with Ava.
As she slowed down to pull into the driveway, Morgan looked over at Astrid and sighed. “Did you believe them?”
Astrid didn’t hesitate to answer, “I did. You?”
“Yeah, and that call with the commander of RMCP sealed the deal with me. I won’t get into it tonight, but apparently those three men had worked their asses off to try to get answers that led them here. They’ve been working for Mason for the last three months at least, and it wasn’t until you thought to run their prints and DNA that we started getting answers. I think we can work well together, as long as they provide the documents we require, I have no problem sharing information with them.”
“I don’t want to tell you how to do your job,” Ava said from the back seat as she braced herself when they drove across what would eventually be the driveway to the garage. “But, are you going to tell Uncle Chip about what we learned today?”
“Yeah, I think I should. This way if any egos need to be smoothed over, he’ll be in the know and can handle it for us.” She whipped the truck around, and backed it into the garage, and Joyce showed her how to fill out the log from the glovebox. Once everything was done, the four of them exited the garage, and made their way to the house. As soon as they walked in, eleven men jumped to their feet and greeted them. Justin, John, and Alex, along with Wyatt rushed forward, and took their woman in their arms and kissed them.
The women were laughing when they broke apart. “We weren’t gone that long,” Astrid laughed.
“It’s after midnight,” John said.
“Oh, wow, sorry, I guess we were gone that long.”
