Page 84 of Embedded
“Yeah, and I forgot, that bag is from Smith’s food store and still has a receipt inside for some snacks. It’s time-stamped three days ago. Nicole said she saw fruit with the same logo in Bruno’s house before she was transferred to the avocado farm.”
“Christ, this is huge.” He grinned. “I’ll get the guys on this and see what else we find. You get a shower and something to eat. We ship out in two hours.”
“Copy that.”
John took a deep exaggerated breath before he walked away. Just as he did, Frank came around the corner.
“Good, just the man I needed to see.” I brushed past him, opened the door to the bunk room, then slammed it shut. I’d probably get reprimanded for my behavior, but I didn’t give a fuck.
Nicole and I slept most of the way back to Shadows. She was beat, and I needed to be alone with my head. A few times, I caught John’s stare, but I knew he wasn’t mad anymore, just concerned.
I knew Frank was being forced into retirement and was determined to have one more big win before he left. Only he’d almost dragged me down with him while doing it. I was below him in rank, so I couldn’t go against his orders no matter how much he bent the rules.
My eyes popped open when Nicole’s hand touched my arm. “We’re here.”
I didn’t even know we had landed. The others were already off the chopper, so we hurried down to meet everyone.
After the wives greeted their husbands, they went straight for Nicole to make sure she was all right. Abby came out with Chase, who wiggled with excitement when he spotted her. She wrapped him up in a huge hug and buried her face in his neck.
I stood back and watched as warmth spread through me. She loved my son, and he loved her. She smiled and took his hand to wave at me. I joined them, and as I did, he reached out for me. I dropped my bag and scooped him up and held him high while I made my chopper noises. He laughed and gave me the sweetest smile.
“Seems someone got past his nerves.” She beamed at us. “He trusts you, Paul. We both do. That’s something to be proud of.” She stood on her tiptoes and kissed my cheek, and that instantly caught Savannah’s attention. Damn woman never missed a thing. Chase nosedived back into Nicole’s arms, and they headed inside the house while I stood there and tried to wipe the silly grin from my face.
“You need to tell her, man.” John came up next to me, and all the joy I was just filled with was sucked away, as I knew he was right. “She’s falling for you and is head over heels in love with your son.”
“I know.” He may be right, but I couldn’t imagine how.
“Come on, we have a lot to celebrate, so everything else can wait a few days.” He started to walk then turned back to face me with his face all serious. “Just so it’s said, you’re out of the doghouse.”
“My boy is off the couch.” Mark wrapped an arm around me with a grin. “Look at you two making up.”
I shoved him off and headed inside.
The next day, we had a celebration of life for June, in the same spot we had it for Lexi. It was hard to process that we still had no answers for what happened, but the one thing Doc Roberts drove home was that she had lived a full, beautiful life. One that most only could dream of living, and that was what we needed to hang on to.
The following week, things seemed to fall back to normal. The pain of June was still there, but acceptance of her loss started to take hold. Nicole worked tirelessly with us, filling in as many gaps as she could with her resources.
“Son of a bitch,” Cole said as he hung up his phone and walked into the conference room. We were watching drone footage that Dark Water had taken of the Canos Cartel. “Mark, bring up the map.” He pointed at the property Esmerelda had bought. “We can’t touch it. There’s legal paperwork in place that protects it.”
“What do you mean? What’s it filed under?” I asked.
“It’s under a privatized community project for, of all things, a religious group.”
Mike looked around. “Meaning?”
“Shit,” I rubbed my head, “it makes it damn near impossible for federal agents or the military to legally raid the area. At least without extreme justification.”
“Is this not extreme justification?” John huffed.
I pointed to the map. “Even if we could storm it, they’d have time to get rid of evidence. We’d need to know exactly what they’re up to, and we’d need someone willing to cut corners for us.”
“We need to bring the Feds into this.” Daniel pulled out his phone. “Let me make some calls, see what I can do. For now, we watch. Thanks to Nicole, we’re a step ahead of them.”
“Excuse me,” Savannah was in the doorway, and Cole’s face lit up, “I know you’re all busy, but Olivia is ready to leave for Zack’s, and I’d rather not have her friends wait.”
The heaviness from work evaporated, and we all jumped to our feet. Olivia’s birthday that year had been a bust because of a mission, and her father promised her a redo. He even bent a little and agreed to have it at Zack’s so she could invite some of her friends. She was over the moon excited and hadn’t talked about anything else since we got back.
“Ready?” I came up behind Nicole as she struggled to get Chase’s mittens on. He looked like a starfish stuffed in his snowsuit.
