Page 31 of Dreaming

Finally, ultimately, it was that she dared to walk away from him, from what they had. That she couldn’t even be bothered to let him know she was okay. Too much time had passed without hearing her voice, feeling her touch.

In early November, he carried a bottle of scotch into his solarium in a t-shirt and sleep pants. He stared at the sunrise through the glass and remembered the first morning he woke up to Nia in his bed.

The way she looked, smelled, and sounded. The way she sucked his cock as no one had in his adult life.

The woman gave him everything he’d ever wanted and snatched it away like it was nothing.

It would have been better to never know the pleasure, to never know what love was, to never start needing her.

How he loved her.

How he hated her.

Early morning light flickered on the surface of the heated pool but light didn’t fit how he felt.

Taking a long pull of the scotch, he let darkness take him.

Chapter Eleven

November 2017

Dennis blinked and tried to figure out where he was. Glancing at the wall above him, he saw the equipment outlets used in hospital rooms.

A man sat in a chair beside him.

“You passed out and fell in your pool. Sunk to the bottom like a rock. Took two people to get you out. You swallowed a lot of water.” The man stood and crossed his hands at his back. He wore the same tactical gear of the people who’d been guarding him. “Are you done feeling sorry for yourself, Mr. Hancock?”

“Fuck you.” Dennis turned his head and stared at the ceiling.

“Eloquent. How do you think Nia would feel if she saw your pathetic ass right now?”

“Why don’t you run out and get her? We can ask.” The man didn’t move and Dennis laughed without humor. “I didn’t think so. Keep her name out your fucking mouth.”

“I’ve known her for over a decade and consider her a rare friend. Therefore, I’ll say her name any fucking time I feel like it, Mr. Hancock.” One side of his mouth lifted in a smile. “Let me ask you something - a rich guy like you - did you ever pull a background on Nia? Were you interested in anything other than what the inside of her body felt like?”

“When I get out of this bed, I’m going to kick your ass.”

“You are welcome to try. I asked you a question. Did you ever pull a background on Nia?” Dennis didn’t answer. “I take that as a no. Did you ask questions about her dad, her brother? Do you know what happened to them?”

Turning, he stared at the other man’s face in confusion.

“Let me explain how our band of misfits works. There are those on the front line. People who kill anybody who needs killing and protect people like you, caught in the crossfire of shit you can’t control.”

Dennis frowned and pulled himself further up in the bed.

“Behind the front line is the tech team. They point everyone where they need to be, monitor camera feeds, and generally have a finger on the pulse of anything that might go wrong.”

“What…?”

“Behind those two layers, we have those in the Think Tank. That’s where people like Nia work. They’re the thinkers, people recruited into our hijinks because using muscle without a brain doesn’t work for long.”

Dennis whispered, “People like Nia?”

“There are more than a thousand people involved in our top-secret organization, Mr. Hancock. Most of them are soldiers, hackers, spies, administration, and support personnel. There are fewer than ten people working in the Think Tank at any given time.”

The man crossed his arms on the bars of the bed and leaned closer to Dennis. “The rest of us cover their asses, buy them time when they need it, and guard them with our lives. We do that because without them, we wouldn’t save the thousands of people we save every year. Numbers are Nia’s thing.”

“N-numbers?”

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