Devoted Defender (12 page)

“And not using being a chef as a crutch or an excuse not to live out fully the rest of my life.” Annie paused. “I’m not going to lie. It all sounds good, but it’s easier said than done. All I can do is take it one step at a time.”

“I can see it in the way you look at Caleb. You care for him. Don’t let what happened to you before make you miss out on the opportunity for a life changing relationship.”

She nodded and wondered if she was capable of following Hope’s advice.

“Caleb is such a good man. And I can tell you from what Gabe has told me, Caleb hasn’t been in a serious relationship since before he left for the military. So the fact that he’s so interested in you shows that this is special. That you’re special to him.”

“Thanks for everything, Hope. I wish it would’ve been under different circumstances, but I’m really enjoying getting to know you.”

“That goes both ways.” Hope looked down at her watch. “I better go see if Gabe is ready to go. I know he said he had to do some more investigating.”

“Thank you again, Hope. For everything.”

As Hope left the room, Annie thanked God for sending a much needed friend into her life.

**

Caleb locked the door after Gabe and Hope left, just as Annie was coming down the stairs. She looked a little tired, but still beautiful to him. He would do anything to take away the hurt he knew she was facing.

“How did you sleep?” he asked.

“I’ve had better nights,” she said. “But it was nice being able to see Hope again.”

“I’m sorry about your night, but I’m glad Hope came over too. She has a lot of first hand experience living through dangerous times.” Caleb pointed to the coffee table. “Gabe dropped off a file on Vaughn. I’m going to do the deep dive and get totally up to speed on everything law enforcement knows about him.”

“Okay. Then we should start.” Annie walked over to the coffee table. “Let’s take a look at what’s in Damon’s file.”

“I don’t know if that is such a good idea for you, Annie.” He was worried of what might be in the file. “I think I should take a look first.”

“After all I’ve been through, do you really think that it’s necessary to try and shield me from the truth?”

He was taken aback by her visceral response. “The last thing I want to do is hurt you. Since I haven’t read the file, I can’t guarantee what we’ll find in there.”

“I can handle it.”

He reached down and picked up the file and prayed that this was the right thing to do.

**

Annie could sense Caleb’s hesitation as he opened the large manila folder that contained the information on the man that had wrecked her life. She needed to do this. Not just for the sake of the investigation and trying to secure her safety, but because she needed to prove to herself that she wasn’t the scared and confused seventeen year old girl anymore. No, she was so much stronger now and she could beat this. Or at least that’s what she kept telling herself.

“Caleb, I already lived through the worst of this when I was seventeen.”

“But I know good and well that a trigger to a traumatic event can really have an impact on someone.”

What was he talking about? It sounded like he was speaking from personal experience. Maybe the death of his parents? “I promise you. I can do this. We already know that Damon Vaughn is not a good person.”

He reached out and grabbed onto her hand. “Annie, do you trust me?”

She paused, conflicted between what she thought she should feel and what she was actually feeling. Her mind told her that she should never trust anyone ever again—and certainly not a man in law enforcement. But her heart told her that Caleb was loyal and would stay true to his word. In the end, she knew how she had to respond. “Yes, I do.”

“Let’s do this together then.”

The next couple of hours they waded through pages and pages of documents about Damon Vaughn. Everything from his troubled youth to his current illegal activities. His familial connection to Silva on his mother’s side and an obvious quest for more power that had been building over the years. From reading all the intel that had been gathered, it was clear that Damon was every bit as dangerous now as he was a decade ago when he had attacked her. The only difference is that now he was even more of a threat because he actually had become a power player in the Silva organization. Back when Damon had dated her mother, he was still an up and comer.

“This is all interesting reading, but how does any of this help me get out of this mess?” she asked.

“Vaughn’s connection to you and Silva provides the motive for McCoy to lie about you killing Doc. We’ve got to take this to Sasha.”

“How do you know that you can trust her?”

“I don’t know for sure, but we need to clear your name. We can’t afford to have the police looking for you in addition to Silva and Vaughn trying to track you down.”

“I don’t feel comfortable going down there to Sasha’s office again.”

“No, that wouldn’t be the plan. First, we’ll call her. Try to gauge where she’s at. Then determine after she hears this information whether it would be appropriate to meet. Gabe said that Sasha has a very strong reputation as being ethical and being fair. I see no reason to think that she’d be out to get you.”

“Unless Silva has gotten to her, too.”

“Not everyone is on Silva’s payroll.”

“But we know that there are at least some people in law enforcement who are.” She let out a breath. “Honestly, I feel like I’m reliving the nightmare of my past.”

“The truth is on your side, Annie. It was back then and it still is today. Sasha will be able to see that.” He reached out and took her hand in his. “I’d like to make that call. But before we do, I could tell that you were very upset about what happened at the DA’s office.”

“We’ve been over this already.” The thing was, that there was nothing Caleb could say to change the circumstances. Her point of view was shaped by her experiences just like his was. “I don’t feel like expending energy that neither one of us has arguing over our differences.”

“Whoa.” He squeezed onto her hand. “How did we get from me making a mistake to us having differences?”

“Caleb, I appreciate all you’re doing for me. You’ve saved my life countless times. You’ve proven to be a friend I could trust when there was no one to turn to. But as far as there being something more than friendship between us, I don’t see how we can find common ground. Your whole life revolves around law enforcement. You have a completely normal and loving family. A well-adjusted way of life. And then you have me, who has never had any of that.”

“I think you’re looking at this all wrong.” His blue eyes locked onto hers. “Yes, you went through a terrible tragedy when you were seventeen. And it caused you a lot of heartache and pain. But I know what it’s like to live in the past. It will eat at you from the inside out. You need to try to find a pathway forward.”

“Are you talking about the death of your parents?”

“That definitely impacted me. Losing them was heartbreaking. But it’s more than just the loss of my parents that has made me the man I am today.”

“You’re talking about what you experienced in the military.” He’d alluded to it before, but she didn’t have any specifics.

“Yes. And I’d like to tell you about it.”

**

Caleb hadn’t discussed exactly what had happened in Afghanistan with anyone. But as he stared into Annie’s eyes and saw the pain she was going through and the struggles she was facing, it made him think that maybe if he shared his experience with her, that it could provide some small level of healing to them both.

“What happened?” she asked.

“I’ve told you before that I was in the military, and that I did special ops. It’s a bit more than that. I was on a SEAL team.”

“You were a Navy SEAL?” Her eyes widened.

“Once a SEAL, always a SEAL. But yes. My team was on a special high value target mission in Afghanistan hunting down some really bad men. I can’t discuss the actual details of the operation because that’s still classified. But…” As he started to continue the story, he wondered for a moment if he would actually be able to get the words out.

She grabbed onto his other hand, now holding them both. “Take your time. It’s not like I’m going anywhere.” She gave him a slight smile, trying to encourage him.

“One second everything was fine. The next, it was complete chaos. We were ambushed. I was with one other SEAL and we were cut off from the rest of our team.”

“Oh no,” she said.

“And to make matters worse, it had been my idea for the two of us to go ahead and do some advanced recon. I didn’t know that we were walking into a trap.”

“There’s no way you could’ve known that, Caleb. You made the best decision you could at the time.”

“And that decision—the decision I made as the leader of the Team—that decision got my fellow SEAL killed.”

She flinched. “I am so sorry.”

“I saw the bullets riddle his body. I watched him take his last breath.” He fought back tears as the pain seemed as real as it was that day years ago. “But somehow, someway, I survived. I pulled his body out of the line of fire when the rest of my team arrived to help. But it was too late. He was gone. And it was all because I’d made the decision for the two of us to go ahead of the rest of the team.”

Annie’s eyes were filled with tears, and she kept her grip on his hands. “I can’t even imagine.”

“I was never the same after that. A part of me died out there in the mountains of Afghanistan that day. A piece of me that I’ll never get back. So when I tell you I can empathize with what you went through, I believe that I can. And I went through a really dark period after that. I didn’t know why God had spared me and taken my friend. A man who in my opinion was a much better man than I’ll ever be. I questioned everything. I isolated myself from everyone—my SEAL buddies, my family.” He paused for a moment and figured if he was being brutally honest he should just put it all out there. “I even wondered if my life was worth living.”

“How did you get through it?”

“I’ll never get over it, Annie. But with God’s help, I have been able to live with it. I couldn’t do it on my own. By myself, I was a complete wreck. Depressed, lonely, angry. I was so mad at everything—mostly at myself. One day I just lost it and fell to my knees in prayer. It wasn’t an immediate solution. But day by day, I got stronger. I was able to use the emotions I had and channel them into something positive. Make no mistake though, I’m forever changed because of what happened. So when you talk about being damaged, Annie, I’m damaged, too. I’m just a man who has a past full of nightmares, but who is living each day by the grace of God.”

Tears were falling down Annie’s face. “I don’t even know what to say.”

“I haven’t ever told anyone else what I just told you.”

She tilted her head to the side. “Then why me?”

“Because you matter to me, Annie. Like no other woman ever has.”

“You could do so much better than me, Caleb.”

He shook his head. “No. I like you just the way you are. The way I see it, we’re perfectly matched.”

“Even with all my issues?”

“Your issues make you who you are. I’m not looking for perfection. I’m looking for a real connection. And I believe that you feel it between us, too. Something strong and real.”

“I do. But…”

He lifted his finger to her lips to stop her. “No buts. Not right now.”

She nodded and looked up at him. And he could see in her eyes that she felt something for him as well. He leaned down and kissed her gently, realizing he had already given this woman his heart.

**

The next day Annie sat anxiously waiting for him to make the call to Sasha. Annie was still reeling from what Caleb had told her yesterday. He’d opened up to her in a way that he hadn’t with anyone else. And she knew that meant something.

But she was still scared to death about her own feelings. Even if he said that he accepted her as she was, did he really know what that would entail? And yes, he had a traumatic past, too, but there was a big difference. He was stronger than she was. He had a rough time and he came through it on the other side. She didn’t know if she ever would fully be the woman she wanted to be.

She was always bouncing back to her childhood. The lack of love and security. The lack of a father. A mother with addiction issues. And that was on top of the entire shooting episode. She’d survived this long because she insulated herself from others. She didn’t rely upon anyone else for anything. Her way of self-sufficiency was how she managed.

But now she had this man in her life who was wanting more. Wanting her to step out of the shadows of her past. Even if she wanted to, could she?

“You ready to do this?” Caleb asked.

“Not really, but I realize we don’t have much of an alternative.” And that was true. She was boxed into a corner. After having slept on it, she realized her best option was to try to get on the good side of the prosecutor. And pray that Sasha wasn’t bought off by Silva. Hope’s insight had also provided her a small measure of comfort that talking to Sasha was the best option.

He dialed Sasha’s direct office line on speaker and they waited.