Elite (39 page)

The next morning Daniel woke up to the sound of the alarm going off on Norma’s phone. He opened his eyes to see a stream of morning sunlight coming in through the window, shining on Norma who was turning off her alarm, now back in her own bed.

He was certain that when he had fallen asleep she had been lying in his arms. Now she was back in her own bed, once again wearing her running shorts and sports bra.

Had he only dreamt that they had sex?

He lifted up his sheets and looked down. Nope, he was buck-ass nude.

He let the sheets fall back down on top of him and lifted his arms over his head to stretch, smiling as he watched Norma make her way to the bathroom.
Horchoff’s “experimental procedure” was the gift that kept on giving.

Being in total control of his body functions proved to be very useful in more ways than one during his session with Norma the night before.
Not only was he able to bring his partner to climax four times before letting himself have a turn, but his strength and cardiovascular stamina helped in making him a literal sex machine.

He was able to lift Norma up and carry her to every corner of the room, putting her in positions that he had never even dreamt up before – which was surprising considering how much time he had spent in his life thinking about sex.

Of course a great deal of that time had been spent trying to think of the perfect way to impress Jordan with his sexual prowess. If she could only experience him now she would be enamored by his ability, he just knew it.

As he finished the thought Norma walked back into the room, now fully dressed in yoga pants and an old t-shirt.

“Get up!” She ordered. “We have a flight in three hours.”

Daniel smiled as he rose from the bed and grabbed some clothes before heading into the bathroom, remaining completely naked as he did so.

Norma just rolled her eyes as he walked past her.

He was glad that his first time with his abilities had been with Norma. He only wanted to impress Jordan to make her regret choosing Gordon
Demérs over him. He actually enjoyed pleasing Norma and the way she had wanted to please him back. Their sexual chemistry was off the charts.

Even so, the two went about the rest of their day as if nothing had ever happened. Norma seemed to have absolutely no interest in bringing it up, and Daniel didn’t want to be the first to mention it.

She would occasionally catch him giving her eyes, but she would return his gaze with a confused stare, as if she honestly had no idea why he was looking at her that way.

“Leave your pistol on the bed,” she instructed him as they were getting ready to walk out the door.

“But it’s
my
gun,” he countered, almost whiningly.

“You’ll get it back,” she assured him, like a mother talking to her child.

Daniel shook his head and did as he was told. “Crazy Richfield,” he murmured to himself.

It felt like only the blink of an eye before they were landing back in Chicago. From the moment the wheels of the plane left the ground in Costa Rica, Norma had gone back to the quiet passenger next to him just staring out the window.

“You are a very complicated woman,” he at one point said to her on their flight from Dallas to Chicago.

Her response was nothing more than a small smirk as she continued staring out the window in silence.

When they returned to the complex they were immediately directed to the briefing room for
a debrief, which given the unspectacular circumstances of the assignment lasted no more than ten minutes.

After the debriefing, Richfield and Blank stopped Daniel for a quick conversation.

“So what did ya think, Danny Boy?” Blank asked him.

“She’s a very complicated woman,” Daniel responded.

Blank and Richfield both cackled at the agent’s remark.

“Well you’re a certified agent now,” Richfield congratulated Daniel with a pat on the back. “The money has already been transferred into your account. Why don’t you take a few days
off. Go home and see your family, maybe look for a new place to live. You’ve got to be tired of being cooped up in this place.”

Daniel let out an unexpected sigh of relief. This place had come to feel like home, and he wasn’t sure where else he might want to live now. But as far as seeing his family – he could think of nothing better. He had never gone this long without seeing his mother in his entire life, and he couldn’t wait to spend some time with her and the rest of the family, and enjoy a home cooked meal.

Richfield must have been able to read the expression on his face.

“We’ll see you in a few days,” he said, patting Daniel on the side of the arm.

“Oh,” Richfield added, “and here’s your gun back.”

Daniel turned to see Richfield handing him the same gun and holster that he had worn throughout his Costa Rica assignment. How in the hell he had gotten it back before Daniel he could not imagine.

Daniel didn’t bother to inquire. Instead he just took the gun and said his goodbyes to the two mysterious managers of the crazy organization.

Charlie and Shifty caught up to Daniel before he could leave the facility.

“How was it, man?” Charlie asked, excited to hear all of the details.

“She’s a very complicated woman,” Daniel responded.

Chapter 20

Daniel never thought he’d be so happy to be back in Indiana. He spent all three days he had off with his family. They went to their favorite restaurants, went to the movie theater to see the newest superhero blockbuster, played board games, and his mom made her world famous lasagna that had been known to spark conversation for miles around from all those who were fortunate enough to have tasted it.

The only difficult part of being home was trying to explain his job and his training to his family without giving away too much. He didn’t like having to keep secrets from his mom and dad, but it wasn’t like it was the first time. Every young man had aspects of their life they were better off not revealing to their parents, and that their parents were better off not hearing.

When the time came to leave his childhood home and travel back to Chicago, Daniel felt sad to have to go so soon after spending so much time away, but he was also anxious to get back to Elite and take on his next assignment. Besides, now that he was no longer restricted to the complex for training he would be able to see his family far more often. He couldn’t wait to find a nice new place to live and invite them over for visits so they could see for themselves the wisdom in his decision to go to work for Elite.

Over the next month Richfield kept Daniel busy, sending him on three different assignments, ranging from one to three days each.
Given that they were his first solo missions, each job was rather simplistic in nature, but they earned him some pretty decent cash. Each client was willing to pay forty-thousand for Daniel’s services, and because it was Daniel, Richfield agreed to pay him twenty-percent of the take instead of his usual fifteen for rookies, netting Daniel eight grand for each job. Making over thirty-one thousand dollars in just one month of work left Daniel with more cash than he knew what to do with.

All three assignments were precautionary detail, the first for a famous actor named James
Darvin who was shooting a few scenes for his new movie on the streets of Detroit. Given that Darvin was a white man who had recently made some controversial statements on race, he wanted to be sure he had extra protection in a crime-ridden city that had a majority African-American population and an almost non-existent police force.

Fortunately, the only real threat
Darvin faced while on the closed set was from the paparazzi, something Daniel let Darvin’s normal security team handle. The locals seemed to be more concerned with the fact that a major motion picture was being shot in their backyard and couldn’t have given two shits about James Darvin’s political point of view. They had too many other, important things to worry about in that city.

The second job Daniel received was protecting a United States senator and his family, who were taking a trip to New York City. This would be the first time Daniel experienced a direct threat to his client.

“Always remember that when assigned to a politician that fifty-percent of the population who gives a damn about politics generally hates them,” Richfield had said to Daniel in the briefing.

“Those who
don’t care about politics probably hate them to, but have no fucking clue who the hell they even are – and if you’re in a foreign country, assume everyone hates them.”

The senator and his family were on a weekend trip, and on Saturday evening as they exited a fifth-avenue store, some punk in a red winter vest and a black beanie approached the senator and started yelling something about healthcare, his sentences riddled with expletives.

The senator’s two other body guards stepped up to deal with the psycho, but Daniel made sure not to get drawn in. The senator’s regular personal security detail could handle some disgruntled citizen on the street.

Instead Daniel stayed with the client, hailed a cab, and made sure that the senator, his wife and two daughters got into the vehicle safely before climbing in with them and directing the cab driver to the hotel. He smiled as he texted the two members of the senator’s protection detail to let them know that they were headed back to the hotel and would wait for them there before going back out into the city. Norma and Richfield would have been proud of him.

The third assignment was the worst of them all. Some big-wig stock trader from New York named Eli Jefferson was coming to Chicago for a night and wanted to hire a bodyguard because he was known for causing trouble everywhere he went, and wanted protection from over-aggressive bouncers. The only reason he hired Elite was because he had heard they were the best “local” agency.

By eleven o’clock Eli was plastered, and dragged Daniel along with his posse to a strip club. To no surprise of Daniel’s, Eli seemed to feel he was above the “no touching” policy and molested three of the girls before the club’s bouncer had seen enough.

Daniel intercepted the bouncer telling him “I’ll handle this.”

He then picked Eli up out of his chair and threw him over his shoulder before heading for the door. The man protested quite loudly, but was unable to convince Daniel to set him down.

The rest of his crew went to confront Daniel. Daniel just turned and gave them all a death-like stare. Knowing who Daniel worked for, the men quickly came to their senses and let the bodyguard walk out with his client slung over his shoulders.

By the time Daniel got Eli into a cab, the man had passed out completely. The next morning he couldn’t remember a thing and called Richfield up to tell him about the wild night he had in the windy city and requested Daniel – “The bro who had rescued him from the mean bouncer at Madame
Vavavoom’s” – again the next time he was in town.

When Richfield told Daniel about the request Daniel responded by saying, “Let’s hope I’m ranked too high for that assignment the next time he comes to town.”

After four assignments Daniel was beginning to feel very comfortable with his place at Elite and was optimistic about his future at the company. He had learned quickly that being on assignment was more mental than it was physical, and he was good with that.

If the time came when he needed to be physical, he knew that he would be ready for that too.

And the money – the money was the best part and made it all that much more enjoyable.

Daniel didn’t see much of Norma with all of the assignments Richfield had been sending him on. They would only occasionally see each other in passing without any real time for conversation.

That pattern ended one night when Shifty and Charlie were both outside of the complex and Daniel and Norma happened to finish their workouts at the same time, so they decided to have a drink together. It was the first time the two had drank alone together, and unlike on the plane, there seemed to be a great deal of chemistry between them.

They talked about absolutely nothing and yet were completely enthralled by the conversation. They laughed and joked about their friends and their clients – she really enjoyed his story about Eli Jefferson – and at one point Daniel thought it may have even become flirtatious.

Finally as the bar was closing down, Daniel walked her down to her bunk where she had decided to stay for the night. She looked both ways to make sure no one was watching and gave him a soft and sweet goodnight kiss before going inside.

Daniel walked back to his room with a smile, absolutely smitten and possibly in love for the first time since Jordan. He was finally over her and onto something new. He just hoped that this wasn’t a sporadic thing tied to alcohol consumption, and that Norma was genuinely feeling the same things he was.

He would never get to find out.

On what seemed like a normal afternoon at the complex, Daniel was in the middle of his workout when a commotion suddenly arose as Blank, Richfield and two medics burst through the doors and sprinted across the room to the doors on the other side that lead to the lobby.

Suddenly the double doors to the lobby flung open as Frank from the front desk and an EMT ran in, pushing a stretcher.

The body on the stretcher was instantly recognizable, and the weight Daniel was lifting fell straight to the floor when he saw Norma lying there unconscious, being pushed across the floor with a breathing mask over her face.

His heart sank to his stomach. All he could do was stand in shock as he watched the medics hover over her.

Only he wasn’t standing. He thought he was standing but he wasn’t. His body had begun involuntarily running in her direction.

Blank noticed Daniel coming toward the stretcher and immediately ran over to intercept him.

“Let the doctors do their thing, Danny boy,” Blank said, putting his hands on Daniel’s chest to stop him.

“Norma,” was all Daniel could muster, tears streaming down his cheeks as he watched the woman that he loved being carted through the doors toward the elevator. He hadn’t even realized that he was crying until now.

Blank looked at the distraught man’s face for a moment before instinctively wrapping his arms around him in embrace.

“There’s nothing you can do for her right now, Danny Boy,” Blank told him.

Daniel regained his composure and took a step back from Blank.

“What happened?” he asked, still not completely comprehending what he just saw.

“I’m not exactly sure, kid,” Blank responded.

“Job went sour,” Richfield interjected, approaching the two men and wiping some tears away from his own face. “Norma and the client ended up in the middle of some stupid gang-banger turf war.”

“Turf war?!” Daniel repeated, completely confused. “Gangs?! What the hell kind of assignment was this?!”

“The kind where she ended up seeing something she wasn’t supposed to see,” Richfield responded. “She was supposed to be there to protect the client during some sort of business transaction. Apparently his business partners turned on him and tried to kill him. Norma was able to get the jump on them and hide the client in a safe place. It turned into a firefight. She drew their fire away from the client and tried to clear a path for them to escape, but there were too many of them and they had automatics. They gunned her down just before the police arrived.

“She saved the clients life but she paid for it.”

Daniel sniffled violently, digesting Richfield’s story.

“What kind of business transaction was this?” Daniel demanded.

“I don’t know,” Richfield admitted.

“You don’t know?!” Daniel cried, dissatisfied with the answer.

“We don’t ask!” Richfield shot back.

“Well that’s just perfect!” Daniel shouted at his boss. “Look how that turned out for Norma!”

“She knew what she was getting into!” Richfield lashed out at Daniel. “We covered all of it in the briefing! She agreed to take the assignment anyway!”

Daniel took a deep breath and another step back. That sounded like Norma. She wouldn’t have backed down from an assignment no matter how shady.

“Come on,” Richfield said, understanding the reason for Daniel’s anger and desire to lay blame. “She’s going into surgery now. Let’s go wait downstairs.”

Daniel had attended several funerals in his lifetime, but none of them had been surrounded by the level of darkness that hung over
Norma’s. The air of the church was filled with still lingering feelings of shock and disbelief, which had bled into anger and sadness over a life taken too soon.

The shock Daniel had felt when
Horchoff had approached Richfield, Blank and him in the infirmary had lasted days. After two hours of surgery, Horchoff and the other doctors were unable to save her. Her internal injuries sustained from multiple bullet wounds were too severe. They could not stop the bleeding.

In the three days between Norma’s death and her funeral, Daniel had barely left his room. He spent hours in his bed watching movies and TV shows, trying to distract himself. He tried to work out for a little while, but had little motivation to do anything. Norma had been able to fill a gaping void that Jordan had left inside him, and now a few gangster punks had reached into his chest and pulled it right back out of him. He was empty.

Empty – He felt empty. It wasn’t until he arrived at the funeral and saw Norma’s mother – a woman he had never met but knew so much about – and the pain on her face and the depression in her eyes, that he began to feel the sadness.

He began weeping in the pew as a wave of realization that the woman who had represented new hope in his life was gone forever and he could never get her back. He tried to fight back the tears but was no longer in control of his emotions. He lowered his head and turned to the side, trying to hide his face from Shifty, Charlie and the other Elite agents in attendance.

The complex had been a dark place after Norma’s passing. Everyone there had cared for Norma and all were stricken by her death.

Shifty and Charlie had spent a great deal of time in the lounge, drinking their sorrows away as the cliché went. Daniel had no interest.
He didn’t want to do any of the things he had done when Norma was around. He didn’t want to remember her right now.

Besides, no one understood just how close the two had been. Neither Daniel nor Nora had ever spoken to anyone, including each other, about their night in Costa Rica. Whatever feelings they shared would be buried with her.