LOGAN SEAL Team Seven (Book 2) (3 page)

Tyler was my wild child. He and the Commander had shared a close relationship, we all did, but Ty is everybody’s problem child and we tend to keep them closer than most. If these fucks tried to blemish the Commander’s name in anyway I’m pretty sure I’ll have a hard as fuck time keeping him from going rogue.

“The money, it’s got to be about the money we moved.” It was a fuck load of money that we’d found in an account Dani’s ex Robert and that Rosalind woman had set up using Dani’s name. Quinn was still monitoring that shit to see what popped off, but so far nothing. We all knew that with that kind of money involved it wasn’t gonna go down that easy, but it was a risk we’d had to take to smoke the fuckers out. I just thought we had more time, damn. Connor looked back towards his place where Dani was just coming out the door. She looked over and waved with a bright smile, then my door opened and Gaby came prancing out.

“Handle that Con. The rest of you know what to do. Gabriella, come here.” She glanced over at me in surprise, probably because of the tone of my voice. The others scattered around the perimeter as she walked towards me. “I need you to stay inside today.”

“But…” I just lifted my brow and that shut her up.

“Yes sir.” I tapped her ass lightly to let her know I was pleased with her response, before pulling her in to kiss her forehead. “Good girl.” We looked over to where I was sure Connor was telling his woman the same thing.

The women headed into Con’s place while the brothers met in a huddle in the middle of the compound. “Change of plans, let’s make sure this place is secure.” I passed my phone off to Quinn. “Check this out, find out how this hump got my number and where that call came from.”

Most people don’t understand the strength of the technology the armed forces deal with. They see us as civilians without any backing now that we were stateside, but the reality was that my guys and I were always smart.

We brought shit home with us that we knew would come in handy when it came to protecting our asses as well as our families. Some of us had shit in our head that it would take a stick of dynamite to remove.

Each man went about his business making sure our shit was on lock. I called one of the men on the job to let them know we were either going to be late, or not there at all today, and to send someone else out to make the runs. The last job was almost done and we had a few more lined up after this, and were even at the point of turning people away.

All in all things were going fine except for the shit that was going on down by the water. We were accomplishing a lot of what we had set out to do, making strides. I wasn’t about to let anything fuck with our program.

My brothers and I had been through the bowels of hell together, they see me as their designated leader and I take that shit seriously. No one was gonna get through me to hurt my family, fuck that.

“Everything looks cool Lo, but I say we take this shit as an eminent threat. Whatever this is I think this was the first volley, which means they’re gonna come at us with more unless we back down, and I’m guessing we’re not about to that shit right.” Zak was usually quiet, but he was always ready for a good tussle. It had been a while since we’d kicked any major ass, except for Con’s little skirmish a few weeks ago. Somehow these people had figured out what we were up to, and since the leak hadn’t come from any of us, I’m guessing it was the asshole ex, the sidepiece, or Crampton. And since Crampton was bitch made, I’m more inclined to believe it was one of the other two.

“Con we have to go hunting, let’s see if your boy was dumb enough to talk. Who do we have in NOLA that can nab the ratchet broad he was messing with?”

There was a lot of throat clearing which told me that I may or may not like what was coming next. The seven of us were a unit, but we dealt with other brothers in arms, sometimes people from other branches. Some of them were more fucked up than others, and we tend to attract the rougher element.

When all eyes turned to Zak I pretty much knew what was coming and so did he, from the reaction we got. “Fuck no, uh-uh anybody else, fuck, I’ll go get the skel myself.” Damn, I thought he was over this shit.

“Bro, we gotta do what we gotta do, and we don’t have time for you to make that run and head back here. Where is she hiding out?” I turned to Quinn because he would be the best one to give me what I needed since he was the one keeping tabs on Rosalind or whatever the fuck she was going by these days.

“French Quarter a little place off Chartres St. The place is old and noisy as fuck and it’s right in the middle of the hustle and bustle of the tourist crowd. I guess she learned her lesson last time; but there’s one thing she missed, there’s a balcony.” He grinned at that because Vanessa, the Lieutenant we were planning to send after her, wasn’t called Cat-woman for nothing; that chick could climb.

“Tell me you’re okay with this brother. We won’t do it if you ain’t but we need her. Is she stateside Con?” He looked at Zak as he nodded his head and rocked back on his heels with his hands stuffed in his pockets. “Man up bro, stop being afraid of one little woman, what is she four-eleven?” I turned to scowl at everyone’s pain in the ass.

“Ty shut the fuck up, who said anything about being afraid?” Zak looked angry enough to chew nails. We all knew the story about Zak and Nessa, well some of it anyway. That was one tale he hadn’t shared in its entirety. But we all knew that something had gone down between those two and whatever it was it had ended badly.

The way he was glowering at Ty he wasn’t over shit, and knowing Nessa, she wasn’t gonna back down either. I need this fuckery on top of everything else. But you gotta do what you gotta do. “Make the call Con. Zak, I expect you to be on your best behavior.” It was short fucking notice but it looked like we were in the middle of some shit, now was not the time for bullshit. Fucking women.

“I’m cool, just keep her little ass in check when she gets here or I’m gonna finish what I started.” He walked away after that cryptic note and I was already second-guessing my decision to bring her here.

If I knew more about what had gone down with them I could maybe try to mediate, but I didn’t know shit. The only thing I was sure of is that another man wasn’t involved, because had it been anything like that, my brother would’ve been court martialed already, so hopefully whatever it was wasn’t too bad.

“Have any of you ever figured out what the fuck went down between those two?” I watched him storm towards the gym we all used. That more than anything told me what kind of mood he was in. Poor sap, she still had him tied up in knots.

“What always goes down between a male and a female Cap? I don’t know the particulars but from what I remember about last time, this shit ought to be good. I’ma stock up on beer and popcorn, that shit was better than the movies, or more like ringside at a Heavyweight bout.”

“Ty, anyone ever tell you you’re a pain in the ass?”

“Nope, what I ain’t is whipped like the rest of you fucks; looks like Zak’s gonna be next. Y’all keep that wedding shit away from me ya hear, shit’s catching.”

Like I said, problem child. He loped of somewhere to give the rest of us peace of mind for a minute. He was joking and acting like everything was cool, but all of us knew to keep an eye on his high-strung ass. He was already wound tight about the Desert Fox business, and this would just be one more thing to bring out that fucker’s crazy.

Chapter 4

LOGAN

We sat around in my kitchen all day working out strategy. It might’ve seemed like a bit much to anyone looking in from the outside, but we knew that every little thing meant something.

You learn that shit fast when you were in the thick of battle, returning enemy fire and your heart went out to the kid you saw trapped in the middle of the crossfires, only to see that same kid detonate when one of your fellow soldiers go to help. A couple episodes of that shit and you learn to be overly cautious about every damn thing.

Outwardly I was cool I had to be. I’d learned a long time ago that the boys followed my lead. It wasn’t something that we were conscious of, but it was the truth nonetheless. If I was in a shit mood, they’d pick up on it, and that could sway the day for everybody. So if I let on that I was more upset by the caller’s innuendo, then for sure they would be too. So I had to keep that shit close to the vest until I knew what was going on. Then I was gonna fuck somebody’s shit up for trying to mar a good man’s name.

A man who had done more for his country than most; especially some drug trafficking asshole.

“Okay so this is the first we’re hearing about the Commander being involved in anything shady. First things first, we consider the source.” I wrote that shit in big block letters on the power point board I had set up.

“Next, we know the Commander, he was basically in charge of whether we lived or died for a huge fucking chunk of our time when we were in, and he never let us down. Aside from that, we knew the man, stand up as they come.”

We were all in agreement that whatever this was-was nothing but a smokescreen. I wasn’t sure what the locals knew or thought about what we did in the navy. It’s a safe bet that the Commander never discussed missions and shit on the outside, but they had to at least know that you had to have nerves of steel to make it through fucking boot camp, farther more stay in for as long as the seven of us had.

“Devon I’m gonna need you to keep your ear to the ground, they seem to trust you around here more than they do the rest of us.” That’s because he had this deceiving, innocent boy next door look about him. With his nod I carried on.

“Until we know who said what and to whom, we can’t really move, but we’re not sitting around here on our asses waiting for them to make first strike. Con is right, it has to be about the money. We moved it, they start calling. That was a lot of fucking money; people commit horrendous acts for less so we know what we’re up against.

From now on the women are under twenty-four hour guard. There will be no time when they are not under the eyes of one of us. They’re always together anyway unless they’re going off to work. Con make sure Dani takes a leave of absence or some shit, I’ll work on Gaby. They can use the weddings as an excuse.”

You’d think in the middle of this fuckery there would be no room for bullshit, but that didn’t stop the five of them from making smart ass remarks about marriage.

“Moving right the fuck along, tonight we’re gonna start with Robert, aka the douche.” I don’t know where we got a pic of this guy but we had one up on the board with a death arrow pointed at his head. I didn’t have to think too hard to figure out whose handiwork that was. “I’m not sure he has the balls, but we’re not taking any chances.” They may think this shit was gonna have us running scared, and again, I don’t know where they ever got the idea that we were pussies, but that phone call had the opposite affect to what they expected.

We threw around scenario after scenario but the reality was for now, all we could do was batten down the hatches and protect our flanks until we knew who the enemy was.

“You know what I’m thinking, I’m thinking somebody knows about our relationship with the commander. I’m not talking about the town’s speculation as to why he left his team his land, but someone knows how any mark against him would affect us not only personally, but because of missions.”

“Lo’s right; the more I think about that call the more something stinks. We already know that this is no low-end operation they’re too good. We can’t even get a whiff of who these fucks are, and the people we’ve spoken to so far don’t even seem to know who the fuck they’re working for. I’m thinking that phone call was their first mistake, it gave us a little more insight than we had before.”

“You’re on to something there Con.” I looked around at the rest of them, especially Ty who already looked like he was ready for battle, hotheaded little fuck. “Did you make that call?”

I kept my eye on Zak as I asked and almost rolled my eyes at his reaction. He was as prickly as a damn teenage girl on her period over this shit. “Yep, she’s on it, said she was getting rusty since her retirement.”

“Retirement? I didn’t know about this.” Vanessa was a little young to retire so that meant something serious had went down. I guess I’ll have to wait until she showed up here to get the particulars. Zak seemed as stunned by the news as the rest of us, which meant he hadn’t been keeping tabs on her. I wasn’t even gonna go there with him right now, because that shit looked like it was gonna take a couple bottles of scotch at the very least.

“You know we never went through the Commander’s stuff when we took over. It’s still all locked away in the library of his place.” Cord reminded me of something I hadn’t thought of in a while.

None of us had wanted to go through the old man’s personal papers and shit, felt too much like a violation of trust. So we’d locked everything away safely in his old home, which we had pretty much converted into an office with bedrooms and shit.

“What are you saying, that there’s something there to verify this shit?” I sighed long and hard at Ty’s outburst. This fucker is gonna give me agida. The only time he’s actually calm and rational is when we’re on a mission, any other time it’s like dealing with a psych patient fresh off their meds; ADD fucker. “No Tyler that’s not what he’s saying. Look, we were all there; we all know the Commander was the salt of the earth. I think what your brother is saying is that maybe we’ve been coming at this thing all wrong.

None of us stopped to wonder if the old man was privy to any of this, if he suspected something or not. It’s worth a look to see what if anything he knew. We just assumed that the old guys came to us first, but what if the Commander, who we know was highly intelligent, and extremely perceptive, was onto whatever this is?”

That seemed to calm his ass down and we were back on track. We decided that there was no point in putting that shit off once the decision had been made, so we sent Candy home early, which translated to her heading to Connor’s house, where the women were gathered with their wedding shit.