On Her Six (Under Covers) (5 page)

Chapter Five

After spending six grueling hours waiting in the emergency room, Sam finally made it back home. The doc said her foot wasn’t broken, thank God, but she should stay off of it for a day or so. That was fine with her, since the next two days were going to be filled with sitting on her bum and spying on her neighbor.

She knocked on the door at Grandma Rose’s house and heard voices yelling from inside.

Grandma opened the door and peered down at Sam’s foot with a worried expression.

“I’m good,” she said. “Just have to keep it elevated and put ice on it. The pain’s more in my rear-end than my foot.” It still throbbed like an extra heartbeat, but the doctor wrapped it good and tight. Even if she walked into a wall, it wouldn’t hurt it any further.

“That’s good news. When Lou called and said he’d had to practically drag you to the ER, I didn’t know what to think.”

More shouts erupted from inside Rose’s house. Sam looked over her grandmother’s shoulder.

“They’ve been here since noon.” Rose smiled and motioned with a swing of her arm for Sam to follow.

Sam ambled into the back of the house toward the kitchen, where the rest of the women from the 19th Street Patrol huddled around the table like a pack of lions devouring a fresh kill.

Grandma’s house was identical in layout to Sam’s. Living room with TV just inside the door, a short hallway with a powder room, then the corridor opened to a dining area with sliding glass door to the right and kitchen to the left.

Sam stopped in the doorway between the dining room and kitchen, gripping the inside of the doorjamb.

Evening had descended. The moon was full, sending its white rays through the window, acting as a spotlight to gadgets laying on the kitchen tabletop.

“No,” Maybel snapped, yanking a video camera with infrared technology from Estelle’s hands. “I told you,
I’m
going to use it. I have better vision than you do.” Maybel, Vice President and oldest member of the neighborhood watch group, was what most people would consider a typical grandmother. Wearing a blue short-sleeve cotton shirt and khaki culottes, she appeared as the essence of simplicity. One would never guess that behind that easy-going facade lurked a woman with an unquenchable thirst for information.

During the Cold War, Maybel had worked as an operative for the CIA. She usually clammed up when Sam asked her about what happened, but Grandma Rose had said Maybel played a part in the peacekeeping efforts between the U.S. and the Soviets. Whatever that meant.

She must have had a pretty huge part, because she still had connections at the Agency and beyond. She never spoke about the who and the what, but if the 19th Street Patrol needed anything, Maybel could provide it.

“But my hands are steadier,” Estelle barked, snatching the piece back. “You can’t hold the camera still long enough to see what’s going on. Always looks like the suspect’s being sucked into a damn hurricane.” Estelle wore a spaghetti-strap top and a tight denim skirt, looking more like a barmaid than a grandma. She’d lived alone, five doors down from Grandma Rose for forty years. Never married, but never without a list of adoring suitors at her beck and call.

“What do I get to do?” Celia asked no one in particular. At sixty, she was the youngest and most proper of the group. Dressed in her usual Sunday best—cashmere top, pearls, kitten heels, and hair pulled into a perfect chignon—she reached cautiously across the table for a dart gun. She marveled at it and then pointed the barrel at her face.

“No!” Sam leaped forward, pulling the gun from Celia’s hand before the woman figured out how to pull the trigger. Celia shooting herself in the face and passing out from the tranquilizers wouldn’t be a great start to the evening.

Voices continued to holler over one another, arguing about who was going to handle which device. Excitement at the prospect of gathering information on their mysterious neighbor had taken over the room. Sam let their racket go on for another minute, before forcing order.

“Ladies! Ladies!” She bobbed her hands in the air like a teacher trying to calm an unruly class of first graders. “Ladies, please listen.”

The arguing continued.

Grandma Rose stuck her fingers in her mouth and let out an ear-piercing whistle.

All eyes turned and gave Sam their undivided attention. “Thank you for coming. We have a very important mission tonight. We need all hands on deck for this one. As you know, we have a new neighbor. And he’s a slick one. I had a run-in with him this morning. Big, bad, and carries a pistol.”

A collective gasp erupted.

Sam nodded for effect. “The man is dangerous.”

Maybel dropped her binoculars onto the table with a
thud
. “I bumped into him while I was out walking Rufus this afternoon—”

“More like spying on him,” Estelle said out of the side of her mouth.

She shot the woman a stern sideways glance. “I questioned him is all.” She straightened her spine and lifted her chin. “As VP of the watch I have a right to.” She paused, seeming to wait for someone to challenge her logic.

“And?” Estelle said, drumming her fingers on the table. “What’d you find out? We’re waitin’ on baited breath here. Some of us might die soon.”

“His name is John Black. He moved back to town after serving in the Army. He grew up around here.”

“That’s it?” Estelle asked. “That’s all he said? What about the juicy details?”

Juicy details was right. He might have moved back to his hometown, but then why the gun? And how did he know so much about those drugs?

Maybel slumped in her chair. “There weren’t any. I could tell there was more to his story though. Much more.”

With an eager expression, Estelle rested an elbow on the table and leaned over it. “Like what? Firefighter by day, Magic Mike by night? That kind of thing?”

Maybel sent a deadpan look to her friend. “No, Estelle. I was thinking more that he was hiding something of importance.”

The other woman leaned back and shrugged. “You don’t think a man who can gyrate like Channing Tatum is important?”

Celia bent to whisper to Rose. “Who’s Channing Tatum?”

Rose waved her off. “I’ll show you tomorrow afternoon during tea.”

Satisfied, Celia nodded and folded her hands in her lap.

“What I
meant
,” Maybel said in a stern tone, “was that I don’t believe his story about who he is and where he’s from. He’s definitely hiding something and I want to know why.”

Sam’s gaze shifted to the windows looking out to the back alley. She focused on the aged-wood fence outlining her grandmother’s small yard.

A vision of her brawny neighbor came to her, and her heart suddenly beat double-time. “He’s arrogant,” Sam mused. “But I guess he can be, since he’s all buff and what-not…he’s wide like a tractor-trailer and just as tough…a bit roguish, but it’s a front. He’s not fooling me with that tough-guy exterior.” She snorted.
But man, the way he’d saved me from that kid and took control of the situation. Capably. Securely. Forcefully.
She shuddered. It was meant to be in disgust, but it definitely wasn’t.
His muscles are enormous. And he has this commanding way of—

“Is he a bad guy or a hero in a romance novel?” Estelle said through a sly smile. “Sounds like Channing Tatum ain’t got nothing on Beefy next door.”

Sam jumped and glanced at the smirking faces staring back at her. She’d said all of that out loud. How embarrassing.

Estelle threw her shoulders back, showing off her low-cut neckline. “From that description, I’m thinkin’ we should go over and welcome him to the neighborhood, if you know what I mean.” She nudged Maybel in the ribs and winked. “Might not be such a bad thing havin’ a little eye candy to stare at.”

Sam’s focus cleared and snapped to the women at the table. They had to understand the importance of tonight. “He’s no piece of candy. And if he is, he’s a…a…chocolate-covered maggot.”

There was a shared, “Eww.”

“Yuck,” Celia whispered to herself, her face turning an ill shade of green. She pulled a handkerchief from her pocket and placed it over her mouth. “Why would anyone want to eat a maggot covered in chocolate?”

“No one eats ’em, Celia,” Estelle responded. “It was a figure of speech. A poor one, but one nonetheless.”

Sam narrowed her eyes at Estelle but didn’t comment.

Estelle shot her a mega-watt smile and batted her eyelashes.

“Oh.” Little red patches appeared on Celia’s cheeks.

“Chocolate maggot or not,” Grandma Rose interjected, “I’m grateful to him. He did, after all, save you from that horrible drug addict.”

Another collective gasp.

Sam’s arms waved up and down to calm the group. “It was nothing. I could’ve handled it on my own.” But she hadn’t. Ash had saved her. Her voice didn’t sound as confident as she would have liked, and the awkward silence and worried expressions on the other women’s faces told her they had picked up on it.

Sam turned to Celia with the intention of getting them back on track. “You can handle the audio. It’s important we hear what our new neighbor has to
say
.”
Not what he looks like
. “Your job is the most important.” She pointed to the corner of the room where the Long-Range Laser Listening Device sat propped against the wall. It was a tall, camera-looking thing on a tripod typically used by law enforcement or military. All Celia had to do was point the laser at their neighbor’s house, into one of his windows, and they’d be able to hear him moving about. The device attached to an amplifier unit with audio recorder, so if he said anything really interesting, they’d have it on tape.

Celia sat up straighter in her seat and grinned.

“I’ll be the lead on this investigation,” Sam continued. “Grandma, I need you to install the GPS on his car.”

Rose flashed a cocky grin. “Done. Installed it this afternoon.”

All at once, the women reached and grabbed equipment from the table, eyeing each device carefully, acquainting themselves in preparation for their assignment.

“Are we sure he’s really bad?” Celia placed a pair of headphones in front of her. “Maybe he carries a gun for hunting.”

“You don’t hunt with a handgun,” Maybel responded.

“There must be a good reason,” Celia said. “What if we go through all this to find out he’s a good guy?”

“That’s what we’re hoping,” Rose spoke up.

“Yeah, right,” Sam muttered.
Good guy, my ass.

“But then why—”

“Remember the Wilkensons?” Grandma Rose said.

“The family that died?”

“
Killed
, Celia,” Maybel said. “By their neighbor. He seemed like a perfectly normal, nice young man and then one day he shot them both dead in their house. No one on the street had any clue he had mental issues.” Her eyes closed as a shudder ran through her body. “Thank goodness the kids were at their grandparents’ that night.”

“That’s why we’re doing this,” Rose added. “So hopefully children like them never have to wake up without their parents again.”

Sam remembered the day clearly. Maybel and Rose had formed the group the day after the funeral, and they’d been adding members and keeping watch over their neighbors ever since.

A hush fell over the group as the women took an unofficial moment of silence for the Wilkenson family.

After a few moments, Sam’s head snapped up and she grinned. “Let’s get started.”

…

Ash savored his last bite of Chinese food. Now all he wanted to do was relax. He’d set up a nineteen-inch TV in his living room to the right of the front door and directly under the bay window. All that hung over the window was a grimy pair of sheer ivory curtains that had probably been white at one time. They suited his purpose.

The room was bare apart from the curtains. No pictures, no rugs, nothing to add warmth to the house. A TV on a milk crate, a worn sofa, an end table, and lamp without a shade were all he’d set up. He wasn’t planning on staying long.

He settled onto the soft sofa cushions and turned the channel to ESPN, catching up on baseball scores from around the country.

His eyes grew heavy and his blinks slowed. He laced his fingers over his stomach and dropped his head to the side, giving in to the tiredness.

When his cell phone rang, his eyes shot open. Leaping from his lounged position, he scrambled into the kitchen to retrieve his phone.

“Yeah,” he answered, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

DEA Northeast Regional Director Joseph Landry spoke, “Status report.”

Fuck. He’d forgotten to call Tyke and report what he’d seen with Blondie and the Vamper.

Ash cleared his throat. “Had an incident this morning with a Vamp. Held a local woman at gunpoint demanding money. I handled the situation.”

“Really?” he asked. A few silent beats passed, prompting Ash to elaborate.

“Just some punk in need of a fix. He came out during the daylight though. Must’ve been desperate.”

“You’re sure he was on Vamp?”

“Yes. Same red and black eyes, chalky skin, shaking like a leaf.”

“I see.”

“Said he buys his stash at Club Hell. Viktor Heinrich’s joint.”

“Anything else?”

Ash paused.

“Spit it out, Cooper.”

“The incident with the Vamper. The woman involved…she was asking questions.”

“Who is she?” The director’s voice turned weary.

“Next-door neighbor. She noticed the eyes, sir.”

Landry stayed silent for a moment, then said, “You’re a capable agent. You’ll figure something out.” He paused a fraction of a second before saying, “But, Cooper, if you blow your cover, you can kiss reinstatement to team leader good-bye.”

“Understood,” he replied through tight lips.

“I shouldn’t have to say this, Agent Cooper—”

Here it comes…

“—but I’m going to, so listen up. You’re not leading this investigation. Got that? You’re there to observe and collect intel on the area around the port. We’re expecting a drop anytime now, so activity should be hopping. Pass anything else you see on to Tyke for the team’s analysis and action. He’ll take it from there.”