Secret Maneuvers (6 page)
My first thoughts at seeing Charlie standing there, waiting for me, were happy ones. The past 24 hours had cracked open a vault of emotions I’d never thought to experience again, so the sight of him standing there as the plane came to a stop was like a fresh breath of air.
The next thought was pure unadulterated panic. He could blab explosive personal information out in front of a particular person who needed to be left in the dark as much as possible. Grabbing my bag, I made a beeline for the door to be the first one out, then practically ran down the stairs to throw myself into Charlie’s waiting arms. His bear hug spun me in a circle before setting me on my feet.
Pulling his head down, I placed my mouth next to his ear and whispered, “Charlie, I need a favor. I need you to not mention Seth and tell Walters to do the same. Can you do that for me, please?”
Pulling back I saw the confusion on his face, but shook my head when he started to ask why. Glancing behind, to the men disembarking from the plane, he looked back down to me, still confused, yet he ultimately only shrugged his shoulders. “Don’t worry about it, darlin’. It’s not a problem.” Giving him a grateful smile, I let go of him to turn around and face Boyd and the EX Ops team. Deputy Walters sidled up next to me and threw an arm over my shoulders to squeeze.
“Everyone, I’d like to introduce you to my good friends, Sheriff Jenkins and Deputy Walters. Deputy Walters here is kind enough to drive you to the hotel I’ve reserved for you. By the time you get there you should also have two rental SUV’s waiting with the keys at the front desk. Boyd and I have some errands to run, but we’ll meet you back at the hotel in a few hours to prep for tonight. We’ll be doing undercover surveillance at the Big Bull Bar to see if we can find any further activity. Commander Wall, you have our numbers if you need to reach us. If you need anything at all just give us a ring.” Charlie leaned behind my back to whisper briefly in Deputy Walter’s ear while I was telling everyone to pile in the vehicles.
Boyd piled in with me into Charlie’s SUV while the EX Ops team piled into the back of Deputy Walter’s black van. The two vehicles took off in different directions, which made me feel more than just a tad relieved to be putting a little distance between myself and the man that caused too many memories to creep up after I thought they’d been long since buried.
There had been a number of times that I’d seen Bobby out of the corner of my eye, staring at me from across the plane. Desire, mixed with determination, written plain as day on his face for the world to see. The shadows of regret that were visible in those beautiful eyes of his were what had gotten to me the most. Did he actually regret leaving me? The thought made my heart skip a beat, but my brain quickly reminded me that it didn’t matter. Life had moved on in big ways. There was no safe place in it for Bobby Baker.
Bobby
Close to nine o’clock that night I sat with the other men in Jaxon’s hotel suite, waiting for Belle and her partner to show up. Everyone was dressed in their civilian clothes as if they were headed out to have a good time, instead of getting ready to do reconnaissance work at a busy bar. Though, every man in the room was armed in one way or another; guns or knives carefully concealed in their boots or around their waist and underneath their shirts. We all sat calmly, waiting, like the steady soldiers we were, until a few minutes later a firm knock sounded on the door. Jaxon crossed the floor from where he’d been sitting in a chair, bouncing his leg, and peeped through the hole before he opened the door to admit first Boyd, then Belle, with Sheriff Jenkins right behind her.
I had to tell my lungs to keep breathing as the sight of Belle reached me. My eyes were probably glazed with desire because the way she looked right now felt like a hit of a wonder drug on a detoxing body. Gone was the professional demeanor of her ATF attire and in its place stood someone reminiscent of the wild girl I’d fallen in love with all those years ago. Her jeans—that were so low rise they barely covered her private areas—were settled perfectly over her black cowboy boots and were paired with a mid-sleeve, fitted, western shirt with the buttons halfway undone to show the black, lace tank top underneath. Her hair was long and loose, cascading down her back in gentle curls, topped by a sexy, black cowgirl hat on her head.
Flashing a dazzling smile she addressed the room. “Hey y’all! Who’s ready to have some fun tonight?”
Shell shocked men sat in silence staring back at her. It took everything I had not to run up and tackle her so that my unit would stop ogling what I obviously still considered mine. Charlie let loose an amused chuckle. “Darlin,’ I do believe you’ve made an impression.”
With a roll of her eyes and a soft snort, she crossed her arms over her ample chest. “Anyways! Moving on now. I’ve talked Charlie here into accompanying us tonight with his Deputy since he’s the one who spotted the suspicious activity. They’ll be on the lookout for the two men to help us along. I thought we could break up into four groups so that we can all arrive at separate intervals to avoid suspicion. Maybe fifteen or twenty minutes apart? We all arrived in our own vehicles, but Boyd will ride in one of your SUV’s if you have go bags already in them. I take it that you guys are going to be wearing some sort of communication devices tonight?”
Jaxon nodded. “We’re all equipped with comm. links that can be activated by pushing a button on the actual device in their ear or by a button on their watch. Either way, everyone in the unit will be able to hear what’s being said when one of the comm. links are activated. Also, it might be a good idea to use two of those four teams and position them outside the bar. With groups in the front and back, we can be on the lookout around the perimeter.”
Belle angled her body to face Jaxon. “Perhaps then, Commander Wall, it might be best if we split Boyd, Charlie, Deputy Miles and myself up with your men so that we have a link to the rest of the team tonight through you all.”
“That works.” Jaxon faces us to start rattling off teams. “Logan and Wyatt team up with Agent Boyd. You’ll go by ‘Group Four’ and position yourselves outside the front. Chase and Arturo team up with Deputy Miles to make ‘Group Three’. Situate yourselves outside the back. Declan and Riley can team up with Agent Roberts for ‘Group Two’. Bobby, Lucas and myself will team up with Sheriff Jenkins to form ‘Group One’.”
Jaxon started handing out a printout of information to Belle, Boyd and Jenkins. “We were able to obtain a little information on the bar. The picture shows the man who owns it. His name is Travis Henderson. Mr. Henderson seems to have a clean rap sheet and little else is known about the bar or its employees. Anyone got any questions?” Silence enveloped the room. “Then if everyone is ready, let’s roll out.”
Belle headed out of the room first to disappear in the parking lot while the guys proceeded to file out a few minutes later. Being at the back of the group I missed what made the guys catcall and laugh until I came into full view of Belle leaned up against a black jacked up Ford F350 decked out with a ram air hood, brush guard, monster-sized tires and a banner on the top of the windshield that read ‘G.R.I.T.S.’.
Lucas’s slightly New York accented voice sounded confused as he asked, “G.R.I.T.S.? Isn’t that like a food or something?”
Logan clapped him on the shoulder as barks of laughter echoed in the parking lot. “Naw, buddy. That stands for ‘Girls Raised In The South’. You could say that Agent Roberts is showing off her southern pride a bit, that’s all. It’s a damn good thing to be proud of, too.”
Belle climbed up into the cab of the truck. Still hanging out of the door a bit she yelled, “Come on Sullivan brothers. We’re gonna have some fun before we head to the bar!”
Declan and Riley Sullivan looked wary. “What kind of fun exactly?”
“Muddin’ and Jason Aldean. Let’s go, baby!” The heavy rumble of her engine came to life as ‘She’s Country’ blasted out of its open windows.
The Sullivan brothers looked at each other nervously. Riley spoke in a low voice to Declan, “You think she’s alright upstairs or should I be worried?” Declan clapped his brother on the back before hopping up into the passenger side of the truck.
I was insanely jealous as the truck tore out of the parking lot to head down the highway while the rest of us piled into our respective vehicles to leave. It almost felt as if she was trying to rub my nose in one of our best memories. When you lived in a small southern town, out in the middle of nowhere, muddin’ with your buddies, your girl, and pilfered beer where you could cut loose and be free was one of the few options for entertainment. There went my buddies. There went my girl. Here I still stood, looking like a jackass.
Jaxon watched the retreating vehicle with a mix of amusement and trepidation. Turning to Sheriff Jenkins he asked, “Should I be worried about any of that?” His finger pointing in the direction of where Belle’s truck had already disappeared.
The Sheriff’s easy smile didn’t seem to convince Jaxon. “Not at all, Commander Wall. Annabelle is harmless. Swear.”
I snorted. “Tell that to the guy she knocked unconscious her senior year. He was twice her size.”
Sheriff Jenkins’s eyebrows shot to his hairline as he turned to face me in the back seat. “You knew Annabelle in high school?”
My mouth kicked up in a half smile. “Yeah, you could say that. We grew up in the same small town. Belle and I were as close as you could get until I left for the Army just after graduation.”
The Sheriff’s eyebrows pulled down into an intense expression as something flashed over his face before he could cover it up. He quickly turned around to start the car. “I’m just going to turn on the radio. Hope you don’t mind.”
The radio kicked on and a local country station came on. All conversation in the car stopped. The last look the Sheriff had made bothered me. There was something there that made my instincts flare up. The Sheriff knew
something. What in the hell could that possibly be?
Bobby
Just before ten o’clock I stepped into the Big Bull Bar. We were the second team to arrive, ten minutes behind Group Four who was stationed on t
he outside in the back. Country music blasted through the building, flirtatious women writhing around on the dance floor luring drunken men off their stools to try and dance with them. The place was rowdy, yet entertaining, making it pretty clear that it was a hot spot in the area to be frequented for good-time seeking residents. The walls were painted a sinful dark red on the top half with distressed black wood wainscoting on the bottom. Scuffed but sturdy dark, hardwood floors ran throughout the wide open space. The walls were decorated with bull horns and giant framed pieces of art depicting half-naked cowboys and saloon girls.
Sheriff Jenkins motioned to a table in the back that would give us a perfect view of the bar while we waited the night out. Walking past the dance floor I saw a mechanical bull on the other side, to the left. On the right side was a long bar against the wall that held a good sized group of individuals. Where we seated ourselves in the back consisted of some tables half-filled with the locals; socializing, drinks in hand. The manager, Travis Henderson, was behind the bar helping the bartender fill orders and I failed to see anyone matching Deputy Miles’s descriptions of the men he’d observed in the parking lot the other night.
Fifteen minutes later, Arturo reported through the hidden comm. links attached to our ears that he was in position with Deputy Miles and Chase. Another twenty minutes slid by with no interesting activity. Well, nothing interesting unless you counted the young, twenty-something, long-legged blonde that sidled up to Commander Jaxon with the kind of smile that was pure invitation to a good time.
Just last week that was the kind of thing I would have envied. A night of meaningless sex to fill the void that felt unfillable. I might have even tried to steal her away from Jaxon just for the fun of it. Now, all I could see was that she was nowhere near as blessed on top as Belle. Neither did she exude that kind of confidence that came with the innate kind of sexiness that Belle gave off without trying at all. I should have been amazed that I was relatively pussy-whipped so fast, but I couldn’t seem to bring myself to care that I was. In place of fear or dread over impending shackles of commitment were flashbacks of Belle before I left for the Army.
Half-naked on the back seat of my car with the windows fogged up. Lying on a blanket on the bank of the creek with love and devotion shining in her green eyes. In the hayloft of my father’s barn where we explored with our hands and mouths each other’s bodies. God what a fool I’d been to try and walk away from her. Right behind those memories were the ideas of how to get her back. If she gave me too much grief about talking about what had happened between us, I could just get some rope, tie her up and make her listen. Actually that idea held a lot of appeal for me.
With a half-empty beer in my hand, I watched as Belle strutted through the front door with her arm wrapped around Declan’s waist. He held her tucked into his side with an arm slung over her shoulders. Every muscle in my body tensed while I fought the desire to go down there and kick Declan’s ass. Watching my buddy make my girl laugh on the plane ride was one thing. Watching my buddy hold my girl so close to his body that they could have been super glued together was another. The logical half of my brain told me that I was being completely irrational. Declan would never go there because he knew exactly what Belle meant to me, which was everything. The other half of my brain that dealt with emotions and thought logic was a little bitch called me a moron for sitting back and watching the smooth talking Sullivan touch what was definitely mine. Stupid fucking emotions. They stunk worse than flying monkey shit.
