Waiting... On You (Force Recon Marines) (26 page)

He picked her up, one big hand
cradling her half-diapered bottom. Hugging her to his chest, he kissed the top
of her downy soft head. She smelled incredible, like nothing he’d ever smelled
before.

“Your daddy was a good man— the best,”
he murmured into her wisps of dark, curly hair. “He was my friend, and I know
he loved you a whole bunch, little lady. Life doesn’t always deal us a fair
hand, angel, but I’ll come running if you ever need anything.” And damn it, he
was going to get the guys who killed Dylan!

That was the picture Hanna walked in
on when she entered her bedroom, wrapped in her damp terry robe. She heard what
Nick said to the baby. It brought tears to her eyes. Silently, she went over to
them and put her arms around them both. Her brother’s death was such a terrible
tragedy, especially when viewed through the loss it meant for his daughter.

Katie let them both know when she’d
had enough hugging. She uttered a little series of distress cries, then her
diaper fell.

Hanna stepped back and saw it on the
floor. Nick lifted one broad shoulder in a helpless shrug. “I couldn’t find the
safety pins.”

Hanna took the baby and set her back
down on the bed. “Come here,” she said over her shoulder to him. “Let me show
you how this is done.” She pulled apart the sticky tabs on the sides of the
diaper. “See. No pins needed. They’re kind of built in.” She turned to smile at
him as she picked the baby back up. “Now you can add one more skill to your
extensive training, Colonel Kelly. Diapering 101.”

Nick followed her across the hallway,
into Katie’s and Christina’s room. “You look good with her, Hanna. Have you
ever thought about having a baby?”

At the changing table, she laid Katie
down and pulled open a drawer below to select some clothes for her. Surprised
by his question, she turned to him as he came closer. “Have you?”

“No.”

“Neither have I, then.” Slipping a
tiny shirt on Katie, she saw him frown, as if he hadn’t expected her response.
“Why were you looking for me? It must have been important, the way you came
charging into the bathroom.” Hurt and anger gave her words an edge.

“You know, I lied.”

She couldn’t imagine what he was
talking about now. She stared at him, vexed.

“I
have
thought about having a
family,” he explained as she slipped a pair of tiny shorts on Katie. “I mean,
I’m not getting any younger, and most men my age have a wife and kids by now,
even my fellow teammates in recon. I’ve begun to think I’m missing something.”

When Katie was dressed, Hanna turned
her full attention on Nick. “Missing something, huh? You mean the Marine Corps
doesn’t fulfill your every need?” She was mocking him, being sarcastic. She’d
always been half jealous of his love for the Corps.

“No, it doesn’t fulfill every need,
though I know it tries to make you believe it does.”

“Oh my! You mean that you’re not
completely brainwashed after twenty years?”

At that, she marched out of
Christine’s room, dressed in her bath robe, holding Katie over her shoulder.
Nick followed. The baby was too young to understand his confused expression,
but her vision was fixed on him nevertheless. He thought Katie might be
commiserating with him, the way she was smiling at him. He had no idea, though,
what had set Hanna off.

He followed her into the kitchen.
Colleen, his mom, and Christine were seated around the kitchen table, drinking
coffee, apparently waiting for him. He heard Christopher in the den watching
television.

Hanna plopped down in a chair and
bounced the baby on her knee. “We just gave Uncle Nick a lesson in diapering,”
she told the three women at the table. “Katie was very cooperative. She didn’t
even pee on him when he couldn’t figure out how to keep her diaper on.” Hanna
rolled her eyes and tossed him an impertinent smile. “He was looking for pins.”
She did try not to laugh— for about five seconds before it simply burst forth
from her.

Nick failed to see the humor. “Real
funny! At least I tried.”

“So, now he thinks he’s qualified for
fatherhood!”

Colleen, Jessie, and Christine all
stared at the two of them quizzically. Despite her laughter, Hanna seemed
irritated, and Nick looked clearly annoyed with her.

“Nicholas,” Colleen interjected. “What
did you want us all here for? I gather you have something to tell us.”

“Yeah, I do, actually.” He shot Hanna
one last disgruntled glance, then went over to the small recorder on the
kitchen counter. “My phone taps picked this up over the weekend, while we were
in Seattle. I’m just going to replay it for you and let you listen. It’s a
phone conversation between Yancy Masters and a man named Li Chen.”

For his mother’s benefit, he explained
who Li Chen was. Jessie paled, clearly distressed by the information that Nick
had killed the man’s brother in a drug raid in Indonesia.

He pushed the play button on the
recorder, then sat down next to Hanna and Katie, who was now in her baby
carrier, being rocked to sleep. The recording began with Yancy greeting Li
Chen.

The drug lord wasn’t too happy to hear
from the bar owner.
“I don’t like phone conversations, Mr. Masters,”
Chen told him.
“They can be taped and traced. You have other ways of
reaching me.”

“This time it can’t be helped,”
Yancy snapped.
“I have a big
problem with your last shipment. It was two containers short of what I paid
for.”

“It was as you ordered, no more, no
less.”
It was a
crisp, unemotional reply.

Yancy’s angry voice played next.
“It
was not as I ordered or, may I remind you, paid for!”

“Are you calling me a liar, Mr.
Masters?”

“Are you calling me one, Mr. Chen?”

“Since neither of us seems to be
liars, I suggest it may have been someone else who was responsible for the loss
of the two of the containers sent to you,”
Li Chen suggested quite rationally and coolly.

Hanna looked over at Nick. They were
the only two people who apparently knew he had the containers the two drug
merchants were talking about.

“It wasn’t one of my men. I sent my
best and most trusted to pick up the shipment,”
Yancy informed him.

“The same here,”
Li Chen countered sharply.
“I am
told, though, that two of your men were the fools who tried to make a pick-up
while it was still daylight and got caught by that provincial policeman. It is
a good thing our friends there were able to develop other reasons for the
unfortunate man’s death.”

Christine gasped as she understood whom
that provincial policeman was that they were discussing. Colleen reached over
and caught her hand.

“As long as we’re talking about
stupidity,”
Yancy
ventured irritably,
“I’d like to know why it was necessary to seize and
detain Colonel Kelly’s brother.”

A collective feminine gasp circled the
table. Hanna immediately looked to Jessie and saw her eyes fill with tears.
Hopefully, she had found some solace. These two men had just confirmed that
Lance was indeed alive. It was news they had all hoped and prayed for. Now they
had to find out where he was being held.

“Certainly, Mr. Masters, you are not
calling me stupid or questioning my actions, are you?”
Li Chen’s voice was quietly chilling.

“Not if you weren’t the one who nabbed
Lance Kelly,”
came
the instant reply.

“My men did so on my orders, so yes, I
was responsible for his nabbing, as you call it.”

“Why didn’t you just leave him alone?
He had no evidence of anything, did he?”
Yancy paused to wait for a response. When there was
none, he continued.
“His brother is a Colonel in the United States Marine
Corps, and he’s home, investigating Lance’s disappearance, as well as the death
of his friend, Officer Dylan Wallace. This guy is Special Forces. You don’t
want him breathing down your neck, and we sure as hell don’t need him fucking
up our operations.
”

There was a protracted silence before
Li Chen spoke again.
“This conversation is over, Mr. Masters. Contacting me
in this manner is utter foolishness. We will continue this matter at our usual
location, tomorrow afternoon. Three o’clock.”

That was the end of the conversation.
For a few moments, the kitchen was absolutely silent.

“Nick!” Jessie finally exclaimed.
“Lance is alive!” She stared across the table at him, her eyes still shimmering
with tears. “But where? And for how long? It’s been a month already. Why would
this Li Chen hold him that long?”

“I’ve been giving that some thought,”
he contemplated aloud. “I think Li Chen is waiting for me to come for Lance.
The Triad is big on revenge. He won’t do anything to Lance until I show up.”

“Oh my God!” Jessie lost what little
color she still possessed.

“I’m sorry, Mom.” Nick reached for her
hand across the table. “But you have a right to know what I think Lance’s
disappearance is all about.”

“Are you sure?”

“Pretty sure. It’s the only thing that
makes sense.”

Jessie got up slowly from the table
and headed toward the back door. “I need to go home.”

Nick intercepted her and put an arm
around her shoulders. “I will bring Lance home, Mom.”

She looked up at him worriedly. “But
will you be all right, too?”

“I’ll certainly do my best.”

“Oh, Nick! What a nightmare!” Leaning against
him, Jessie left with her oldest son, and the two headed across the yard to her
house.

When Nick returned an hour later to
talk to Hanna, Colleen told him she had gone jogging along the beach. After
seeing how upset his mother was and comforting her, he decided he could use a
good run, too. Conveniently dressed in the appropriate clothes, he headed for
the beach.

The sun was out in its full summer
brilliance, and there was a cool breeze blowing from the northwest, across the
strait. He could smell the sea salt on the wind. No matter where he was in the
world, the scent of the sea always reminded him of home.

At the McHenry dock, he looked around for
Hanna. Finally, he decided to run north, toward McHenry Point. Ten minutes into
his run, he spotted her, sitting cross-legged on a big smooth rock by the
water.

When he jogged up to her, he noticed
she looked like she had run hard and fast. “Mind if I join you on your rock? I
brought a bottle of water.”

She took a long drink, then handed the
bottle back and scooted over to make room for him, drawing her knees up and
wrapping her arms around them.

Nick drank more slowly. Neither of
them spoke as they looked out across the water. He could tell Hanna was
troubled by the news of his brother. It was such a mixture of good and bad. He
sat beside her and decided to wait until she had something to say.

It took her about five minutes. “Did
you have any idea this Li Chen was holding your brother?”

“Once I heard he was in the region, it
crossed my mind that he might have had something to do with Lance’s
disappearance.”

She turned to him. “If this Li Chen
wants revenge because you killed his brother, why hasn’t he killed Lance? Why
is he simply holding him?”

“I imagine he’s waiting for me.”

“He wants you?”

“He’ll want both of us.”

“Oh, God!” Hanna dropped her head onto
her kneecaps. Nick slid an arm around her, and she turned her head sideways to
peer over at him. “Neither Li Chen nor Yancy Masters seem to know you have
those two containers of heroin. Since you didn’t tell Kurt or those DEA agents,
either, what are you going to do with them?”

“Hang on to them for a while,” he
replied. “Rattle their cages a little. Turn one against the other possibly.
Maybe use them in a trade for Lance.”

“This is going to be dangerous, isn’t
it?”

“Dealing with drug cartels like the
Triad or the Columbians is always dangerous, but I’ve dealt with them before.”

She studied his calm determined
expression. “Are you going to get help from the FBI and the DEA?”

“Quietly and unofficially, yes. It’s
too risky for Lance if I call in a lot of visible assistance. I’m going to find
out where he’s being held, then use Kurt and his connections when it’s time to
take Chen and his operation down. First, I’ll get Lance out, though.”

Hanna didn’t like the solitary sound
of his plans. “I’m still going to help you.”

“Not for this stage of the mission.” His
response was swift and firm. “The Triad is much too dangerous for a civilian. I
can’t be distracted by you, either.”

That hurt. It also made her angry.
“Distracted? Is that what I’ve been to you? A distraction? A diversion?”

He swiveled his long body around on
the rock to face her. “No, not the way I know you mean it,” he countered. “It’s
just that once I get close to the target, I can’t worry about your safety.”