Waiting... On You (Force Recon Marines) (7 page)

Nick still had one arm wrapped around
her shoulders. His hand curled over her upper arm and squeezed gently. “Rest
assured I won’t ever believe that of Dylan either. I may not have been home a
lot in the last twenty years, but Dylan and I wrote to each other regularly.
There was never anything to indicate he had a drinking problem.”

She turned to him, her face full of
anxiety. “I feel so guilty because I asked Lance to help me find out what
happened to my brother.”

“He would have investigated Dylan’s
death, regardless, Hanna,” Nick reassured her. “He was Dylan’s best friend.”

Hanna knew that, but it didn’t ease
the guilt she felt. “I still shouldn’t have let him dive alone that day. But he
couldn’t have drowned. His body would have been found by now. And what happened
to his dinghy? It disappeared as mysteriously as he did. None of it makes any
sense! What can we do? Where do we start?”

Nick caught her hand and stroked it,
trying to ease her distress. He gave his mother an assessing look. She looked
as distraught as Hanna. Both women definitely needed his help. He could see
they felt they had hit a dead end, with nowhere to go next.

“I’ll start by going over all the same
ground you’ve already gone over, with all the same people,” he informed them.
“I have a friend in the FBI office in Seattle who might be of some assistance.
I’ll also see how much pressure I can put on Phillip Douglas and the sheriff to
reopen this investigation. I’m anxious to hear, first-hand, what they have to
say about Lance’s disappearance and Dylan’s death.”

Jessie rolled her eyes. “It will be
the same old baloney they’ve been giving us.”

“I’m sure it will be, but they’re not
going to get away with standing on that. They aren’t going to ignore me the way
they’ve been ignoring all of you.”

“They’re probably blowing us off
because we’re women.”

Nick nodded in obvious disgust, then
gave both his mother and Hanna a reassuring smile. “I will find out what
happened to Lance and to Dylan. I’ve got lots of training in this kind of
thing, lots of tools at my disposal, and some good contacts that can help me
get the information we need.”

Nick’s confident assurances relieved
some of the frustration and guilt Hanna had been carrying around for too long.
“Well, please don’t go diving without me. I don’t want to lose you, too.”

Nick smiled indulgently at her. “I’ll
take you with me.” Again, he missed the interest in his mother’s eyes as she
watched his tender exchange with Hanna. “Now tell me what happened to you on
the way home from work last week.”

“I was driving home about midnight.
We’d had an entailed emergency that night, so I had to work late. I was on McHenry
Point Road when a car came up fast behind me. He didn’t have his headlights on,
or I would have seen him sooner. As he came up alongside me, he swerved toward
me and forced me onto the shoulder of the road. My car hit the guard rail. He
sped off. I didn’t get a license number, although it looked like a Washington
plate.”

Nick pictured the scene, and it scared
the hell out of him. She could have easily ended up in the bay below the cliff
road.

“You keep saying he. Was it a man
driving?”

“I think so. He had short hair. But it
was so dark….”

“What did the car look like?”

“It was a sedan, an older model. I
don’t know the make. It was a dark color, maybe blue or black.” Hanna shook her
head. “I wish I could tell you more, but it happened so fast.”

“You weren’t hurt, were you?” Again
Jessie saw the unmistakable concern on her son’s face.

Hanna shook her head no. “It just
shook me up a bit.”

“Was that the only incident?”

Colleen came back into the room and
sat down in a rocking chair near Jessie. Hanna asked her if Christine was okay,
and she told them that she was lying down. “The next night I was near the same
spot on the same road, and I had a flat tire. I’d just had the tires replaced,
so I was a little surprised. A man on a big bike like yours, a Harley, stopped
to offer me help. He looked like he belonged to a biker gang. He was scruffy… scary.
He had long hair and was dressed in a black leather jacket and chains. He might
have been in his thirties. His face was rough, pock-mocked. He didn’t threaten
me. But he made me uneasy. He came up really quietly behind me while I was
getting my tire iron and tools out of my trunk. He startled me, but I was ready
to clobber him with the tire iron if I needed to.”

Nick frowned, clearly troubled.

“Luckily, a male nurse from the hospital
happened along at that point and stopped, recognizing my car. The biker left then.”

“And the latest incident?” he prompted
her.

Hanna shot Jessie and Colleen a
censuring glance. They obviously had told Nick about her latest fears. Since
they were just that, she hadn’t intended to tell Nick about them. He had enough
to worry about. “It wasn’t really an incident.”

“You thought someone was following
you,” he reminded her. “Under the circumstances, that’s important. And I
understand your car isn’t running too well.”

“Grandma! Jessie!” Hanna sent both
women a look of rebuke.

“We’re just worried about you, honey,”
Jessie told her.

“I think we’ve lost enough of the
family the last few weeks,” her grandmother gently scolded. “We certainly don’t
want anything to happen to you, too.”

Hanna felt immediately contrite. “I
know. I’m sorry. Yes,” she said, looking at Nick. “I’ve had the feeling that
someone has been watching me, following me. But I’m not sure. Only suspicious.”

“Nick’s home now. He’ll take care of this,”
Colleen inserted, giving him a brief smile.

“Suspicious is good,” Nick encouraged
them. “It will be a lot easier to take care of all of you, if you don’t keep
anything from me, no matter how trivial it seems,” he added just as Christine
came back into the room and sat down. “Until we know what’s going on and who’s
targeting our families, you need to be extremely alert. Look around you all the
time. Be suspicious, even of people you know. Paranoia doesn’t hurt under
circumstances like these. It might save your lives. I carry a regular cell
phone on me all the time, plus my SAT phone. I have an extra one that I’ll
leave with Mom. You can reach me anywhere with it, no matter where you are.
I’ll send all of you my numbers. Call me if you need me, no matter how silly
you think it might be. No one is going to chastise you for it, especially not
me. Christine, don’t go to your house alone. Always wait for me to go with you.
And Hanna, no more using your car. It’s not reliable enough. If you break down
on the way home after work, on a dark stretch of the highway, you could be in
big trouble. You’ve been lucky so far. In fact, I’ll take you to work and bring
you home this week.”

“Can’t you just fix my car?”

“I’ll take a look at it, but it’s not
a priority right now.”

“If I go to work on the back of your
bike, I’ll be a mess by the time I get there.”

Nick smiled. “I won’t take you to work
on the Harley. I’ll use Mom’s car.”

“Lance’s new Jeep is at the house,”
Jessie suggested. “And his truck is at the boat yard. We probably need to do
something about the business, too. Paul is keeping things operational, but you
might want to see if he needs anything.”

Nick nodded. “I’d planned to check in
with him this week. But the business is not as important as finding Lance and
keeping you safe.” He meant everyone, but he was looking at Hanna. “You’re not
going to give me any trouble about taking you to and from work, are you?”

“No,” she answered him, then made a
face at him. “You know you sound like you did when we were kids, always in
charge. No wonder they made you a Colonel.”

CHAPTER 5

IT WAS A TRADITION ON SUNDAY, after
church, to take Christopher to the park to play football or baseball, sometimes
basketball, actually any game that entailed using a ball. Whoever didn’t have
to work went. Lance had always taken his son. Hanna went most Sundays. Dylan
and Christine often joined them. Afterward, they usually had a picnic.

This Sunday, after everyone had gone
home and changed out of their dress clothes, they decided to go Fort Worden
State Park. The fort itself was a nineteenth century military installation with
a parade ground, officers’ quarters, plantation style barracks, and 434 acres
of beautiful green manicured grounds and huge leafy trees. The big guns that
had once guarded Admiralty Strait had been quiet since World War II. The
meticulously preserved site now housed campgrounds, a picnic area, museums,
conference facilities, and a non-profit center for arts and education. There
was even a hostel on the grounds, and an underwater park off-shore.

Since Lance’s disappearance, Hanna and
Christine had taken Christopher out as much as possible. With his Uncle Nick
home, there was no doubt who the boy would rather play football with. Sometimes
Jessie and Colleen went, but this Sunday they opted to skip the outing and stay
home. Christine brought the baby, and since there were four of them, one
needing an infant car seat, Nick took his mother’s four door sedan, rather than
Lance’s Jeep.

At the park, they chose a big grassy
clearing, laid down a blanket, and anchored it against the light ocean breeze
with an ice chest and a picnic basket. They were all wearing shorts, and
Christine had her baby girl strapped to her chest in a sling type harness. She
wasn’t about to leave her precious cargo in her baby carrier on the blanket,
while she played touch football. Leaving a baby unattended, even a few feet
away these days, was way too risky.

Nick produced the football, and to
warm up, they threw it to one another for a while. Then the game was on; Nick
and Christopher against Hanna and Christine. The baby went along for the bouncy
ride.

A coin was tossed and Christine got
the ball first.

“Aw, no fair!” ten-year old
Christopher complained.

“The ladies won the toss,” his uncle
reminded him. “Be a good sport.”

Hanna ran down field for a pass, and
Christine threw the football to her. She caught it and laughingly dodged the
tackle Nick tried to make on her. Christopher chased her, caught up to her, and
tagged her a quarter of the way to their imaginary goal line.

When they all lined up in position
again, facing one another, Hanna pushed her sunglasses up and shook her finger
at Nick. “This is touch football, Colonel. No tackling. Your nephew knows the
rules, and so should you.”

He threw up his hands. “What fun is it,
playing football with girls, if you can’t tackle?”

Hanna rolled her eyes. He sounded just
like he had as a teenager. “Play by the rules, Kelly. Be a good sport,” she
echoed, making Christopher giggle.

And he did, for most of the game.
Hanna and Christine made the first touchdown, then Christopher and Nick made
the second. Hanna was fast. Neither of the boys had an easy time trying to tag
her, while she caught them and tagged them frequently. Nick and Christopher
thought they were going to beat the girls easily, but an hour later, they were
down by one touchdown. Everyone was getting tired and hungry, so they agreed to
play only another fifteen minutes. Christine and Hanna were on defense. Nick
threw the ball to Christopher, who caught it and started to run down the field.
Christine couldn’t catch him with the baby. Hanna was close behind her
sister-in-law, and charged after her nephew.

Angling in from her blind side, Nick
dove for her just as she was about to tag Christopher. He caught her around the
waist and tackled her to the ground. He broke her fall, but she landed with a whoof
beneath him. Momentarily winded, she stared up into his laughing gray eyes.

“No fair!” she protested. “There’s no
tackling!”

“I had to— just once,” he argued, his
eyes twinkling with mischief.

Before Hanna could scramble out from
under him, he lifted his hand to caress her cheek. Her eyes widened as his
mouth began a slow descent to hers. “You look so cute with that new haircut, I
couldn’t resist doing this.”

This was a kiss— a totally unexpected,
breathtakingly wonderful kiss. At first, it was just the gentle sampling
pressure of his lips against hers, tasting and savoring. But as her lips
softened and warmed beneath his, the pressure increased.

As the kiss deepened, his mouth
slanted more vigorously across hers. Pleasure sliced through her, swift and
hot. His tongue probed the seam of her now wet lips. They parted, opened to let
him in. He plunged inside, his tongue tangling fiercely with hers―
demanding, hungry, wanting more. The heat between them ignited into a blaze.
Nick plowed his fingers through her sweat-dampened hair and groaned.

His body was so big and hard in all
the places it pressed against hers. Hanna lost all sense of time and place. His
masculine arousal was clearly evident where his hips pushed against hers. The
pleasure became so acute, a breathy little moan escaped her throat. Then
Christopher jumped on Nick’s back, and broke the magical spell.

“Uncle Nick, I made it! A touchdown!
100 points. Stop kissing Antie Hanna, Uncle Nick.”

Nick did a push-up off of her, and then
offered her a hand up with a rueful smile. “Great job, champ!” he congratulated
his nephew as he ruffled his hair. “I think you’re just about ready for the
NFL.”

Hanna pretended to dust some grass off
her bottom, unable to look up at Nick or over at Christine, who she just knew
was watching very intently and very curiously.

“Antie Hanna, why kissing Uncle Nick?”
Christopher’s curiosity was bluntly honest, and Hanna was too flustered to
answer.

Nick’s response flustered her even
more. “I think your Antie Hanna likes the way I taste, sport.” He laughed, then
winked at her.

“Yuck! No kissing!” Christopher
expressed his opinion of that clearly, producing a deep rich laugh from Nick.

He clapped his nephew once on the
shoulder. “You’ll like it when you get older, champ. Now let’s go eat. Who’s
hungry?”

“Me, me!” cried the ten-year old as
his uncle hoisted him onto his broad shoulders and carried him over to the
picnic blanket.

“Wow, Hanna! What was that all about?”
Christine whispered to her sister-in-law, hanging back so she wouldn’t be heard
by Nick.

“I’m not sure.”

“We need a little conversation later,
lady. That was one smokin’ hot kiss!”

Hanna blushed so hotly she felt like
she was on fire. It had been
one smokin’ hot kiss
, and she didn’t know
what exactly to make of it. She was still just trying to catch her breath.

After lunch, they all rested and
played with Christopher and the baby on the blanket. Hanna watched Nick tickle
and coo at the baby after he wrestled with his nephew. It amazed her that he
was so fascinated by the tiny girl. He fit the description of a tough,
battle-hardened Marine. Yet he clearly enjoyed holding and cuddling the baby.
The two of them were such a contrast— one so weathered, tanned, and large. Once
so soft, pink, and tiny.

She wondered if he missed having a
family, a child of his own, a wife. He’d never married. As far as she knew,
he’d never had any long term relationships. And while she was glad, she’d often
wondered why.

She saw Christine studying him while
he played with her baby girl. “I notice you’re wearing the Navy SEALs trident
insignia on your shorts,” she mentioned. He had on the navy blue shorts Hanna
had seen SEAL instructors wear on a Discovery channel program she’d watched
once. His shirt was the drab olive green printed with the USMC lettering and
the Marine Corps insignia.

“When I’m stationed at Coronado, I do
a lot of combat diving and amphibious instruction for the Navy SEALs.”

“So what exactly is a Force Recon
Marine? Are you special forces?” Christine asked as he tickled Katie’s tummy.

“We’re similar to the Navy
SEALs, Army Rangers, Airborne, and such, but we complement, rather than replace
other special operational forces. Primarily we’re deep reconnaissance, but we
engage in direct action missions, too, working independently out in the field.
Traditionally, we provided a theater commander with a range of options that
focus on intelligence for forward operations. I’m part of MARSOC now; Marine
Special Operations Command. As a major, I ran several deep recon platoons.
Sometimes I work with other agencies.”

Hanna knew the latter
meant he and his teams did work occasionally for covert intelligence agencies and
the DEA.

“What does it take to be a
Force Recon Marine?” Christine asked.

“Time in the field.
Recommendations from XO’s, and a pipeline of schools. Traditionally, a Marine
goes through a lot of additional advanced training like combat diver, jump
master, SERE, which is survival, evasion, resistance and escape training, and other
special warfare schools; sometimes a language school.
I’ve been through all of them, plus the
Navy’s BUD/S program— just to see if it was any tougher than the BRC, the basic
recon course the Corps put Force Recon recruits through. It wasn’t,” he
laughed. “Depending on the training or the mission, when I’m home, I’m usually
stationed at Camp Pendleton or the U.S. Naval Amphibious Base on Coronado
Island in San Diego.”

“Nick doesn’t like to brag,” Hanna
added. “But he’s one of the best diving instructors in the country. He tests a
lot of the Navy’s new underwater diving equipment and submersibles. He also
gives training classes in underwater demolition.”

Nick grinned at her. “And where did
you hear all that?”

“From your mother and brother, and
sometimes you even let out a little bit of information about yourself in your
letters.”

Nick smiled at her as he played a
silent game of peek-a-boo with the baby, who was giggling up a storm. After
lifting Katie for a kiss on the cheek, he wrinkled his nose and then handed her
back to her mother. “Think she’s smelling a little fragrant, Mom.”

Christine took the baby to the car to
change, and Nick began a game of Uno with Christopher. They let Hanna play as
well. When Christine returned, she rocked the baby to sleep in her infant
carrier. The brief interruption had not stilled her curiosity.

“Dylan told me your dad was a war
hero.” Christine didn’t know Nick very well. She’d been married to Dylan for
two years, but she had never met Nick until yesterday. She’d heard a lot about
him, though. She knew her husband had written regularly to him, and that Dylan
had always admired him. The admiration and pride of his family and close
friends had always intrigued her. “He was in the Vietnam War, right?”

Nick nodded yes. “He was given the
Congressional Medal of Honor posthumously for saving the lives of two special
operations teams.”

“Tell us ‘bout grandpa,” Christopher
urged. Hanna knew Lance had told his son about Nick Kelly Sr. and his bravery.
She also knew Christopher loved to hear the story as much as Lance and Nick had
loved to hear it as boys.

Nick smiled at her, guessing what she
was thinking. “In 1971 most of the troops were slowly pulling out of Vietnam.
The SEALs and Force Recon units were leaving, too. It was a dangerous retreat
because the North Vietnamese had gained control of much of the country.
Grandpa’s Recon unit was working with a SEAL unit providing information about
enemy troop movement, so American troops could withdraw more securely and
safely. The two teams were being extracted from a hot zone when they got caught
in a fierce firefight, a big gun battle,” he clarified for Christopher. “The
choppers couldn’t land, so everyone had to climb ropes to reach them. In order
to get everyone out, someone had to stay on the ground and keep the enemy from
shooting all the men being extracted. Grandpa was in charge, so he decided it
was his responsibility. Everyone got onboard the helicopters alive, although
some of the soldiers were wounded. One helicopter flew away. The other one, the
one with Grandpa’s Marines in it, waited for him and were shooting at the enemy
from the air. While Grandpa Kelly was climbing up to the helicopter, he got
shot. He hung on, and your Grandpa Sean pulled him inside. Grandpa Kelly was
shot real bad, though. He died before they got him to base.

“I was a little younger than you,
squirt, when they buried my father, your grandpa, in the big military cemetery
in Washington D.C. It is a real honor to be buried there. The government gave
your grandma a special flag and a special medal for bravery that grandpa had
earned by saving all those lives. Your dad and I got some special things, too.
Your grandma was real sad, though. So were your daddy and I. We missed our
father, but we were real proud of what he’d done. He was a true hero.”

Hanna knew how proud Nick had been of
his dad. He’d been eight when his father had died, old enough to remember. The
tales Sean had told his stepsons afterward had made a lasting impression on the
two young brothers, particularly Nick, who thereafter, had wanted to follow in
his father’s footsteps. His father’s heroism, bravery, and self-sacrifice had
guided Nick’s life. The impact of it had directed his decision to become an
officer in the Marine Corps, like his father had been.