Lock it down
Three days later…
Something is definitely fucking wrong. I don’t know what it is. I can’t put my finger on it. But something is just…off.
I’m working backup for a protection detail this week in California. Some celebrity needs security. Sean is all over it. I guess he’s been a fan since he was a kid. It’s funny as hell to watch him fangirl all over this poor pop star all grown up. Sean doesn’t care one bit. He has no shame, no cool, no nothing, he’s practically vibrating with excitement every time he sees her. Since we haven’t been with the company long, we’re just backup, filler, until we find the areas we’d like to work in.
She’s at lunch with a “friend,” and I use the term loosely, because this other woman has used every opportunity granted to her to sling mud at our client. I grit my teeth each time she brings up career missteps or weight gain. Are all women really this mean? Fuck, I hope not. Although I have a feeling that they are. It’s like watching the Mean Girls movie in real time but with grownups and not bitchy high schoolers. I have never been more thankful that MacKenzie is like no woman I’ve ever met before.
But thinking about her now reminds me that she didn’t call the other day like she said she would. That’s not like her. I can tell our relationship and how fast it happened, how serious it became, scares her. She doesn’t hide her feelings from me, and her need for some space isn’t unusual, but I figured being half a world away was enough of a distance. At least it is to me. But when she says she’s going to try to call, she does. She finds some way to connect with me one way or another, even if it’s just a quick email, it’s still something. But this is just nothing, it’s like she’s disappeared completely.
I also know that time can become a blur when the op tempo is high. More than once, hell even more times than I can count on both hands and feet, I’ve lost track of time and space while on an op, so it’s not unheard of that she could just be busy. But still, I have a feeling in my gut telling me that something is really fucking wrong.
I can’t help but feel like I’m headed for a crash. It’s almost poetic that the first time I fall for a woman, when I finally find one I want to get to know, to give my time and attention to, she breaks my fucking heart. I guess it’s like they always say—life’s a bitch and then you die.
Sean’s phone rings silently, because he pulls it out of the pocket of his jeans, slides his finger across the screen to unlock it, and answers.
“Erikson.” Whoever called him says something that has his face pulling into a frown. For as long as I can remember, Sean has been a happy-go-lucky guy. Even on deployment, he’d find reason to smile. So whatever it is that has him looking like this is not a good thing. And then he blinks and his face just goes blank. I’ve never seen him clear his expression like that. “Call in the B team. We should be there in thirty.”
“What was that all about?” I ask when he slides his phone back in his pocket.
“We’re needed back at the office,” is all he says. “B team is taking their shift early today.”
That’s it. That’s all I get. No details other than the two guys who relieve us on this detail are coming in early—as in really fucking early—so we can get back to the offices PDQ. I wonder if we’re being moved to a new job. It’s not the norm for us to transition from one job to another before the first is complete. If the new job is high priority, it’s not outside the realm of possibility that management would reassign and prioritize. But still… I have no idea what’s going on and I don’t like it.
Our relief shows up at the restaurant and seamlessly takes our place. Sean nods to me to follow him out of the building. He drove today, so I climb in the front passenger seat when he beeps the locks with his key.
“So what’s going on?” I ask him when he climbs in and starts the engine.
“We’re needed back at the office,” he explains with the same line he’s already given me, and it has the hair on the back of my neck standing on end. What I do know is he drives with a purpose. There is no slow going to get back to work. Something is waiting for us. Something bad. I just won’t know how bad it is until I walk through the doors.
He pulls into the parking lot and shuts the engine off. I unbuckle and climb out of the car. Sean does the same, and as we begin our walk into the building, he stops and looks at me. “You know I’ve got your back, right?”
“Yeah,” I answer immediately, because it’s true. I’ve known him since we were kids, and I’ve trusted him with my life more times than I can count. “What’s all this about?”
“I just need you to know that I’ve always got your back,” he replies cryptically. There’s a burning in the pit of my stomach. My spidey senses are on high alert and I kind of feel like I might throw up.
“Okay.”
If we did more secretive shit than we do, I’d be wondering if I was about to get iced, but I know that can’t be right. Sean would find a way to tell me if someone was about to put a bullet in my brain.
When we walk in the front door, the receptionist takes one look at me, and I swear something flashes deep in her eyes. I don’t know her well, and I haven’t been with the company very long, but I swear it’s there before she hides it. And then, just like Sean did at the restaurant, she puts it away and carefully blanks her face. There’s something they don’t want me to know.
“They’re waiting for you in the boss’s office,” she says. “Go on in.”
I nod and make my way through the office. I knew something wasn’t right. I knew it deep down in my gut; I just didn’t know what. That is until I walk into Jackson Cole’s office and see him sitting at his desk with a pained expression on his face. I look around the room and see a lot of guys I’ve come to know over the last couple of months working for Cole Security, like Mark Dixon and Quinn Miller. Or guys I’ve served with, like Dreamboat and Surfer.
But I turn around and see a man I’ve never met before but know instantly who he is, how powerful he is, and why he’s here. Because looking at me with an expression mixed of wanting to tear the room apart piece by fucking piece and cry like a baby is none other than Ryan Black, the president’s right hand man and my woman’s older brother.
It’s then I know that she’s dead. Mack’s been taken from me and I’m half a world away and helpless to stop it. I should have told her I loved her so that she knew. Fuck how scared she was, I should have told her. I shouldn’t have been pissed and moody that she threw up her walls to protect herself the night before she left. I should have taken her to dinner, I should have made love to her on the beach or the balcony off of her bedroom. There’re a lot of should haves and they’re all going to fuck with me until the day that I die.
“Lock it down,” Cole says from behind me, but I can’t hear him clearly. All of the blood in my body is rushing through my ears. My head is swimming, and the room is spinning. I like to think I’m a tough guy, a badass who can stand tall in any situation, but right now, my knees are shaking in a way that I know my legs are about to give out. “Goddammit! I said lock it down.”
Hands grab me, and I try to shake them off. I throw a punch or two, and an eerie scream comes up from my belly as I fight and claw and yell. I have to. I couldn’t stop it if I wanted to, so I don’t even try. I mean, what does it matter anymore if the only woman I have ever loved is dead, and she died not knowing how I felt about her? But now she’s gone, and I’m the one who has to find a way to survive it. That is if I even want to.
“Fucking hell,” someone bites out. “Will someone fucking grab him already.”
Strong arms like fucking Amazonian pythons grab me from behind, and I know that Sean has me. He said he’d have my back, and now he’s holding me down when I want to rage against the world and everyone in it. Anyone who lived when she didn’t is fair game in my mind, but he doesn’t seem to agree. I guess it was all bullshit. How dare he restrain me when I need to rage. I need to rip the world apart, light it on fire and watch it burn.
