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“Point taken. I’ll take the blue one that looks like a present. The white front door cookie and the dog cookie.”
She pulled on a glove, opened a white paper bakery bag and gently set his cookies inside. “How about coffee?”
“Yes ma’am. I’m going to need it. Today’s my first day out at the base.”
“Are you working in shifts out there?”
“Yes. We drew cards for the shifts and I’m lucky. Aidyn too. He’s already on his way out there. But I wanted to come in and see that things were going alright for you and, as I said, I love cookies.”
She giggled and poured him a cup of coffee. “Cream and sugar are down there.” She pointed to the counter. At the end of the glass case were a variety of creamers and sugars.
He added a bit of creamer to his coffee and snapped the lid on top. Reaching back for his wallet, he pulled out a twenty and handed it over to her.
Shaking her head, she refused his money. “Nope. You said I’d pay you for the security system with cookies, and that’s what I’m doing.”
“I said, if you liked it, we’d talk about price in a few months.”
She smiled at him and enjoyed the smile he returned. “I’ll keep track of the cookies you eat, and we’ll go from there.”
His grin grew larger. “Fair enough.” He walked to the end of the counter again and pulled a wooden stir stick from the holder. “Have a great day, Lara. I hope your first day open after the break-in is the best one yet.”
“Thank you, Tate. I hope your first day at the base is your best one yet.” He halted and his head cocked. “No wait. I didn’t mean that. I mean, I hope your first day at the base is fantastic.” She inhaled deeply and felt her cheeks heat.
“Thanks, Lara. See you later.”
He sauntered out of the bakery, and she watched him. Every step. The man had a nice behind. He had a nice front, too. He... boy, she was inept at summoning coherent thoughts at the moment. Lack of sleep was a real thing. She meant he was handsome. Probably she shouldn’t talk much today, just smile and nod a lot.
Tate’s headlights bounced off her walls as he pulled from the parking lot, and she watched as his truck drove away.
She strode to the end of the counter to straighten the creamers and saw the twenty-dollar bill laying under the creamer container. She instinctively looked out the window and shook her head. How to handle this?
Chapter9
This job was far from the usual, and he suspected that during the day, there’d be very little to do. Which he wasn’t looking forward to.
The sun was just peeking over the horizon, shrouding the hills in a gorgeous orange-yellow light. “What do you think we should do while we’re here during the day, Tate?” Aidyn asked.
He grinned. “I was just thinking about that. While Spencer’s here, he can work with the communications team and learn what they’re up to. Not that he doesn’t already have a ton of knowledge, but this is an enormous job. So, different skill set.” He glanced around. “So we don’t go insane from boredom, we could work with the construction company and help with the building. We’d still be here if the BRR come down.”
“I wouldn’t mind some physical work.”
“First thing we should do is familiarize ourselves with the plans. Let’s hike the entire perimeter today. Then we could target practice, or we could run through some recon exercises, too.”
Aidyn shrugged. “I’m on board with all of that.”
“Great. Let’s check in with Baxter first, then we’ll look at what we need to do for today.”
They walked up the metal steps to the door of the construction office. Lights glowed from the windows and the aroma of coffee wafted outside. He knocked, then heard Baxter’s gruff voice call out, “Come in.”
Tate twisted the knob on the door and entered the trailer. Baxter stood at the window next to his desk and stared out into the darkness, his phone pressed to his ear.
“Yeah, they just walked in. I’ll send them over.”
Baxter tapped his phone and tossed it on his desk.
“So, those BRR bastards came down last night and cut up our wires. All that we’d just repaired, they cut it all up. I’ve got my guys taking pictures and waiting for the sheriff to arrive. I’m on my way to see the damage for myself. You may as well come with me. I want you to see if you can find tracks and what they used to snip the wires. They’re large in diameter, no regular tool would cut them, unless they took their time to cut through the casing first and then the individual wires inside.”
Tate nodded and glanced at Aidyn. They both followed Baxter from the trailer. Baxter stomped to a dirty white pickup truck a few yards from Tate’s truck. “You may as well bring your own truck. I’ll need to come back here to handle the other issues from last night.”
