AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Zeb, have you brought this up to Bravo-One?” Sam asks.
“No, sir. I didn’t want to presume we’d take this on until I discussed it with CJ.”
“Well,” Sam says. “You’ve got the green light from me. Anyone dissent?”
A chorus of “Noes”rings out.
“Zeb, Brady’s on the line,” Mitzy speaks. “Bravo-One, we’ve got something for the team. Zeb, you want to fill him in?”
“Absolutely.” I brief Brady on what happened to Kaye and my intention to put Scott down.
“Sounds like a plan,” Brady says. “But what are you going to do about Carmen and Rosalie? They threw a fit when Rafe and Hayes wanted them to stay at HQ. Now you’re going to convince them to move back? Props if you make that happen. They’re fiercely independent.” There’s a low chuckle from Brady.
“That’s the goal.”
Brady makes it sound like a challenge, but I’ve seen how the girls interact. They’ll do whatever it takes to help Kaye.
As for fiercely independent, that’s not a stretch. Carmen intercepted the rescue of Isabelle LaCroix by jumping on the end of a rope dangling from our helicopter. She led the charge for returning to her father’s residence to rescue not only Rosalie, but scores of women who were held captive there.
During that mission, we rescued the captive women, but lost Rosalie and Hayes during exfil. The two of them escaped through the jungle, and to hear Hayes recount what happened, Rosalie basically saved herself and dragged him along for the ride.
“They’ll do it for Kaye. That won’t be a problem.” I’m ninety percent sure it won’t. If anyone can convince Carmen and Rosalie, it’ll be Kaye.
Not me.
“That’s all I need to know.” Brady doesn’t waste time with superfluous questions. “Are you at the house?”
“Yes.”
“Good. You work on the women. We’ll brief the team once you have the green light from them.”
“I have quarters,” Mitzy says. “We have four empty TLQs in the dorm. Sending the requisition in now. As for Professor Douchebag, this isn’t the first time he’s done something. There are complaints filed against him.”
“He has other complaints? How is he still on the faculty?” My words come out an animalistic growl. I’m beyond pissed. Way beyond.
Murderous comes to mind.
“Tenured, for one, and for the other?” I can practically see Mitzy shrug. “All the complaints were dismissed. Sounds fishy to me. I’m going to sign off this call and do some digging. I’ll have something to report back by tonight.”
“Anything else we need?” Sam gives everyone a chance to speak before ending the call.
As soon as I’m off with all the bigwigs, Brady calls me on a separate line.
“How bad is it?” he asks.
“Asphyxiation play. Tied her down. Could’ve killed her. He sent that box with the dog shit in it the day Rosalie and Carmen moved back in. The next day, he cornered her at the library. This has been going on for weeks. Now, he’s openly threatened all of them if Kaye doesn’t submit.”
My guts twist and churn thinking about how long this has been going on. Kaye’s red-rimmed, unblinking stare, completely vacant of emotion, tells me how much damage she’s sustained.
When I held her, she looked miserable with the abrasions and bruising, but it was the way she curled against me that broke my heart.
I should’ve known. I should’ve been out there protecting her. Instead, I’ve been moping around the townhouse during my weekly watch because I thought I’d been relegated to the friend zone.
News Flash.
We’re done with that.
“Fucking-A.” Brady curses on the other end of the phone. “I have a bad feeling about this.”
