ESCANTA: A James Thomas Novel (The James Thomas Series Book 1) (13 page)

“Yes,” James said. He didn’t want to lie to Deacon—it wouldn’t help the situation.

“Well, we might as well talk about the case, seeing as we’re handling it now,” Deacon said.

“After reviewing the intelligence, I’m not sure how much of a case there is.”

Deacon paused. “You said you thought this was going to get complicated…”

“Yeah,” James said. “The mob is unpredictable, so who knows what they have planned, but as long as we protect her properly she should be fine. I thought the circumstances around her husband going missing were weird, but after looking at the additional details Samuel’s found…I think he was doing some dirty business and got in over his head. It happens all the time.”

Deacon’s eyes narrowed. “So why do you have that look on your face?”

“I’ve just got a bad feeling about those notes, the scrolls, but I don’t know why. I can’t find anything to justify my anxiety.”

Deacon sighed, letting the chair float down on all fours. “I don’t want to suggest this, because I want you to forget all about her, but maybe we should go and do some surveillance tonight? Cami checked in, advising she was taking her to a cocktail bar downtown. We’ll go and have a look…It might put your mind at ease?”

James tapped his finger on his chin.

“Look, I’d suggest it’s better if I do it on my own,” Deacon said, “but I know you better than that, and how you like to double-check things, so let’s just go and get it over with.”

James considered it. They had nothing else pressing to do, and it would put his mind at ease.

“Okay, let’s do it,” James said, pushing his chair back.

The men checked in with Samuel and then went down to the parking lot. Deacon drove and although the tension between them was unresolved, it felt less strangling when they worked together.

Deacon had never been under James’ command in either Delta Force or in the agency—Deacon had been a Ranger. But they’d worked together on a joint mission, the last mission either of them went on—the mission that changed everything. When you see the things they had, it bonded you in a way that could not be broken. Blistering tragedy could tie souls together for eternity.

“How are Cami and Mak getting along?” James asked.

“Good, I think. Cami hasn’t said anything, and Mak seems comfortable.” Deacon’s eyes left the road only to check the mirrors.

“Good,” James said. He wanted Cami partnered with Mak because she was their best, besides himself or Deacon.

“You need to be very careful around her,” Deacon said. “And I’m not saying that because of what you so obviously feel for her. But she asks questions, a lot of them, and then you can almost see her turning the information over in her mind. She’s not unlike us in that she’s been trained to question everything—but she does it the right way, the legal way. Behind that pretty, innocent face of hers, that mind is working and if you’re not careful she’ll piece together much more than you want her to.”

“I know,” James said. Sometimes it was the way she looked at him after he answered one of her many questions—she paused, holding his gaze, tethering his mind like she was drawing further data from it. It was dangerous.

They arrived at the bar and Deacon pulled up around the corner.

“What’s the plan?” James said, letting Deacon call the shots tonight.

“Tom?” Deacon said.

“Copy,”
Tom said, his voice coming through their earwigs. Tom was another Thomas Security bodyguard and he was inside the bar as Cami’s backup.

“We’re coming in to do some surveillance. Where is the client situated?” Deacon asked.

“Two o’clock from the entry. High table, and Cami is sitting with them. All clear, you should be able to enter and break up easily, since the bar is full,”
Tom said.

“Copy.”

James leaned forward to tuck his weapon into the back of his jeans. It was no accident that Mak was at this bar—Thomas Security had arrangements with several bars, and this was one of them. It meant that they could bring weapons in, without questions being asked.

James followed behind Deacon as he walked past the queue and up to the bouncer. He gave the code name ‘Vester’, and the bouncer bowed his head slightly, opening the door for them. Inside, they immediately split up. James went to the back of the bar, farther away from Mak, and let Deacon take the post nearest to her. It was another way of trying to stay in the background of this case.

James blended into the crowd, like a lion in long grass. And he was every bit as much a predator.

James couldn’t see Deacon, but he didn’t need to—they were constantly connected via their earwigs. He could see Mak, though, and his breath halted. She was sitting on a stool, talking to the woman he assumed to be the friend she’d arranged to meet. His eyes traveled down her spine—the deep, backless ‘V’ of her dress revealing her soft, taut skin. And she wasn’t wearing a bra.

“I forgot how cool this bar is,”
Deacon said.
“We should come here for drinks.”

Deacon obviously wasn’t having the same thoughts James was, which was a good thing.

“We don’t drink,” James said, turning his head as he spoke, hiding his moving lips from anyone who might be watching.

“Yeah. Perhaps in our next life we’ll come back as raging party animals,”
Deacon joked.

In another life they could be and have so many things, including a woman to love. In an attempt to keep his eyes off of her almost naked back, James kept an eye on his watch, and the bar patrons, but it was looking to be a boring night at La Casa—just the way he liked it.

“Move to nine o’clock.”

Deacon’s command captured his full attention. Fast enough to get into position, but slow enough not to cause attention, James moved to nine o’clock.

“Black shirt, Caucasian, green eyes.”

“I see him,” James said. He stepped to the side, pretending to let someone through, but really he was on autopilot, blending-in mode. He did it so well he barely had to think about it, and that was a good thing because right now his focus was on the man Deacon had identified. The man who was watching Mak. He was good, he did it subtly, but he wasn’t good enough.

“I’m running it.”
Samuel’s voice came through his earwig and James knew Samuel was running the man’s face, picked up by one of the hidden cameras on their shirts, through their facial recognition software.

Minutes passed, and the man continued to casually watch her. And Cami. He was with a group of friends, but James knew he’d brought them along as a façade. He was the only one watching her.

“Ooh…”

“Samuel,” James said, warning him to finish that sentence.

“You’re not going to believe this. His name is Adam Avex, a former SAS.”
SAS was Special Air Services, a Special Forces unit of the British Army.
“But,”
Samuel continued,
“he died. Two years ago.”

“What the fuck?”
Deacon swore.

“I’ve run it twice. I’m not wrong,”
Samuel said. Samuel was rarely wrong, and certainly not about something like this. He didn’t give information like that lightly.

What was a former SAS guy watching her for?

“Cause of death?” James asked.

“Killed in combat.”

The earwig went silent. James imagined Samuel in his office madly running searches, looking for more information. For James and Deacon, they knew what to do: watch, and don’t make a move unless he did. They needed as much time as possible to work out what was going on.

Mak covered her mouth as she yawned wide.
She must be exhausted
, James thought. She’d had a long week in court, not to mention the upheaval they’d created.

He wanted to take her home and tuck her up in bed—after he’d peeled her dress off her.
You’re not the guy for her,
the voice inside his head reminded him
.

James’ hand went to his weapon before he had a chance to think about it. His hands were itching to draw it but he held back. Dead-boy Adam had his hand on Mak’s back and was asking if she had a lighter—James could tell by the action he made with his hands—the rolling of his thumb over an imaginary spark-wheel.

James wanted to walk over there but he had a good idea what Adam was doing, and he wouldn’t play into the trap.

“Hold,” James instructed his team. He was failing to let Deacon call the shots, but he no longer cared.

Cami stood up, picking up her bag that she’d conveniently hung over the back of Mak’s chair, and pretended to search through her bag. She was aware of the entire situation, via her earwig, and in her faux attempt to find him a lighter he’d had to take a step back and she’d effectively blocked Mak’s body.

Good girl
.

Cami put on a good show, throwing a flirty laugh as she came up empty-handed. Adam sat back down, as did Cami, but Adam’s eyes were moving like rovers.

“He’s assessing her security,” James said. He knew the move, because he’d used it a hundred times. Create a scare, not enough to cause a scene, but enough to capture someone’s attention. If Cami hadn’t been right next to her, Tom would’ve moved in and revealed himself.

For another forty-five minutes James watched on silently until Adam and his group stood up and left the bar.

Again James and Deacon didn’t need to discuss the plan: follow him. The men were standing outside when the Thomas brothers exited and walked casually by them to Deacon’s car. James sat in the front passenger seat with his gun in his hand. They were waiting for the cue from Samuel, who would be watching them on CCTV.

“This is bad,” Deacon whispered, as if saying the words too loudly would make it all the more real.

“Go,”
Samuel said and Deacon pulled out and turned left at the corner.

“Silver Lexus…Fuck, he’s in a hurry,”
Samuel said.

“Don’t lose him,” Deacon said, planting his foot down and speeding through the red traffic light—Samuel was going to have a busy night deleting evidence.

The GPS screen activated as Samuel fed Adam’s coordinates to them.

“Uh…he’s flying and this system is too slow. He’s moving through the frames too quickly, we might lose him,”
Samuel said, referring to the city’s CCTV system.

They were going to have to tail him, and he was definitely going to pick them up—he was no average soldier.

“Go, go, go!” James said, and Deacon did what he did best—drove. The car weaved through the cars on the road and James watched the GPS.

“You’re catching him,”
Samuel said. James could see the two green circles inching together on the screen—Adam was soon going to realize he had a tail.

The wheels screeched as Deacon pulled a hard right, heading west. James lifted his eyes now, but only to squint, searching for Adam’s taillights ahead.

Deacon saw them too. “He’s going to pick us up any minute,” he warned.

“I know. Just follow him,” James said.

Deacon kept up the intensity, swinging the ass of the car through the New York City streets—it wasn’t called a concrete jungle for nothing. Turn after turn Deacon kept up with him and as hard as Adam tried, he couldn’t lose his tail—Deacon was too good.

They followed him for six more blocks before Adam pulled a one-eighty.

“Oh, fuck! Hold on!” Deacon said, not lifting his foot off the accelerator.

Adam was driving straight toward them, and neither car was slowing down.

“He’s got his window down!” James said.

Adam swerved at the last minute, firing a round of shots at Deacon’s window.

“That motherfucker shot my car!” Deacon was pissed now, and a furious Deacon was a sight to behold.

Deacon pulled the same move, pulling the car in a full one-eighty, chasing down the man who had just damaged his baby. “Bad move, buddy, bad move.”

They were hot on Adam’s tail now, and Deacon wasn’t backing down. They were bumper to bumper, until Deacon nudged Adam’s car. The car swerved as Adam fought to keep control of it—a fight he would ultimately lose. The car went up on two wheels and then flipped over as it skidded into the traffic light.

Deacon slammed the car brakes until they came to a stop. He reversed up and James put the window down, enough to point his weapon into Adam’s car. He smelled it as soon as he inhaled.

“Back up, back up!” James said and Deacon changed gears and pressed his foot to the floor as Adam’s car ignited into a fiery ball.

“Well, he’s definitely dead now,” James said, looking at the burning end to their night.

“Get out of there, now,”
Samuel instructed and the boys obeyed.

Mak felt like sheets of sandpaper were rubbing her eyes every time she closed them. She’d worked all week, and all day. She would devote her life to this case until it was over, until she won. Failure was a possibility in the land of reality, particularly for the third case, the case of Kate Loren. The evidence was weaker, and that worried Mak, but still she refused to accept defeat. She would win, she would do it for the victims, and their loved ones whose hearts were breaking every day.

Yesterday had been a draining day, and she still hadn’t recovered. She’d presented more forensic evidence, all the while avoiding the eyes of the victims’ families. She could only imagine how hard it must be. It was one thing to know what happened, it was another completely to see it in photographs, and to hear it described in detail. It was brutal, and the hardest part of her job. Possibly the hardest thing she’d ever done.

She’d attempted to distract her mind, or numb it at the very least, with a few drinks. She’d met Kayla at a bar downtown and for a few hours she’d managed to suppress her emotions, but as soon as she tucked herself up in bed, they came flooding back. She felt sadness, and she felt guilt. She felt like she was hurting the families all over again but she had to do it, it was part of the process, part of the process that would hopefully provide justice. It wouldn’t bring the dead back, but it would make someone pay. If she won.

Mak’s phone rang, startling her from her thoughts. She looked at her phone, surprised to see a caller ID associated with a number she had never programmed into her phone.