Framed (7 page)

“
We
could go. There’s no way I’m letting you snoop around in a murder investigation by yourself. Have you forgotten there were three men in the alley the night Sutton died? Whoever he pissed off, they’ll wanna let sleeping dogs lie and Kade to continue to take the fall. They wouldn’t hesitate to go after a pretty little thing like yourself.”

“You know that’s twice in one day a handsome man has called me a pretty little thing,” I grinned. “If I wasn’t so offended by neither one of you thinking I can take care of myself, I might get a big head.”

Polishing off the rest of his beer, Dad belched before tossing it into the recycling bin. “We Dashes are known for our fast wit. However, you get your looks from your mother, God rest her soul, and a day doesn’t go by that I don’t thank God you look just like her. You keep her memory alive for me every time I look at you. So you’ll have to give your old man a pass for worrying about you. You’re all I have left of her.”

“Is that why you never dated after she died? Because I’m a constant reminder of her?”

Shaking his head no, my dad moved in front of me. I saw the sadness in his eyes that he usually kept hidden.

“Daddy?”

“Your mother was the love of my life. I don’t want or need to find a pale comparison. What little time I had with her was more than most people get in a lifetime of loving.”

“But don’t you get lonely?”

“Sure. But I have you to push away the gray clouds,” he said, running his hand across my hair. “Now, enough about me. Tell me how it went with Kade today.”

That is a loaded question.

“Well, he seems to have bonded with Buck since I was there two days ago.”

“And?” he asked, crossing his arms over his chest, giving me the “dad” vibe like he did when I was in trouble.

“And what?” I hedged, not about to tell him how my heart beats faster anytime I look at the man. “I’m there to teach the men how to train their dogs. It’s not like we were sitting around socializing.”

“Right . . . Harley, when I told you last night that he came looking for you, you lit up like a kid in a candy store. Look, I’m sure as hell not gonna tell you how to run your life, but I will say it’s clear how you feel. But he’s an inmate and he’s angry about that. He could lash out at you or he could latch onto you like a life preserver. My advice to you is to use caution so neither one of you gets hurt, okay?”

“I’m keeping my distance,” I lied. “He’s just another dog handler in my program, that’s all.”

“Good to hear, good to hear. Ok, moving on. What do you say we head to St. Elmo’s Fire after we polish off a side of ribs at RibCrib? We could get started tonight on that file of yours.”

Jumping off the counter, I kissed my father’s cheek.

“What was that for?” he asked.

“For being a great guy who is willing to help someone in need.”

“You’re just now figuring out I’m a great guy?” he chuckled as we headed for the door.

“No, but I figured it was about time I said so.”

***

Two hours and a full rack of ribs later, we were sitting in St. Elmo’s Fire having a beer, making small talk with the bartender when Dad finally asked him how long he’d worked there.

“My uncle owns Fire. I’ve been working here most of my adult life.”

Taking a pull from his draft, my dad let that lie for a moment. I didn’t know the best way to approach the man about what happened that night, so I let my dad take the lead.

“Seems I remember there was a murder behind the bar a few years back,” he finally asked.

Leaning across the bar to replace Dad’s peanuts, Gary, the bartender, nodded as he switched out the empty bowl for a full one.

“You know, it’s funny, we haven’t talked about that murder in a while and you’re the second person tonight to bring it up.”

Hearing that, the hairs on the back of my neck started to rise. I looked around the bar thinking that the killer had returned but didn’t see anyone who looked nefarious.

“Oh, yeah?” my dad prompted while I had my head turned.

“Yeah. Two huge guys; they asked to talk to my uncle. In fact, they’re still in the back room with him now.”

As if on cue, the door to the back office opened and two of the biggest, baddest, Hawaiian shirt covered men I’d ever seen—next to Kade that is—came marching out.

“Oh, my God, they’re huge!” I whispered.

“SEALs,” Dad replied with a grin.

We both stood as they made their way around the bar. All I could think about as they made their way towards us was that Kade was stuck in prison while these bozos looked like they were on vacation in their flower-covered shirts. Incensed and outraged on Kade’s behalf, I marched towards them both before I could check myself and shouted, “You sure as heck took your sweet time getting back here. Where the eff have you been?”

My first mistake was walking away from my father. Scratch that, my first mistake was losing my cool; my second mistake was not moving out of the big blond man’s personal space when he grinned at me with mischief in his eyes. He looked down at me, one brow cocked in surprise, and his mouth pulled into a grin that spelled trouble with a capital T and, R.O.U.B.L.E for good measure. His eyes roamed my body slowly while I scowled at him, my arms crossed for added punctuation. He wasn’t intimidated though, instead, he grabbed me around the waist, pulled me into his big body, and began to dance to Conway Twitty’s “Hello Darlin’” blaring from the jukebox. I tried to explain what I was angry about, but the big galoot swung me out, then back in again every time I opened my mouth. Before I could even so much as say, “Kade’s in danger,” he dipped me low and planted his lips. Right. On. Mine.

“You wanna let my daughter up,” Dad laughed as I pushed at the blond man’s shoulders.

Hearing my father’s request, the massive SEAL looked up at him and grinned, if you can believe it. He had to be closer to seven feet than six and had a flattop you could balance a level on it was so precise. When he released me, I took a step back towards my father then leveled the huge SEAL with a glare.

“As I was saying . . . What took you so long to get here? Kade thinks you’ve written him off.”

“What the fuck?” the other SEAL, who was a fine looking black man with a bald head and amber colored eyes, hissed before grabbing my arm and moving towards a corner. “Talk to me,” he ordered once my father and the other SEAL had followed.

“From what I gathered from Kade your mission was over six months ago; when you didn’t hit town like he thought you would he assumed you’d written him off. “

“Our mission was extended to twenty-four months. He knows there is always a possibility of that happening.”

“He may know that, son, but considering he’s in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, you can see how he might lose faith. He’s focusing on the wrong done to him, not whether or not you got delayed,” my dad jumped in.

“Who are you to the Chief?” he asked me.

“Kade? I’m his dog trainer.”

“Pardon?” the SEAL I’d decided to dub “Drago”, since he reminded me of the Russian from Rocky 4, asked, confused.

“Why don’t we sit down and start from the beginning?” I replied.

The SEALs wasted no time pulling up chairs so Dad and I joined them. A waitress came straight over, her boobs pushed out in an obvious attempt to get their attention told me the boys wouldn’t be lonely long if they were looking for female companionship. Impressively, they ignored her; they were too attentive, focused on me as they waited for me to continue.

“I’m Harley and this is my father Harry Dash. We own and run Dirty Harry’s Auto Repair in Milton.”

“Oh, fuck,” Drago mumbled, his eyes shooting to the other SEAL.

“What?”

“Nothin’, nothin’. Please tell me you’re still married.”

“Um, I was ’til a few years ago . . . Wait, how did you know that?”

“I’m Michael McDonald,” Drago blurted out, shoving his hand in my face to shake. “Everyone calls me Mickey D, but you can call me Dead Man Walking.”

I looked at my dad and bugged out my eyes, then shook his hand. Mickey D had gone from cocky and sure of himself to nervous and jittery in a blink of an eye.

“You can call me Prez,” the other SEAL jumped in, pulling my hand away from Mickey’s.

“Why Prez?” my dad asked.

“Because I was named after the greatest President to ever hold the office. Ronald Reagan, God rest his soul,” Prez answered with pride, his hand over his heart as if uttering the Gipper’s name required the same respect as the Pledge of Allegiance.

“Amen,” my dad joined in, shaking Prez’s hand. An immediate bond, born of conservative values, was formed between the two.

“Tell me how you know so much about what’s happening with my brother?” Prez inquired.

“As I said before, I’m his dog trainer. I volunteer at the prison with a program called IDTP. We rehabilitate abused dogs using inmates within the correctional system. I’m assigned to the prison Kade was transferred to after his conviction and I recommended him for the program.”

“Do you always take this much interest in the inmates you train?” Mickey asked.

“Oh, no. It’s just that Dad and I followed the case from the beginning and knew he was innocent.”

“Okay, but that doesn’t explain why you think he’s in danger now or what you’re doing
here
.” Prez asked.

“I was at the prison today and he had stitches on his arm from some sort of attack. He blew it off as nothing, but I knew he was in trouble. As for why I’m here, not knowing if you guys were actually going to show up we decided to dig around and see what we could come up with on our own.”

Prez chuckled when I was done, shooting Mickey a curious look. Then he turned serious and leaned into the table; for the next few minutes he was all business.

“We set down at seventeen hundred hours today. We can’t get in to see Kade until visiting hours at oh eight hundred tomorrow morning. We came straight to the scene of the crime and just finished interviewing the owner. D and I both took a 30-day leave to sort this shit out and get my brother out. If we need more than 30-days, then we will request it. Kade is our brother, once a SEAL always a SEAL. We do not leave a man behind, we do not give up until our mission is complete, and we will not rest until our brother is set free. Do you feel me?”

“I feel you,” I answered because the man was intense, he was determined, and he was pissed right the hell off. “You’re The Brute Squad in fatigues.”

Prez’s head jerked back at my comment and a slow grin pulled across his face. “Did you just quote Princess Bride?”

“You know that movie, too?”

“Know it; we can quote the whole damn movie. Kade’s final mission with our team, we forgot our movies. Our portable DVD player made it on board the plane so we checked to see if anything was inside. Thanks to our lieutenant’s wife, who had borrowed the device, The Princess Bride was inside. We ended up watching it every night for two months.”

“Kade said one of your wives quoted it all the time and that’s how he knew the movie,” I laughed.

“I bet,” Mickey D chuckled. “We’re The Brute Squad, princess. We don’t want to admit we liked a chick flick.”

“But there’s sword fighting, shrieking eels and Cary Elwes,” I stated. “It’s way more than a chick flick.”

Both men nodded in agreement and I felt an instant bond. They had to be good men Kade could trust if they quoted Princess Bride.

“You boys got a place to stay?” Dad asked, grinning from ear to ear. No doubt he found it as hilarious as I did that these macho men liked my favorite movie.

“I won’t need much sleep, sir. I’ve got a friend to rescue,” Mickey answered, his face hard with anger once again.

“All right. How about a place to store your gear while you’re out hunting down the bad guys?”

“Are you offering?” Prez asked.

“My casa is su casa.”

“Then we accept,” Prez replied.

“Before we see Kade tomorrow, I want to know how our brother is really doing.”

“I’d say on a scale of one to killing someone, he’s about a seven.”

“Then there’s no time to lose. Take us back to your house and we’ll store our gear and get started.”

“Have you already been to the courthouse and obtained a copy of the court records?” I inquired, surprised they could investigate anything their first night in town.

“Princess, the less you know, the better,” Mickey stated.

“I don’t understand? If you follow the evidence, then what’s there to hide from me?”

“We have a select set of skills which allows us to . . . How should I put this? Access information without leaving the comfort of home.”

Oh, Lord!

Leaning in so no one would hear I whispered, “You’re going to hack into the courthouse, aren’t you?”

“No
going to
about it; all we need has already been obtained,” Prez answered, raising a duffle bag that I assumed held their equipment.

“Whoa, you
are
The Brute Squad . . . but with brains.”

“No, darlin’,” Prez smiled. “We’re Navy SEALs . . . “

***

“Are you gonna tell him you kissed the woman he’s been hard for for more than fifteen years, or am I?”

“Why do I have to tell him?”

Prez cocked an eyebrow at D as they waited for Kade to be brought up and shook his head slowly. “For a SEAL you’re a dumb son of a bitch, you know that, right?”

“Prez, it’ll just piss him off. Why upset him any more than he’s already been,” Mickey hedged. But the truth was, he liked his balls right where they were. He had no doubt that Kade would tie them in a knot if he knew that his lips had gotten anywhere near his dream woman.

Prez, Kade, and Mickey D had gone through BUD/s together, moved up the ranks together, and had each other’s backs on a daily basis. So Prez and D knew all about Harley. The one who got away.

During boot camp, they’d heard all about how he’d met the perfect woman in high school. About the cheerleader he’d knocked down during a game, but had left her alone ‘cause he knew he was too wild for her. He didn’t know her name then, but he knew that he wanted to find a woman just like her when he was ready to settle down. Years later, he’d seen her at her dad’s garage when he had no time to talk to her, but he at least knew where to find her. Fast-forward two years, after a long and bloody mission, Kade had headed straight for Pensacola and a certain auto repair shop only to find out he was too late. Kade spent the next few years looking for a woman who compared, but everyone fell short.