Tickle His Fancy: Trident Security Book 6 (Trident Security Series) (19 page)

Brody wasn’t taking any chances with Fancy, though,
especially with those punks causing all sorts of trouble on top of the serial
killer. After leaving the location where Naomi’s mutilated body had been found,
he’d swung by the Trident compound and grabbed the tracking bracelet he wanted
her to wear until this creep was caught. The unassuming piece of jewelry had
been used before when Angie and then Kat had been in trouble. The device had a
GPS tracker in it, along with a one-way microphone that could be heard through
his computer program if his laptop or tablet were close enough to the source.
It had been a vital tool in rescuing the women after each one had ended up
being held hostage at different times.

At first, he’d used a medical alert bracelet for the device,
since they tended to be thicker and most people wouldn’t question it, but Angie
and Kristen had convinced him to find something a little more stylish. Their
point had been that if a bad guy knew enough about his victim, he might know
they didn’t need a medical alert tag. With the help of the jeweler who did a
lot of the submissives’ custom collars, Brody had come up with a design they
liked, yet still met his requirements. Tomorrow after his morning detail, he
would swing by Fancy’s shop and put it on her—for now, it was in the pocket of
his pants. He also had to get a few more tracking bracelets up and running.
Angie and Kristen had nothing to worry about living in the secure Trident
compound, but Boomer and Marco wanted Kat and Harper to have one, just in case.
And he didn’t blame them. Hopefully, this newly formed task force would find
this sick bastard before another submissive went missing. And God help his next
victim if they didn’t.

Brody was glad the girls had invited Fancy out to dinner with
them. It would give her a chance to get to know all of them better. If he had
any say in the matter, which he did, she’d be a part of both of his families
soon—here and in Texas. He knew they were headed in that direction, but he had
to give her time to get used to their relationship before springing an
engagement ring and permanent collar on her.

Was Christmas too soon? He sure as hell hoped not. He wanted
everyone to know Fancy was his, and his alone for the rest of their lives. His
father had always told him when he met the right woman, he’d feel as if he’d
known her all his life. And that was exactly how he felt about his little
baker. She was the second half of his heart and soul he’d been waiting for over
the past thirty-six years.

It had been a long day with the two teenage shit bags, the
crime scene, and the task force, and he was looking forward to vegging out in
the hot tub for a while and just relaxing. The image of Naomi Nguyen’s
mutilated body was still fresh in his mind, and he continued to try, unsuccessfully,
to shake it free. The sun had set about a half hour ago, but he enjoyed being in
the spa in the dark; it soothed him. As much as he wanted Fancy in his bed
tonight, he was due to get up far too early in the morning for the surveillance
gig with Boomer. It would be best to let her get a good night’s sleep since
they were going to the club tomorrow night.

Speaking of tomorrow, he had to remember to drop his Navy
dress whites at the dry cleaners after work so they would be ready for Ian and
Angie’s wedding. Fancy had taken that afternoon off from work and would meet
him at the church after she made sure the cake got to the reception in one
piece. He was also going to see if she would take the weekend of the hoedown
off and accompany him to Texas. He couldn’t wait to introduce her to his
parents and siblings and was confident they would love her instantly.

As he made a right turn toward his neighborhood, his cell
phone rang. Hitting the button on his steering wheel, he connected the call to
his car’s Bluetooth system, which automatically silenced the music from the
radio. “Hello?”

A familiar male voice came over the speakers. “Hey, Brody,
it’s Corey. I’m at Fancy’s shop. I saw someone run behind the building as I was
driving past. He’s gone, but…I think you better get over here. Is Fancy with
you?”

His gut clenched. “No. She went out with a few girls for
dinner. What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know. I don’t even know what I’m looking at. I’m
calling the cops as soon as I hang up with you. I think there’s a dead body in
the woods back here, but it’s such a mess. I don’t want to risk screwing up a crime
scene.”

Fuck!
Was there a body like Heather’s and the other
girl dumped behind Fancy’s shop? Maybe it was one of the missing submissives
who had disappeared before Heather. Brody glanced in his side view mirrors and
did a U-turn. “I’m less than five minutes away. Don’t touch anything.”

“I won’t. Let me hang up and call the police. I’ll see you in
a few.”

A few minutes later, Brody sped into the bakery’s parking
lot. It must be a busy night because he’d beaten the cops there. This part of
town was mostly shops which had shut down hours ago and there was very little
traffic. That was one of the reasons he was glad Fancy hadn’t had insomnia
lately, giving her the urge to bake in the middle of the night. Stopping near
the back of the shop next to Corey’s truck, he threw the gear in park and
killed the engine. Grabbing his Mag-lite from under the seat, he opened the
door and jumped out. “Corey?”

“Yo, back here!” The man stuck his head around the corner of
the brick building. “The cops are on their way, but apparently, the full moon
is fucking with the call volume. Dispatch said they’ll get someone here as soon
as they can and not to disturb the scene. You can kind of see it without
getting too close, but it’s covered in a lot of brush.”

“Let me take a look.”

He rounded the corner and started walking toward where
Fancy’s brother-in-law was pointing. As he passed the man, pain shot through him,
and his legs buckled when nearly 50,000 volts of electricity from a Taser being
held on his exposed neck coursed through his body. His hand lost its grip on
the flashlight, and he dropped hard and fast to the ground as his muscles
spasmed out of control. When the device cut off after five seconds as it was
supposed to, he barely felt the needle that was stabbed into his upper arm. As
he tried to figure out what the hell had just happened he sank into a sea of
darkness.

* * *

Russell Adams watched helplessly as the bastard who’d stabbed
him in the chest earlier picked up an unconscious Senior Chief Evans. Using a
fireman’s carry, he loaded him into the bed of the retired SEAL’s Ford F-150.
The man pulled a tarp from his own truck and covered Evans with it before
starting the Chevy and driving away in it.

Despite his wound, which was slowly bleeding despite the
dirty bandana he’d shoved in it, Russell tried to crawl his way through the
wooded area to help the man who’d been nothing but kind to a fellow seaman. But
the blood loss was making him weak, and he couldn’t go more than a foot or two
before stopping. He’d seen the man before in Fancy’s shop, and according to the
cute, blonde girl who worked with Fancy in the morning, the guy was the owner’s
brother-in-law, and a city fireman.

Pain coursed through Russell’s body, forcing an unwanted
flashback into his mind. Russell’s last tour in Iraq had been the worst.
Assigned to Camp Bucca, one of the U.S. Naval bases in that part of the world,
he’d been there through numerous attacks on American personnel, both on and off
the base. They had been on constant alert for suicide bombers and Iraqis
pretending to be allies, when in reality they were trying to get on the base to
kill as many Americans as possible. Russell had lost one of his best friends in
one incident, and missed being KIA himself by a mere five minutes. A suicide
bomber had gotten close enough to one of the camp’s manned gates to kill three
naval guards who had relieved Russell and two others from duty minutes before.
That was when his PTSD symptoms had started taking over his life. Now medically
discharged, he was wary of everyone—not a good way to be unless you lived on a
deserted island.

Running footsteps caught his attention, bringing his mind
back to the present. The assailant must have parked his Chevy nearby because
he’d returned and was climbing into the driver’s seat of Evans’s Ford.
Russell’s heart plummeted when the vehicle backed out of the parking space and
took off as if on a Sunday afternoon drive.

His head spun, and he stopped to rest again. Going after the
truck was not an option. Neither was calling for help—the bastard had searched
his pockets and found the cell phone Evans had given him and smashed it to
pieces, and pay phones were hard to come by these days. There had to be a way
to save himself and the senior chief—there had to be.

Russell collapsed at the edge of the parking lot, barely out
of the bushes. No one was around and even if there was, he didn’t have the
strength to yell or get their attention. Maybe if he rested a bit, he could
crawl across the lot and flag down someone driving by.
Rest. . .just
for a minute or two.

* * *

Glancing at his watch again, Boomer paced the parking lot in
front of the Trident offices. Brody was fifteen minutes late, and that was
highly unusual; the geek was never late.

Boomer pulled out his phone and hit the speed dial for his
friend. “Hey, Egghead. It’s me again. Get out of Fancy’s bed, if that’s where
you’re at, and get your ass to work. If I don’t hear from you in five minutes,
I’ll head out and let you know how to catch up with me. See you in a bit.”

Hanging up, he climbed into his truck and started the engine.
It was way too early to wake anyone else up. None of his teammates would
appreciate a call at 0300. He could handle this detail alone as long as the guy
they were supposed to be following didn’t notice he was being shadowed. That
was why the team liked to use two vehicles in this type of situation…they could
hopscotch and alternate tailing the subject. The only problem was the guy they
would be tailing usually left at 4:00 a.m. when there was almost no traffic on
the roads.

After seven minutes, Boomer knew he couldn’t wait any longer
because it was a fifteen-minute ride to the target’s house. Putting the truck
in drive, he left the compound. Once he reached his destination, if he still
hadn’t heard from Brody, he’d send Ian a text. The last thing he wanted to do
was wake the boss. It was like walking into a bear’s den shouting “hi, honey,
I’m home”—not a good, fucking thing to do.

* * *

Devon strode through the door to his brother’s office, not
even bothering to knock. “Any word?”

It was a rhetorical question; Brody had been missing for at
least three hours and Ian would have let him know if the status had changed.
After getting the early morning call from Boomer, the eldest Sawyer had gotten
into his car and gone looking for their AWOL teammate. In their business and
experience, a missing man usually spelled trouble.

The geek and his truck were nowhere to be found. His boss had
let himself into Brody’s house to find it empty, then drove past Fancy’s
apartment. Ian hadn’t wanted to awaken the woman and worry her unnecessarily,
but it was getting to the point when they would have to question her.

“No. The computer’s not picking up any signal from his cell phone,
and I drove all over the place trying to figure out where he might be. Cook
will be here in about twenty minutes, but I can’t think of anything he can do
that I haven’t already done.” The new computer tech would need a starting
point, and since they didn’t have one yet, he’d be spinning his wheels just
like everyone else. “I swear I’m ordering tracking devices and implanting them
in everyone’s ass around here. I’m fucking tired of people going off on their
own and getting into trouble. Usually it’s the women around here, but the guys
have done their fair share, too.”

Dropping into a visitor’s chair, Dev rubbed his tired eyes.
You’d think after years of being a SEAL, he’d be used to functioning on little
sleep. JD had been up half the night crying. Then after the baby was finally
asleep, and his father had been just drifting off, Ian had called him at 4:45
a.m. “I’m worried.”

“So am I, brother,” Ian replied, the frustration in his voice
was unmistakable. “But I have no idea where else to look for him. I’ve got
Marco and the Omega team out searching the entire city for him. I called Chase Dixon,
and he’s sending one of his guys to relieve Boomer, so he’ll be free in a bit.
And I also just put a call in to Isaac Webb to put an APB out on Egghead’s
truck. If you’ve got any other suggestions, I’m all ears.” They both knew the
police usually wouldn’t take a missing person’s report until twenty-four hours had
passed, at the very least, but thankfully, they had plenty of connections and
were able to bypass the waiting period.

“Do you think this has anything to do with the missing
submissives? I mean, is it possible this guy is targeting anyone in the
lifestyle?” Devon didn’t know what to think. He didn’t think a serial killer
would stray that far from his routine MO and victim type, but then again, he’d
never before seen or heard of what the bastard terrorizing the BDSM community
in Tampa was doing.

Ian sighed and stood, picking up his empty coffee cup. “I
don’t know, but we have to consider every angle.” He was about to round his
desk when the landline phone rang. Reaching over, he stabbed the speaker key.
“Sawyer.”

“Ian, it’s Webb—”

Devon flew to his feet. “Did you find Brody?”

“No. But I may have a lead. Just got a call from a patrol
car. He found a half unconscious guy in a parking lot with a stab wound. I
pulled up at the same time as the medics. The guy had been alert enough to hand
the officer a business card. It’s Evans’ Trident card. Before we could question
him further, he passed out. I’m pulling up to the ER at Tampa General now. This
guy’s going to need surgery as soon as possible.”

Grabbing his keys and cell phone from the desk, Ian said,
“I’m on my way. Wait a second. . .what parking lot?”

“It’s for a few shops—a dry cleaner, a bakery and two other
stores.”

As Devon’s eyes grew wide, Ian gut clenched. “Fancy’s
Bakery?”

“Yeah, how’d you know?”

“Fuck, I’ll tell you when I get there. I’m on my way.” Ian
disconnected the call and hurried out of the office with Devon on his heels.
“What the fuck is going on?”

“No clue, but I’m going with you.”

Ian hopped into his car and sped out of the compound with
Devon in the passenger seat sending out texts to update everyone. Ian just prayed
the victim, whoever he was, held on long enough to give them a lead to Brody if
he had one.

* * *

Ian and Devon strode into the ER waiting room and made a
beeline for Detective Webb as soon as they spotted him standing with a
uniformed officer. Webb turned their way, and Ian didn’t bother with
pleasantries. “Did you talk to him?”

The tall, black man shook his head. “No. The paramedics said
he almost coded in the bus. The doctors are still working to stabilize him
before they send him to surgery.”

A “bus” was what medics and cops called an ambulance and “coding”
was when a person stopped breathing and went into cardiac arrest. If this guy
knew what happened to Brody and died before they could talk to him, they were
screwed. “Fuck. What happened?”

The beat cop stepped forward. “I had the bakery on my list of
properties to check during my shift. Apparently, the shop’s had a lot of
vandalism lately.” Ian knew all about that so he nodded for the man to
continue. “I was going to check behind the building, and suddenly I see this
homeless guy on the ground at the back of the lot. Had just enough strength to
flag me down, I guess. He was really out of it, and after calling for a bus, I
got out the first aid bag and tried to stop the bleeding from a stab wound to
his chest. I think the only reason he’s still alive is he stuffed a bandana in
the wound and laid on his stomach which slowed the bleeding. He kept grabbing for
my hand—I thought he was trying to stop me from treating him, but then I
noticed this in his hand.” The man held up a clear evidence bag with a dirty and
bloody business card in it…
Trident Security, Inc., Brody Evans.
“Then he
managed to speak, but all he said was ‘help him.’”