Watching From The Shadows: Trident Security Book 5 (10 page)

“Why don’t you go see if anything looks like it’s missing while I get the mail?”

She glanced around. “Who cleaned up? From what everyone told me, I figured it would be a mess.”

“Kristen, Jenn, Angie, and Kat did it last night after the police released the crime scene. They came with Brody and Boomer because they didn’t want you to come home to a mess. Kristen said they put a lot of things in boxes and bags in your office for you to sort through. They were afraid to throw anything out, in case it was important or sentimental.”

Reaching the new security panel in the foyer, Marco punched in the same six-digit code from the garage, then unlocked and opened the front door. A quick inspection of the front property told him nothing seemed to be amiss and Boomer’s truck was parked across the street, where he and Foster would be keeping an eye on things until their relief showed up. Taking a step out onto the wooden porch, he froze when a faint click, which was very out of place, reached his ears.

Holy shit! Please, Lord, don’t let that be what I think it is.

Eyeing the long driveway, he realized his teammates were too far away to hear him if he shouted and he couldn’t take the chance of retrieving his cell from his pocket. Using all his strength and will to keep perfectly still and not shift his weight, he called out, “Harper?”

“Yes?”

“Can you come here for a minute?” he asked through a clenched jaw. Her footsteps announced her reentry to the foyer. “Stop right there and don’t come any closer. I need you to call Boomer’s cell phone and tell him I need him.”

“What—”

“Just do it!” He hadn’t meant to bark, but there wasn’t time for her questions.

“Okay.” Her fear and uncertainty hung on that one word. “W-What’s his number?”

Marco rattled it off, and in less than thirty seconds, he saw the two men bolt from the truck and rush up the driveway, scanning the area for whatever the problem was. When they were close enough so he didn’t have to shout, he spoke with a calmness he didn’t feel. “Boomer, I need you to crawl under the porch and tell me I’m wrong.”

“Huh?”
His teammate’s eyes first narrowed in confusion and then flashed to horror a split second later. “Oh, fuck! Don’t move!”

“As if I didn’t figure that out for myself, jackass.” While Boomer ran to the end of the porch, Marco saw the moment Foster put two and two together. They needed to get Harper out of the house and had to assume the rear entrance was rigged as well. “Call Ian for backup. Tell him to have the team on her mother and baby move them to the compound ASAP.” When the man pulled out his cell phone and weapon, Marco turned his head slightly, so Harper could hear him. “Sweetheart, I want you to grab my keys and go back out through the garage to Cain. Don’t touch anything else. He’s going to put you in my truck. As soon as the rest of the team gets here, he’s going to take you back to the Trident compound and keep you safe.”

Her voice dropped to a frightened whisper. “Marco, what is it?”

He didn’t want to scare her, but he needed her to obey him without question. “I hope I’m wrong, but I think I just stepped on a landmine.”

A loud gasp was followed by the jingle of his keys and the interior garage door opening. From under the floorboards of the porch, the sounds of Boomer belly-crawling in the small space became louder until he was almost underneath where Marco stood. Terror and impatience battled for superiority within him as he awaited his friend’s verdict. His gut sank when a muffled “fuck” came from below, then his life flashed before his eyes, and it wasn’t pretty.

“Polo, don’t fucking move. It’s not a landmine, but damn fucking close. It’s a homemade job with a pressure trigger. I gotta get my tools, so just hang on.”

“Sure. No problem. Have someone get me a beer and a pizza, and maybe the sports section of the newspaper to make the time go faster.” If they’d all learned one thing in the military, it was that wry humor tended to ease a person’s panic. Most of the time. Some of the time. Oh, fuck, it wasn’t helping his panic at all this time.

As Boomer crawled back out to retrieve his EOD—Explosive Ordnance Disposal—kit and protective gear from his vehicle, the overhead garage door finished sliding open, and in his peripheral vision, Marco saw Harper emerge. She was wide-eyed and pale from fright and he wished he could be the one to comfort her right now.

Proving he knew how to protect a principal asset at a time like this—well, he
was
a former Secret Service agent, so he’d better—Foster grabbed Harper’s arm. He rushed her to the waiting truck with his gun in his other hand, ready to fire at any threat which might appear. Harper clicked the remote, unlocking the door, and with a worried glance over her shoulder at Marco, she jumped into the passenger seat at Foster’s urging. Taking the keys from her, he instructed her to climb into the rear seat and lay down out of sight, before slamming the door shut. Hopping into the driver’s seat, the man started the engine with a roar and sped toward the end of the driveway, away from the potential blast. While it wasn’t an ideal location for her at the moment, it was better than the alternative, and Marco didn’t want them heading back to Trident without reinforcements. Confident Harper was in good hands, he concentrated on staying perfectly still as beads of sweat rolled off his forehead and temples. And for the first time since Nina was alive, Marco began to pray.

Was this how it was supposed to end for him? Was fate going to be so cruel as to kill him on a beautiful sunny day, far away from the hells of war, right after he found out he was a father? Yeah, he wasn’t thrilled about that, but…damn. Was his teammate going to die with him? Jeez, Baby Boomer had just reunited with the love of his life a few months ago, after thinking the woman had been dead for twelve years. Marco would curse the universe if he was the reason those two were separated by death once again.

He didn’t know how much time had passed—it felt like hours…eons even—before two Clearwater P.D. patrol cars with their lights flashing came screeching to a halt in front of the property, followed by several unmarked vehicles. Ian emerged from a black suburban, barking out commands. From another SUV, Marco saw Drew Murdock climb out and give two uniformed officers their own orders. The cops split up, heading for the houses on either side of Harper’s, probably to evacuate any occupants.

Following Ian’s command, their new sniper, Lindsey Abbott, and the Omega team’s Mancini jumped into Marco’s truck and Foster floored it before both doors were fully shut. The rest of the crew dashed across the front lawn, with Brody and Devon skirting the house to check for more explosives. Marco didn’t miss the worried look, followed by a thumbs up that his regular ménage partner sent his way, before disappearing around the corner. While they hadn’t spoken since yesterday’s fist fight, he knew it was his best friend’s way of saying that no matter what, Brody was watching his back and always would.

“Sit rep.” Ian stopped at the bottom of the porch steps with Murdock and Darius Knight. While it was great to have the newly retired SEAL on board with them again, a proper reunion would have to wait for a bit. All three had put on bullet-proof vests as a precaution. Not that the protective gear would stop flying shrapnel from ripping them to shreds if the explosive went off, but there was no way of knowing if an ambush was planned if the bomb wasn’t successful.

Ignoring his boss’ request, Marco asked, “Are Harper’s mother and the baby covered?”

Ian nodded. “McCabe and Tiny have them en route to the compound. No signs of trouble at their end. Boomer?”

“Down here,” came the answer from under the porch. “I’m going to need someone to come in from the other end to hold this flashlight for me.”

Ripping the Velcro straps of his vest open to remove it, Knight responded, “I can do that. Which is the ‘other end’?”

When Marco shifted his eyes and gave his head a minuscule tilt to his right, the experienced newbie hurried over, pulled off the piece of lattice covering the crawl space, then dropped to the ground to drag himself underneath. Marco wasn’t surprised their old teammate jumped right into a fucked-up situation on his first day, and he planned on thanking him. That is if they all survived the next fifteen minutes.

Boomer filled the newcomers in on what he’d found. “It’s a homemade bomb, Ian, with a pressure switch. The good news is, it’s a bomb any idiot can make if they have access to a Wal-Mart and the Internet. The bad news is, it’s a bomb any idiot can make, and I can’t guarantee this guy followed the directions to a ‘T’.”

A round of curses came from all of them. Brody and Devon came back from the rear of the house and the now dirt covered geek ducked into the garage. Just as dirty—they’d obviously crawled under the back porch—Devon approached his brother. “All clear back there. No signs of forced entry and there’s nothing to indicate the alarm system was bypassed, but we’ll do a run through inside just in case.”

By this point, the sweat on Marco’s forehead was rolling into his eyes and down his neck, but he didn’t dare try to wipe it away. Any movement could cause him to shift his weight and then it would be bye-bye time. “Dev, get him out. Ian, you guys have to get out of the blast range. You, too, Murdock. It’s bad enough Boomer and Knight are fucking toast with me if this thing blows.”

“Oh, ye of little faith.” Boomer was obviously a tad insulted.

A large black van with T.P.D. Bomb Squad in large white letters on the side pulled up to the curb in front of the house along with two more patrol cars. Tampa PD’s specialized unit also covered the smaller cities and towns in Pinellas County. Their arrival caught everyone’s attention for a moment before Ian turned back to face Marco with a frown. “Fuck you, Polo. This is no different from combat. When one of our asses was on the line, the others didn’t bail back then and it’s not fucking happening now either.”

Marco watched as Devon also ignored his plea and headed toward the garage door while Ian just stood at the bottom of the steps and crossed his arms. Marco knew it would be like trying to move the Hoover Dam ten feet to the left, but he had to try once more. “Boss-man, please. You’ve got a fiancée now. One who, I might add, won’t be happy if I get you blown to smithereens.”

“And you have a daughter now, so, I repeat—fuck you. Besides, no one is going to get blown to smithereens. Boomer can do this shit with his eyes closed”

“Hey, how’d you know my eyes were closed?”

Usually, the inane banter in stressful situations didn’t disturb Marco, but at the moment, he wanted to punch his younger teammate’s lights out for shits and giggles. Shaking his head at the bad joke, Ian eyed the detective standing next to him. “You, on the other hand, have procedures to follow, so go fill your squad in.”

If Murdock took offense to being ordered around, he didn’t show it. In fact, Marco wasn’t surprised to see a flash of relief come over the other man’s face and didn’t blame him. As the detective proceeded down the driveway, two bomb squad members were on their way up. After a brief conversation with Murdock midway, they approached the porch with their own equipment. Thankfully, this wouldn’t turn into a pissing match, since Boomer had done some cross-training with several local, law enforcement bomb squads, including T.P.D. and the F.B.I., over the past few years. There were always advantages to having government security contracts, and this was one of them. Both men had worked with the former Naval E.O.D. expert before and respected his skills as much as the Trident teammates did.

The two-man team, consisting of Sgt. Barry Templeton and Officer Freddie Mendoza, acknowledged Marco’s precarious position, but wisely ignored him after that. He needed all his concentration for the task at hand—remaining perfectly still—and it was getting more difficult as the seconds ticked by. After being told Boomer was under the floor boards, Templeton raised his voice to be heard. “Boomer, how you doing down there?”

“Pretty good. I just beat Knight’s straight with a full house, but I could use another beer and some buffalo wings. How you doing up there?”

Marco growled at the quip from under the porch and silently swore he was going to kill Boomer if they lived through this.

“Not bad. Mendoza’s with me. You need us down there?”

There was an extended pause before the answer came. “
Uh
, yeah, actually. I can’t completely remove the cover and do what I have to do without an extra set of hands. The wires are too short. The FNG came from the other end and is holding the flashlight, so you’re going to have to come in from the side. Avoid the plank Polo’s standing on and the two on either side of it, for a total of five.”

Squatting to inspect the lattice covering the space he needed to get to, Mendoza’s eyes narrowed. “Who or what’s an FNG?”

Ian, Boomer, and Knight all gave the same droll response. “Fucking new guy.”

“Ah. Gotcha.”

Marco’s torso was now as sweaty as his face and it was starting to itch like crazy. He wished he could yell at everyone to shut the fuck up, as well as hurry the fuck up, but it would be a waste of breath. It would be done when it was done, and working any faster could kill them all. “Ian, can you check on Harper and Mara for me?”

While his boss stepped away to make the call, Marco realized it was the first time he’d said his daughter’s name aloud. Up until now, he’d referred to her as ‘the baby’, ‘the kid’ or anything else along those lines. Carter and Brody had been right, and if Marco got out of this alive, he was going to make sure Mara knew he’d always be there for her—and not just financially. Nina would come back from her grave to haunt him if he didn’t man-up. An image of her holding her niece popped into his head and the corners of his mouth ticked upward, despite the situation. Remembering how good she’d been with her school children, he knew Nina would have made an awesome aunt and mother if only things had been different.

Muffled comments came from below after Mendoza joined the party and it seemed as if hours had passed, instead of only ten or eleven minutes, before Boomer finally announced, “We’re clear! You can move, Polo.”