Sophie
One week after the chase, Sophie was a bag of nerves. Sleep wasn’t coming easy, but luckily, she’d been so busy at Stephan’s shop she was exhausted every night, which helped her shake the investigation from her mind... enough to sleep anyway.
She groaned and slapped her hand clumsily on the nightstand until her finger eventually hit the alarm button and silenced the buzzing gadget.
She turned on her back and sighed, staring at the ceiling. They had to solve this nightmare soon. Zeke was picking her up at nine a.m. to head to Nathan’s. She’d had to bite her tongue and not ask too many times why it was all taking so long. Nathan was entitled to his vacation, but Sophie couldn’t help but hold a grudge over the fact that the whole time he was sunning himself in the Florida Keys, Zeke’s life was at risk – and hers and Stephan’s by proxy. Still, he was home now, they could get on with their plans.
She drank an extra strong coffee to try and summon some energy, but it didn’t taste right. Damn, even my taste buds must be stressed, she thought.
She was still drying her hair when Zeke arrived. When she answered the door, her breath caught at the sight of him. His thick, black hair was ruffled on top, his white T-shirt was just tight enough to give a hint of his muscular chest, and his eyes sparkled even more than usual.
“You ready?” he asked, plunging his hands into his pockets.
“Do I look ready?” she asked sarcastically, pointing to her head of half wet hair. “I’ll just be two minutes. Come in. You can grab some coffee while you wait for me.”
She made her way back to the bedroom and began blow-drying her hair again. A minute later she nearly jumped out of her skin when a hand slipped around her waist from behind.
“Jesus,” she shrieked, turning to face Zeke. “Don’t sneak up on me like that.”
“Couldn’t resist,” he said, placing his arms around her waist with a mischievous grin. He planted a kiss on her lips, and her body instantly buzzed in anticipation.
He kissed her lips gently as she stood still on the spot, her head spinning with lust. His sandalwood scent encased her in his masculinity.
“Stop,” she said, letting out a deep breath and placing one hand on his chest. “We’re getting distracted. We need to keep focused for today. We’ve waited ages for this next chance to dig for information. Let’s not mess it up like a pair of horny teens.”
Zeke took a step back, the smile still lingering on his lips. Damn, that look was sexy. His eyes were full of danger – the good kind. Sex and passion. She cursed herself inwardly for turning down the chance of more sex with this amazing guy. But truth be told, she felt far from sexy in her tiredness, and she didn’t want to give him anything less than one hundred percent. Not at this stage anyway. He was so unbelievably hot, she didn’t want him to be disappointed in the cold morning light. For the kind of lust they shared, her apartment at nine a.m. just wasn’t enough. Besides, it was never a bad thing to make a man wait, she thought.
“You’re right,” he said, clasping his hands together. “Let’s get this over with. Plenty of time for... all that jazz after the case is solved.”
“Jazz,” she said, rolling her eyes and laughing. Yet secretly delighted he’d revealed his intentions to keep seeing her after they’d caught their man.
***
The journey was only forty minutes along quiet, leafy roads. It was actually quite pleasant. The breezed danced through Sophie’s hair as she shut her eyes and clicked her passenger seat window down to enjoy the fresh air. When she opened her eyes again, she caught Zeke’s just before he looked back at the road and smiled to herself. Tina was right, this flirtatious uncertainty was fantastic. Getting to know him was more and more fun with each encounter. And when she was with him, the whole bomb scare was less daunting. She even felt safe.
“We’re nearly there,” he said, swallowing hard.
“Are you nervous?” she asked gently, noticing him licking his dry lips.
He smiled at her and sighed. “A bit. I haven’t seen him since I was in hospital. I suppose I’m worried it’ll bring it all back... for him too. It’s hard putting it all behind you, you know? And to have to bring it all to the surface again... it’s not ideal.”
“You’re only doing this because you have to,” she reassured him. “Your life depends on it.”
When they eventually pulled up at Nathan’s house – a large, white wood house with a perfectly cut lawn – Zeke and Sophie looked at each other and nodded. No words were needed. They spoke a silent language of reassurance.
As they made their way up the path, the door opened, and a large man in beige shorts and a mint green short-sleeved shirt opened the door and said, “Zeke Draper. It’s good to see you, son. You look a lot better than when I last saw you.”
Zeke smiled and held out his hand for an enthusiastic shake from Nathan.
“And this must be your wife,” he said turning to Sophie with a huge smile. “Beautiful.”
Sophie laughed. “Definitely not the wife.”
“You asshole, Zeke,” Nathan said, giving him a playful shove on the shoulder. “Get on it. Consider that an order.”
Zeke laughed and rolled his eyes. “Good to see you’re still as full of yourself as ever.”
Nathan turned to Sophie. “This here’s the nicest son of a bitch I ever worked with. Stick with him. He’s a good ‘un. Anyway, come on in, cool off with a soda.”
They followed him into the house. His wife, Tracy, was in the kitchen and greeted them with drinks before disappearing to the summer house to work on a patchwork blanket.
“Should I go with her?” Sophie whispered to Zeke.
He shook his head. “I need you here in case we find out anything important. It’s better than me having to relay it all to you later. You’re as much a part of it as me now.”
They sat at the large kitchen table in front of two huge open windows looking out over the garden.
Nathan took a slow sip of soda and sighed. “So, what really brought you kids out here? You didn’t really just want to see an old fart like me. What’s going on?”
Zeke explained everything, right down to the man he’d pinned to the ground last week. Nathan nodded along calmly, which Sophie found interesting. These guys had been trained to act with dignity in the face of the worst situations. It stayed with them for life. Here they were in this sunny, domestic setting, explaining a bomb attempt and ongoing threats as if it was a discussion about a baseball match. She admired their strength.
When Zeke finished talking and slumped back in his chair – a sign of the strain this was taking on him – Nathan leaned forward.
“Well, young Zeke. I’m glad you came to me.”
Zeke raised an eyebrow. “You know something?”
Nathan rose to his feet and began pacing the room while he spoke. “A year after the explosion, I received a letter. All it said was that there was blood on your hands, Zeke. It also said that as your commander, the overall responsibility was on my shoulders. The crazy thing is, it was signed by Gary. I knew that couldn’t be possible. I identified his body, for God’s sake. I can still picture his messed up remains.” He paused to take a drink, his face twisted momentarily in anguish. “I tried to ignore it, but something like that tugs at your mind. For a while I worried about who could be out there, brooding over the tragedies and pointing the finger in the wrong places. You know as well as I do that there was nothing we could’ve done to prevent that IED going off. We did our jobs as best we could. Hell, I wasn’t even on the base at the time. Everything went quiet, so I just put it down to a sick hoax. The interesting thing is, I had no idea until now that Gary had a brother.” He stroked his chin in thought with his arms folded across his chest. “This could be significant. It could be him. Twins are connected in ways normal siblings would never understand. The death of one twin must be devastating. It could send someone over the edge. It’s perfectly plausible it could be that this Troy guy has gone mad and wants to take his anger out on us.”
Suddenly, a loud smash tore through the conversation as a brick came soaring in through the back window, landing just inches away from Nathan’s feet.
Sophie screamed and bounced backward, causing her chair to skid across the tiled floor. Zeke had instinctively thrust his arms out in front of her for protection, but on realizing it was just a brick, he got up and moved forward, his shoes crunching on broken glass, to grab a piece of paper strapped to the brick with a rubber band.
He unrolled the paper, tiny shards of glass falling like rain drops to the floor as he did.
“Careful,” Sophie whispered in a shaking voice. She could see his fingers were trembling ever so slightly.
He read it silently and looked up at Nathan, with panic in his eyes. He glanced at Sophie with a pained expression.
“What? What does it say?” she asked, stepping forward. She looked over his shoulders and read the words – All three of you will pay. She gasped, and as her knees weakened, she steadied herself with one hand on Zeke’s shoulder.
“I won’t let him hurt you,” he said, staring into her eyes intensely. “I won’t.”