The Lynx Series Boxed Set II: Books 4-6 (Iniquus Security Action Adventure Boxed Set Book 3)
Page 60
His face turned red.
“She’ll understand. She’ll be proud. But she can’t suffer this way. You fill her dreams.”
“Are you happy? Are you okay?”
“I’m working on it.”
***
Striker was waiting for me outside the hospital room.
He wrapped his arm around me, and we walked down the long corridor. “Did you get everything worked out?”
“He agreed to divorce.”
“How did you feel? Did the operation work?”
I offered him a tired smile. “I felt friendship and absolutely nothing else. No shimmer. No irrational bond. Just a member of my Abuela Rosa’s family.” We took a few steps. “Kaylie?” I asked.
“Prescott’s with her. When she’s released from the hospital, they’re going to go get her daughter in Turkey. Her sister, Melody, has Kaylie’s son in Virginia. The DNA sample came back as a positive match. But anyone who sees him says it’s obvious.” He kissed my head then reached to push the door open.
We stepped out under a sky filled with stars.
I stopped to look up at the glory of it. Closing my eyes, I breathed in deeply and exhaled. Yes, I felt different. A little off balance. A little strange. But good. Solid. Calm. When I opened my eyes, I found Striker staring at me with that assessing look of his.
I offered him a smile. “Let’s go back to the camp. I’m planning to get a good night’s sleep for the first time in years.” I slid into his arms. “And wake up in the morning able to love you with my whole heart and no distractions.” I reached my hands to his shoulders. “Just think how wonderful this is going to be.”
Striker snatched me by the waist and twirled me around.
“Miraculous,” he said, sliding me down his body until his lips found mine.
The kiss was slow and delicious.
Being here alive, in love, and whole was just that, miraculous.
The End
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Hyper Lynx
My great appreciation ~
To my editor - Kathleen Payne
To my cover artist - Melody Simmons
To my assistant – Margaret Daly
To my real-world friend Allan Leverone who lent me his name to do what evil I should wish.
To my Beta Force - who are always honest and kind at the same time. Especially E. Hordon, M. Carlon, J. Scaparotti.
To my Street Force - who support me and my writing with such enthusiasm. If you’re interested in joining this group, please send me an email. FionaQuinnBooks@outlook.com
Thank you to the real-world military and FBI who serve to protect us.
To all of the wonderful professionals whom I called on to get the details right. Please note: this is a work of fiction, and while I always try my best to get all of the details correct, there are times when it serves the story to go slightly to the left or right of perfection. Please understand that any mistakes or discrepancies are my authorial decision making alone and sit squarely on my shoulders.
Thank you to my family.
I send my love to my husband and my great appreciation. T, you are one of my life’s greatest miracles.
And of course - thank YOU for reading my stories. I’m smiling joyfully as I type this. I so appreciate you!
Copyright
Gulf Lynx is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
©2019 Fiona Quinn
All Rights Reserved
Cover Design by Melody Simmons from eBookindlecovers
Fonts used with permission from Microsoft
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Neither the publisher nor the author has any control over and does not assume any responsibility for third-party websites and their content.
No part of this book may be scanned, reproduced, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without the express written permission from the publisher or author. Doing any of these actions via the Internet or in any other way without express written permission from the author is illegal and punishable by law. It is considered piracy. Please purchase only authorized editions. In accordance with the US Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at Hello@FionaQuinnBooks.com.
Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
Hyper
Book 6
Hyper Lynx
To my dear sister, Melissa B.
Thank you for the encouragement you’ve given me
from my very first steps on this journey.
I so appreciate your love and kindness.
The Players
The HYDRA
The Mastermind – Indigo (Deceased)
The Moneybags – Sylanos
The Private Army – Omega
The Political Cover – The Assembly
The Diner
Jim – the owner
Destiny – server
Barb – Server
Nicole – Server
Huahine – Short-order cook
Strike Force
Gator and Christen
Striker and Lynx
Jack and Suz
Deep and Grace
Blaze and Faith
Reaper and Kate
Axel
Randy
CIA
Oliver
John Black
Johnna White
Casper
Cho
DiSalla
FBI
Special Agent in Charge Damian Prescott
Special Agent Steve Finley
Dr. Gupta, Ph.D.
Modesty (Destiny) asset
Cerberus Tactical K9
Ridge and K9 Zeus
Ryder and K9 Voodoo
Delta Force Echo
Ty and Kira
Davidson Family and Friends
William and London Davidson – father and stepmother
Christen Davidson - daughter
Karl Davidson – eldest son
Rochambeau Family
Mama Rochambeau
Gator – Iniquus Strike Force Operator
Genevieve
Auralia
London Bridge is Falling Down
London Bridge is falling down,
Falling down,
Falling down.
London Bridge is falling down,
My fair Lady.
Build it up with iron and steel,
Iron and steel,
iron and steel,
Build it up with iron and steel,
My fair lady.
Iron and steel will bend and bow,
Bend and bow,
bend and bow,
Iron and steel will bend and bow,
My fair lady.
Build it up with silver and gold,
Silver and gold,
silver and gold,
Build it up with silver and gold,
My fair lady.
Chapter One
It was such a relief when my phone’s buzz suddenly yanked me awake.
Mentally thrashing through an endless dream, I was too exhausted to stay asleep.
I had gone to bed last night braced for torment—whether it showed up as warm, loving pictures or angst-filled ones. Either would make my heart bleed.
Today was Mom’s birthday.
In my life, which was overflowing with heroes, she stood out as the miracle maker. I missed her dearly.
All day yesterday, childhood memories had been popping up.
My brain had been feeding th
em to me like bon bons.
Closing my eyes, I savored each one.
The flavor on my tongue of Mom’s extra-special raspberry chocolate rum cake. The warmth of her voice as she whispered, “You’re my favorite,” into my ear. The earnestness in her eyes as she gave me good counsel or just stared out the window, thinking.
I remembered Mom as bright slashes of color on her pallet as she brought her imagination into a tangible form on a canvas.
Whenever I saw a bouquet of flowers, she was there in the richness of the hues and the delicacy of the petals, easily bruised and crushed.
She was still part of my every day.
Painfully sometimes. Joyfully sometimes.
The emptiness she left was only made more acute this last week as I probed around my memories like a tongue finding and fiddling with the space from a lost childhood tooth.
Only this ache didn’t come with the expected Tooth Fairy reward. Or knowing that another tooth would come in and replace the baby one that had fallen out.
Nothing could replace Mom.
There were just certain days that were more biting than others. Her birthday was always the hardest for me.
My life growing up had been enchanted. My parents had given me the Willy Wonka gold ticket of childhoods. Living a working-class lifestyle, my father seemingly owned a garage and acted as a mechanic. I believed that to be true until last year. That’s when I discovered that the garage was a cover story for his actual job as a CIA officer.
Though my family didn’t have a lot of material trappings, I never felt want. My parents filled my life with the colorful, the exciting, even the fantastical at times. And they brought into my unschooled education a parade of amazing people to mentor and teach me, despite Mom’s being sick for almost all of my life.
Mom’s imminent death had been part of my every day. And because I kept expecting her to die and then she didn’t, I convinced myself she’d always beat the odds. That she’d be able to stay in her bed where she’d always been, making a nest of pillows for me to join her. I’d cuddle up to listen to her read to me. Or I’d draw quietly while she slept…
Dad had positioned the parental king-sized bed in such a way that we could watch through the window as airplanes flew low in the sky on the way to one of the D.C. airports. We’d tell each other imagined stories of the great adventures that the passengers had just lived.
Mom’s gentle smile and creative way of viewing life…
I still needed her.
I never really got a chance to mourn her passing. Not properly. Right after her death, my life had spun out of control. I became the focus of a serial killer who started a parade of criminals through my life.
They were now in my past.
And I was slowly recovering both physically and emotionally from the years of terror.
In my toolbox of valuable skills, I had my mother’s example of sheer dogged perseverance that had helped me through those terrible times.
Mom had heroically clung to life for as long as she could. As my last remaining relative, her big goal was to stay alive until I was a legal adult; she hoped to see my twenty-first birthday.
Valiantly, she made it until I was nineteen and a half.
Then one day, to my great sorrow and equally to my great relief, she just stopped.
Her transition to life beyond was peaceful, where her illness hadn’t been.
That day, I had carried a tray with her preferred breakfast—a pot of orange pekoe tea, toast with honey, and a banana—into her room.
The stillness as I pushed through the door stood like a sentry. It stopped me from entering.
Hovering in the hall, I looked through the crack and realized that the room was empty though Mom was in the bed.
She had traveled from this world to the next, joining Dad on the other side.
Mom must have known it was close; she went to bed that night with my pink baby blanket and had it clutched to her chest.
When I was very little and couldn’t sleep, Mom would wrap me in that soft pink blanket and carry me out to the tiny balcony off the living room in the Washington D.C. apartment where I lived my entire life until it burned to the ground.
I loved that apartment. It was the center of my own special universe.
Outside, with the white noise of the highway buzz, Mom would cuddle me into her as she soothed me.
I would block the smell of the city by burrowing my nose into Mom’s dress. The savory scent of garlic and onions, spices, and lemony dish detergent, would fill my nostrils.
It was bliss.
All the strains and upsets of my little life fell away with the steady cadence of the old-fashioned wooden rocker’s creaks and thumps.
Mom hummed nonsensical notes instead of any recognizable melody. Her cheek rested against my head, so she could turn and plant kisses in my hair when she took a breath in to hum again.
When she did sing an infrequent song, it was usually something monotonous and straightforward like Row, Row, Row Your Boat.
The truth was that Mom’s talents were visual, and she had minimal capacity to find a beat or a melody.
It embarrassed her because dad and I both had good voices. Dad had been in a band all through college. He’d had to make a choice at some point to give that up to follow his career with the CIA.
Imagine sitting on a dorm room bed and thinking: Will I be a spy or a rock star?
My dad was a rock star to me, even if he made the choice to let his music become an avocation.
Mom liked to listen to us singing together, but I think she felt left out.
Before I went to sleep last night, my fiancé, Striker Rheas, had shown me a YouTube of a teenaged acapella group singing Queen.
There was one young teen who tickled my fancy. He held the tempo with his beatboxing, which he took very seriously.
As well he should.
He had carrot red hair, porcelain skin, and looked completely cherubic as his mouth made the sounds of cymbals crashing. I could just imagine him showing up at the audition, wanting to participate in the group, and being told his voice wasn’t up to standard. Undeterred, he found a way to join in.
Mom would have loved that.
And so, as I lay in bed with Striker beside me, not wanting to toss and turn and interrupt his sleep, I was thinking again about Mom.
In my imagination, I pretended to wrap myself in the pink blanket, sending myself down memory lane onto the balcony. And there, I imagined baby me lying in Mom’s arms as she monotoned, “Row, row, row your boat.”
And that was what I had done all night in my dreams.
It hadn’t been a pink, fluffy-blanket, sweet dreams kind of boat ride.
It was the nightmare kind.
The danger is imminent kind.
My mother had stood on the bank with her bare feet in the roiling waters, one hand clinging to a branch, the other cupped around her mouth screaming at me, “Row faster, Lexi! Faster! You have to get away! Go. Go. Go!”
And because I believed my mom, trusted my mom to always do the best she could to protect me and keep me safe even in a dangerous and turbulent world, I rowed.
Hours of frantic rowing.
And now, with a rubbery arm and physical exhaustion, I reached for my phone buzzing on my nightstand before it woke Striker, grateful—even if it was a wrong number—that by waking up, I had made it to shore and could stop.
I stroked my thumb across the screen and whispered, “Hello?”
“In a moment, you will get a call from the FBI. Take the call. Accept the invitation. Out.”
The phone went dead.
Chapter Two
Striker came awake beside me. “Who was that?” He scrubbed a hand over his eyes and scratched through his short-cropped, rusty-blond hair. “What time is it?”
“Spyder,” I whispered, turning the phone to check the readout. “It’s almost five. Go back to sleep.”
Striker rolled onto his side and bent his arm to elev
ate his head. His features were hard to read in the dim indigo of near dawn coming through my bedroom window. “And?”
I tipped my head. “A call’s supposed to come in from the FBI. Spyder told me to take the meeting.”
“All right, Chica.” He shifted the covers off him.
I wish he hadn’t.
Striker went to bed naked last night. His morning ready-for-a-tumble body was darned enticing—broad shoulders, tight abs, those thigh muscles, and—Whew!
If only I knew when this FBI call would be coming through, I might have taken advantage of waking up before the alarm rang.
“But I’m going to remind you,” Striker tapped my hip, refocusing me, “we already have a meeting on the books today at eleven hundred hours. Spyder wouldn’t have called like that if it wasn’t high priority. This meeting at the CIA is, too.”
I pulled myself up to sitting, punched a pillow, and laid it against the headboard, leaning back—the “ready for a conversation” position. “Do you know what’s going on at the CIA? A gist? A whiff?”
“This is what I know.” He pushed himself up to sit against the headboard beside me.
I would have felt a lot more guilty about his losing sleep if Striker wasn’t the kind of guy who could get by on four hours of shut-eye and then head out to compete in a triathlon.
Must be nice. That definitely wasn’t me.
Coffee would help.
“The original meeting was scheduled,” Striker said, “with a room full of people connected with a case. Once Iniquus Command confirmed with the CIA working group that I was bringing you with me, that roomful narrowed down to three.”
I shrugged. “So, maybe it’s not that important, and it would be okay if you take notes and catch me up later?”
Amusement twitched at the corners of his lips. So darned cute. “I’m going to speculate based on tone.”