by Angela White
“It’s like the babies want a play date,” she said finally.
Kyle recognized the trust moment and was careful with his response. “That might raise some alarm in the sheep.”
“I don’t like it when you call them that!” Jennifer snapped. “They’re our people.”
Surprised, Kyle grinned at her. “Caught the bug, didn’t you?”
“Yes. I love Safe Haven.”
Kyle gently put an arm around her for a soft hug. “So do I.”
“I’m taking it.” Jennifer drew in a breath. “We’re taking the safety net, Reece. You’re coming with me.”
Kyle leaned down and placed a light kiss to her forehead. “Yes, ma’am.”
Secure in what she’d needed from him, Jennifer placed a returning kiss on his jaw as a reward for agreeing, and for being patient.
Kyle froze, as he always did.
Jennifer lingered, resting her head against his.
Kyle felt peace and strength surround them, and gave up the act. He grinned like a fool. “You should insist on stuff more often, Jen.”
“Maybe I will,” she teased, liking the feel of his arm, his smell of his aftershave. “I miss the stubble a bit,” she confessed, red faced. “That first night, it made you seem…”
“Dangerous?” Kyle supplied.
“Yes, but more than that.” She hesitated, not sure how to explain.
Kyle lifted a brow in amusement. “Sexy?”
“Yes.”
Kyle felt his day was getting better and better, and didn’t push. “Nice. You looked like hell.”
Jennifer gasped.
Kyle laughed aloud as she playfully slapped at him. This was all he’d ever wanted, someone to love who could at least care for him in return. He hadn’t planned to become obsessed with an abused teenager, but now that he had, Kyle wouldn’t trade it for anything. Before rescuing Jennifer, he’d only been faking life.
Chapter Three
I See More
1
“Try to relax.”
Kenn’s words drew a snort from both females. They were behind the main camp, using the naturally rough landscape and dreary weather to simulate sniper conditions.
“Seriously,” Kenn insisted. “You know that’s key. You can’t pull the trigger when you’re tense. You’ll miss every single time.”
Crista took in her breath and released it slowly, seeing her shot before she took it.
“Now fire.”
Crista jerked the trigger and there was only a puff of dirt near the target.
“Next,” Kenn switched them, wondering how much skill Angela needed these two to have. Crista was good when she took her time and Samantha was good even when she was rushed, but neither was trained for doing this during combat.
Sam gently pulled the trigger, confident, and was pleased when her round smacked into the balloon and popped it. They were saving the more powerful shells for the battle, but hitting a target hundreds of feet away was a big rush for Samantha.
“Good. Next.”
Crista didn’t like being shown up. She hit the next two balloons without even trying.
Sam responded in kind by hitting her next target dead center and Kenn settled down a bit. This was the first time he had worked directly with the snipers on Angela’s team. He hadn’t been expecting much.
“Bump them to the next set,” Marc instructed, passing by on his way to help Charlie’s team with their practice. Marc had refused the teenager’s demand of Kenn as his running target, knowing their aim wouldn’t be as careful with someone they didn’t like.
“Now or later?” Kenn asked.
“May not be a later,” Marc muttered lowly. That old feeling of trouble was everywhere he went today.
“Tonight,” Angela stated, coming up to lean against his arm. “Something’s close.”
“Yeah,” Marc agreed, but didn’t ask what or send his demon searching to discover it. From here on, this was Angela’s show. He had to be careful not to interfere with it.
“I love you, Brady.”
Marc glanced down in surprise. Not at the words, but the tone. It held an endless well of sadness. “You okay, baby-cakes?”
Angela shook her head, allowing him only a tiny glimpse into the true feelings that she could share. “I’m damned after this, Marc. We all are.”
Marc didn’t realize how much that would matter later as he slid an arm around her hip. “It’s worth it, right?”
“Of course,” she responded, forcing cheer back into her words. There was a long time to go before the truth could be revealed to everyone. She needed to cowboy up.
“I have rounds,” she said absently and moved off toward the small row of tents where she had teams based for working on their runs.
Marc didn’t watch her, drawn into the session again as both sniper women argued the new distance for the next level was too far, that their coming targets would be closer.
“Does that matter?” Marc asked, noting Shawn trailing Angie as he’d been instructed to. “If you can hit it at three hundred yards, you can definitely hit it at one hundred, right?”
The females got his point and returned to their challenge.
“Aim small,” Kenn told them. “Account for the wind, the leaves, the spider web that might be blow across right as you fire.”
Samantha went first. Hard or not, she couldn’t wait to be doing this for real.
Marc didn’t stay for the next shots, but he was positive the females would hit what they aimed at. Kenn didn’t understand how intent these women would become once the actual moment arrived to kill. Angela had chosen well.
2
Angela ducked into the tinkering tent, as Theo had dubbed it, and saw that their new partner had arrived.
“Candy.”
“Boss.”
Theo held up a sheet of paper from the messy stack on the table. “These okay for her?”
Angela read it, sensing a spark that she hadn’t seen before. That was good. “Yes. She can do all of that. Marc evaluated her yesterday.”
“Great,” Theo stated. “We’re all set then.”
“Can I keep this?” Angela asked, sure they had another copy. Everyone was using carbon paper these days to be sure not to miss a single line of details.
“Yep.” Theo glanced at Candy, who was sitting quietly, waiting to be told what to do. “Can I eval her? For my team?”
Candy didn’t have the training her other females did. She’d come late to the party, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t work for her. Angela shrugged. “If it makes you feel better. I think she’ll be fine with you.”
“No, I meant keeping her. We don’t have a female yet.”
Angela stared in surprise, along with Candy. “What position?”
“Lackey to start,” Theo answered, passing another sheet. “Eventually she’ll help us place things we don’t want seen. She has design experience.”
The second page was observations on all the members of his team, plus Candy and a few others. “I am keeping this.”
Theo grinned. “I thought you might find some of that useful.”
“Why wasn’t this included on the personal sheets?” Angela asked curiously, seeing that Candy had designed websites for her business and had a degree in graphics. The next line was about Theo himself.
“And why didn’t you tell us you speak four languages and have a minor in architecture?”
“Wasn’t on the questionnaire,” Theo responded. “I’ve been a tool engineer for a decade. Didn’t think the other mattered until recently.”
“I’ll let you know about the position. Handle her as you see fit until then.” Angela tucked the papers into her pocket and ducked out of the canvas. After this was all over, she would revamp the Safe Haven personal information sheets. If Adrian had known Theo was so valuable, she was sure he would have given the engineer serious work long before the government had come. Engineering was a prize during the apocalypse, but add architecture with it
and you had someone who could actually build your future.
Zack fell in with Angela as she came from the tinkering tent and she let him stay as she slid into the next canvas where Seth and Doug were at a table with the same messy stack of papers that Theo had been surrounded by.
“Gentlemen,” Angela greeted them. “We all set here?”
“Almost,” Seth answered, scribbling. “We’ve got it packed up except for the padding. I don’t have it on my list.”
“You’ll see to that personally?” Angela wanted to know. That padding would save Safe Haven lives.
“Right this minute, if you like,” Seth joked lightly.
“Yes, that would be good,”
Seth frowned a bit at the tone, but rose and did as she wanted.
Angela waited until Seth was gone and then met Doug’s glare. The big man hadn’t been given an envelope and he was staring resentfully.
“It’s not because you’re sick,” she began. “You won’t accept that, I know, but time will prove it.”
Doug didn’t respond and she left the tent. In a few days, the big man would understand why she’d put him with the sheep. Until then, he would help with the thousand other chores she needed done. It was FND, for lying. Everyone now knew he had type II diabetes.
Angela knew where Seth would go first and took herself there as well, aware of Zack still trailing her. Zack had opened his first order this morning and he had questions. His was one of the few envelopes that hadn’t been dated for Labor Day.
Angela spotted Seth lingering outside the kids’ training tent, hoping for a moment with her even though Becky was busy working. Angela took a paper from her notebook as she joined him.
Seth straightened defensively, but Angela only handed him the sheet, not even casting a disapproving glare. He understood why when he read it.
I want the sheep moved tonight. You’re overseeing it. Start right this minute.
Seth hadn’t been given an envelope either. This was the reason why.
Happy, Seth spun away from the training tent. He would see Becky in the morning, when he returned from escorting their people to the den. It was a job with too much honor and authority to allow anything to distract him. Seth was out of sight, then out of mind, a few minutes later.
Angela was pleased. And sorry. More guilt settled onto her shoulders and she stood straighter, balancing it. She’d discovered why Adrian had stopped to do this so often. There was always a new layer of weight being added.
3
Inside the kid’s training tent, Marc wasn’t happy.
“What are you hiding from me?”
All four teens went still and silent, tossing up even thicker mental blocks than they had already been using.
“Let me guess. She gave you a job I won’t like and then told you to keep it secret?” Marc snorted at the crumbling walls and shifting eyes. “Great.”
He took the chair in the center of the tent and brought up his protective bubble “Someone shoot me and do it now!”
Shoulder-to-shoulder, all of the kids drew weapons and started pulling the trigger.
Marc waited until all of them were empty before lowering his shield. Bullets clattered to the floor at his feet. “Jennifer, perfect. Conner and Charlie, not bad, but a bit low. Becky?”
The girl was staring at the gun in her hand.
‘Rebecca?”
Becky’s head snapped up. She shrugged. “Got lost for a minute. What?”
Marc pointed at the slug in the tent wall behind his head. “Is that yours?”
She nodded resignedly. “Yes.”
“Why?”
“I flinched at all the noise, even though we have the plugs in our ears,” she answered, embarrassed.
“That makes you a frontline shooter,” Marc said, motioning for them to reload. “If you’re in front of your team, you won’t hit any of them with a stray round.”
Becky vowed to always do that. She only wanted to hurt the enemy.
Marc got into the target position again and gestured. “Put the blindfolds on, one at a time. You’re following my sounds. Becky goes first. Everyone else, stay behind her.”
Outside the tent, Angela sent the witch in to be sure that no one was wounded. The teenagers weren’t like her girls, who were making fewer mistakes now that they had a couple months of training under their belts. It would take the same for these kids to show the progress. In the meantime, Marc would pass on important details that might save their lives when things went crazy.
The kids knew what was coming. With their gifts, she wouldn’t have been able to keep their roles from them, so she’d told them shortly after they’d chosen Charlie as their team leader. Despite the youth and inexperience, all four of these teenagers were going to play vital roles in her plan and Angela would try to live with what came from it.
Angela went to the final canvas in the widely spaced row and tapped on the flap. The men inside were working on ‘under the table’ projects that had to be in place when the majority of the other envelopes were opened.
“Hey, boss,” Neil called without looking up from the temperamental explosives that he and Jeremy were packing for travel down the mountain. “Almost set. Last thee boxes here.”
Angela stayed near the flap, aware of Shawn right outside. He was ready to grab her and pull her to safety if something went wrong with the boxes.
Neil tucked the plastic under the edge of the white block and slid the package into the anti-static bag.
Jeremy took the brick from there and placed it in the thickly padded box. Neither man spoke.
Angela left the warm tent, not wanting them to be the least bit rushed, and felt Shawn’s relief. She flashed him an annoyed glance.
Shawn shrugged, smiling wide enough to make his dimples show.
Angela tossed up her hands in exasperation. Men!
Shawn chuckled, dropping back a bit as Jeremy and Neil came outside while their team loaded the boxes onto the truck that was also inside the wide tent. Angela hadn’t wanted anyone to see what they were working on back here. They’d done a great job of deflecting the curious, even Kevin, who had pretended he was searching for Cynthia.
“All go, boss,” Jeremy updated her. “On all of it.”
“All three locations are a go?” Angela queried, needing to know for sure that she was ready as she could be.
“Yes. Half a team at each site to wait for the main group,” Neil said, not liking the idea that Angela had felt the need for three dens to keep their people safe.
“We cleared them yesterday and last night,” Jeremy added. “We’re all set.”
“Good. Seth is in charge of the move. You two will help him until it’s time to open your envelopes.”
Both men nodded, stifling questions and protests. She hadn’t responded to anyone who had tried to get more information out of her.
“In a few days,” Angela promised them. “you two will be back here with a lot on your minds.”
All three males around her tensed, for different reasons.
“My plan is bigger and I see more. Follow your orders and things will all work out in the end.”
“Can you swear that?” Neil demanded. “Can you swear we’ll be back with her?”
“Yes, so long as everyone does their job,” Angela vowed, not wincing at that guilt layer. She had to have people like Samantha on the front lines, even if it cost their lives.
Zack had been observing as she visited with each tent and thought he now had the answers to most of his question.
“I’m heading out,” Zack said.
Angela nodded. She’d let him figure it out for himself and he had. He wasn’t the only one being kept out of the main loop with a secret job. Most of the fighters wouldn’t like knowing Zack was wiring explosives into all three of the dens that she’d chosen. Zack and his team had already been busy since Marc returned and their days were only going to get longer.
4
He comes. Beware.
&nbs
p; Sam paused in the middle of twirling cold spaghetti onto her fork. She’d been enjoying the warmth of Dog curled on top of her boots, but that comfort was gone. She glanced around slowly, feeling an icy chill that screamed for attention.
Who? she asked warily. Samantha hadn’t been communicating with that voice inside. She wasn’t sure of the rules or the etiquette.
The enemy.
Samantha found Angela at the next table and locked eyes with her, uncomfortable with the new gifts she’d been given. The visions were often ugly.
Angela scanned her and then left the mess without a word to anyone.
Samantha found Marc in her mind an instant later.
Marc took in the blurry images with dismay and also left without speaking.
Neither of them had told her to keep it quiet and Sam didn’t try to stop Jennifer and others from reading the danger. Instead of the panic and confusion that could have ensued, all of the females and their mates looked at Sam, waiting for orders. Even Cynthia.
Sam felt the pride and the stress of making the right choices, but the need to save whoever she could overwhelmed the other emotions. “He’s here. She’s right on the time. Go get your gear. While you’re alone, open the first envelope and get on it. The waiting is over.”
Neil and Jeremy appeared at her side and Sam grinned sadly. “Wish there was time to get use to this.”
Neither man knew what to say.
Sam let them off the hook with a sharp tone and a big smile. “Snap to, Eagles!”
Neil opened his mouth, maybe to question her real meaning, and Sam stopped him. “No. Let’s go spend a few minutes in our tent while I pack.”
She headed that way before either of them could argue.
The mess was deserted a minute later.
A few seconds after that, the camp sirens began to blare.
“There’s a storm coming. Take cover. I repeat, there’s a storm coming. Please proceed to your tent and open your first envelope. Camp will be rolled in according to the new directives. Be in your assigned place before evening mess. There is no backing out now, no backing down. We are going to reclaim our country and drive out the enemy. This is our land, our lives, and we will never surrender!”
