At the Slightest Sound

by M. L. Buchman

There were times that Jesse wished he had the common sense that God gave a gopher. First thing he’d done at the house was track down Ricardo Manella—wonders of a phone listing. And it had spun out of his control from the first moment.

  “Colonel Gibson referred you? Well, isn’t that just so interesting. Yes, Isobel and I would love to meet with you, but we’re leaving the country in a few hours. Not exactly sure for how long—could be just a day or so. Could be longer. How about we meet for dinner? There’s a wonderful spot right by the airport.”

  “We just came from the airport, sir,” and having just gotten Hannah to the ranch, he wasn’t planning to backtrack all across San Antonio. If he did, the next thing he knew they’d be all the way back in the Colombian jungle as if yanked by a long rubber band stretched taut.

  “Oh, sorry. Not SAT. We use a private airfield northeast of the city.”

  He read off the address, which was thankfully quite nearby, and they’d been on their way to meet the Manellas before they even had time to shower—separately or together. He’d barely had time to leave a note for Daddy so that he wouldn’t worry.

  Someone was conspiring against him getting his hands on Hannah. A matter on which he was going to be filing a letter of complaint right soon if they didn’t cut it out.

  The “wonderful spot” was pure Texas. It was a weather-battered building that might have once been painted white, or maybe brown. It had a sun-faded sign that said “BBQ Pit” and a smell that had him rolling down the Toyota’s window from a mile out.

  Before they had a chance to go inside, an up-armored, black Lincoln Navigator with tinted windows rolled onto the gravel parking lot from the opposite direction with a loud crunch of tires and brief skid to a stop. The couple who climbed out were a study in contrasts.

  Ricardo Manella was a lean, wiry man, but those always seemed to be the guys who could go forever. He was five-ten—midway between himself and Hannah, and had that relaxed casualness that was so easy to discount, if he hadn’t had the Spec Ops gaze. Despite the sleek, wrap-around sunglasses, it was clear that he saw everything going on around him…everything. The loud Hawaiian shirt worn loosely over his black t-shirt didn’t hide his intense fitness. The scar down his left cheek looked wicked.

  “Pansy ass car for a soldier,” apparently Ricardo Manella’s version of “Hi, nice to meet you.”

  “Rental.” He should have grabbed his truck from the garage.

  “You work with Gibson?”

  “That would be the lady,” Jesse nodded toward Hannah, which earned him a surprised grunt. “Do not underestimate her,” he warned the guy. “How about you?”

  “Yeah, he rode my butt and rode it hard. The man is something else. As to women, I know the feeling,” he nodded toward the woman coming up to his side. “My older twin sister can be a real hazard when she puts her mind to it.”

  “He likes saying that. I’m only twelve minutes older.” She was gorgeous on the screen, but she was in a whole other league in person—both more and less dramatic than he’d expected. Shorter than Hannah, well-curved without quite tipping over into voluptuous, long dark hair with eyes to match, and deeply sun-kissed skin. Not the least sign of a soldier’s build—which made her on-screen fight scenes all the more surprising—but there was something about how she carried herself that said she could take care of herself in the real world as well.

  But this wasn’t just some woman, this was Isobel Manella, the movie star. He’d never met an actress—not a real one—and not one of any kind since high school. He’d always thought they’d be less…normal-looking. He’d have passed her on the street with nothing more than a “wow, she’s beautiful” thought. She didn’t seem…famous—whatever that was supposed to look like.

  “Twelve minutes and a day,” Ricardo countered.

  “I was born just before midnight and he was born just after. We get back-to-back birthday parties because Mama is awesome.” Isobel acknowledged in the Spanish-accented low voice that had made her a screen idol. “Mama always made one big batch of cake batter, to make two cakes, until I got wise to that and started asking for separate flavors. I was always the smart one,” she teased her brother.

  “And, like I said, way older.”

  Isobel ignored his last comment as she greeted Hannah with a friendly smile and a warm embrace, just like any two women meeting for the first time while he and Ricardo circled each other carefully. Women were strange.

  Inside, the place—restaurant was too fine a word, but “pit” was a fair match—was just as battered as the outside had made him expect: scuffed-dull Formica tables with red-leatherette-and-rusting-chrome seats. But it was still half full of cowhands and other locals, despite the mid-afternoon time. It had a soda jerk fountain, a big coffee urn (no decaf, no hot water with an assortment of tea bags), and a three-item menu board on the wall that hadn’t been altered in decades by the look of it: beef ribs, pork ribs, or brisket sandwich. The only fresh-painted thing in the place was a sign that declared, “No cash? No food.”

  Less than twenty miles from home, how had he missed this place?

  Isobel and Hannah slid into a long booth, which left him and Ricardo the lanky Latino ex-Delta to go up to the window for food.

  “So, what’s your twist?” Ricardo’s voice was Delta-soft like Hannah’s…and every other Delta he’d ever met.

  “Twist?”

  Ricardo ordered two servings of the beef ribs and two sodas.

  Not knowing what Hannah would like, he ordered one beef and one pork; but the soda machine stumped him. Finally, he decided she was from the South but not Texas, so he poured her a Coke and a Dr Pepper for himself. Ricardo hadn’t missed his hesitation and Jesse ignored his unspoken question. The things he didn’t know about Hannah were vast and not knowing if she drank Coke over Dr Pepper only emphasized that in ways he wasn’t comfortable with. At least there was no diet or caffeine-free option to worry about; the only other tap was for root beer and it had a faded and curling “Out” sign taped to it.

  Ricardo shrugged and went back to his earlier question, “Gibson wouldn’t have sent your lady to Isobel unless she had a twist. A gift.”

  “Thought we were sent to you,” but Ricardo was shaking his head. Jesse sighed. He didn’t know whether or not “your lady” applied either. He’d thought that relationships were supposed to make more sense with time, not less. Ricardo’s accent said local, which meant that the phrase “your lady” could mean a lot more than it seemed to, or a lot less, depending on the circumstances.

  When he didn’t answer, Ricardo shrugged as if it didn’t matter to him. Though Jesse suspected that it did. If that’s what the man had meant, it wasn’t his place to tell anyway.

  He was still pondering the word “gift” by the time they’d filled their sodas and returned to the counter for their orders. The conversation with Gibson had been curious. They’d never quite spoken of Hannah’s sonic capabilities. Not directly. And yet he’d sent them to meet the Manellas.

  “Sound,” Jesse said the single word, hoping he wasn’t speaking out of school.

  “Huh! That’s a new one. Just her, or are you part of it?”

  Jesse picked up the tray with the two massive platters of ribs at the window, “Bit of both, actually.”

  “That’s good. Wish Isobel and I shared ours. Think I’d like that.”

  Jesse suddenly wished he had a horse racing program to figure out this conversation, but they were already back to the table. It was like they were having a conversation without actually having it. He’d thought it was at least the same one, but now he wasn’t so sure. Ricardo hadn’t made any comment of just what “gift” he didn’t share with his sister.

  Isobel Manella was in mid-sentence. “—we have a few others like us. We’ve formed a club. Still looking for a good name.”

  “Well, the US Special Forces already have the Psy Ops for their psychologic warfare efforts, so that name is out. It should be PSI something,” Hannah responded as if
that statement made any sense.

  “Wait. What did I miss?” Jesse held out both the beef and pork for Hannah to choose as he slid in beside her.

  “Plenty, cowboy,” Hannah’s smile teased as she took the pork ribs—proving she was no Texan—and his Dr Pepper. That would teach him. He wasn’t a big fan of Coke.

  “Psy with a Y like in I’m gonna need to be seeing a psychiatrist if some figurin’ out doesn’t happen right soon? Or sai as in S-A-I like in the Japanese fighting knives?”

  “Psi with the ‘i’ like in science fiction,” Isobel said without batting an eye.

  He glanced at Ricardo, who, rather than looking disbelieving, was clearly enjoying Jesse’s complete overwhelm.

  Hannah started eating as if all of this made sense. Of course nothing really had since the moment he’d first met her sarcastic boots apparently hanging from a red dirt sky. Why should this be any different? He’d known her less than forty-eight hours and all of a sudden the new normal was that nothing in his life made sense anymore.

  “And what in God’s green world are you talking about? Psi powers are still all mythological, aren’t they? That hasn’t changed while I was deployed, has it?”

  “Well, we don’t talk about it much. But it’s not so mythical.” Ricardo selected a rib and started in on his meal.

  “How else would you explain what you and Hannah have together?”

  He stared at Isobel. “What we have together? Even I don’t believe in it…”

  Hannah looked at him as if he’d just stabbed her.

  “…except I’ve got no choice because it saved our lives. There are more people who…whatever?” It was the uncomfortable kind of itch that there was no way to scratch.

  Ricardo waggled a half-chewed beef rib at his sister and himself.

  “Haven’t you ever seen a sign for a psychic? They’re everywhere.” Isobel was now giving him the same amused look Ricardo had been.

  “Yeah, what rock do you live under, Outlaw?” Hannah’s voice still sounded hurt, which he hadn’t meant to do at all.

  “Psychics? That’s all card-reading and crap, right? Come on, Hannah. Until you and I ran up against each other, you would have said the same.”

  Her shrug admitted the point.

  “Asides, I live on a horse or in a helicopter, thank you very much.” It was hard to take offense at Hannah’s smile. Even when it was being as sarcastic as her boots had once been, it was a great smile. He also had the impression that it was something she didn’t deploy very often and he liked how easily she offered it to him in any form.

  A big hand thumped down on his shoulder as if it was trying to drive him through the aging springs of the booth’s seat cushion.

  “Did you say helos? Can always use another hand at the controls.” The big voice that went with the big hand threatened to create a sonic boom as big as the one Hannah had used to save their lives, except it was trapped within the confines of the BBQ Pit and seemed to rattle the stack of coffee mugs.

  Jesse looked up at the man who had just hammered him down. Then he looked up farther. He was taller than Jesse, which wasn’t all that common, and huge. Wide enough of shoulder that Jesse never wanted to sit beside him on a crowded airplane, and a bright smile in his dark face that might have been saying hello or might have been a feral warning that he was preparing to tear Jesse limb from limb just for the fun of it.

  “What airframes?”

  “Mostly Little Bird. Had a weird commander who believed in cross-training his pilots, so I’m also Black Hawk-qualified and enough time in a Chinook to not kill myself in one.” The monstrous twin-rotor Chinook still spooked him each time he took one aloft because they were so damned big.

  The guy stared down at him for a long moment as if he was processing numerous factors. “Gibson sent us a Night Stalker? Hot shit!” And the big guy shoved him over against Hannah on the long booth bench and sat beside him. “Tell me about your last mission.” His East Coast accent landed harshly on Jesse’s ear. He never quite grew used to how English was spoken north of Kentucky. At least he wasn’t a Yankee—they were almost incomprehensible. Maryland or maybe Delaware.

  Jesse ended up shoulder, hip, and thigh pressed against Hannah and he remembered why they were here. For her.

  A tall knock-out redhead, with eyes bluer than a spring sky, sat down across from the huge black guy, which placed her next to Ricardo.

  “Anton has no manners. I’m Michelle Bowman, we’re both Bowmans now.” She didn’t explain the comment before continuing on the same breath. “Call me Missy and you’re going down hard.”

  “Don’t mind Missy, she’s all hot air.” Then Anton twisted sharply on the bench. There was a loud clunk as a woman’s Crayola red cowboy boot slammed into the wooden front of their bench, probably missing Anton’s knee by millimeters and his own by only a couple handfuls of them. The two of them traded near feral smiles.

  Jesse introduced himself and Hannah. “She’s the one you need to be talking to, ma’am.” He nodded in Hannah’s direction. “Though I’m still not sure who or what y’all are.”

  “Well, these three losers,” Anton indicated Isobel, Ricardo, and Michelle seated across the table. “They’re all—” He jolted and glared across at Michelle. Apparently her kick had connected this time.

  The message was clear. Shut up, Anton, and let the women speak. Jesse was fine with that.

  “They—” Isobel started.

  “We,” Ricardo Manella corrected his sister, apparently enjoying living dangerously. Which earned him a sharp elbow headed toward the ribs; something he blocked with the ease of long practice.

  “They,” being an actress, Isobel clearly chose her words carefully, “are former warriors who no longer fit in the normal military world. We, in our little ‘club,’ are an elite contractor for US Special Operations. We specialize in what others aren’t allowed to do, or sometimes can’t do. The men would prefer we women took a background role—”

  “Damn straight,” Ricardo and Anton muttered in unison, though not very loudly.

  “But,” Isobel didn’t even break the rhythm of her speech, “since they’d be dead several times over without us, they can’t just shun Michelle and I the way they’d like to. Besides, Anton and Michelle are both gifted and are half-siblings.”

  “Mom’s side,” Michelle the redhead stated emphatically.

  “Dad’s side,” dark-skinned Anton stated simultaneously.

  “Half-siblings means you share a parent. Which one?” Was it even possible for a redhead and a black man to share the same parents.

  “Ma and Pa were married…” Anton started.

  “…then got divorced…” Michelle continued.

  “…had us while they were apart…”

  “Oh,” was all Jesse could think to say.

  “They do this thing,” Ricardo waved a beef rib bone at them. “Doesn’t matter if you interrupt them, it just keeps going. You should save your breath until they’re done.”

  “…then got another divorce…”

  “…and remarried. So…” Anton was smiling.

  “…we’re actually unrelated… Thank God,” Michelle muttered to the heavens.

  “…except…” Anton aimed a big finger at her.

  “…by our parent’s marriage. Kind of…”

  Anton missed his next beat because he’d snagged one of Jesse’s beef ribs, leaving Michelle to finish.

  “…half-half sibs. But that sounds confusing.”

  “That’s what sounds confusing?” Hannah whispered in his ear.

  “So, what gift do you two share?” Jesse hoped something would make sense soon.

  “Oh, we don’t share anything—” Michelle said.

  “—except being half-halfs,” Anton finished.

  “It’s this reprobate that I’m stuck with,” Michelle waved a hand at Ricardo.

  “Turns out we can talk to each other, silently,” Ricardo supplied.

  “Woulda been damned usefu
l for exams if we’d met back in school,” Michelle bemoaned.

  “Sure, except some asshole would have given me the wrong answer in Social Psych just to beat my grade.”

  “Not me. Maybe your big brother.”

  “Me?” Anton did a pretty good job of looking as innocent as a puppy, especially for six-five of buff soldier.

  “Telepathy?” Jesse had fallen off the edge of reality somewhere. Maybe this was how Hannah had been feeling in the field as she kept creating new sounds. Like his ears were buzzing and he was in mid-flight after being thrown by a horse—with a harsh landing coming up right soon.

  After a brief pause, Ricardo smiled and said, “Anton says ‘Bet your shrimpy white ass’.”

  “I’ll take that, but only because Anton is twice as wide as I am.”

  “I’m not the one you share thoughts with, asshole. Besides, I’d never say that to a Night Stalker. Ricardo’s got no respect just because he’s a Delta ground pounder. I started on the ground, regular grunt. But I jumped across and finally flew Hawks for the 10th Mountain out of Fort Drum. I know what kinda game you’ve got.”

  Michelle’s gaze hazed for just a moment then she laughed. “Anton’s wouldn’t be hot for the man. Just for his skills.”

  “Real telepathy? Like two minds as one or something?”

  “Thank God, no,” Michelle shuddered. “Like a conversation. When he isn’t speaking at me—which is usually, since he’s Delta—my world is blissfully quiet.”

  “Anton is a remote viewer,” Isobel continued. “Give him a reference point and he can often zero in on an image and get us a view of where the team needs to go.”

  “And what can you do?” Jesse turned to Isobel.

  “I’m an empath; that’s emotions, not thoughts. A terrorist asshole with mayhem on his mind looks just like any other civilian. Even Ricardo and Michelle couldn’t hear a thing out of place—if they could hear someone besides each other. But if they are assholes, I can always feel that. The same thing is true for Hollywood directors by the way. It’s very useful in my line of work.”

  Jesse looked at Hannah but wasn’t ready for her whispered question.