He spit out the saltiness and dropped his mask on the deck. Behind him, Cindy laid a hand on his shoulder, three shades darker than usual, and for the hundredth time whispered, “Thank you.”
“You deserve it and more,” Hannibal said. “Besides, I’m having at least as much fun as you are so…”
“Don’t spoil it,” Cindy said. “Just let me appreciate my knight.”
Saint Tropez was just a fishing village in the sense that Las Vegas is just a Western frontier town. To Hannibal it was like walking through a movie set but to Cindy it was Disney World in French. But the sand on the beach really had been white, the drinks had been strong, and their time on and in the water truly magical. And healing.
“I’m happy with you just enjoying a vacation with your man.”
“A vacation?” Cindy dropped to the deck, pulling him down to sit with her staring out at the horizon. “Hannibal you haven’t 198just brought me to wonderland. You saved my life. You know that don’t you?”
“I think you’re overstating a bit.”
She punched his shoulder. “Don’t you dare make it less than it is. Maybe you don’t understand how important your work is to people. Maybe I didn’t know until this week.”
“You’re talking of me closing the case?”
“You gave me closure by finding the man who killed my good friend. You allowed me to understand why someone would steal him away from me. You let me see exactly how and why I was not to blame, and that I wasn’t a random victim. My world was spun into chaos, and you restored order.”
Hannibal closed his eyes for a moment, just enjoying the feeling of his woman’s arm around his shoulders. Could she be right? Was he some kind of knight in shining armor? No. Not a knight or a hero, he decided. He was just a sheepdog, sent there to protect the sheep in his charge from the wolves who wandered the world.
“Cindy, I love you, and I’m glad I was able to keep to our plans and bring you to the Riviera. The rest, well, it’s just what I do babe. So, how about you just thank me for the trip?”
Cindy’s smooth skin glowed in the sun. Hannibal slid a hand into her hair, covered her mouth with his own, and accepted his fair and just reward.
Author’s Bio
Austin S. Camacho is the author of the Hannibal Jones Mystery Series and the Stark and O’Brien adventure series. His short stories have been featured in four anthologies from Wolfmont Press, including Dying in a Winter Wonderland – an Independent Mystery Booksellers Association Top Ten Bestseller for 2008 - and he is featured in the Edgar nominated African American Mystery Writers: A Historical and Thematic Study by Frankie Y. Bailey.
He is also a communications specialist for the Department of Defense. America’s military people know him because for more than a decade his radio and television news reports were transmitted to them daily on the American Forces Network.
Camacho was born in New York City but grew up in Saratoga Springs, New York. He majored in psychology at Union College in Schenectady, New York. After three years, he enlisted in the Army as a weapons repairman but soon moved on to being a broadcast journalist.
During his years as a soldier, Camacho lived in Missouri, California, Maryland, Georgia and Belgium. He also spent a couple of intense weeks in Israel during Desert Storm, covering the action with the Patriot missile crews and capturing scud showers on video tape. In his spare time, he began writing adventure and mystery stories set in some of the exotic places he’d visited.
After leaving the Army he continued to write military news for the Defense Department as a civilian. Today he handles media relations for DoD and writes articles for military newspapers and magazines. Camacho is a past president of the Maryland Writers Association, past Vice President of the Virginia Writers Club, and is an active member of Mystery Writers of America, International Thriller Writers and Sisters in Crime.
The Camacho family has settled in Upper Marlboro, MD with Princess the Wonder Cat and their dog, The Mighty Mocha.
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