“Ready to lift Alyssa?” Hunter asked coming around to the front of the car. Tink looked at him and then to me in confusion, Hunter took the assertive road. “You must be Tink,” he guessed extending his hand.
She took it, shaking it gently with a looked that demanded answers. “And you are?”
“Hunter, Hunter Grayson,” He revealed with a smile that could melt anyone’s suspicion.
She had trouble closing her mouth for a second, and when she finally did, the oddest sound came from her mouth. Laughter. “Hunter Grayson?” She giggled pulling her hand away. She looked at me with the same amused face. “This is the help?”
I sighed, and then turned to the car. “Ignore her, let’s get the trunk. Tink can you get the door?”
“Sure, sure, sure.” She laughed on her way to it.
I grabbed one end of the trunk while he grabbed the other, “So… does she always laugh when she meets people?” He whispered as he lead the way towards the door.
I shook my head, “Ignore her.” I repeated. She, as well as the other girls, knew who Hunter was from my Special Ops stories, why she would find this funny I couldn’t fathom.
Inside, the group from the conference room came to greet us, all possessing a curious eye on the trunk in the middle of the lobby and the guest standing next to it. I acknowledged Victor and Liam first, since I hadn’t seen them since the wedding, “Victor!” I smiled practically leaping into his arms, but this time he was so guarded by Hunter’s presence that he barely caught me.
“Pop Harris.” I addressed hugging him as well, following with Danny and Jeff.
It was Jeff that brought attention to Hunter, “Who’s your friend there Chance?”
I had almost forgotten, that they didn’t know Hunt. “Oh sorry, Hunter this is Kristen,” I gestured since she was the closest to him.
“Hi Kristen, Hunter Grayson.” He greeted shaking her hand.
Kristen didn’t laugh, expressing her surprise in another way. “Hunter Fucking Grayson.” She repeated, making Tink laugh again. “No fucking way!”
“Well you got two out of three names right,” He joked still shaking her hand.
Doc’s expression demanded an explanation and I gave her one, “I went up to New York to get some supplies from my old house, and we bumped into each other. He’s offered to help.”
“Small fucking world.” Kristen stated, still shaking his hand.
“Hand Kristen,” Doc reminded as she stepped forward, taking my explanation a step further for people that weren’t familiar. “Commander Grayson is a friend of Chance’s from her time in ‘Special Ops.’ Nice to meet you, I’m Tawny.”
He shook her hand, a hint of his Biloxi drawl touching in. “Nice to meet you too. I’m sorry that we couldn’t meet under a better circumstance, but I assure you that I am here to help in whatever way I can Miss.”
“Thank you,” She smiled, though I could tell she was trying her best not to take a liking to him instantly. She came back over, giving me a hug of my own. “This should be interesting Chance,” She whispered in my ear before letting me go, “welcome back.”
“It’s nice to see you’ve been talking about me.” Hunter laughed throwing a playful arm over my shoulder after he was introduced to the rest of the team and the others that came to help.
“Don’t flatter yourself. My girls have a long memory.” I sniped rolling my eyes.
“Good to have you back Chance,” Cam greeted coming out of the room with Adrian, who froze at the sight of the stranger with his arm around me.
I addressed that situation first. “Hunter this is”
“Adrian, I’m guessing.” He greeted kindly extending his hand after letting his other arm drop. “Nice to meet you man, I’ve heard a lot about you on the way down here.”
He shook his hand and nodded stiffly. I decided to explain who he was before Adrian could come back with a snippy comment about how he didn’t hear anything about him. “He’s a friend of mine from my Air Force days, he’s here to help with Juan.”
“And what is it you do now?” He pressed curiously.
Hunter didn’t mind the question, probably because he knew that they were all in some agency at some point. “DIA.”
“DIA?” Liam asked curiously, sharp to the tension emitting from his son. “Well we never worked with them before, nice to have you aboard, son. Let’s get you up to speed.”
“Alyssa’s already done that.” He admitted, “On the way up here.”
Cam shook the file in his hand. “Well I just received new stuff I was about to brief them on in the conference room.
“Well let’s get to it.” Ross suggested leading the way.
I took my seat next to Adrian and Liam, while Hunter pulled up a chair near Tink. Adrian put a hand on mine underneath the table and I had to think about if I were still angry about the fight, and whether or not to pull away.
Was I still mad at him? No, I needed him and cared about him too much to hold anything against him for too long. Had what he'd said hurt me? Absolutely, but everything we'd spat at each other was only said in the heat of the momentwith our hearts hurtingand it wasn't anything I wasn't already berating myself over. Fighting wasn't exactly foreign to him and me, but we'd always apologized at the end of it, and always moved on.
Sometimes, our thick-headed natures didn't always mesh. We were strong people independently from each other, but together, we were just...better. We'd forgotten that in the blink of an eye. It helped that I just knew him and it didn’t help that he knew me. He could see what I was doing, see that I was putting up defensive walls. It had just been so long since the last time I’d done that with him that he’d totally forgotten how to deal with it. Once I realized all of that, the hand stayed, and I gripped it into mine.
“How is the head?” I asked looking behind him.
He shrugged, “It’s fine.”
He did look fine, besides his nose, and I was taken back by it. Though straight, it was red, and looked slightly swollen. “What happened to your nose?”
“Nothing I didn’t deserve.” He whispered back.
He avoided my question “What happened to your nose?”
“Ask Pop,” He motioned dryly towards the other side of me.
I turned to him, he must have shown up just after Adrian and I exploded. I missed him, and now that I was back, I'd never been so glad to see him. “Did you have to punch him in the face Pops?" I queried, cocking an eyebrow at him.
He leaned in next to me after shooting a humored glace at his son. "Yes," he stated firmly. "Consider it like a slap to someone who was in hysterics, Alyssa. He needed to be brought back to his senses, because that's not who my son is...anymore." His statement was followed by his own raised eyebrow, Liam truly loved his son and only wanted to see him happy, but he also needed his son in control in order to find Juan and Cedrick.
I leaned over, kissing his cheek. "Thanks for fighting in my honor and all, but next time, just...smack him upside the head or some shit. Don't make him bleed," I sighed, pulling back.
"There won't be a next time," he snorted.
Cam allowed a few minutes of greetings, but eventually took Hunter aside to bring him up to speed. I could hear him, going over every name and face and location we'd already looked througheverything that was posted on the board. I was pretty sure the layout of the EXPO was up there, showing where the abduction started, along with my path toward the highway.
A file slapped down in the middle of the table, and Cameron took a seat across from us, but it was the looming presence of Victor behind him that Adrian’s fierce gaze locked on. This was the first time all of us had been in the same room since the melt down, and seeing us obviously reminded him of what happened. Victor was pissed, and I knew what he was about to say.
"Victor, don't," I asked, glaring up at him, but also mentally begging him not to start with Adrian, because I wasn't sure if I could take anymore arguing at this point. There was too much stress a
nd frustration floating around everyone.
"Little one, he..." Victor started, his fists opening and closing over and over at his side. Victor didn't scare me, because I could see his protective nature when it came to me, but it just wasn't necessary at the time.
“Vic," Pop Harris warned, looking up from his position at the head of the table. "That's my son...I handled it."
"Adrian," Victor seethed, ignoring Liam, altogether, "I will break more than your nose if you don't learn respect her. Am I clear? From what I could tell, she did nothing wrong…”
Adrian tensed, his fingers gripping the side of the table, but I watched as he calmed himself down minutely. "Crystal clear, Victor. It won't...happen again." His voice was thick with his vow, his temper barely under control, but I wriggled closer to my him in order to get his attention, because Victor didn't look appeased.
"Stop!" I commanded. Though my voice wasn't that loud, the table came to a standstill. "We can't do this..." I begged, looking to Liam, and then Doc. "We’re barely keeping it together as it is. Please! We need this..." I gestured to everyone at the table. "I need this to function together. Otherwise, we will lose it. We will lose Cedrick, and we will lose Juan. So focus people."
"Good girl," Doc praised softly from the other side of Ross, sitting next to Kristen.
"Between that and this new shit. There's way too much fucking testosterone around here for my liking," Ross stated suddenly with a dramatic sniff from the opposite end, looking around the table, and Doc tensedwaiting for her temper to explode I suppose. Or someone, because I knew that the ‘new shit’ was Hunter coming into the mix and Adrian’s reaction to it. "Everyone needs to calm the fuck down, or we'll never get anything done. Playboy!" she called, and he spun to look at her. "You okay now?" she asked, raising an eyebrow at him. "You let off some steam, I see. Chance, you okay, too?"
"Yeah," Adrian and I both said at the same time.
"See? That's all that matters," she said, smiling her sarcastically crooked, but beautiful smile. "It's not about you guys...it's between them. This is some scary fucking shit, but Doc and I aren’t losing it, so none of you are allowed to. If they've worked shit out, then I'm okay and we can focus that energy on finding my kid. Cammy, please continue," she huffed, waving at the file he'd slapped onto the table. "I'm sure we could all learn from whatever you've brought."
Liam chuckled softly next to me.
I seconded her, “My crew, we’re family. We fight, we state our opinions, and then we get the hell over it.”
Victor stared at Ross for a split second, only to turn his attention to Adrian and me. "Sorry, Miss Alyssa," he mumbled, before taking a seat. “Sorry Tawny, sorry Roslyn.”
Adrian huffed a small nervous laugh, kissing the side of my head. "Yeah, sorry, baby," he whispered to me.
"Me, too." I nodded, linking our fingers together and turning my attention to Cameron, who was clearing his throat.
"I was able to get some information out of Dr. Grubbs and his wife that I think you'll all find interesting," he stated. "The very second Cooper and I walked into the house the damn family practically begged us to take the man away," he chuckled, shaking his head, but turned to look at Tink. “They cut him off financially so he’s getting desperate.
The last time they saw him was at his wife’s birthday party. Showed up with Myles Thompson and his little girl friend, Zoe Nowak. Caused a scene, stole some of his grandmothers jewelry, and left. ”
“You’re kidding?” Tink gasped going to work on the female name.
"What we got on her?" I asked, glancing between Cameron and Tink.
"She was a patient of his," Cam groaned, shaking his head. "I asked Grubbs about his son, her, not to mention Myles. Dr. Grubbs opened up like the best of books." He chuckled, shaking his head again. "He confessed to everything like I was his priest." He paused for a moment and took at deep breath. "Zoe Nowak. A patient of his that was also Myles’s girlfriend. She was released from St. Elizabeth’s psychiatric center not even six months ago. She never should have left. You see Dr. Grubbs and Zoe…were…. ”
"Lovers," I sneered, shaking my head when he nodded. "So...let me guess," I sighed, sitting forward a bit. "In order to be released, Zoe and David blackmailed Dr. Grubbs with her affair. And he’s fucking backing them on the kidnapping and extortion. He's fucking helping her."
"Right on one, Alyssa," Cam stated with a smile. "Grubbs forged all the paperwork, fully aware what he was releasing out into the public, because he went in and changed her medical history, too." He pulled out a few pages from his file folder, laying it at my fingertips. "She's a sociopath, with no conscience, no hope for ever being a normal human being. No medication will make that better. But he gave them both ten thousand dollars. He knows nothing about Juan or Cedrick.”
“So now they ran out and want more.” Hunter guessed leaning back in his chair.
Jackson sighed, running a hand over his head. “So we got psychopath, an ex con, and a prodigal son on the street that shouldn’t be there.”
“In possession of our kid.” Ross groaned picking up a pencil. “This is some shit.”
Macon agreed. “But who the fuck is backing them now?”
“Tink, get us everything you can on this Zoe Nowak” Kristen ordered looking at the files. “Something doesn’t add up, were still missing players, not to mention what they actually want.”
“In all reality," Cam continued with a deep sigh, "if David hadn't come along, none of this would be happening. It was him getting everyone together that started this shit.”
"There has to be more. This guy was at the wedding," Adrian concluded in a subdued voice. Pointing at the paper we’d been unable to match to anyone so far. “I’m telling you, we have to connect him.”
“I can send it into DIA.” Hunter volunteered. “Have them run it off the record of course.”
“I’ll send it, just tell me where and make the call.” Tink agreed. “We might be able to find something.
"Probably," Cameron said with a nod. "But I wanted to talk to you two about something." He pointed a finger at Doc and Ross. "Assuming this is Zoe like to see how she reacts if Adrian takes the next call."
I pulled back from Adrian to look up into his concerned face as he said, "I really don't want to piss this bitch off, Cam. If they want to talk to Alyssa..."
"I know," Cam interrupted, holding up his hand to stop him. "but if they think someone else holds the key to the money, then she may be willing to negotiate quicker."
"Or she may get pissed off and hurt those boys!" Adrian countered, trying really hard to maintain his fear and his temper.
I winced, but turned his face to mine. "Hey, I can answer if she freaks out," I encouraged, shrugging one shoulder, "or we can both talk to her."
"I can't fuck this up," Adrian whispered, but it was heard loud and clear around the table. He shook his head, running a hand through his still damp hair.
"We won't let you," Cam stated with a shake of his head. "Adrian, this is what I do. Please just trust me on this. If I think we're about to lose her on the phone, we'll let Alyssa take the call back over, but I honestly think because she's not truly upset with you in general, she'd be calmer talking to you."
My boyfriend nodded nervously in acquiescence, but said nothing more on the subject.
“I guess it’s back to waiting.” Doc sighed.
Tink piped up after sending the fax to the Pentagon as Hunter suggested. “What did you bring us Chance?”
I had completely forgotten about the case until she mentioned it. “Oh, let me bring it in.” I started to get up.
Dario and Macon got up before I could. “We got it.” They offered going out of the room quickly and just as curious.
“What do you got in this thing Giselle?” Dario grunted, sitting the footlocker in the middle of the conference room table.
I climbed on the table sitting Indian style opening the trunk. “You know me, always preparing for war. It’s some
things that I left at the house just incase there was ever a need for them.” I pulled out the case on top opening it. Doc leaned in and Jackson winced feeling the memory of the Beretta.
“The Sleeper.” Tink grinned picking it up and playing with it. “Is it loaded?”
Jackson grabbed it from her carefully and put it back in the case. “Accidental fire isn’t the best way to find that out, Sugar.”
I couldn’t help but laugh as she frowned, “Sorry.”
“It’s not loaded.” I assured locking the case again.
Doc decided to explain to Liam, Victor, Hunter, Jeff, Dario, and Danny exactly what ‘The Sleeper’ was. “The modified ammo acts as a general anesthetic putting you to sleep for a few hours followed by a regional causing temporary paralysis. I designed the micro tranquilizers myself, with Tink’s help of course.
Liam was impressed. “Interesting. Does it work?”
I admitted, “I’ve only used it twice, so far I’m two and two.”
“It works Pop.” Jackson nodded. “I was a subject.”
They all looked at me confused by Bravo’s laughter, and I just shrugged. “Long story. Next, case.” I revealed opening up the case with six vials.
“I thought you destroyed those?” Kristen frowned sliding it over to Doc.
Doc explained again. “It’s a truth serum that I was working on, but I can’t get the side effects right.”
“Truth serum?” Hunter asked with a raised eyebrow. “Now I get it Babes, she’s a freaking genius too.”
“Told you.” I agreed. Ignoring the fact that Adrian tensed beside me as I reached for the next case. “As soon as we get our hands on one of those assholes were testing it.”
I opened it, forty-eight small chips, resembling a half dollar without the engravings perfectly sorted into six rows of eight. “Ah, ha. These are my design.” Tink grinned.
“What are those Tiny Tink?” Macon asked picking one up, turning it over and putting it back “You starting the new currency for after you take over the world?”
The Law of Motion (Law Series) Page 13
