by M. Garnet
Could I fall in love with a man because of his eyes? How long does love last with a killer? Do actions kill love?
Love is strange no matter how young or old you might be. Scientist dedicate years studying to see what draws together two humans that love one another. I was drawn into love by a pair of dark dangerous eyes.
It led me from my normal life with everyday work hours and normal friends into a wild chase across the county that was laced with both the scariest danger and the most outstanding love and sex I had never dreamed was possible.
What I never expected was how it would all end up, after everyone wanted me and I was not sure I wanted anything but my old life back.
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Eyes Of Danger
Copyright © 2013 M. Garnet
ISBN: 978-1-77111-795-1
Cover art by Carmen Waters
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.
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Eyes Of Danger
By
M. Garnet
Dedication
Dedicated to all the men I have loved and who loved me.
I have gained so much in my life from having lived the experience of knowing them, from both the love and the pain I experienced with them.
Prologue
Love, the dictionary says, is an intense feeling of deep affection, a deep romantic or sexual attachment to someone. Yet these are only words and cannot express the feeling each of us has inside when we do find ourselves in love with someone, that personal inside draw that is definitely our own and we are sure no one else understands. Oh, the poets and composers seemed close to putting into words or music what some of us felt, that hits that center in our stomach and our chest and behind our eyes, that sometimes bring tears when we listen or read. But it is because we, each one, have had our own experience of love that one group of words or line of music has reached that point inside of us that holds our memory of love.
Yet, around us, there are people one feels have never known love. There is that man surrounded with emotionless men who have guns not exactly hidden beneath their jackets. These men are in offices with too much power that allows them to break the rules and rewrite the laws.
They are the people that think it is natural to use others, no matter what the cost. They believe they have a right to fight to get to the top over whatever body count is necessary. These people think that love is a weakness, a tool to use against others. Love, beware.
Chapter One
Michelle
Love. Let’s see what love has taught me. I have to laugh as I look at these words on paper. What did the poet say…let me count the ways. Sure—guns, hiding, stealing, fooling really nice people, and coming up against some really evil ones.
Love. It is a strange thing. A word we use every day, but one that we also wish for, pray for and dream about. Who ever thought that it could be frightening, or that it could hurt so much?
My name is Michelle Tompson, a nice old fashioned name for a tall slender girl with long reddish brown hair and brown eyes with a touch of green. Other than the color of my eyes, there is nothing remarkable about me. Yet, love had finally been unbearably remarkable.
Wait, I make that sound like a bad thing, but in my life now, after love, it is good. I can blend in to do the things I never believed I would ever do. I can go to a library and use computers to hack into areas considered non-hackable and no one notices the average but pretty girl in the corner.
Love. I had it for a short time—four days. That was ninety-six hours—five thousand seven hundred and sixty minutes, three times of watching the sun rise, and four times of watching the stars with someone special. It was the most amazing, glorious, star shooting feelings they write about. However, they forgot to tell about the pain, the ache, and the hurt that the loss of love brings. They forgot to tell you that if you lose it, you no longer looked at the stars even though you did not sleep. What little sleep you got was haunted with a pair of eyes that would disturb you for the rest of your life.
Because of those ninety-six hours, I learned how to field strip an AK-Forty Seven. Before that time, I had never seen an AK-Forty Seven. I knew how to hide a Glock within my clothes so that it did not make the clothes sag from its weight, nor bulge from its size. I now knew where to hide the additional ammunition in a vehicle so a police search would not locate it. Even now, I knew, thanks to the Internet, how to make a single shot thump gun just in case I was unarmed out in the woods. Hey, out in the woods, I now could make a fire, find water and eat bugs. Yuck, but I would survive. Because of Love, I would survive.
As a little girl, I filled my head with the fairy tale thoughts of love. Love of that kind was clean, spotless, with a handsome prince. There was hand-holding and gentle kisses that were never invasive. Just close my eyes, and warm lips would touch mine, then there was beautiful music, and the movie ended. All that neat Disney stuff, Prince Charming, and sighs with my preteen friends and secrets that we did not tell our parents.
In puberty, it all got a little messier—the sloppy kiss from the boy across the street with his desperate grab at my little undeveloped breast. It just didn’t seem like the stories we were reading. I had my closest friend. We traded books and secrets, but the rough fumbling by the high school boys disappointed the both of us. I did two things. I quit reading the romance books and went into history, and I gave up on the high school, and later, the college dates. Oh, I wasn’t a virgin, just hadn’t found the Love that was in the books, even in the history books. Sex was not very great either. I was not a hundred percent sure if I had ever had a real climax, though I sure knew how to fake it. I could pant and groan enough to make the guy happy and then find an excuse not to see him again.
So, here I am, twenty-eight years old, wrapped up in my blanket and crying myself to sleep due to the heartache of love. Why does it have to hurt so much, and why did it have to be only four days? And during that time, I really did have orgasms with no pretending, no acting—just mind blowing body shattering orgasms. All of this especially when I was so frightened at first.
* * * *
My best friend Connie Blue who is the same age as I am and working on her second husband along with probably her countless affairs once told me that when she couldn’t go to her favorite counselor, she found that the best therapy was writing it down in a journal. I bought a hard-bound book full of lined paper and started writing it down as I remembered it. Just as I was starting to write it down, though, I had to wonder why a woman with a forty-two D-cup who had two husbands and many affairs needed a counselor.
Actually, Connie was along at the start of it since she was what I had narrowed down to one of my few friends. We just did not realize that it was the start of anything. We were out shopping for something for Connie. She needed an excuse
to buy clothes to wear for a night out, and tried to pull me into going along. Personally, I would have preferred to spend the night at the dentist, but most of them closed at five so I could not use that as a reason not to go with my friend. At least I had a couple of days to come up with some kind of reason to avoid the pain of shopping. When I thought about it, Connie found any excuse to shop and buy new clothes. For her, shopping was fun and easy. Make it tight and bright, and she did not care about the price.
I was a little more of a problem. I was reluctant to break away from my budget and would not take from my savings for an outfit for a bar night. I also didn’t do tight and bright. I finally found a nice blouse to put an end to Connie’s nagging and she found three outfits that she would have a hard time deciding which one to wear, which meant we could at least get out of this store and I could get home.
As we were paying at the checkout counter in front, Connie tapped me on the shoulder.
“Okay, now I know why you drive that fancy jeep. It draws the guys.”
I looked out at the parking lot and was surprised to see a guy standing behind my jeep looking at it. I had a distant relative who worked at a dealership and he got me a great deal on the jeep, and I loved it. It was a soft top and in the nice weather, like today, it was the perfect convertible. I could put whatever I wanted into it without any fuss. It moved in and out of the heavy traffic with effortless stress.
We gathered up our packages as Connie grabbed my arm.
“Look at him. He is a hunk. Hurry up and we can talk to him,” she urged as she dragged me out of the store.
I could see the man as we pushed through the doors, but something made me hang back. I don’t think I could explain it, but I felt that something was not right. As for Connie, she never had a negative feeling about a male between twenty-five and fifty.
I was pleasantly surprised that I didn’t have to worry. We came out with Connie moving on ahead, all smiles and chattering. I had to admit I didn’t hear her. I just watched as he turned, watching us over his shoulder and quickly moved between several other cars. Then, suddenly, he was out of sight. I could see his tall head and shoulders moving smoothly through the parking lot. It was just someone who was looking at my four by four.
By that time, Connie was at the jeep, but I was still standing on the curb. I also realized I wasn’t breathing so I forced a deep breath, then another one before I took a step forward. I tried to think what it was that bothered me about the man. I had only seen him for a moment. I got an impression of a tall slender man. Still, he seemed to have some muscle in the shoulders and arms. He was dressed in military pants and boots, but a plain white tee. He had a backpack slung over one shoulder. This was not unusual in this day and age as the military-look was popular whether the man had been in service or not. He had brown hair streaked by the sun, but the one glimpse I got of his eyes was that they were very dark. He was taking in everything, not only Connie and me, but also all the others and any traffic as he moved away.
Connie had her packages in the jeep. She didn’t need an audience to talk to so when I caught up with her, she was still chattering. I had no idea what she had been saying. One of the reasons Connie and I got along was that Connie didn’t really need someone to answer her, just to be there as her mouth moved. She said things that were important to her ears.
By the time I dropped Connie off and got home, I had forgotten what time or why I had agreed to go out with her. I didn’t even remember what day we were going out.
To my sad experience, Connie didn’t let me forget the time or the date. Unfortunately, she wouldn’t put up with having her hair blown in the wind so I had to accept using her sedan. It might have given me two days, but I didn’t come up with any good excuse to get out of going with Connie. To make matters worse, she had two other friends. I had no problem with groups, but Connie’s friends were like her, more interested in taking turns in front of the mirror than in what had been on the Discovery Channel last week. They also were more interested in the most popular drink for this month. This meant I was the designated driver.
Everyone was bored with the first two bars. Since I was the only one who ate the appetizers, I started driving to the next couple of nightspots. Finally, they were happy with a lively bar that had too many people, too many bodies on the dance floor and waitresses with too little in the way of outfits. It was complete with music too loud, drinks that were too expensive with two-for-one offers. It was what they wanted, but what I wanted was out. I began to watch the sports TV and made sure the tabs didn’t get bloated. Yep, I really was having a great time. I was ready to go home two hours ago.
The group also had a great time squeezing in at the tall tables that had tall stools. They proceeded to make fools of themselves while they really got plastered. I just clung to the table, ignoring the requests to dance. Finally, one of the girls got sick. I helped her out of the bathroom, then rounded up Connie and the rest of the group to get everyone headed out to the car. At last, the excuse I needed to get us all home.
I got the keys out and used the remote to unlock the doors with the sick girl wrapped around my shoulder. Connie was dancing around the car, but her other friend leaned over the trunk. She seemed to have passed out since she just did not move. I was sure glad I came along because I really needed this whole picture. I got the sick girl loaded into the back seat and went around to get Connie. I gathered the sleeping one from the trunk into the car. There was a guy getting into his car on that side, so, of course, Connie began dancing with him. He wasn’t drunk, but it was obvious he had no problem taking advantage of a drunken woman. He easily slipped his arms around Connie, as they were moving together to the back of the cars.
As I got the other girl into the back seat, he had Connie up against his car, dropping kisses on her as he pushed his hand up under her blouse. The worst part was Connie wasn’t fighting but giggling and kissing back. She was into him as much as he was into the easy time. I walked over to pull them apart, but the guy wasn’t happy to have a sure thing taken away.
“Go on. I will see she gets home later.” This was from the guy who was trying to move Connie away from me.
“I don’t think so.” I pulled at his shoulder, but he swung his arm back, throwing me away against the car. I hit the car so hard it knocked the breath out of me for a second. Then I felt a hand on me, pulling me upright. I looked up, and even in the darkness of the parking lot, I knew I was looking into a pair of very black eyes surrounded by heavy lashes. I had seen those eyes somewhere.
I stood up, but he had already turned away. Within a split second, he had grabbed the arm of the other man, twisting it up behind him. The man let out a couple of yells as he was hustled forward between the cars, then out of sight. I stood up, but the drunken Connie giggled, starting after the men. I grabbed her so I could wrestle her into the car, snapped her seat belt, and ran around to the driver’s side. I took a moment to look over the top of the car, but I couldn’t see anyone near us in the parking lot. Time to get out of here.
I was sure, though, the help had come from the same guy who had looked at my jeep a couple of days earlier. Then, I shrugged and started the car. I went ahead to drive away. Just a coincidence, though a lucky coincidence, I thought.
Chapter Two
F. J. Franklin
F. J. Franklin sat at the plain metal desk looking out the window at the military base. He took the time to contemplate his life at this stage of his plans. He had a great deal of power and support. It had taken him years to get the power, but even longer to get the support. Most of it gotten legally. Then, when a Senator was stupid enough to be elected by the public as a nice clean Christian and then paid his staff to bring him ten-year-old boys from the back allies of slums, they deserved whatever pressure he brought against them.
He was aware of so much, but knowledge was how he controlled things. He was even aware of himself, of his strength and his weaknesses. He constantly worked on his wea
knesses, trying to overcome them, trying to eliminate them. His anger was one area that he couldn’t eliminate. For years, he had found it harder and harder to tamp down or to remove it. It was harder now to keep it hidden from others.
Right now, he had teams all over the world, but he wasn’t getting the results he needed. This was making him angry. He was looking out of the tiny window at the corner of the next metal building, doing everything he could think of to arrest that anger. Otherwise, he couldn’t act with the right motivation, the cool decision, the calm thought.
He had the best hard troops taking part in hidden operations, but lately, he had to be content with a smaller working team. He once had visions of grandeur, of heading up the nucleus of the top of the pyramid for the largest and richest country in the world with the trained army below him. Then, real life hit him in the face.
The troops were the best trained, but somewhere in their training, they developed loyalty to the wrong purpose. So only a very few, less than one out of thousands, could be turned to understandthat sometimes, it was necessary to do something that wasn’t covered by laws or so called morals.
To top the cake, there were really mentally gifted humans out there. Everyone wanted to use those talents. Of course, everyone played the game, pretending to claim that those with a sixth sense weren’t to be taken seriously. Many thought that the talent couldn’t be intertwined with physical actions, but he had found that there was some reality to some of these talents. If he couldn’t take over the military, he could take a different route. He could take a place behind the scenes. Take some men who would follow his orders to do whatever needed to be done. He would hunt for the talents he needed to gather a force that would provide him the power, even if it was to be behind the throne and not on it. Still, turning and using these people was harder than turning the normal troops. He needed them, but when one got away, like Tim Myers, it triggered his anger.
