by Webb, Peggy
This was her chance to confront and dissuade said problem before anything out of order happened between them. To face and conquer it without interference from the team. That's why she'd wanted just the two of them on this low risk, low adrenaline recon. Cooler minds do prevail. She needed to clear the air because if she didn't, she was afraid she knew where this was heading. Sex. Maybe even something more.
Sex and work didn’t mix. Especially with their kind of work. Life and death situations didn’t allow for even minor slip ups that a distracting physical relationship could possibly initiate.
You didn't think with your head when you were involved with someone whose life was on the line. Made stupid decisions based on emotions instead of logic. Took stupid chances.
So, yes. It was time to sort it out with him. Admit that the attraction wasn't just on his end. Agree that they needed to face it, forget it, and forge on without acting on their more primal urges which, without a doubt, could jeopardize their future missions.
So she'd fix it. Nip it in the bud.
Satisfied that her secondary mission to clear the air with Haskins was a go, she fell asleep.
Yet as she slept, she dreamed. Unfortunately, Haskins was in the dream. Again.
Naked.
Again.
* * *
The Eastern Iowa airport was small but modern and efficient. As soon as they disembarked the plane, they rode down the single escalator and headed straight toward the rental car counters.
“Better get a 4-wheel drive,” Cara said, otherwise deferring the rest of the details to Haskins to select their ride.
Outside the terminal windows, a light mix of freezing rain and snow had started falling. She didn't like the looks of that but since she couldn't do anything about it, she turned to her GPS to acquaint herself with the Cedar Rapids area.
Five minutes later, Haskins met her by the exit door pocketing a set of keys.
“Everyone had the same idea,” he said.
She looked up as he held out the paperwork for the rental.
“Best I could do is a small SUV. Let's hope it's got good traction. And did we know we were running into snow?”
She let out air between puffed cheeks. “Weather reports have been sketchy. Last I heard, the snow was going to veer back north but, apparently, we're getting a little Christmas surprise. Let's regroup on the road and hope we're in and out before the worst of the weather sets in.”
After cleaning the dusting of snow off their white SUV, they stowed their bags in the back seat and Haskins settled in behind the wheel.
“Head north toward I-380. We've got a little ways to go.”
“Read me in,” he said, as they cleared the airport parking complex.
Need to know was standard mission protocol and up until this moment, Haskins hadn't had a clue what they were about.
“Palo, Iowa, about twenty minutes north of here, is the site of an aging nuclear energy plant.”
“Still in use?” He flipped the turn signal and pulled out onto the on ramp.
“As of now, yes. It's due to close in the next year or so, though. This plant has been in commission since the 70's so obviously it's got some years on it. In any event,” she continued then caught a gasp when the SUV hit an icy patch and fishtailed sideways.
“Sorry.” Haskins let off the gas, regained control and they continued on their way.
Windshield wipers worked at slapping away the snow that had picked up a little in intensity. The defrost fan ran overtime to keep the glass fog free.
“In any event,” Cara began again, relieved to see that Haskins had regained a solid handle on the vehicle, “RRA received a report from NSA. They intercepted a burst of cyber-chatter from an IP address in Cedar Rapids. This was a week ago.”
“And this nuc plant was mentioned,” he concluded.
“Actually, no.” She smiled grimly. “The plant was never mentioned, but Armageddon was - several times. Along with some veiled phrases that are typical of extremist groups wanting to make a big noise about a big bang.
“Before NSA could zero in on absolutes, though, whoever was communicating using this IP address got wise and started encrypting all of their messages. Then, two days ago, they went totally silent.”
“Which raised some red flags,” Haskins deduced. “Still a stretch to think we're going to find Armageddon in the making. From locals. In Iowa.”
“Apparently this same IP user had been on their radar a couple of years ago for much of the same kind of chatter but went silent then, too.”
“Until last week when they picked up this new communication. Still,” he said, sounding dubious. “Like I said. It's a stretch.”
“True. But stranger things have happened,” she reminded him.
“Yeah. 9-11,” Haskins mulled grimly. “Seems I remember a connection to one of the hijackers and Cedar Rapids.”
“There was that,” she agreed quietly and felt the overwhelming rush of anger and anguish and patriotism that had been the impetus for her Army enlistment and ultimately her service in the RRA.
She'd been a kid when the Towers fell, but she'd never forget the images on TV and the utter despair she'd felt for the victims and the country. Her future had been decided then and there. She wanted to serve. She needed to serve and her focus from that moment on was doing just that. As soon as she turned turned eighteen, she joined the Army, worked her way up to a noncom officer, furthered her education and advanced through both the service and her degrees to her position at RRA.
She'd led missions all over the world. Asia. Soviet Union. Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Central America. There wasn't a Third World or sophisticated European country where she hadn't laid down footprints.
Now? Now she was Iowa. The thought that she was within driving distance to the Field of Dreams as opposed to the killing fields of Cambodia made her smile. She was due for a cush assignment. She was banking on this sneak and peep being it.
Beside her, Haskins drove in thoughtful silence. She took the time to pull up the RRA message on her phone and reread the directive in case she'd missed anything. The orders had been short on info and long on speculation. Because of that sudden flurry of cyber-chatter over a very recent and very brief window of time, NSA alerted RRA to scramble together a team and check things out immediately.
Everything had moved at warp speed after that. They'd been wheels up out of LaGuardia within two hours of their return from their most recent mission in Somalia. Just the two of them. Traveling light and lean while Christmas travelers hummed along with the holiday music piped over the airport PA system between called and canceled flights.
She closed the message and stared out at the interstate which had become a ribbon of white. “Let's hope it's a wild goose chase.”
“Your Christmas wish?”
She smiled. “Close enough.”
They both knew that at any given time, there were details similar to theirs checking out threats, sometimes finding nothing, sometimes squashing a real menace that the general public would never hear anything about.
“The life of a shadow warrior,” Haskins said with a self-effacing smile. “Missed holidays, missed opportunities. Nothing but selflessness and sacrifice.”
“Yeah, that,” Cara said, appreciating this little glimpse of his sense of humor – something she'd rarely seen. “Regardless, whoever these people are, we need to find out if they're some wannabe bad guys just talking to hear themselves talk or if they're the real deal and they're actually planning something.”
“How did NSA settle on this nuc plant as the likely target?”
“Process of elimination. There are other potential targets in the area, yes, but none as target rich and as capable of producing death and destruction as this.”
“Got it. So has security at the nuc plant been notified?”
“Not yet. No need getting everyone's tail in a twist if it turns out to be a false alarm.”
He nodded. “So we're strictly recon and
assessment.”
“That's the directive, yes. We need to get a read on: a) if we're truly looking at a terrorist cell, b) and if so, if they're actually planning something - which would most likely be destruction or damage to the plant, c) if they have a plan, how far developed it is, and d) if they have the means to pull it off.”
He grunted, tapped his thumbs on the wheel. “And it had to be at Christmas. Of course.”
“If we're looking at jihadists, then yes. It's the most celebrated Christian holiday. But, if they're home grown and zealot, say environmentalists who are opposed to nuclear power on principal, they might simply want to take advantage of the winter weather to sneak in.”
“If they're environmentalists,” Haskins pointed out, “then they're not looking to do any real damage.”
“Right. These far out groups are happy to stage mock attacks just to point out the vulnerabilities of nuclear power, hoping to get nuc plants shut down all over the world.”
“The fools don't think about the havoc they create. Or that they could actually get killed themselves in their staged drama.” Haskins stared straight ahead, his jaw tight. “Or that if they're successful, a bevy of copycat attacks could be staged all over the world.
“The problem is, one of those attacks could be real then everyone's caught off guard as radioactive waste is released and we start seeing the consequences down the road.”
Cara heard him loud and clear. “Still, I vote for environmentalists as the best case scenario. They don't generally deal in bombs and rocket propelled grenades.”
“True that. But, let's say it is jihadists,” Haskins hypothesized. “Al-Qaeda. ISIS. And they want to blow the plant. If they want to do the most damage we're not exactly looking at a highly populated area. There are other nuc plants near much more densely populated cities.”
“Actually, they could do a lot of damage here. Think of Palo as the hub in a wheel connecting Chicago, Twin Cities, Omaha, St. Louis, and Kansas City and you've got plenty of population. The Mississippi is also a stone's throw from the plant. There would be major devastation all the way down to the Gulf if the river is contaminated with nuclear waste.”
“Guess I need to brush up on my geography. Hadn't realized where we are now in relation to Chicago, et al.” He slowed down for a semi when it joined traffic from an on ramp. “How much farther to Palo?”
“Not far. But this cell – and we'll call it a cell for expediency sake from now on - is not based in Palo. Per Intel, the IP address is from a computer in an apartment on the north side of Cedar Rapids.”
“Why not in Palo?” Haskins glanced sideways at her.
“Because Palo is a barely a town. It tops out at around a thousand people. There'd be no place to hide there without sticking out like an elephant in a strawberry patch.
“So, no. Cedar Rapids is about nine miles from the plant and close enough for a base of operation. Again, if there is an operation. And we're going to proceed as though there is.”
“Do we have a head count? Any ID? Pictures? Names? Faces of these suspected cell members?”
She shook her head. “I wish.”
“So we've got nothing, is what you're saying?”
“Pretty much.”
“And yet they're thinking home grown – whether we're talking Jihad or environmental terror?”
She shrugged. “Only because there've been no links or threads to any known groups from the Middle East or parts unknown to this area. Facial recognition software at major airports would have spotted any ringers entering the country and headed this way and they've tagged nothing.”
He pushed out a grunt. “You're forgetting that we've got a porous southern and northern border that pretty much ensures terrorists could enter with a ridiculous amount of ease.”
“True, but the chatter has been pinpointed coming only from this apartment with only local contacts, which indicates they're confined to Cedar Rapids.
“While we're here,” Cara continued, “both NSA and RRA are all over social media trying to find and connect more dots. We'll hear from them with details if they find a suspect. And any partial Intel we gather – names, photos – we can feed to them and they'll run it through the systems, see what they find.”
“Could be a long established sleeper cell as well,” he said after giving it more thought. “Planted by some offshoot of Al-Queda or ISIS just waiting for the right place, right time to pull the trigger.”
Before she could comment, a weather warning buzzed in on Cara's phone.
“Perfect,” she said after opening up the bulletin then reading it out loud for Haskins' benefit.
“A southern boy like you is going to love this. National Weather Service just issued a blizzard watch. A huge storm could approach central through northeast Iowa within the next twenty-four hours. Heavy snowfall with accumulations of twelve to twenty-four inches of blowing and drifting snow and subzero windchill factors. Underlying ice will make road travel difficult to impossible.”
“Sounds positively chilling.”
She glanced across the front seat at him. “I guess a watch is better than a warning. Let's hope the weatherman's wrong or that we can stay ahead of this storm. Otherwise, it looks like we might be up for mission impossible.”
Haskins braked lightly as a vehicle ahead of them skidded sideways on a patch of ice before the driver regained control.*
The STORMWATCH Series
Holly, the worst winter storm in eighty years…
Holly blows in with subzero temperatures, ice and snow better measured in feet than in inches, and leaves devastation and destruction in its wake. But, in a storm, the weather isn’t the only threat—and those are the stories told in the STORMWATCH series. Track the storm through these six chilling romantic suspense novels:
FROZEN GROUND by Debra Webb, Montana
DEEP FREEZE by Vicki Hinze, Colorado
WIND CHILL by Rita Herron, Nebraska
BLACK ICE by Regan Black, South Dakota
SNOW BRIDES by Peggy Webb, Minnesota
SNOW BLIND by Cindy Gerard, Iowa
Get the Books at Amazon
About the Author
Peggy Webb is the award-winning, USA Today bestselling author of almost 100 novels. The former instructor of writing at Mississippi Sate University writes in multiple genres under her own name and two pen names, Elaine Hussey and Anna Michaels. Reviewers dubbed Peggy “comedic genius” for her Southern Cousins Mystery series and “one of the Southern literary greats” for her acclaimed literary fiction. A native Mississippian, Peggy lives in a writer’s cottage tucked among flower gardens where she has quietly become the most prolific writer her state has ever produced.
Peggy also writes screenplays and has penned more than 200 magazine humor columns. Several of her books, including the Southern Cousins Mysteries, have been optioned for film. She holds a B.A. from Mississippi University for Women and an M.A. from the University of Mississippi. A gifted musician and actress, Peggy loves taking the stage at Tupelo Community Theater, singing in a 60-voice church choir and playing her vintage baby grand. She particularly loves blues and has stacks of blues lyrics she composed for her own amusement, including Why Ain’t You Dead Yet. Peggy loves hearing from readers. Follow her on her two blogs at her websites www.peggywebb.com and www.elainehussey.com as well as on Facebook, Twitter. Goodreads, BookBub and her Amazon Author Page. Sign up for Peggy’s newsletter at www.peggywebb.com.
Also by Peggy Webb
(A sampling of Peggy’s books, selected by the author)
Stars to Lead Me Home
The Sweetest Hallelujah
(written as Elaine Hussey)
Magnolia Wild Vanishes
(A Charmed Cat Mystery, Book 1)
Elvis and the Devil in Disguise
(A Southern Cousins Mystery, Book 13
Elvis and the Blue Suede Bones
(A Southern Cousins Mystery, Book 12)
Elvis and the Pink Cadillac Corpse
(A
Southern Cousins Mystery, Book 11)
Get a printable list of all Peggy’s books at :
www.peggywebb.com
Don’t Miss
THE EXPLOSIVE SUSPENSE SERIES
A ground-breaking, fast paced 4-book suspense series that will keep you turning pages until the end. Reviews describe BREAKDOWN as "unique," "brilliant" and "the best series of the year." The complete series includes the dead girl by Debra Webb, so many secrets by Vicki Hinze, all the lies by Peggy Webb and what she knew by Regan Black. You'll want all four books of the thrilling BREAKDOWN series!
