The Widow (Federal Hellions Book 1)

by Gray Gardner

  “Where do you get all of this energy?” he asked, walking beside her underneath the tall cast iron gas lamps lining the sidewalk.

  “What do you mean?” she asked, thankful for the oversized coat as her feet froze.

  “Well you’re always into something,” he sighed, as the walkway curved through some newly planted trees. “Maybe you need some extracurricular activities.”

  “But I already have an art class and a music class,” she protested, looking up at him and sounding a little whinier than she intended. She honestly didn’t have any spare time, and she had the feeling this conversation was leading towards a time consuming endeavor.

  She spent part of the day in class and doing homework, but a lot of her time was taken up with e-mails about analysis with the lab at the DOJ or staring at satellite images of the school and surrounding areas for hours at a time. Extracurricular was her whole life.

  “What about sports?” he asked, glancing down at her and noticing that her pace was quickening. “It’s uh, a great way to make friends.” He sped up.

  “No,” she answered, shaking her head and trying to get to that dorm. What, did he think she was a loner now?

  He was surprised that someone who had enough energy to traipse around campus at night and break into buildings wouldn’t want a release like some sort of organized activity.

  “Just no?”

  “No.”

  “Have you ever played any kind of sport?”

  “I played soccer when I was ten,” she answered honestly. And everyone either knocked her flat on her back or shoved her into the mud. Like all of her friends, she just did pep squad and a little tennis in high school.

  “Perfect!” Dr. Thomas grinned, as they finally turned into the breezeway between the dorms. “I’m holding soccer tryouts in a couple of weeks. I want you to come. I think you’d really like it.”

  No thank you. She turned to decline his invitation, but he quickly pulled her to the side of the door and removed the coat hanging on her shoulders. He then stood beside her and leaned over to her ear.

  “Put your hands on the wall.”

  She quickly complied, placing her hands on the cold, rough brick and leaving her backside completely undefended. Which was his point, she was certain. Then the lecture began.

  “Don’t let me catch you with another cell phone, Jane. I really am very sorry that you’ve lost your parents, but school rules are in place for a reason. I won’t tell the Dean but remember, I’m watching. Have a good night.”

  His hand smacked down on her behind, sending her hips flying forward and causing an involuntary squeal to escape from her mouth.

  She tried to say something, but he had shoved her inside and the door swung shut in her face. Awesome. A spanking. That definitely wasn’t going into her daily report to the guys back at the agency.

  Problems and Punishment

  That Monday her art professor was going on about their video projects when the dean’s assistant interrupted with a note for George. She about had a heart attack as the plump woman approached with the pink slip of paper. Had Thomas squealed on her? The feeling of betrayal quickly left as she opened the note at her long table, students looking over her shoulder, and realized it was a coded message from Director Nelson.

  Her new cell phones hadn’t arrived yet and apparently Nelson had something important to say.

  Grandma is sick. Please call at lunch.

  As the class slowly resumed, she half-smiled and folded the note up, placing it into her bag. That could not be good. Nelson wouldn’t have tried to reach her unless something had gone wrong on her end of the op or unless George had really screwed up. She knew it was the latter.

  “George!”

  She pulled the receiver of the portable phone in the social room away from her ear as she sat on the edge of one of the leather couches and ate a chicken sandwich.

  “I didn’t—”

  “Did you really have to involve me in this?” Nelson snapped. Her breathing, and a faint tapping, like heels on a floor told George that her boss was pacing. Again.

  “I didn’t have a choice!” George argued, making sure she was alone. “This Thomas guy is perceptive! He had your number and I couldn’t have him calling my parents in Texas! And I couldn’t very well eliminate him!”

  “Well for God’s sake don’t step out of line anymore! Next call I get from him, I have to come have a conference at the school. And he wants me to come watch some soccer shit or something.”

  George rolled her eyes as she exhaled. She was always so good at blending in and going unnoticed. She could acclimate herself into any and every situation. She’d been everything from a dealer to a librarian. In the past year alone, she had people convinced she was a Spaniard and a Colombian.

  Why was Dr. Thomas onto her?

  “George!”

  “I got it,” she sighed, controlling her temper. “I’ll try and blend in better.”

  “Just call me tonight when you get the new phone.”

  Someone walked into the social room, so George quickly signed off and ran to her next class. What was she doing wrong? Why was Thomas focusing on her?

  She thought about his hands pulling the coat off her shoulders and his gentle touch and voice as he instructed her to position herself for his spanking. He wasn’t cruel about it at all, which was how she’d imagined that type of discipline would be. And although he was kind about it, she felt chastised. She sort of felt like she wanted it to happen all over again. His attention made her feel things she hadn’t felt in a while.

  And if she was totally honest with herself, she understood why all of the girls drooled over him. He was strikingly good looking.

  Damn it.

  The bell rang, and she clutched her bag tightly as she walked to his class and tried to remember what it was like to have a hopeless high school crush. What did she use to do when she liked someone? It had been so long since she’d dated—or even flirted.

  “Good afternoon, Jane. Should I frisk you for that cell phone or did you heed my warning?” Dr. Thomas asked, standing directly in front her.

  George giggled at the memory of the emphasized warning and nodded like an idiot as they stood at the door to the classroom, then turned and walked inside, rolling her eyes at herself. The look he’d given her was either one of suspicion or one of sympathy because she was so pathetic. Crap, she had to get it together.

  Dr. Thomas closed the door as the last student scrambled in and walked to the front of the room. He leaned against his desk and called the far right row up to the board to do homework problems. The guys groaned and shuffled up. The girls passed and batted their eyes, smiling and strutting. The last to walk up was Jane, who actually smiled adorably and took a spot at the board with the most complicated problem. He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen her genuinely smile, and he was certain it was never aimed at him.

  And he really wished the only word to describe her wasn’t adorable.

  Then, when the students were asked to explain, the boys monotonously pointed at their work, and all of the girls, including Jane, shot affectionate glances his way as they showed how they got their answers. It was weird.

  When class ended, there was no note to come see him at his desk. She quickly left before the circumstances could change. She had work to do. Dr. Thomas, however, ran after her and caught up just as she was walking outside and buttoning her coat as the wind blew her hair across her face.

  “Jane?”

  Damn, she’d almost made a clean getaway. She didn’t have time to chat, though. She was going to try and find Clancy and get an invitation up to his room.

  “Yes?” she asked, not smiling adoringly, not looking like she was naming their unborn children, just giving him an inquisitive look as she fiddled with the top button on her coat and squinted in the sunlight. She had a lot on her mind.

  “Is, uh, is everything all right?”

  She shrugged and nodded. “I guess so.”

  She
was just happy that he hadn’t made her stay after class. She had a lot to do that afternoon, starting with the call she’d placed to James Clancy the day before. She shot a quick smile at her professor.

  “Was there something I forgot in class?” she asked leadingly.

  “No,” Dr. Thomas shrugged, shoving his hands in his pockets as the breeze picked up. “I’m just hoping that I wasn’t too hard on you Saturday night.”

  Wow, he really was a nice guy.

  “Dr. Thomas,” George began, looking down at her saddle shoes. “My parents died a long time ago. It doesn’t bother me to talk about it.”

  He glanced right and left, then softly said, “I’m sorry I had to spank you, Jane, but I had to get my point across.”

  The blush that filled her cheeks was cute as she looked down and nodded her head.

  “All right, well, if you need anything other than cell phones, you can come and talk to me whenever. I’m always in my office if I’m not in class or on the soccer field.”

  “Thanks,” she nodded, casually turning and walking away. That was awfully nice, and he was awfully nice to look at, but now she had to focus. As she headed towards Penway Pond, she spotted a tall figure in the shade of the tree. Clancy was right on time.

  Dr. Thomas rubbed his jaw as he watched her. She sure could turn it on and off in a hurry. He could have sworn she was imitating the other girls during class, and very poorly, but the second before she was just as she’d always been; distant and preoccupied. She turned for Penway Pond and he darted back to his classroom, smiling and acknowledging all of the girls who looked romantically at him, then closing his door and grabbing the binoculars. What was she doing?

  She heedlessly approached the boy standing under the tree, but it wasn’t James Clancy. It was a senior.

  “You Jane?” the tall boy asked, as George approached and paused, glancing behind her.

  “Who are you?” she asked, taking a step back. And where in the hell was Clancy? She had a long list of questions and even a script she’d memorized to try and get him to talk. And it all rested on the basis of her getting him to take her up to his room.

  “Christian,” he replied, leaning back against the tree. “Clancy sent me. He’s got detention.”

  “Then I’ll see him when he doesn’t have detention.” She huffed, turning and starting back for her dorm. Rule number one, always stick with your guy and don’t stray.

  “You got money?” he asked.

  “Maybe,” she paused, not sure if this kid was for real or some kind of wannabe. She looked over her shoulder. His pupils were huge. He definitely wasn’t a wannabe.

  “How much do you have?”

  “I have enough.” She scoffed, folding her arms across her chest.

  “Then try this. I know you’ll like it,” he said, offering her a lipstick tube.

  She took it, looked at it like she had no idea what it was, even though she knew exactly what it was and started worrying about how deep these kids’ connections went, and handed a hundred fifty dollars over to him.

  “What if I need more?” she asked, placing the tube in her coat pocket.

  “You won’t,” he chuckled, pushing off of the tree and walking away. “Come back to me after you try that.”

  “Well then what if I wanna party with my boyfriend?” she asked, trying not to sound too eager. He stopped.

  “I was hoping if you liked it, that you and I could hang sometime,” he said, sounding a little more forward than he wanted to.

  That was a little too easy, but she needed to see where this was going. She shrugged and stepped closer. “He does live all the way in DC.”

  “I’m free on Wednesday night,” he offered, raising his brow.

  “Meet me in the student parking lot at ten pm,” she replied, looking him up and down. “Mine’s the big, black Tahoe.”

  He nodded and backed away as she turned and headed for her dorm. She knew what had happened there. James Clancy had told his friend about his good looking new client and he wanted in on the action. If she could get him alone in her car, she could possibly get more than a couple of names out of him. Maybe even his supplier, if not his connection anyway. As she strolled, she glanced behind her, found the coast clear, and sprinkled most of the white contents of the lipstick tube out next to her leg, sealed it in an evidence baggie to mail to the lab later and headed on her way.

  Dr. Thomas didn’t know what felt worse. His concern and protectiveness towards Jane was significant. He had no idea why she was conversing with Christian Whitman or buying what looked like drugs from him. The jealousy he felt about their rendezvous that was supposed to happen on Wednesday night—if his lip reading was still up to par—left a pit in his stomach. And again, he wondered why she’d handed over a hundred plus dollars for whatever she’d gotten, only to dump it out onto the polo field on her way back to her room.

  He watched her intently the following day. At breakfast and lunch, she ate by herself, joined only momentarily by three girls he knew to be involved in the UN Youth Council. During his class she turned in her perfect work and attentively took notes, not ogling him as she had the day before. What was with her?

  “Jane, a word, please?” he asked, approaching her on the sidewalk outside after class had ended.

  She turned and looked guilty as she stuck her hands behind her back and faked a smile. “Dr. Thomas? What’s up?”

  He grabbed a handful of her coat and yanked her forward, reaching around and prying the black cell phone out of her hands. She had been on an important call with the director, detailing what she’d do on Wednesday night and how she would extract information from the Whitman kid. Dr. Thomas put the phone to his ear as he watched her.

  “Jane’s aunt?” he asked, looking down at George and clicking the phone closed. “She hung up.”

  George scratched underneath the barrette holding back her parted hair and narrowed her eyes in the afternoon sun. This was fucking unbelievable. How in the hell was this guy always one step ahead of her? She was supposed to be the observant one.

  “I can explain that,” she blurted, pointing at the phone in his hand. Jesus, would he spank her again? She had conflicting feelings about it, but she also needed to get some work done for her real job.

  “I’ll bet you can,” he replied, grabbing her coat again and pulling her back inside. The coat fell off of her shoulders and a hand on her back led her into the classroom. His voice at her ear was so gentle but strong. “Hands on the desk, Jane.”

  God, his words made her toes curl. She swallowed and looked down at the large desk in front of her. The hand moved up to her shoulder.

  “I won’t hurt you. I’m not mad. But you need it.”

  For some reason that gave her comfort, so she slowly placed her hands on the desk. Why was she so complacent? The calming hand on her shoulder disappeared and left her feeling cold, but that sensation was soon replaced by a hot sting across the thin pleats of her skirt. Then a ruler slapped down on the desk and the hand was back on her shoulder.

  “No more phones, Jane. I’m running out of excuses to keep you out of the dean’s office. And trust me when I say that you don’t want that.”

  He walked around and sat her next to him at his extended desk, which was a brown file cabinet. “Now you get to spend the rest of the afternoon helping me grade the freshman exams.”

  She stared at him as he sat next to her and plopped a huge stack of papers in front of her. She didn’t have time for this. She still had to follow Christian Whitman to his dorm, bug his phone, and figure out who he associated with at the school and beyond. There was no way she could sit there and grade algebra papers.

  “Something wrong?” he asked, flicking the red pen around in his hand. He seemed on the verge of getting pissed off.

  She obediently picked up the red pen in front of her. “No, sir,” she sighed, pulling the top packet off of the stack and beginning to mark the wrong answers according to the key. She was furious at herse
lf for getting caught, but she was even more upset at the fact that no matter how she acted, flirty or aloof, he still managed to notice her more than the other students. And what the hell was that awesome smell coming from his direction?

  “Why are all of your word problems about medicine dosages on the field of battle in Iraq?” George asked, breaking the silence between the two of them as Pink Floyd played softly from his computer. She glanced over at him from the current test she was grading and raised her brow.

  “I don’t know. I guess you write what you know,” he nodded, as her blue eyes suddenly brightened.

  “You were in Iraq?” she asked, with a grin. She didn’t believe it.

  “Don’t act so surprised,” he laughed, placing another packet in his finished pile. “I’m not as soft as I look.”

  “No,” she interrupted, shaking her head and looking at him admiringly. “No, it’s not that. I’m just… impressed, I guess. I’ve, uh, never had a professor who was a war vet from Iraq.”

  “I was a medic,” he nodded, looking humble as he smiled. “And I was only there a year. Not sure how big of a difference I made.”

  “A pretty big one, I’m sure.” She nodded, looking at him like he was crazy. She turned back to her papers, genuinely impressed that this spoiled professor who probably had tenure and a sporty foreign car would actually do something as selfless as going to war for his country.

  The bell at the campus chapel rang and they both glanced at the clock. It was six pm, time for dinner and time for her to get out of there.

  “Sorry,” she sighed, glancing at the half-graded stack in front of her. “I guess this means you’re going to have a late night.”

  “No,” he grinned, standing and helping her put her coat on. “It means we’re going to pick up where we left off tomorrow after class.”

  She turned and frowned up at him, mouth open in distress but unable to express it.

  “But, Dr. Thomas…”

  “I’m busy tonight. See you tomorrow, Jane,” he said, turning to shut down his computer. He had to really tamp down the urge to send her out of the door with a quick smack on her backside. She was a good kid, but she needed to listen to him or she’d find herself in real trouble she couldn’t get out of.