Deadly Force (2 page)

That’s what I get for marrying a military man.

She’d never dreamed when she’d finally caught up with him after high school and said “I do,” that Cal would end up career military. He’d run to the Navy to get away from her. Once he had her, she figured he’d serve out his term and come home.

Wrong.

Once he’d served, the Navy had gotten into his blood. He’d become driven and relentless in his quest to serve his country, especially after he realized he couldn’t give her the future they’d both dreamed about as innocent kids.

She’d matched him career-step for career-step, graduating top of her class with a double major and an offer from the National Security Agency. When she’d told Cal she had accepted the position, he’d brought her champagne and chocolate truffles and then made her swear on his tattered copy of
The Art of War
—a book he kept close at all times—that she’d keep her nose out of his work.

Hard to do when you worried constantly about your husband’s safety and you had access to everything he and his commando team did.

From down below, she caught the whiff of wet dog and screwed up her nose.
The dog’s new
.

Cal had always been a dog guy, but with their insane work schedules, having any kind of pet was out of the question. “Someday,” he would always say, “I’ll retire and we’ll have a dozen dogs and a couple of kids.”

Devoted as he was to the SEAL team, someday had never come. Not until now.

Bianca scanned the marina, saw no one watching her.
It’s the one you can’t see that you have to worry about.

Which was what had brought her here. There was a man looking for her. A man who had a bullet with her name on it.

She’d lost her family, had no friends because of her insane work hours and need for secrecy, and she was in the process of giving up Cal—her only touchstone. Now her job and her life were on the line.

Loser
. Her mother had always called her that, and maybe it was true. She’d never done anything right, no matter how hard she’d tried. With her high intelligence and photographic memory, she’d never been normal. Hated the very word. So here she was, on the run and about to screw up Cal’s life all over again.

What choice did she have? She’d told the truth…he was the only man in the world who could protect her.

That’s what being
ab
normal got you.

Swallowing the sudden lump in her throat, she sought cover inside
The Love Boat
.

Chapter Two

Stark
was the only word to describe Cal’s new home.

No one would call this place home,
Bianca thought, her heels clomping on the deck to the descending wooden stairs. She’d never been sentimental and could appreciate a functional, sparse place, but this was downright sad.

The upper deck held the bridge and navigation station. Below deck, the walls were unadorned except for a set of weather instruments to measure wind speed and barometric pressure. From the looks of their ragged frames and scratched glass, they were originals. Ditto on the sailcloth curtain hanging over the window above the bunk bed, and the cheap, dark paneling lining the galley and head.

Living quarters
. That’s what Cal would call it. It was definitely no love boat.

The place smelled like freshly brewed coffee, wet dog, and sea air. Bianca’s gaze skimmed over the bed with its tussled sheet, a bottle of Jack Daniels on a shelf, a gun next to it, and across from the bed, a small table with a bench seat.

Her eyes came back to the bottle. Cal never touched hard liquor. Was the bottle a left-over remnant, like the weather instruments, of the previous owner?

She picked up a squat glass from the sink and examined it in the low light. A few drops of brown liquid clung to the bottom. She sniffed and the acrid scent of whiskey met her nose.

If the previous owner had left the bottle behind, Cal had made use of it. As much as it surprised her—he never drank anything stronger than beer—she didn’t blame him for seeking comfort with a shot of Jack. Being a SEAL meant everything to him, and now his career was over. He’d lost three men, was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, and was facing a military investigation. If she knew him at all, she knew he cared little about the outcome of the investigation compared to the deaths of his friends and teammates. Those men had been closer to him than brothers. He’d carry the responsibility of their deaths, and the families they left behind, forever. Even if, in the end, she proved he wasn’t responsible for what had happened in that terrorist compound.

Her eyes fell on the gun. Cal always had guns, but she didn’t like what her brain synopses were floating past her frontal lobe. Setting the glass in the sink, she checked the gun’s chamber.

One bullet.

Her stomach did a dive.

Cal, suicidal? He wasn’t the type. After what had happened, however, who knew what was going on in his head.

Why didn’t he come to me
?

Because your marriage is over
, the voice in her head admonished.

Pain in her chest made her place her hand there. It wasn’t logical…her IQ was 146, genius level, but she couldn’t figure out how to fix her marriage.

The real irony was that her EQ, emotional intelligence quotient, was so low it caused her all manner of interpersonal problems. Cal had been the only person she’d ever had a real relationship with. He’d brought passion and excitement to her life, to their marriage. He’d protected her from the first day he met her—no small thing to a young girl with no father and an abusive mother.

The floor under Bianca’s feet rolled, making her shift to keep her balance. Her stomach was empty, but it threatened to bring up dry heaves. Backing away from the gun and whiskey bottle, she hugged her briefcase and leaned her butt against the cabinet to steady herself. There was nothing inside the briefcase that would prove Cal was a pawn in a government cover-up, but like him, she needed something to hang on to. Cal had given her this briefcase the day she graduated from MIT. It had become her lucky charm.

Right now, she needed all the luck she could get.

The only proof she had that Operation Warfighter had been compromised before Cal’s team even hit the ground was in her head—something she’d accidently come across while investigating a cult leader several days ago—and it was circumstantial at best.

But she knew when she was being followed. Knew when her phones had been tapped and her emails were being read. Hell, she was one of the NSA’s most elite eavesdroppers. She better damn well know when
she
became a target of the very government she served.

Her encrypted cell phone buzzed inside the briefcase and Bianca startled. She did that a lot these days…jumping at every noise, every shadow. Getting distracted by all the cranial activity inside her head.

Pulling out the phone, she glanced at the display.
Punto
. Bianca shifted her thought process, clearing her head of blown missions, Big Brother, and bullets with her name on them. She had to pretend she was at work and not let on she was about to disappear. She raised her voice to be heard above the waves and growing wind outside. “Hey, Ronni. What’s up?”

FBI agent Ronni Punto was part of the Southern California Violent Crimes Taskforce and working undercover on Project Bliss trying to take out a narco-terrorist. “That name I gave you yesterday? Did you have a chance to track it down, land an address?”

Bianca had an eidetic memory. She could recall details of every case she’d ever worked on without the aid of notes or memorization…one of the reasons the NSA had wanted her before the ink was dry on her degree. “The name Fire Chetfler was bogus as you suspected. It’s a codename. I played with the letters and came up with Rife Letcher. Ran that through the system and got a hit. His rap sheet includes everything from petty theft to B&E.”

“Hot damn,” Ronni said. “Where can I find him?”

“Unfortunately, his current physical address won’t help you.”

“Why not?”

Bianca sank down in the padded bench seat and rested her briefcase on the table. Her roiling stomach seemed to appreciate it and settled down. “It’s the state pen. He was convicted of prescription drug tampering and Medicare fraud six months ago.”

“You’re kidding.” Ronni mumbled something Bianca couldn’t hear. “Any possibility he’s running this ring from inside?”

Bianca shrugged even though Ronni couldn’t see her. “Anything’s possible.” The motto she was currently running on and hoping would save her life. “I’m checking into all the visitors he’s had since he’s been in there as well as his lawyer’s background. If there are any leads, I’ll give you a heads-up.”

“Thanks, Marx. You okay?”

Ronni Punto hadn’t been a fan of Bianca’s when she’d joined the taskforce. Bianca was too direct and didn’t know how to play well with her coworkers, often saying things that annoyed them. After surviving the cult operation, however, she and Ronni had grown on each other. Neither of them was the touchy-feely type and there was a sort of respect in that. They each recognized that the other was there to get the job done, and they shared the mutual goal of survival in a world of alpha males and giant egos.

What Ronni didn’t know was that Bianca’s gig on the taskforce was a cover for another mission. One the NSA was keeping off the books and another reason Bianca had to go about business as usual. Whoever was keeping tabs on her knew about Command and Control, but they’d never expected her to come across the damning information she had. “I’m good. Working. You know…”—she cringed—“normal.”

“You sound like you’re in a tunnel with a vacuum running.”

The wind continued to rock
The
Love Boat
and it sounded as if the waves were getting serious about toppling it over. “There’s a storm here. Must be a bad connection. I better go.”

“Before you do, I wanted to say thank you for the books. It’s not easy figuring out how to talk to Adam and understand his bipolar disorder, but we’re making progress. I appreciate your help.”

If anyone knew about mental disorders, it was Bianca. Ronni’s brother was an easy case compared to her mother. “As long as he stays on his meds, you two should be fine.”

“Do you want to grab some lunch today? I’ll be back at the office by noonish.”

“Um.” Bianca wished she could meet Ronni for lunch, and on some levels, it surprised her. She didn’t do the friend thing, but lately it had been nice turning to Ronni for advice. Sharing a laugh with her over a case and learning the art of socializing. “I can’t today. I have a…an appointment.”

“Okay. No worries.” From Ronni’s tone, she knew Bianca was lying, but wasn’t going to hold it against her. She seemed to understand Bianca’s uncomfortableness with relationships. “Talk soon.”

Bianca disconnected, a hollowness filling her chest. She liked Ronni and didn’t like disappointing her, but it couldn’t be helped. She couldn’t involve her taskforce coworkers in this.

Fingering the phone, she considered turning it off, maybe even dumping it over the side of the boat. She’d already diverted the GPS signal with a little software code that was all hers, so anyone tracking her phone would think she was miles away at a Starbucks in downtown San Diego. Her usual haunt during the week. But going AWOL from Command and Control would require more than disabling her phone’s GPS and would tip her hand to those tracking her. Not the smartest idea. Not yet anyway. Not until she talked to Cal and got his feedback.

She only hoped he would help her.

She sat back and toyed with the zipper on her briefcase. Her fingers shook ever so slightly, and she clenched her hand tight. She was in serious trouble but this wasn’t her first rodeo. The information she’d intercepted and decoded may have put her life in danger, but now she was here. If anyone could keep her safe until she figured out how to expose the truth, it was Cal.

She thought she’d made it clear to him that her life was in danger, yet he’d taken off with the dog.

Good to know he puts his dog’s wellbeing over my safety
.

Cal took Maggie along a familiar route, then doubled back through a less populated area. A week ago, he’d been a mess, anxious every time he went out in public. An expert at threat assessment, he’d never felt unsure of his surroundings. He’d relied on his unit, his team, to always have his back. Once they were gone, his mind continued to be stuck in Afghanistan. Every noise made him jump. Every person who stuck their hands in their pockets was suspect. He felt claustrophobic in every store. The places to hide an IED were too numerous.

Even outside, tall buildings were hide sights for snipers. Every corner was the perfect place for an ambush.

He felt like a walking target.

The only place semi-comfortable for him was on the water. The minute he saw the boat for sale, he knew it was the only place he’d find peace. What he found when he showed up to take ownership, was Maggie.

Since then, she’d become his “unit.” She had his back, kept him centered. Calmed him down when the anxiety hit. He still struggled with crowds and entering buildings, but he was doing better thanks to her.

The marina had two escape routes, a parking lot, and the shack with the office and rental equipment. From his location, Cal could see all of it. Vehicles in the lot were few, none with tinted windows or out-of-state licenses. No faces stared out from Chewy’s shack or any of the boats. Because of the storm, few souls were out, making his reconnaissance easier.