A lot of people get killed in the kitchen by assuming it’s their house. I didn’t let Dee make that mistake, I drew going in her front door, and cleared the house. It didn’t take her half a shake to understand, she was port arms beside the drapes, watching the street as I left the living room. We were the only people home. I snagged the tablet for grocery lists, we weren’t saying anything out loud.
“Where’s the family?” I wrote, starting a conversation on a notepad.
“Folks,” Dee answered, “away from here.”
“City or country?”
Dee grinned. “Country, good neighbors/dogs, Dad’s AK no toy. Safe.”
I put the pistol away, leaving a round chambered. “Good - any unknown cars?” I wrote, starting to get that shaky queasy thing that goes with guns while she sat down on the couch. Dee answered with a shake of the head.
The queasy thing always starts in my shoulders, and works its way down. It was getting close to my knees, I flopped down beside Dee. I think hers must go the other way. When she rolled over for a hug her legs looked steady, but her shoulders were shaking. It took five minutes before either of us were ready to move. When we did Dee led us out onto the back patio beside the ‘Stang to talk, firing off the car stereo for cover.
“Carson,” she said, “what in the sam hell have we gotten into?”
“Um, best guess is big, black, and way nasty. Beyond that, not real sure,” I answered, scanning the back fence neighbors yard behind her. “Someone stuck a memchip in my calculator, lots of innuendo I didn’t have time to get sorted. If I were guessing from the language I’d say at least one power player is military intel. What tipped you off? You were open for business at dinner.”
“Jim, you know, the pj boy. He must be on our side.”
“I’d kind of figured that. But he isn’t under Cambell or we’d have been told.”
Dee threw an eyebrow at the sky. “Not of necessity. Cam is bigger than you think, Carson. But he’s not exactly military at the moment. Enough said?”
“Yup, more than enough,” I answered, wishing I had something to drink. Beer, coke, milk, something cold and wet before the epoxy in my throat finished setting up. “Tipped how?”
“We were doing the worksheets. Everyone is bored silly, so Jim says ‘bad guys bang-bang’, grins real big, and tags the teacher with a laser pointer. When I looked down my napkin had been flipped over. Jim had drawn the Japanese ideogram for assassins on it. I made three of them after class, and lost them. What’s scary is the one we took wasn’t one of the three.”
“So I wasn’t being paranoid in the hall then,” I said. .
“Hell, no. I was wanting something with a longer barrel and a bigger clip.”
Ours, plus three, the enemy had a squad in town. Whoever that was. And the odds still didn’t stack up. If they only sent one man after Dee then they’d made the fatal mistake of underestimating her the first time, but they wouldn’t do that twice. They must have had other targets, like me, or Jim, or both of us, or hell, how many of us were there? Depending on how badly our operation was blown several possibilities presented. One line of logic said they were short on both manpower and time, planning to take all their targets by surprise in one night and compelled to go out solo to do it. Obvious as hell it didn’t matter if they hadn’t known me from beans, as soon as his body was found I was blown. They knew I was in the room and nine millimeter and 45 ACP don’t come out of the same gun.
“This is not looking real good, Dee,” I said. “We have to assume they know your house. We can’t stay here.”
Dee nodded. “No, we can’t. But I have to call in the kill from the house phone, and my number is only answered at eighteen after the hour. Unless I’m told different we’re sleeping at a friends’ house tonight.”
When the clock agreed Dee called the number, didn’t say anything I didn’t already know, and hung up in less than a minute. She pulled out a burn phone to call her friends and clear us in. “You take the truck, go west, drive legal,” she said. “I’ll take the ‘stang the long way to the highway, and catch up before you need to turn.”
You’d look at Dee, the house she lives in, the way she dresses, the all American den mom of all time and never suspect she has friends like those. Drop dead gorgeous, but one an Amazon, the other a Valkyrie, and tattoos that made one picture when they had their shirts off and stood beside each other, which is how they were when they opened the door. We were barely inside when they took turns lifting Dee off her feet to plant multiple noisy smooches on her cheeks. You might think they were fond of her. I was making it a point not to look below collarbones. Dee introduced me to the Amazon, Tina, and the Valkyrie, Shelly. They looked at each other, shrugged in unison, and gave me the short version, except I’m tall enough they didn’t have to pick me up. I’m sure they could have.
They led us in by the hand, and put us on the couch. Tina looked at me with a sympathetic smile and said “If you were a bottle baby I can cover them up, if it will help.” Dee was giving absolutely no hint beyond a half grin that threatened to explode into laughter. I’m a big boy, it was just a bit of a shock, changing cultures without warning. About that point I was thinking Dee had them do it deliberately.
“Tina,” I said, “unless you’re fresh with something in the eighty proof range I don’t think they’ll be any problem.”
She laughed, and said “nope, sorry, dried up when I gave up the bulls. But I’ll see what’s in the fridge.” They both left the room, and when they came back they had shirts on, and huge tumblers of iced tea for all.
Once they’d completed their greeting a strange man ritual it didn’t take ten minutes to understand why they are very much part of Dee’s version of the baker street irregulars. Serious faces, serious voices, quick minds in their mid thirties. Formidable. I said nothing of consequence, Dee said little more, but thirty minutes later they opened the arms locker. They didn’t ask and they didn’t bother to button up before coming back, one toting a combat shotgun, the other a big bore ranch rifle, and side arms. Well, more front arms, with them. Amazing how well a pistol rides strap clipped between breasts like those.
“You didn’t ask,” Shelly said to Dee, checking her pistol, “but you wouldn’t be here looking scared, keeping company with a warrior male who looks scared of a lot more than us if there wasn’t major trouble brewing. We’re night owls anyway, we’ll mount guard, you guys go sleep or whatever. We made up the bed in the playroom just for you.”
I did sleep for a couple of hours, the clock on the wall read one thirty when I startled back awake. I’d only been staring into the dark for a minute or so when Dee said softly “Carson, does getting shot at make you horny?”
“Only if they miss,” I answered, and didn’t have time to wonder if something was about to get started before Dee rolled over on top of me. Dee is good medicine, I was sound asleep when MP’s led me in where Cambell was taking notes on a ghost recon. ‘Sir, we recommend stealth approach under cover of darkness, it’s a very tight perimeter. Best approach is from the south, but once you’re past the perimeter it’s open terrain, easy to move in. Use caution to the north, you’ll be vulnerable to the eyes, they generate total addiction. We lost Carson to the eyes. Other intel as follows: exceptional skill at all levels, deceptively powerful back and legs, twice the estimate, intel totally missed deep concealed nipples, how I don’t know, they’re unusually large and sensitive. Do not send in rookies, sir, not on this one, they’ll lose it big time with this twice over veteran momma, she’s…” and then Cambell, damn him, woke me up by pounding his fist on the table and the clock read five thirty.
Tina and Shelly were by the bed wearing soft smiles, holding hands looking down on us sleeping naked. No doubt about it, they both have a major chunk of hopeless romantic in their souls. Dee was cuddled up beneath my arm, her leg over my middle. “Rise and shine, kids. It’s a school day,” Shelly purred while Tina tried not to chuckle.
They fed us breakfast before they let us leave. Check that, they fed us a feast before the sun was up. Those gals are damn good cooks, both of them. Quite a pair.
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