Finding Grace (10 page)

“Some of it is. Plays all kinds. You can never be
too sure what’s gonna come out of there.” Oh, they had no idea how
true that was.

He pounded on the door and the music dropped enough
for them all to hear, “Am I the only one who works around here?
Leave me the fuck alone!” before the volume returned to its
previous decibels.

Dagger opened the door anyway and three of them were
treated to a profile of nimble fingers flying, knitting needles
flashing, and a ball of yarn rolling toward them while Thorne’s
purple head nodded to the throbbing beat of the music and stared at
the monitors.

Markham actually took a step back when Thorne
scowled up at them.

“Give me an hour,” was all he said before cranking
the volume up even higher.

“What the fuck?” Hawks and Markham said as they
exchanged glances en route back to the big office.

Farley, still seated at a desk, laughed.
“Unsociable, belligerent little fucker, isn’t he?”

“And you’re sure he’s a he?” Markham didn’t look too
sure.

“Near as we can tell.” Farley shrugged.

“Hey, what happened to the window, anyway?” It was
Hawks this time. “And that chair looks like it got shot out of a
cannon.”

Farley started to open his mouth, but Dagger gave
him a look that closed it. There was only so much crazy those two
would be able to accept, and he figured they’d already reached
their limit.

“Just, ah, a little misunderstanding, is all, boys.
Nothing for you to worry your pretty little heads about.”

* * * *

Fifteen minutes later, Thorne was standing in the
doorway to the big office, carrying her soldering supplies and
wearing her new-to-her, freshly-snowed parka. The guys with Jack
had been the ones from the vision and she couldn’t help
herself.

She shrugged off the snow and the hood and started
talking as though they weren’t all staring at her. “I stepped out
for a minute, needed some stuff.” They just kept staring. “Hey,
don’t you look at me like that. What, with the way you guys sneak
around I can’t use a little subterfuge? I’m ready to tie bells
around your fucking necks before you give me a heart attack.” She’d
been toying with something a little more sophisticated, actually,
but she wasn’t going to tell them that.

She hesitated, torn between bonding and bolting,
before she set the box down in the hall and stepped in.

“You must be Markham and Hawks. Which one is which?
No wait, lemme guess.” She put her hand to her chin like she was
deep in thought. “It’s beyond my ability; you two have been
together so long your names should be hyphenated.”

Farley chuckled. “Psychic, just like I said.”

“Markham. Thanks for saving my ass, Thorne.” He
stood up out and reached for her hand. She grasped it hard.

“Hawks. Thanks, Thorne.”

The other man nodded and said it with his arms
folded. Great, another tight-ass GI Joe.

“How’d you know? Have you always been psychic? Can
you, like, read minds and stuff?”

Aw, this Markham was kind of cute.

She shifted and let her breath out slow. Now was as
good a time as any. “No, I can’t read minds. Intentions are pretty
easy to pick up on, though. Usually, the visions or whatever you
want to call them come out of nowhere. Sometimes I can find when I
seek. I don’t usually get much about me.” She tried and failed to
keep her jaw from tensing. “It started a few years go.”

Jack nodded like he remembered she’d said it before.
She should be more careful. Wait, she had just the distraction.

She smiled and looked at Hawks. “So, did you get to
play those three kings, or did you two have to pack up before the
hand played?”

The way GI Joe suddenly looked like he’d just seen
an entire battalion of ghosts was priceless. The other three saw
it, too.

With that sweet taste in her mouth, she said, “Say,
would you guys need to lug that comm unit around if your satellite
phone encryption was more secure? It would have saved time if I
could have called you myself.”

“I wasn’t aware that level of encryption was
available in a satellite phone,” Paul said from just inside the
door. Thorne wondered briefly if she shouldn’t work on those
proximity neck bells first.

She couldn’t help but laugh. “Is that supposed to be
a challenge, boss?”

He avoided her eyes when she looked at him, so she
just picked up her box and headed for her office. Fine, she didn’t
have anything more to say to him, either. He’d noticed her parka
and probably thought she’d worn it to make him happy after he’d
practically ordered her to replace Jefferson’s. She was
so
tempted to pop his big-Buzz bubble by informing him that she’d
gotten it because of what Jack had said about her not taking care
of herself, but she didn’t think it was a good idea to admit that
Jack had that kind of power over her either. Not out loud,
anyway.

* * * *

Nobody other than Dagger saw much of Thorne the rest
of the week. At least she was wearing a real winter jacket. Paul
wondered if she’d chosen something so oversized, ugly and used out
of defiance or because she felt safer in it than in something more
flattering. At least she’d stopped arguing about being driven
home.

He’d thought it a good sign when she’d introduced
herself to Hawks and Markham on Monday. Too bad he still hadn’t
been able to look her in the eye. And she’d been holed up in her
office ever since. Was she just immersed in her work, or was she
avoiding him? He wanted to know if she still trusted him.

He would have asked Dagger if she’d said anything to
him on those rides home, but it wasn’t hard to remember Thorne’s
“Judas” digs and how they’d bothered his friend. He didn’t want to
put Dagger in that position again, and maybe burn the last bridge
to Thorne besides.

It was Friday and three more of his men were back
from assignment, plus Mills. People that worked together needed to
play together. It could be the easy answer to seeing how Thorne was
doing, too.

He stopped at the big office first. “Why don’t we
knock off early today, get a head start on the weekend over at
O’Leary’s?”

A chorus of cheerful grunts and various other noises
of assent told him the idea was well received.

His answering smile remained in place until he stood
in front of Thorne’s closed office. He had no idea what kind of
music was making its way through the door, but it didn’t sound
inviting. He pounded twice and opened the door anyway. Hell, he was
a man, wasn’t he?

Thorne looked up at him and if she wasn’t smiling,
she wasn’t scowling, either. “What can I do for you, boss?”

Paul kept his voice easy and informal. “We’re
knocking off early and heading down to O’Leary’s. I’d like you to
join us.”

“Is that an order, boss?”

The fact that she hadn’t called him Paul since what
he’d come to think of as “The Big Misunderstanding” hit home. He
didn’t have to look too hard to see how she’d tensed up, even if
she was still leaning back in her chair with her feet up. Damn.
Pushing now was the last thing he should do.

“Not this time.” He tried to find his smile.

“In that case, thanks but no thanks. Is it okay if I
still take you up on checking out early? I’m just spinning my
needles here, anyway—elusive algorithm.”

Like that meant something to him. From what he could
see, she’d just stopped knitting. He should ask what she was
working on, try to engage her in conversation. She was like anyone
else, right? She’d love to talk about her work. But no, she’d see
right through any attempt like that, right to his doubt and guilt.
Besides, in the short time he’d known her, she hadn’t seemed to
like to talk about much of anything. She reminded him of Dagger
that way.

“You know, maybe I should ask Farley to drive you
home. It’s not like you’re going to improve your people skills
around Dagger.” God, he must be nervous because it had just slipped
out. He hadn’t meant to do his thinking out loud.

Paul wasn’t sure, but he thought Thorne was blinking
at him behind her dark glasses. She straightened in her chair,
letting the front legs drop back to the ground as she set her
knitting down.

“Are people skills a job requirement now, boss?”
She’d said it almost lightly, but damn if he didn’t feel trapped
all of a sudden.

Just then, Dagger called past him, “Hey Thorne, you
ready to go?”

She looked at Paul.

He scrambled to take advantage of the break. “So,
ah, riding with Dagger’s working out for you then?”

She tilted her head and said, “Yeah. He even lets me
plug my iPod into the SUV. You want me to tell him we should work
on our people skills instead?” Her mouth was perfectly
straight.

Paul’s eye twitched. He hadn’t felt this busted
since his mother’d found the empty beer bottle in the garden
shed.

“Thorne’ll be packed in a minute, Dagger.”

He couldn’t wait for a beer. And a shot.

* * * *

“Guess I’ll come in with you, take a look at the
menu.” Dagger had to drive around for a while before he found a
parking spot. People gave him odd looks walking down the street
with Thorne. He was used to getting looks from people, but not the
kind he was getting walking with the kid. He supposed they did make
an odd pair.

Tron’s little neon sign flickered.

Tron, or whoever he was, smiled ear to ear when they
walked in. “Thorne, so good to see you. Two of the usual?”

“Nice to see you, too, Tron. Yeah, the usual, plus
whatever Jack here wants. Put it on my tab—which I’d like to pay,
by the way.”

Thorne ignored the protest Dagger tried to
lodge.

Tron passed a piece of paper with a column of
numbers on it.

Thorne frowned. “Uh, Tron, is this for the whole
month? Should be more than twice this.”

“Thorne only pay for man wrong in head. Not want
money for Thorne and…friend.” Tron’s eyes flickered over him in
rhythm with his sign. Dagger started to protest again, but silenced
himself this time. Thorne, a friend? This was the second time
someone had said that. Not five minutes ago, he himself had just
thought of them as an odd couple. Shit.

A petite Vietnamese woman in her forties stepped out
and distracted him from his thoughts. She bowed low to Thorne.
“Call mother last month. Tell her your dream. She go to doctor. You
right, Thorne, she have bad heart. Doctor say catch early, save
mother easy. Only need pill every day. Thorne not pay.” Then she
disappeared.

Dagger couldn’t think of anything to say except
“thank you” to Tron when he brought their food.

They found Jefferson nearby, gave him his bag and
got back in the Escalade. He could see why Thorne liked the old
guy. He said some very sane things for a crazy bastard.

“So Thorne, what’s up with you and Jefferson? I
mean, the guy tells a good story, but that doesn’t really explain
why you look after him like you do.”

Thorne shrugged. “Nobody else does. He left his mind
in a fucking rice paddy forty years ago when Uncle Sam sent him
there and never gave a shit about what came back. Still doesn’t.
And you wonder why I’m so pissed at our fucking government.”

“He’s a vet? Really? But I thought you hated…” He
shook his head in the vain attempt to settle yet another Thorne
contradiction.

Thorne said, “It’s like this, Jack. It’s
because
I care about the soldiers and vets and the people
whose countries get torn up due to our government’s invariably
fucked up foreign policy that I have such a big problem with the
whole thing.” Dagger felt Thorne’s eyes on him. “The last people I
blame are the ones on the ground. What made you think I did?”

He remembered that first day. Had it only been a
week and a half ago?

“Because of what you said. Something about a
narrow-minded bunch of prehistoric, red-white-and-blue sheep.” He
thumped the steering wheel and changed lanes. “Said we’d follow a
flag anywhere.”

“Only after Mills called me an un-American liberal
fag. Helluva way for you guys to welcome a new teammate.”

“Helluva way for you to antagonize a room full of
men three times your size.”

“Those guys don’t scare me.”

“Really? ’Cause we’ve got this brand new window in
the big office making the other ones look dirty and a chair that
probably couldn’t even hold you anymore…”

He could actually feel the change in the air. They
were almost at Thorne’s place and he didn’t want it to end like
this. Besides, he couldn’t understand…“I know you’re not afraid of
me. Why not, Thorne? A little guy like you—especially a little guy
like you
—should definitely be afraid of me. So why aren’t
you?”

“’
Cause you’re such a sweet Georgia peach.”
Thorne’s grin was oddly reassuring.

“Fuck you, Thorne.” It should have come out harsher
than it did, but the release of tension in the Escalade’s close
quarters felt good.

“Only if you promise to be gentle.”

He barely snorted back a laugh.

“So why don’t you join us for a drink, Thorne? It’s
because you’re underage, isn’t it?”

He’d been wondering why he had such a hard time
picturing Thorne sitting in a bar and realized it was because the
kid didn’t look old enough to drink.

They’d made it to Thorne’s door.

“I’m twenty-six, Jack. You?”

“Twenty-six?” What! More like sixteen. “Thirty-four.
A really old thirty-four. So why won’t you come?”

“Look, it isn’t that I don’t appreciate the invite,
but I don’t drink. Shit’ll rot your brain, you know.”

He felt his lips curl into a grin. “I guess we can’t
have that. So why not just come to the bar, hang out for a while,
drink ginger ale or whatever it is you people drink.”

“I don’t go to bars.” The kid said it with the same
tone other people said they didn’t go to funerals.