Mackie's Men (8 page)

The five inch heels on her feet did fantastic things for her ego. She stood in front of the full length mirrored doors in her bedroom and checked out her appearance in detail. The small semi-auto causing a slight bulge on her left front side was barely noticeable. The simple black dress showed a small amount of cleavage, and in her opinion, too much leg, but Laura insisted the dress was perfect for her. Her hair had been professionally styled and hung smoothly over her shoulders. She wasn’t crazy about the way the wrist length sleeves of the dress clung to her arms, but she had to admit the person who designed the garment was some kind of genius. This dress made her look almost sexy, which gave her a laugh. She was the least sexually active person she knew.

Laura looked gorgeous and the General was hovering over his territory with a scowl at any man who he perceived to be a possible threat to his property. Especially after last week when an overzealous activist had crashed the cocktail party they had attended. Mackie had dealt with the man, and since it wasn’t the first time someone had approached the woman they thought was the Senator, she had been able to take care of the situation before many people noticed the man’s rants about the war in the Middle East. She had steered the guy out into the foyer of the building by pretending to want privacy for the discussion. When the Security Personnel finally realized that there was a problem, they hauled him away from the vicinity.

This was a bigger party than last week’s had been, and Mackie stayed close to her charge, but not so close that people would remark on the resemblance between the women. She was a decoy, it wasn’t the first time she’d assumed the role, and from the looks of Laura’s appointment calendar, this was just the beginning of the party season. Next week was Halloween, and knowing that one of the parties would be a masquerade would make it even more difficult for security.

She smiled, remembering how Laura had forced the big bad Army General to sit with them and watch a Bette Midler film about Halloween and witches last night. He’d flatly refused to allow his wife to dress as one of the witches for the masquerade party. Mackie had grinned when he tossed his wife over his shoulder as if they were in their twenty’s instead of their late forty’s, and smacked her on the ass. “You’re enough of a witch without the ugly make-up when you are in a mood. I refuse to allow you to force me to look at the woman I love with a big green wart on her chin, and ratty clothes. Now say goodnight to the nice lady, we are going to bed.”

Mackie was still grinning at them when Laura raised her head from the middle of his back and waved her way. “Goodnight.”

Several people approached the handsome couple, and everything seemed to be going smoothly so far. There were several diplomats and plenty of security here tonight, so she should have been able to relax, but for some reason, she couldn’t. She happened to glance up, and saw a man crouched behind a thick newel post at the top of the open staircase. It could be a person from the security detail, but they were normally not as furtive as this figure was acting. Mackie quickly made her way to the General’s side and signaled him with a slight nod of her head. Other than a narrowing of his eyes, he made no sign the interruption of their evening was more than a scheduling problem.

“Well I’m afraid it’s time for us to scoot, darling, we’re already late for our next stop and if we arrive much later, they might not allow us in the door.” He hustled her from the room as quickly as possible, and Mackie watched them drive away before she went back inside the building.

Her number one priority was safe, now she needed to find a dark corner and wait for an opportunity to speak with the influential hosts. The party was being thrown by one of the manufacturers of Drone technology. The stock of the company was rising rapidly with the uses for drones increasing into the private sector, and she cursed herself for not remembering the rest of the details concerning the company. Her only excuse was lack of time to completely study the dossier that she’d been given last night. Her initial perusal of the file had been routine, but Laura had several appointments to be at today, and time management wasn’t exactly the Senator’s top priority.

She watched the stairs to see if the figure of the man could still be seen lurking, but there was no one there. If there was one time in her life she hoped that her intuition was wrong, she hoped it would be now, but the hairs on her neck and arms were standing at attention, and she needed to move. She asked a passing waiter where the host was tonight. “It’s such a crush, and if I don’t find him before the party’s over, I’ll be in big trouble.” The older man smiled at the woman towering over him and directed her to a spot twenty feet over to her right. She thanked him and began making her way through the people, listening for anything that might clue her into trouble.

There were two men standing side by side in the center of the small crowd of people. Both men were tall, over six feet, but the older man was at least two inches shorter than the younger man. It was obvious they were father and son. They reminded her of someone, but she didn’t have time to search her brain for the recognition that it would require to figure out. The oldest gentleman spied her and assumed she was Senator Downs. She could tell he was happy Laura Downs had made an appearance and was even approaching him to speak. It would have been true enough had Laura stayed at the party. She always made it a point to be gracious and thank her hosts everywhere they went.

“Ah, the lovely Senator Downs has decided to grace our little get together. Allow me to introduce my son, Drummond Klinger.” As she shook the hand offered, the name registered and she smiled in a more friendly way. Her fingers were given a harder squeeze and she realized the old boy thought she was flirting with him. Well, she would use that as an excuse to speak with them privately.

“Gentlemen, you have a lovely party, with so many people wishing you well in your endeavors, I haven’t had a moment to speak with you in private on a subject the General has told me you have made inquires about. If I could have just a minute?” She smiled and widened her eyes, as they excused themselves from the four men staring at them in speculation. They walked to a semi private corner, and she leaned toward them.

“I am sorry, but I am not the Senator, she and her husband, the General, just left. I wanted to alert you to a possible intruder I saw earlier, just in case he isn’t one of your security team. There was a man wearing black clothing crouched on the highest landing of the stairs a few minutes ago, and since he is no longer there, I would urge you to get your security people looking for him. I have counted at least eighteen high profile people here tonight, and most are still in this room.”

Mason Klinger narrowed his eyes at her, she was certain his minions in the boardroom shook in fear at the look, but she was not his minion. “Who are you, young lady, and how did you get past our security?”

She grinned at the tone of his voice, but answered his question, “I am Senator Downs’ personal security guard, I assess any and all possible threats to her well being.” She looked directly at Drummond Klinger, “My name is Maxine Vaught, I think you might have heard the name before.”

She bowed her head acknowledging the men and stepped back, before walking toward the front doors. Her self-appointed task was done. If she was mistaken, they might be a bit pissy, but if she was right, and there was a threat, they would know it was there.

The puzzle of why Eric had been a target made perfect sense now. Drones were just interactive videogames, controlled by remote flight simulators, and the younger man developed those games.
Ha, and she didn’t even need to research that out. Score one for her
. She needed to speak with the General about something else too.

Liam was trying to make his way through the crowd of people to see who it was they were having such a cozy chat with. When she walked away from the elders, he would’ve sworn it was the woman who mocked him in his dreams. By the time he made it to the men, she was gone. They were scowling and leaning close to each other. “What happened?”

His father looked almost relieved to see him. “We might have an issue, it seems Senator Downs’ bodyguard saw someone creeping around on the second floor, the Senator left immediately and the guard stayed to warn us. She just left. We are trying to decide what the best course of action we should take without causing a riot.”

“Well first, I know Darryl Reynolds is upstairs, I just saw him heading that way a few minutes ago, so I think we need to sit tight until he reports in. If he tells us to get people moving out, we’ll worry about it then.” Thoughts of Maxine Vaught left as he considered the best way to move three hundred people out of the building without causing a panic.

His cell vibrated and he checked to see who the message was from. “Situation neutralized, party on!” Darryl was being witty.

“It looks like there was an intruder, Darryl says party on, so he has the intruder in custody.” His father was looking at him strangely, and he asked, “What?”

Now that Drummond had met the woman who had saved his nephew and his family, and had also saved Liam, he could see the attraction she inspired in his son. She was a beautiful woman. Statuesque, curved, and self-assured. The woman was capable with weapons and after tonight, he had to add that she was a very observant trained security guard.

“Oh nothing, son, we briefly met your mystery GI Jane.” Mason Klinger was eighty-two years old, but he acted like a man half his age most of the time, especially around beautiful women. “You should grab ahold of that one, sonny, she has, well, let me just say I wouldn’t kick her out of my bed if I could talk her into it.”

He knew it, the woman he’d spied earlier
was
Mackie. At least he now knew she was in the area. If she were a member of Senator Downs’ security team, it would explain a few things. It also gave him a way to contact her. His grandfather was right, if he got her into his bed, he planned to make it a memorable experience for both of them.

The woman was a mystery and he had been trying to find her for too damn long. She had been impossible to forget, and after a few nights of drinking and talking, his friends told him the same woman was haunting their dreams. As Darryl put it.

“She was like what I always imagined an Amazon or Valkyrie would have been back in the day. I tried to make it to her before Tyler shot her, but I was on the other side of Eric’s SUV when I heard the shot. I looked up and started running, but it was too late.” He’d shaken his head, as baffled as Liam had been at the time. “I keep dreaming about that face of hers, the scars, the whole thing, and let me tell you, if I ever get her near a bed and she’d healthy, I’m not surfacing for a week. I can’t dig up much on the woman, but I’d bet she has one hell of a story, if she were to share it.”

Liam agreed, right down to the week long bed stint. John had been researching scars and had identified most of Mackie’s injuries to his own satisfaction, and had shared his findings with both of them. The three of them had then made a timeline and cross-referenced the information in the reports like any good stalkers would do. Officially she was considered a semi-retired security consultant, yet they could find no contact information, and her trail went cold when she left the hospital.

They’d met her, now that they knew where to find her, they would need to find out more about her, and from the one meeting they’d had, getting ideas on how to integrate her into their sphere wasn’t going to be easy. Then again, they didn’t want easy, they wanted a permanent partner.

It hadn’t taken him long to call
, was her first thought. Mackie had been waiting to see if he would take advantage of knowing where she could be contacted. Now she knew that Liam was as interested in her as she was with him. When he’d called this morning, she was still surprised he asked her to meet with him at Drysdale’s Pub & Brew House. He must want this meeting to be a personal one, and she was nervous for the first time in a very long time. It had been so long since she’d been on a real date with a man that she couldn’t remember it. The man was as forgettable as the events on that date.

This date was different, she was already attracted to Liam Klinger. The only fly in the ointment so to speak was that she had also been thinking about Darryl Reynolds and of course the gorgeous Dr. John Fielding, almost as much as she’d thought about Liam Klinger.

She had the advantage of knowing who they were to begin with, and had done background checks on all three men. Darryl Reynolds was forty-one years old, and six foot three inches tall. From the pictures she’d seen, she knew he had several intricate tattoos decorating his thickly muscled shoulders, arms, and back. He probably outweighed the other two in just muscle alone. He had blue eyes and close-cropped brown hair and a set of lips that gave her thoughts that were X-rated. He was also a former Navy SEAL. He was divorced and had two half-siblings that still contacted him when they wanted something. His reputation in the industry was impeccable in the security community.