RULES OF LOVE (A Navy SEALs Romance) (2 page)

While he poured his coffee, Reinhart told him why he was pulled from the sanctuary of his home. “We have another witness crisis—caught something on film the drug lord didn’t want to be seen.”

“What did he catch? I’m assuming civilian?”

“
She
is. Films documentaries and the like on native tribes all over the world. She was in Thailand and stumbled on something no one was supposed to witness.” One of the men from the table, a rear admiral, inserted a disc to his laptop and hit play, motioning for Beau to watch.

For the first few moments, the image was out of focus, and Beau couldn’t tell what he was looking at. Slowly, the video became clearer, and he could see what appeared to be a bamboo forest. The camera was focused on temple ruins, tigers carved into the stone at the base before it jutted up into the broad-leafed trees surrounding it. The image swung down and zoomed in closer. On the ground before the steps of the temple, on their knees with hands behind their heads, were five men, all equally frightened.

The camera shook slightly as the person moved, trying to get a better, more focused view. There were more men, most with AK47s, standing guard. One screamed to the men and pointed at something off-camera. The image zoomed out, and a large truck with a tarp covering crates could be seen parked far from the men. Without warning, the man raised his handgun and shot all five dead in quick succession. They fell to the ground, and the person with the camera clearly nearly dropped it in shock. The sound was muffled as the person fumbled with it, and the image turned upside down before being righted again. When it did, it focused once more on the unmoving bodies.

Evidently deciding it was time to leave, the person holding the camera began to move quietly but froze when she stepped on a stick, the crack echoing around the forest. The camera turned slowly back to the men down the hill, who evidently spotted the person holding it. They were yelling and pointing. Beau heard the gunfire as the person staggered away, bullets hitting trees and the ground all around. The person reached an orange Jeep parked in a clearing before the video cut off.

Damn civilians, why can’t they just stay out of the way?
he thought bitterly, sipping his coffee.

“Shortly after this, they tracked Naomi Veri down and tried to kill her in public. When that failed, they found her home in the US and leveled it. Luckily, she was out of the country.” Reinhart glanced at Beau still sipping his coffee, trying not to let his anger show at the woman and her stupidity.

“How did you find out about this?’

“She contacted the federal agents as soon as she returned home. Rear Admiral Bard,” he gestured to one of the men at the table, “went with a few other naval officers to see the footage and assess the situation. In taking the evidence, they assured her she’d be out of harm’s way. We were wrong. Two days later, her car blew up outside her office. After that, the threats started, and she contacted us again. Screamed Bard’s ear off over it. We have a team trying to track down the man from the video and take him out, but it’s turning out to be more difficult than we thought. He obviously seems to believe she knows more than just what she’s told us.”

Beau nodded, staring out the window at the rain pouring down and listening to the wind howling against the side of the hotel. “You need me to be her bodyguard until he’s taken care of?”

“We’ll give you an hour after this meeting is over to gather your things. And I hope you like Italian food,” one of the other men said, handing Beau a stack of files.

“Why?”

“Because you’re going to Tuscany.”

“Why not a safe house here?”

“They’re expecting her to stay in the US,” Reinhart said. “Moving her out of the country will give us time to track them down. There is an old house in the middle of nowhere. It used to belong to some old widow or other, so there’s no connection to Naomi in any way.”

Beau glanced at the plans on the table, blueprints for a massive house. “This is it?” Reinhart nodded.

The house itself was three stories with a full basement. There were winding trails behind it, passing through a garden the size of a football field. High stone walls surrounded the perimeter, giving it only one point of entry—the front gate. For a safe house, it wasn’t a bad idea, though the size didn’t make Beau too happy. Cameras and trip wires were already set up around the house and grounds, but Beau told Reinhart he’d set up some more security once he got there for his own peace of mind.

“Tuscany,” he muttered, staring at the plans for the house. “Well, this’ll be a new one, sir.”
At least I won’t be up to my knees in filth
. It wasn’t much of a consolation, but for the moment, it would do.

***

Beau was ready to go within a half-hour of getting back to his house. Clothes, weapons, files, and fake IDs were shoved into his black duffel that was now sitting by the door. He stared out the back, watching the last of the storm clouds disperse and thinking about the trouble this mission would cause him. His cover, in case anyone did come by who was not part of the protection detail, was a handyman, which fit perfectly—apparently, the ancient house was in serious need of repair.

The pictures they showed him of the possible attackers revealed a mix of bedraggled convicts ranging from druggies to weapons dealers, but one stuck in his mind—the supposed shooter of the men at the temple. He recognized him and couldn’t stop thinking about where he might have seen him before. The pictures were distorted, though, taken from different surveillance cameras, making the faces difficult to identify. He’d encountered so many bastards over the years, but rarely had any of them escaped him or his team. The nagging feeling that he knew this man stayed with Beau as he paced his front hall. It would come to him, he hoped.

The files told him everything he needed to know… Almost. There wasn’t much information about Naomi, except that he was going to have to take extra care in watching her. If she were attacked, she would struggle to defend herself because she walked with a cane. No details were revealed about the handicap, nor had he learned anything about her past to connect the dots. He just hoped he didn’t get pulled out of his only time off to watch some old woman in a crumbling house.

As he turned around to wait by the front door, he realized how dark his house was and how empty it seemed. He never bothered to turn lights on anymore because he was alone. The last woman who lived with him left after a year, just when he was ready to propose to her. She told him it was too hard being with a man who was always running towards danger. There one day, gone the next. He grimaced, remembering how she seemed happier than she’d ever been with him.

When he reached the front door and peered at the street, watching for the SUV coming to pick him up, his thoughts flashed back to the conversation he’d shared with Reinhart before he’d left. He asked Beau if he’d been getting any more threatening messages, and, of course, Beau had lied, telling him he hadn’t. Though he didn’t consider it lying if he left out the one taped to his front door last night. They’d been coming for the past year, each warning him that he was in danger, that they were after him, and that he was going to die. Neither Reinhart nor he could track who’d sent them, though, and the lack of knowledge unnerved him. He hoped it was someone’s idea of a sick joke because he didn’t have time to deal with anything like that right now.

The rain was nothing more than a drizzle when Beau left his house and walked to the black SUV waiting for him out front. It would take him to the base where he would board a plane and leave Monterey. He zipped his jacket before he climbed into the SUV, already missing the view of the mountains as he headed out on his next mission.

CHAPTER TWO

The phone rang just as the clock struck the hour of seven a.m. The man expecting the call smiled with pleasure. He answered, ignoring the static coming from the storm dying down outside.

“They’re sending special ops to the safe house. He’s being held in southern Europe as far as we can tell right now,” a man said quietly on the other line.

“Do you know what country?” Silence met his question, and the man’s lips curled in disgust. “You better find out soon… And they sent her
in, right?”

“Yes, she left yesterday. I’ll try to track her, but it’s not going to be easy—”

“You’ll do it or die like the others. Is that clear?”

He heard a hesitant sigh, then, “Yes, I’ll check in as soon as I find out anything.” A click told him the caller had hung up.

He sat back in the seat of his car and motioned for the driver to continue on to the abandoned warehouse, his new base until they could find a safer, better situation. He wanted his revenge, and he was going to get it. Failing was not an option.

CHAPTER THREE

Eddie Sage moved around her office, sorting through photos—newly acquired that morning—of her new mission, Beau Savage. He would be arriving soon enough, and she needed to be sure everything was set up accordingly. The cell in her back pocket rang, and she answered quickly.

“Sage here.”

“Sage. Plane will be touching down soon,” Reinhart said on the other end. “He has been given his orders and understands his duties, so see to it the civilian he is supposed to be protecting acts like a civilian.”

Eddie frowned, pushing her tongue behind her lip. “Of course, sir, that won’t be a problem.”

“Listen, Sage, I know this usually isn’t your thing, but you have to make him believe you’re Naomi. No guns on you unless you can hide them, and no ordering him around.”

“I know the drill, sir. He won’t know who I really am.”

“Good, because if he does, we won’t be able to hide how much danger he’s really in.”

Eddie nodded. The threats against Beau were put aside as nothing until recently when video recordings of a man, his face covered and voice altered, arrived with the threats, giving intimate details of Beau’s life, his routine, and his recent missions. Each new threat showed images of Beau from only days prior. The man was in danger and he knew it, but the last thing the Navy wanted was for Savage going off the rails. He would try to track this man down on his own and end up getting himself killed.

That was Eddie’s job, along with her team. The civilian protection was a necessary cover-story to get him safely out of the country.

“And Sage, we’re raising the alert on this mission.”

Eddie set down the files in her hands. “Sir?”

“His house was blown up this morning,” Reinhart grumbled.

That was not what Eddie expected to hear. “Sir, maybe we should change our game plan here.”

“We talked about this, and no, he can’t know.”

From the beginning of this entire plan, she wanted to bring Savage in on it, but Reinhart had shut her down at every turn. “Sir, the man’s house was just blown up. I think he has a right to know.”

“I am only going to say this once, Sage. Beau does not know what is happening here, not until we have more to go on. Is that clear?”

She bit her lip to prevent her words from escaping and straightened. “Yes, sir, it is.”

“I expect updates around the clock.” She assured Reinhart he would get them and hung up, fuming over this mess.

Beau’s house was gone. Whoever wanted him dead was no longer playing around, and Eddie ground her teeth. This mission would be her most difficult to date. She’d read the man’s file, and he was not one to sit on the sidelines. He was one of their best, and tricking him for an extended period was going to be a pain in her ass. Wondering how best to approach this man, and running over the last few details of her cover story, she limped across her office—filled with her real computer gear and files—to check the security feeds one last time.

Her damn knee was acting up again, but she ignored it. There were more important things to deal with than an old wound. She radioed the gate, letting them know about Savage’s impending arrival, and left her office. Usually, she would have been on desk duty after her injury, but she was one of their best and they didn’t just put their best at a desk if they could help it. She took a few deep breaths, repeating her name over and over, and prayed this hard-ass wouldn’t give her any more grief than was already piled up against her.

***

The plane landed around three in the afternoon, and Beau was immediately escorted from the runway to another SUV, driven to the front gates of the base, and led out onto a main road. According to Reinhart, he was supposed to meet another agent currently guarding the woman at the house. He would take Beau there and explain the little details to him. One of the main reasons Beau had been called in was because the current agent was having trouble following leads while guarding her at the same time. With Beau there, someone would always be at the house—someone who would allow no one to get past.

Shouldering his bag, he left the base behind and walked down the street aways until he spotted something out of the ordinary. There, in the middle of all the Fiats, was an orange Jeep Wrangler with a man leaning against it. The man nodded to Beau, who walked in that direction, keeping an eye open to his surroundings. The man held out a hand as Beau approached.

“You must be Beau Pierce. I’m Shane, the current handyman. I can’t say how much I’m going to appreciate the extra help at the house,” he said, using the cover story in case someone happened to be listening.