The Current Between Us (11 page)

“
His name is Gage Synclair. He’s the reporter guy. His office is right by the window. It’s his gallery we’re working on,” he said.

“
Trent, he’s gorgeous. Oh. My. God, you love his work! You have all his DVDs. That’s what’s wrong with you. It’s him!” The electric company truck pulled up in front of the gallery, saving Trent.

“
Sophia you’re way off base, and I have to go. The power company’s here,” Trent started to move toward the front door.

“
Trent, he’s gorgeous… You two would be great together. How hot would that be?” Surely she didn’t expect him to answer her question.

“
You’re so not even in the ballpark of being correct, Soph. I gotta go.” Trent didn’t wait, but disconnected the phone before he could hear anything more and met the power company at the front door.

****

“He’s taken a vow of silence,” Gage’s first onsite contact, Javier, said into the phone.

“
A vow of silence? Like he isn’t speaking at all?” Gage asked, completely confused by what he’d heard.

“
Yeah, and he spends lots of time with the highest bishop, the leader here,” his contact said. The weak signal faded in and out, and Javier’s accent so thick, made him harder to hear and understand.

“
Is this a set up?” Gage asked, although he’d talked himself out of that as an option weeks ago.

“
If it is, I can’t find it,” Javier said.

“
Yeah, neither can I. So, he’s found religion?” Gage asked.

“
It’s looking like it. I must go. I’ll check back tomorrow if I can.” The line disconnected, and Gage ended the call on his side.

This one threw him for a surprise, and he leaned forward in his chair. With a few swipes on his keyboard, Gage brought the live video feed back up on his computer to watch in real time, like he
’d been doing for most of the night and all of the day. They were in the La Popa Basin, located in Mexico, an obscure location in a tiny abandoned sixteenth century Christian mission. Men from all over the world stumbled there every day, joining the cult-like teachings of this pseudo-religious throw back of the Christian church from hundreds of years ago.

They all wore long, dark robes, their heads cleanly shaven, and no shoes on their feet. Hours and hours were spent in silent meditation, only to then go into hours and hours of lecture-style teachings of how old religious values of a simpler, yet darker, time in our history, got it right all those centuries ago. The teachings went just shy of promoting the massacres of earlier centuries, changing course in mid-teaching, making it all about the Lord
’s love. Gage listened and came to the conclusion this was some sort of vigilante-meet-Gandhi kind of place and still undecided which side might prevail in the end.

The best Gage could determine, the mission looked like a recent start-up and appeared strategically planned, with abundant hiding places in the mountains surrounding the old cathedral-style buildings. The most undesirable men of the world flocked there and the drug cartel still ran Mexico, but the teachings of this mission
’s underlying goals were to take back their country to a more wholesome time. These newly trained clergy were coming to help in the cause. Perhaps building a small army to fight the drug cartel? Time would tell. For now, Gage knew only one thing for certain: Abdulla spent his days there, on his knees, with no sign of interaction with anyone.

If
Abdulla had a target in the mission, it never made itself known under the constant surveillance. Gage’s gut told him Abdulla fully bought into this new religion he got himself into, because he could have easily taken them all out the first day he arrived and no one would be the wiser. None of Gage’s contacts found any sign of weapons on the property.

A vow of silence
… Well, wasn’t that convenient. By all accounts, it looked like Abdulla might be having a change of heart or at least conscience, but Gage rejected the thought as quickly as it came in his mind.
Come on, asshole, show me what you’re up to.
Why hide in such a remote, uncivilized area? Gage chuckled at his thought. The question actually answered itself: hiding. But who else might be looking for him? Gage’s pursuit had been utterly discreet. Abdulla may have contacts reporting back to him, but one of the reasons it had taken so long to nail this report down were the lengths Gage went to in researching Abdulla. He never spoke with anyone directly associated with the guy. Gage worked his way through interviews with the grieving and hurt, those people left standing after Abdulla demolished their lives on his quest for power and money.

Gage focused on the screen again, watching the newsfeed come through in less than desirable conditions. The video looked grainy, and slightly off focus because of how they hid the device in the room. Abdulla sat on the floor with his legs crossed, meditating now for the last seven hours. He never moved from his spot, nor did he open his eyes. He remained in this position, praying silently. His mouth moved, but no words issued forth.

Under normal circumstances, Gage would have sat right here with Abdulla, watching each minute pass, trying to find the discrepancies, but today he found every few minutes his eyes wandered back out into the gallery, looking for Trent and each time he would have to remind himself Trent had left hours before.

Last night, Gage stayed up watching these videos courtesy of a generator in his bedroom and office. The panel change went on beneath him, the construction stayed loud all night, and Trent
’s presence affected Gage. He could sense him there, within reach, but completely untouchable. There wasn’t much sleep happening when all his body and mind wanted were for him to be right down there in the middle of Trent’s mess, watching the guy work.

Gage made the trip downstairs, under the cover of checking on progress, about every thirty minutes. On about the third trip down, Gage realized Trent wasn
’t clueless to him, but purposefully ignored him. Those were two vastly different things.

The night then became a game to Gage. He dropped in, over and over, putting himself in Trent
’s way. He’d chuckled as he’d watched Trent fumble through the chance meetings, dropping his tools, pulling the wire a little too hard, or bumping into things as he took the widest distance around wherever Gage stood. Trent never looked his way, and when forced to, he focused on Gage’s forehead. Surely it meant Trent wasn’t as unaffected as he pretended to be. Could it be Trent was a closet homosexual or maybe a closet bisexual? But Gage rejected that thought immediately; Trent didn’t seem like the kind of guy who messed around on his commitments. Maybe a late in life homosexual, now stuck with a wife and children…

Even with those thoughts, nothing helped him find an outcome where he could get inside Trent
’s pants without looking like a big ass perv. So, just as he had last night, Gage forced his eyes and attention back to the screen, back to something he could work until the outcome landed in his favor. He sat back, getting comfortable, and prepared to sit there for the next several hours watching Abdulla breathe until he slipped.

One minute, he sat watching the video, the next the gallery plunged into total darkness. Gage looked around the gallery and every laborer working came to an abrupt stop. The air conditioning guys came from the basement door, heading toward his office.

“We blew a breaker,” one of the two said.

“
Did you reset it?” Gage called out through the open office door.

“
It’s not resetting,” the other replied.

“
No one leave! Let me get Coop Electric out here,” Gage said, jumping up from his desk and making his way toward the door. He knew he needed to make it clear no one could leave before every one of these guys loaded up and hightailed it out of there for the night. He palmed his cell and dialed the number he’d saved after their first meeting about the panel change. He stood outside the office door, blocking the way to the front in case anyone made a run for it.

“
I have a couple of generators around back for those who need something right away,” Gage said as he listened to the sexiest masculine voice he thought he’d ever heard answer the phone. He couldn’t stop the silly grin from spreading across his face or his heart from thumping wildly in his chest. Both were reactions he shouldn’t be having, especially since his aggressive remodel had come to a complete stop due to lack of electricity.

“
Trent, it’s Gage Synclair.”

****

Trent popped the top and chugged a double shot espresso while weaving through the exit doors of their crowded local grocery store. Past the point of exhaustion, a yawn ripped free from his lips, clearly to prove the feeling. The few hours’ nap he’d planned for when he got home this morning never fully materialized. Emalynn couldn’t contain her excitement and bounced off the walls. She couldn’t let him sleep for more than five minutes before bursting in, asking if it were time for him to get up yet.

After about the third interruption, he finally forced himself up and got them ready to go. The first stop
sent them straight to Party City, where they spent an hour and a half going through row after row of decorations, letting Em look at everything before she decided on a Barbie themed party, which happened to be the center display when they first walked in the door. As Rhonny suspected, every piece was saturated in hot pink, which fit Emalynn perfectly. Hunter chose the Hulk party plates and balloons for his place setting, officially making his children as different as two could be. With all that, and a hundred dollar bill later, they were out the door of Party City, loaded down, ready to decorate.

The next stop pointed them in the direction of the neighborhood bakery down the street from their house. Em got to taste three different cakes before deciding on a chocolate cake with buttercream icing, just like she always preferred. Of course his little girl talked the decorator into making the entire cake hot pink with Barbie
’s face drawn on top matching her decorations. Their third stop for the afternoon, a quick hair cut for Hunter. And the fourth stop, the local grocery store for their weekly groceries. It took them about an hour in the store, most of the time spent navigating through the masses of people, before they were able to check out and get the heck out of dodge.

Em sat in the front of the cart like normal, and against his better judgment, Trent let Hunter talk him into walking outside the cart, holding the sides with his hand. Trent only needed to remind him about thirty times to hang on to the side and not get distracted away. Emalynn chatted her little head off the entire time about all the selections she could have made at the party store and why Barbie was the very best. The benefit to Em
’s chatter, she never really required him to talk back to her. She could hold the entire conversation on her own, never feeling the least bit slighted if he didn’t respond. Hunter, on the other hand, needed constant watching for fear he might wander off if something caught his eye.

As they made their way outside, Trent squinted in the bright sun. He pulled the cart to a stop. The parking lot was jammed packed with cars everywhere. He needed
the minute to remind himself where he may have parked. Spotting the truck, he pushed them forward and got about halfway through the parking lot when his phone began to ring. He palmed it from his belt, moving them out of the way of any oncoming cars so he could answer.

“
Hunter, I said hold on to the side. You’re gonna get hurt, son,” Trent said when Hunter bent down, looking at something sparkling in the sun, lying on the ground beside them.

“
Sorry, Daddy, I forgot,” he said, looking over his shoulder, taking the side of the cart again, but he turned back, keeping his eyes focused on the ground. By the third ring, Trent finally looked down at the phone screen and hesitated, not recognizing the number.

“
Daddy, can I add the Barbie doll to my birthday list? She’s so beautiful,” Em chatted on. When she didn’t get his attention right away she began to tap her hand on his arm. “Daddy, you aren’t hearing me.”

“
Hunter, get out of the street and hang on to the side of the cart or you have to get in the basket. Em, hang on, honey.” Trent thumbed the phone connection open on the fourth ring. “Coop Electric.”

“
Trent, it’s Gage Synclair.” After a momentary pause as Trent registered what he heard, his heart plunged to his feet right before it slammed back into his chest. “Did I catch you at a bad time?”

Everything came to a stop in the middle of the fast-paced parking lot. Emalynn sat in the basket looking at him, her mouth moving, but he heard nothing she said. He reached down and grabbed Hunter by the back of the collar, pulling him up, keeping a tight hold on his shirt to draw him in closer. He never let go of the back of Hunter
’s shirt and centered into the call.

Trent waited another heartbeat, then two before he answered.
“No, is there a problem?”

“
Actually, yes. Our AC breaker is tripping and taking the lights with it. They came this afternoon to test the units and the breaker isn’t holding. Now, they won’t reset,” Gage said.