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After Michael pulled onto the Eastside Highway, a motorcycle zipped past them and Michael waved. Another cycle lingered a hundred yards behind him. A friend of Nic’s had retired from the same US Air Force RED HORSE squadron, and he’d formed a construction site security company. Since RED HORSE secured sites while constructing airfields in austere and hostile conditions, safeguarding sites on US soil was relatively simple. Copperline Security was happy to help; the defense of Deb’s Bakery was excellent training. Plus, some of Copperline’s clients had been threatened by Koslov and his organizations, too.
Michael and Nic built a basic bunkhouse in the abandoned lumberyard building. Copperline sent four people, rotating them every week, and since many of the employees were former RED HORSE, too, they made improvements on their downtime; the bunkhouse was quite comfortable. In addition to securing the bakery, and their convoy to and from the ranch, they provided personal security for Sam, Michael, Nic and the rest of them as necessary.
The convoy reached the Rocking B Ranch road without problems. The motorcycles turned back to Marcus, and Michael pulled into the ranch’s new garage, built to shelter them from prying eyes and overhead surveillance. It was nothing but post, beams, and metal siding, but it worked, plus it kept snow off the vehicles. He, Nic and the Copperline folks had raised it in a day, with a little help from Pete’s tractor.
Inside the house, Pete plopped into the recliner and rubbed his eyes. “Nap time for me. Wake me for dinner, will you?”
While Pete was enthusiastic, he was also older. If he wasn’t offering to help with dinner, he needed a day off. Good thing they were meeting to discuss their next steps, because the routine was exhausting. And they all had businesses to run.
“Of course.” Deb entered the kitchen, scrubbing her hands. Every evening, she finished dinner—usually a delicious slow cooker meal—and went to bed, ready to do it all over again at o’dark thirty.
Michael followed her into the kitchen like a lost puppy. She deserved a better guy than him, but she drew him like a moth to a flame. He’d happily burn, but he couldn’t let Deb get scorched with him. “Deb, are you really okay? I know this isn’t normal civilian life and it’s got to be stressful.”
She stirred the slow cooker—smelled like a spicy, South American-style stew—and pulled potatoes from a bottom cupboard. “I’m fine. I can’t change anything, so I’ll have to adapt and overcome, just like all of you.”
Michael took the potatoes from her. “I can scrub and peel with the best of them. Why don’t you sit and relax for a while? Read a book.”
“Relaxing really isn’t part of me these days.” But she plopped into a dining room chair and pulled out her phone.
“Danger does that to you. Adrenaline makes you wired. The problem is, you get addicted to it. You’ve got to learn how to manage the highs and lows. I work out.” Deb wrinkled her nose adorably. “Maybe cooking is the right answer for you, then. But after being on your feet all day, I thought maybe you’d like to be off them.”
“Sitting feels good. But I am a little jittery, too.” She scrolled, and giggled once, then bopped in her chair to some bouncy pop music.
He prepped the potatoes and put them on to boil with a little salt. Deb’s giggles, gasps, and snickers were music to his ears; a little normality after weeks of tension. Too bad her good mood wouldn’t last.
Once the potatoes were ready, he put them on the table, carried the slow cooker over and added bowls, glasses and utensils. Deb smiled at him, and woke Pete. After dinner, the three of them gathered in the living room and logged into the video conference Wiz set up. All of them looked tired, including the Copperline security team, nearing the end of their tour.
Wiz scowled. “Sam, Deb, do you want Mills to join us? I can keep him out.”
“Up to Sam. She’s the boss.” Deb shrugged.
Sam’s brows quirked, then she returned to professional-lawyer mode. “Sure. Maybe we can get something useful out of him.”
“Doubt it,” Wiz muttered. “He’s using us, not the other way around.”
Mills appeared. His professional face was good, but not perfect, and he winced slightly. He must have heard Wiz’s comment. “Ladies, gentlemen, thanks for having me.”
Sam’s expression, already stiff, hardened into a mask. “If you have information to share, please do. If not, be silent.” Mills nodded. “We will cut you out of the conversation as necessary.”
Wiz sniffed. “Don’t try to listen in, either. Neither you or your people will like the results. Sam?”
Sam looked down for a moment. “It’s been two weeks of fairly low-level harassment. I’m sure Koslov expected us to break by now. We’ve upped the social media pressure on him; charities are starting to refuse his donations as dirty money, and his invitations to high society events seem to have stopped, because we’re not seeing him on the gossip sites. We’ve rebuffed every one of his harassment tactics, too, although he’s kept Deb’s casual income lower and reduced the number of jobs the rest of us can take on, so he’s had some success.”
Mills raised a hand, and Sam acknowledged him. “Even though I’m on medical leave, my boss has been keeping me in the loop, so I don’t accidently stumble into something and blow someone’s cover. Koslov’s associates and customers are pressuring him to pull out of Marcus, because they’re getting too much attention. It’s only his ego keeping him here. I think you can expect a more active and probably much more brutal attack soon. I don’t know where or when; he’s staying off the phone and internet. All communications to and from Marcus are via courier on his private jet. For the last two weeks, he’s been staying at a luxury resort south of here, but his satellite internet system is acting up, and if he wants to keep up with business, he’ll have to move soon.”
Wiz almost smiled. “I noticed some military vehicles camped down there and saw a notice in the local paper of an exercise. How convenient.”
“Nothing to do with us.” Mills shrugged. “The military can’t target Americans on US soil unless they’re terrorists, so if there are interference problems, it’s probably a poorly-adjusted system, or a training error. But that’s why exercises are so important. I understand the terrain is challenging.”
“Of course. I also noticed a lot of the people deployed with the unit aren’t in uniforms.” Wiz raised her brows.
Mills shrugged again. “Contractors, probably. Trying to work out the bugs.”
They’d traded semi-disguised compliments long enough. Michael broke up their mutual admiration society. “Well, whatever the reason, making Koslov move is good. That, along with the pressure from his biggest customers, will anger him and force his hand. We can expect something violent, soon. But Copperline’s made some great progress on physical security.”
“We have.” Gregory “Geo” Pappas, Nic’s friend who owned Copperline, spoke up. “In addition to the concrete bollards in front of Deb’s Bakery, we’ve installed pop-up barriers across the roads at the surrounding access points, metal shutters on the bakery’s bottom windows, and integrated the controls into Wiz’s security system. We’ve installed similar, but simpler gates at Coffee & Cars, and the entrance to the Rocking B Road. We can’t do that with Nic’s house, since it’s in town, but I know Wiz upgraded the security system there.”
“We’ll remain in Wiz’s guest house, Geo,” Nic said. “Our lives are more important than a house, and it’s insured.”
