Page 34 of Rescuing Macie

They reminded her of her brother in a lot of ways. They were funny and polite, but there was an edge to them that was a reminder they were also lethal.

Most of the men were around her age. They varied in height and physical characteristics, but every single one had an intense look that would have made her nervous if Colt hadn’t been by her side. But by the time they’d left the house after their visits, she’d felt comfortable with each and every one of them. She could totally understand Colt’s devotion to them, and the devotion they had to their commanding officer in return.

It was weird for Macie to think about Colt as a commander. To her, he was just Colt, but it was obvious that he garnered a great deal of respect from his men.

Hearing a noise from her computer that meant she had a new email, Macie opened the program and read over the panicked email from one of her former clients. Somehow, her website had reverted to data that had been on it two years ago and everything was now out of date.

“Shit,” Macie muttered, and got to work trying to figure out what the issue was. After thirty minutes, she sat back in defeat. There had been an update to the platform the author was using, but no one had backed up the data on her website since Macie had done the work two years ago. Macie was pretty sure she could fix it, but the coding she’d done in the past was on an older backup drive at her apartment in Lampasas.

She fired off a note to the author, telling her that she was willing to work on the emergency issue and spelling out how much it would cost. Macie might not be good at face-to-face interactions with people, always worrying over what they thought or were saying about her, but one thing she’d learned over the years was that she couldn’t beat around the bush when it came to money.

Her clients appreciated knowing upfront how much she charged, and Macie appreciated being paid in a timely manner.

The author immediately emailed back, accepting the price for Macie’s help, but insisted that it had to be done as soon as possible. She couldn’t wait because she had a new book coming out in a couple days. It was book three in a new series, and as the website stood now, the other two books in the series weren’t on there. She had to have her site fixed.

It was a small disaster, and Macie couldn’t blame the author for being frantic. She bit her thumbnail and considered her options. She could recode the website from scratch, but that would take forever and would cost the author considerably more. If she could get the work she’d already done from her apartment, there was a chance she could have the website fixed and up and running by tonight.

But the last thing she was going to do was drive over to Lampasas on her own. She wasn’t an idiot. Not when neither Colt and his teams nor the police had found Teddy yet.

Macie felt her chest get tight as she thought through what she should do. She could tell the author she simply had to wait, but that wouldn’t be good for her reputation. The author might turn around and bad-mouth her to others, and she could be blackballed in the profession. Macie knew Colt was busy today. He’d told her that he had meetings with other high-ranking officers on the Army post. They were setting up a new mission for Ford and his team, and the last thing Macie wanted to do was ask Colt to drop that for something that wasn’t an emergency.

Well, it was an emergency for the author, but she didn’t think that really counted when compared to making sure her brother was safe when he was sent out of the country on a top-secret mission.

Macie thought about Trigger and the others on his team. Trigger had made sure she understood that she could contact him at any time, and had added his contact information to her phone.

Biting her lip, Macie decided to wait for Colt to get home. He’d go with her to her apartment and get the drive she needed. She could just stay up late tonight, updating the website. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d lost sleep because of work.

But then another email popped up from the author. She had a newsletter that was supposed to go out that evening, and it had a link to her website for people to preorder the new book, and her public relations woman was on vacation and couldn’t update the email before it went out to literally tens of thousands of readers.

The pressure built in Macie’s chest. She had to have that code today. As soon as possible.

Without thinking too hard about what she was doing, Macie picked up her phone and clicked on Trigger’s name.

“Hello?”

“Hi. Uh…Trigger?”

“Macie? What’s wrong? Are you all right? Where are you?”

“I’m fine,” she reassured him quickly. “I’m at home…er…Colt’s house. I…uh…something came up, and I know Colt is busy. Ford too. I wouldn’t ask, but it’s important.” The words were stilted, but Macie was proud that she’d gotten them out at all.

“You’re okay? You’re not hurt?” Trigger asked.

“No. I’m fine.” She heard him sigh in relief.

“Okay. So what’s up? What can I do to help?”

“If you can’t, I totally understand. I mean, you’re probably at work and it’s not like you can just leave whenever you want. Isn’t that called going AWOL? Absent without leave? I don’t want you to get in trouble—”

“Macie. What do you need?” Trigger asked, a hint of exasperation in his tone.

Macie closed her eyes and blurted it out. “I need something from my apartment. I don’t want to go by myself, and Colt and Ford are busy. It won’t take but two seconds for me to run in and grab it.”

“What do you need? Can I pick something up for you on my way to Colt’s house?” Trigger asked.

It was a nice thought, but unfortunately unhelpful. She quickly explained the situation, and finished with, “It’ll save me hours of work and my client hundreds of dollars if I can get the drive and use what I’ve already done.”

Trigger was quiet for so long, Macie wasn’t sure he was still there. “Trigger?”