Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 105398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 527(@200wpm)___ 422(@250wpm)___ 351(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 527(@200wpm)___ 422(@250wpm)___ 351(@300wpm)
We rode in silence to Wildwood Subdivision where Sidney lived. Parking three houses down, we didn’t have long to wait when a Lincoln Town Car pulled up and an older gentleman stepped out. In his hand, he had a file folder with the words Confidential written in bold black letters. My heart started beating wildly, and my palms started sweating. This was really going to happen, and it honestly scared the fuck out of me to know that in a few weeks, I might have custody of my child, and her life would be in my hands.
The older man knocked on the door, and it wasn’t but minutes later when the object of my disgust answered the door. I guess somewhere deep inside I had hopes that a Sidney wasn’t truly that evil. That I hadn’t spent years of my life with a woman who would keep something so important from me. That she would lie about something that would have changed my life.
Sidney look confused when she took the papers. Once the papers exchanged hands, the older man started walking to his car. Sidney opened the package, and we both watched as her eyes widened, and a look of fear crossed over her features. Then she started after the old man.
“What in the hell is this?” She shrieked.
“I don’t know ma’am. I only deliver the papers. I don’t know what’s in them.” He said before getting in his car and driving off.
Sidney’s hand went to her hair as she pushed it out of her eyes. This used to be a sign that she was nervous at being caught lying about something. When I saw this sign, I always knew she was lying, and seeing it today, I knew that that little girl was mine. What I did wonder is whether she had tried to pass the little girl off as the other man’s, or whether the other man knew what she’d done. I was very interested, and I vowed that I wouldn’t stop until I knew exactly what she’d done and why.
“Let’s go.” I said.
Ember nodded against my back, and then settled the helmet back over her head and wrapped her hands around my waist.
Something deep in me had caught fire, and I knew things would never be the same. One thing I was certain of though.
Ember was going to be mine forever.
Ω
I swallowed hard. Saliva was pooling in my mouth. My palms were clammy, but I wouldn’t let him see my weakness. This really wasn’t going to be that bad, I just needed to suck it up and get it done. He wouldn’t have a problem. He would be happy for us. Wouldn’t he?
Deciding to grow a pair, I opened the door with a bang and walked inside. I’d asked Max to meet me at The Sport’s Page. I needed his acceptance to marry his sister, and when he said yes (note I said when and not if) I would go directly to the jewelry store to buy her ring.
Spotting Max with his back to the room in a back corner booth, I weaved my way through the tables and sat down across from him. This was not my favorite position to be in, with many years of caution ingrained in me to be prepared and aware of my surroundings. I hated having my back to a door, but since I was about to ask the man across from me if I could marry his sister, I decided to leave it alone.
“Thanks.” I said to Max for being considerate enough to order my beer.
“Yeah. Welcome.” Max mumbled.
His eyes were on my face. He was studying it, learning all of my secrets.
During our military days, Max was the one who could make anyone talk, and I do mean anyone. He was one scary motherfucker. You did not want to be found guilty of something and not confess. He had ways of getting you to talk. Where and how he learned them, I don’t know, but he was good at what he did.
I distinctly remember our first mission together. We were all new to the group. The only ones who knew each other were James and Max. Even though we were all part of the army, we still didn’t trust each other with our lives. We didn’t have a reason to.
Our first mission was to get some intel on a leader that was collecting young soldiers, some as young as nine and ten, and introducing them into a local rebel group that branched off Al Qaeda. It was our sixth day into the mission when everything went FUBAR.
We’d been boxed in on all four sides, and they were just waiting for us to try to get out. That, or call for help. Not that we’d have known that if it weren’t for Max. Dougie had caught a man sneaking in. At the time, we hadn’t known that anything was wrong. We were under a black out, no communication in or out. We’d thought we were in a safe house. We hadn’t been.
When Dougie’d brought that little bastard into the room, everyone was stunned speechless. Yes, we did have a patrol, and that very reason was why Dougie found him, but we were running off of a mission that was supposedly handed down to us by the president himself. We never thought that our position would be leaked. Maybe we were green around the gills, but after that mission, we never relied on anything but each other. We still took missions, but we didn’t take them blindly. We did our own recon on top of what was given to us.
Max was the only one who spoke the boy’s language, so he was the logical choice to interrogate him. What we didn’t know was just how brutal an interrogator he was. Not one single thing could have prepared me for the force that was Max. Listening to that interrogation had given me chills, and not much scared me those days. I was living on borrowed time, and I went balls to the wall wherever and whatever I did.