Out of the Shadows (Hudson Security #1)

Chapter 18

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

A fter a restless night plagued by dreams of car chases, intense helicopter rides, and some not quite appropriate moments with her boss, Bean arrived at the office at seven. She’d already guzzled four cups of coffee and was beginning to feel somewhat human. Her first objective was to avoid Gavin at all costs. She didn’t have the greatest poker face and knew if he took one look at her, he’d know something was up. The seriously filthy dreams she’d had about the man were the last things she wanted revealed this morning.

Her face heated as she entered their building’s empty lobby. Since it was Sunday, their receptionist, Mel, was most likely lounging at home unlike Bean and her fellow workaholic coworkers, whose cars she’d passed in the parking lot. After using her security card and typing in her personal code, the door made a quiet buzzing noise and slid open to allow her to enter the secure part of their building. Well, the entire building was secure, but this part was like Fort Knox. As the door slid closed behind her, she paused a moment to take it all in.

The main area was basically one giant room with numerous workstations. Each of the security teams were grouped together with the cyber division’s group being the largest cluster of workstations in the center.

Off to the right side were four conference rooms of various sizes, the restrooms, and the kitchen, which included a break room with couches, televisions, and numerous video game consoles. Along the left were private offices for Gavin, herself, Alvarez, and Esme, along with a utility and storage room that also housed a secure weapons cache. They were a security company, after all.

The far wall was floor-to-ceiling windows—one way and bulletproof, of course—so the place didn’t feel claustrophobic. Gavin had spared no expense when building the place. All in all, it was a gorgeous place to work.

As she made her way to her office, she noticed the cyber division team—Samantha Abbot, Slade Witherspoon, Isaiah Torres, and Jace Oliphant—were busy at their workstations, plates of pancakes, eggs, and other breakfast goodies in front of them. They waved at her as she passed.

“You better hit the kitchen ASAP,” Abbot called out. “Xander, Wilson, and Alvarez just showed up, so there may not be any food left once they’re through.”

“Thanks for the heads-up,” she replied. “Give me thirty minutes and then come on in and we’ll do a quick catch-up.”

“Sure thing, Bean,” Abbot said. “The good news is we actually have some intel to share.”

That’s what she loved about working at Hudson Security. Even though it was a Sunday, no one complained about coming in to figure out what the hell was going on. She was sure it helped that everyone was very well compensated for their time, but the entire team’s attitude was top-notch. She was also certain everyone was taking this latest incident personally. After all, she sure as hell was.

No one was messing with their boss. Not on her watch .

Entering her office, Bean flipped on the light and dropped her purse onto the coffee table. She sat at her workstation, but as she was about to boot up her computer, she froze. Next to her keyboard was a paper plate with a maple bar and a chocolate glazed donut with rainbow sprinkles. Her two favorites.

She glanced at the note next to the plate and sucked in a breath. Even if she’d tried, she couldn’t have stopped the grin from spreading over her face.

Bean,

Snagged these for you before the heathens descended.

I’ll find you later and we’ll touch base.

Gavin

Taking a bite of the maple bar, she smiled. She wasn’t quite sure what was happening between them, but things certainly felt... different. If her dreams last night were any indication, she was definitely thinking about the man in a very non-boss, non-platonic way. She’d always acknowledged that he was ridiculously good-looking. She wasn’t blind. Added to that, she’d known Gavin for so long that she knew him to be a genuinely good human. Intelligent, empathetic, fair, and loyal.

As the maple sugary goodness melted in her mouth, she let out a sigh.

No, she didn’t know what was going on between them, but the more she thought about it—the more she thought about him —she wasn’t opposed to finding out.

However, first things first.

She had work to do.

An hour later, Bean had been briefed by the cyber team. As she’d expected, the license plate they’d pulled was from a stolen vehicle. Regardless, she ran it through one of her programs that would triangulate the original car’s location and backtrack it for the last forty-eight-hours. Perhaps if they could figure out where the last known spotting of that original vehicle was, they’d be able to get footage of whoever had taken the license plate off the vehicle.

However, as Abbot had said, there was good news. Because the cyber team were absolute badasses, they’d been able to get a partial facial image of the shooter by way of a reflection off a nearby building. Complete badasses. The image was currently being run through Bean’s facial-rec software, and she was cautiously optimistic they’d be able to narrow it down to a manageable number of possibilities.

Satisfied her programs were doing their thing, she sent a video-call request to Tiny. Seconds later, his face appeared on her center screen.

“Morning,” she said.

“Hey, Bean.”

“It is morning wherever you are, right?”

The corners of his lips twitched. “Yeah.”

“And where exactly are you?” She saw him hesitate, so she added, “You know I could figure it out in like a minute, so you may as well just tell me.”

He grinned. “Denver.”

“See, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” She popped the tab on her energy drink and took a sip. “If you ever want to work on-site, even temporarily, we do have extra workstations here. Secure lodging too.”

“I’ll keep it in mind.”

“So you and I have worked together over the years, but it’s always been contractor work. With the incident last night, I feel like you’re kind of getting thrown into the deep end here. ”

He was nodding before she’d finished speaking. “Tell me about it.”

“Have you even had a chance to meet with Esme to get all your paperwork sorted?”

“Yeah, we had a video call Thursday afternoon. She had all my employment stuff squared away within a couple hours.”

Bean chuckled. “I don’t doubt it.”

“If you don’t mind me saying so, the woman’s intense.”

Her chuckle turned into a laugh. “Oh, my friend, you have no idea. Let’s start with the basics. I know you’ve worked a lot with MacKay over the last few months. What has he told you about Hudson Security?”

“Not much,” Tiny said. “Basically, he said that I’ll most likely continue to work with him on his projects, but I’ll report to you, and all my assignments will be dictated by you as well.”

“That sounds about right.” With her elbows resting on her desk, she laced her fingers together. Not quite sure where to begin, she tapped her hand to her lips. She’d been flying solo for so long...

“Let me give you a quick structure rundown first. Head and founder of Hudson Security is Gavin. Next in line is MacKay. Esme is our director of logistics. As you’ve witnessed, she coordinates everything. And I mean everything. All the company’s logistics from HR to individual rescue missions.”

“MacKay mentioned she was with the CIA.”

Bean nodded. “If you thought she was intense over a video call, be prepared if you ever meet her in person. She looks all demure, but?—”

“She’s a badass who can kill me in nine different ways.”

“And no one would ever find your body.” Bean shrugged, grinning .

Tiny chuckled. “Good to know. Don’t fuck with Esme. Got it.”

Okay, fine. The guy wasn’t half bad.

“As far as the rest of the team goes,” Bean continued, “we have three security teams of three operatives each. We’re looking at adding at least one more team, maybe two, but it’s slow going to find the right fit. Frazier and MacKay are particular.”

“Understandable. Hudson Security’s reputation is renowned.”

“It’s something we all take pride in.” Meeting Tiny’s gaze, she was reassured by the sincerity she saw. “So Team One is obviously our lead team. Those three are Xander, Tash Silver, and Bennett Wilson. Xander also oversees all the personal security operatives. They’re also the only ones authorized to do solo assignments. Team Two is Carmichael, Riviera, and Bonson. You’re probably most familiar with Team Three since Hanniger, Rizzo, and Schreiber are the ones that tend to get teamed up with MacKay.”

Tiny’s eyes narrowed. “I’m familiar with Team Three, though I’ve seen them take on solo work.”

Bean shook her head. “They’re always either in pairs or as a trio. There may be one individual assigned to a client, but the others are lurking around somewhere.”

“Gotcha.”

“Then there’s me. My position isn’t public information, but it’s technically IT Specialist .” She finger-quoted the title, and when they both chuckled, some of the hesitation she’d felt about letting go of her work eased. “Aside from doing information retrieval, which, as you know, is project by project, I oversee our cyber division. We have four people on the team—Abbot, Witherspoon, Torres, and Oliphant—with Abbot being the lead. They handle the majority of installation and monitoring of the various security systems, both physical and online. They’re an extremely talented group, but I test their systems regularly.” Bean couldn’t help her grimace. “I hate to give this up since it’s one of my favorite things to do, but aside from project-specific stuff, this is something I’d like you to take over.”

“By test, you mean hack into the systems they install?” Even through the online feed, Bean could see the twinkle in the man’s eyes.

“Yup,” she said, deliberately popping the P. “See where it’s weak. Suggest code to shore it up, and then hack it again until you’re satisfied with it.”

A giant grin grew over Tiny’s face. “Nice.”

“When we have specific missions—the kidnapping and ransom types—you and I, along with the cyber division, will get pulled to track and provide intel. We have to be fast and accurate. As you’ve just experienced, weekends and off-hours don’t matter.”

“Understood,” he said, nodding. “MacKay gave me the basics of the last mission with the McClintock child. Good work.”

“Thank you.” Though it had technically been a success, her heart still hurt for what that little boy and his family had gone through. “So now that’s all squared away, have you found anything on Constance or Roger Whitcomb?”