Bravo
B ecca Elliot sat on the hood of her car; her gaze fixed on the gray vinyl sided two story home.
She’d sat here staring at the pale gray house for hours each day for over a week.
Her conscious mind could not comprehend the horror that had taken place inside.
She tried to block from her thinking what her sister’s last thoughts had been.
Thankfully, the police believed her nieces had been asleep when they were fatally shot.
A single .9mm round to each of their little heads in what should have been the safety of their bedrooms. Dealing with this thought was more than Becca could bear, so she pushed that reality far from her thoughts and focused on her sister.
Her sister wasn’t as lucky.
Her body was found on the kitchen floor, a bullet in her back a second in the back of her head.
Becca conjured an image of Nicole running for her life, but not from Nick, as the police believed.
Nicole’s husband had not killed the family before taking his own life.
There was no way he had.
Becca hoped the forensics would prove that out.
They had to.
***
Before Tessman left the office, he sent his friend and teammate Jimmy ‘Taco’ Wilson a text message asking if he could swing by Wilson’s place.
In the past, he would have just dropped by.
But things were different now because Wilson had acquired a live-in girlfriend and a four-year-old daughter six weeks before.
It happened very quickly, so he wasn’t used to it yet.
But it did mean that his days of just dropping in were over.
Besides being his best friend, Wilson was also his team leader on Charlie Team, which he was officially assigned to, though recently, all five of the Shepherd Security teams had been pulled at what seemed as randomly and staffed together on missions.
The mission earlier that morning had Mike ‘Powder’ Rogers, also from Charlie Team staffed as well as Lambchop and Mother from Delta Team in addition to the two members of Team.
Shepherd had said the mixing of teams was temporary with the growing pains the agency was currently going through, and because several of their ongoing contracts required six team members.
Wilson replied to his text immediately, inviting him over.
Tessman and several others had helped move Wilson and his new family into the townhouse just a week earlier.
Wilson had deployed on one of their new Domestic Violence Intervention Cases on Monday, and the small three-person team had wrapped it up and returned to HQ very late the night before.
Now that was a mission type that Tessman would be interested in being staffed on.
When Tessman knocked on the door to Wilson’s new home, Wilson’s new girlfriend, Rae, answered the door.
“Hi, come in,” she invited with a smile.
“Jimmy will be down in a minute.” She was pleasant, had been at each of the four occasions Tessman had spent any time with her, though he couldn’t say he really knew her well.
Tessman stepped into the living room.
His eyes glanced at the staircase that led up to the second floor.
Then his gaze swept over the living room and the kitchen at the far end of the house.
There wasn’t a box in sight.
It looked like they’d lived there for years.
“House looks good. You got a lot done.”
She laughed.
“The garage is still full of unpacked boxes, but we’re getting settled little by little.”
“Don’t let her fool you,” Wilson said from halfway down the staircase.
“She did all this and unpacked everything upstairs, too.” Wilson descended the rest of the stairs and stepped up to the two of them.
“But she is right. The garage is still loaded with boxes. I won’t be parking in there anytime soon.”
“I’m off the rest of the day if you want help to knock some of it out,” Tessman offered.
“Thanks, but it’s stuff that has to be gone through and either put away, thrown away, or donated,” Wilson said.
“He’s saying it’s mine or Lilly’s stuff, or her mom’s, so I’ll have to tackle it,” Rae said.
“I didn’t say that, but sorry, yeah, most of it will be on you to go through, Rae,” Wilson said with a chuckle.
Lilly was the four-year-old who was now Jimmy and Rae’s daughter.
Her mother was facing life in prison.
Rae was her pre-school teacher and was quite attached to her when she and her mother disappeared, prompting Rae to look for them.
She contacted Wilson and when Lilly’s mom, Stella, who was involved in an identity theft ring, discovered that Rae had found her, Rae was kidnapped by Stella and one of her co-conspirators.
Rae nearly died. Wilson and the team found her and Lilly, and the Shepherd Security Team working with the U.S.
Marshals apprehended Lilly’s mom and the criminal network she was a part of.
“Thanks, babe,” she said sarcastically.
“I have to go pick Lilly up from school. You didn’t block Jimmy’s truck in the driveway, did you?” Rae asked Tessman.
“No, ma’am,” Tessman replied.
Rae reached for the keys, which were on the end table near the door.
When she did, Tessman saw the diamond solitaire on her left hand.
“I’ll be back. Don’t feel you need to rush off because of me or Lilly. As a matter of fact, if you’ll still be around, you can plan on staying for dinner if you like spaghetti and meatballs.” She smiled and then disappeared out the door.
Tessman’s eyes fixed on Wilson.
“Was that a ring on her finger?”
Wilson smiled and nodded.
“You proposed? You fucking proposed already?” Tessman asked, his voice expressing his shock.
Wilson chuckled. “We’re not getting married tomorrow. But when we do, you’ll be my best man, won’t you?”
Tessman stared at him, dumbfounded.
“Well, yeah, of course.”
Wilson slapped him on the back and then stepped further into the house.
“You want a beer?”
“Sure,” Tessman said.
Yeah, he fucking needed one, seeing that Wilson had proposed.
Tessman took a seat at the breakfast bar that faced into the kitchen.
Wilson handed the bottle over the sink and bar to him.
“I know you don’t get it, but Rae and me, it feels right. Besides, Rae and Lilly both have my last name, thanks to the Marshals, so I figured we should make it official.”
“Lambchop didn’t mention anything.” Lambchop was an ordained minister and the team pastor.
Tessman assumed Wilson would have him marry them.
“I haven’t had the chance to mention it to him yet. You’re the first on the team to know,” Wilson said, and then took a long pull from his bottle.
“I should probably tell a few others.”
“Married? I figured it would come at some point, but I didn’t expect it this soon.”
Wilson chuckled.
“As I said, it just feels right, them living here, the three of us a family.” He smiled.
Tessman had to admit he’d never seen his friend happier.
“Well, then I’m happy for you.”
“Stay for dinner. I’d like you to get to know Rae better,” Wilson invited.
“She’s right. I don’t want you to feel you need to rush off or stay away, either. I know you think things have changed because she and I are together now, but as far as our friendship is concerned, nothing’s changed, dude.”
Tessman nodded and took another drink of beer.
He knew Wilson believed that, but he knew a lot had changed.
How that would all play out was yet to be seen.
When Rae and Lilly got home, Lilly ran to Wilson and gave him a hug.
Tessman saw a different side of his friend as he asked how her day had been and what she’d learned.
Wilson spent at least five minutes completely focused on the little girl.
Tessman realized that Wilson was already Lilly’s dad.
When did that happen?
“So, are you staying for dinner?” Rae asked him.
She was in the kitchen getting dinner started.
“Please stay,” Lilly begged.
“Mommy said she wants you to.”
“She did?” Tessman asked her with a smile.
“When did she say that?”
“In the car after school,” Lilly said.
Tessman’s gaze went to Rae.
“Thank you for the invitation. I’d love to stay.”
***
Later that night, after he was at his condo, Tessman received the text from Shepherd with his next assignment.
He was assigned to the next CIA Referral Mission that would deploy two days later with Wilson and four of the members of Alpha Team.
There was quite a bit of mission prep he’d begin to do at HQ the following day.
He had to be in by zero seven hundred.
When he got to the office, he and the five other members assigned to the Op met with Shepherd and Digital Team member Caleb ‘Hound dog’ Smith.
He’d be assigned as the primary Digital Team contact while they were on site.
The focus of the case was a business, not an individual, like was normally the case.
But as usual, the CIA would not disclose who they’d been surveilling or why when this company name came up.
Or what was learned that could possibly be illegal, necessitating the surveillance of this company.
“The principal ownership in SLTD Inc. is Chinese, which is a big hint as to why we were passed this one,” Shepherd said.
“They have three main interests in Boise, which will be divided between the six of you to look into. That’s why we’re holding a few days before you deploy, so you can have a good look at those interests from here.”
“Forward requests that you don’t have the tools to look into, to me,” Anthony ‘Razor’ Garcia, the team lead for the Digital Team and a member of Alpha Team, said.
“Smith and other members of the Digital Team can help, but I want to route the inquiries.”
“Of particular interest are large swaths of farmland south of Boise, too close to the Mountain Home Air Force Base for my liking,” Shepherd said.
“The second division of SLTD of concern for me is the food processing plants it controls. And lastly, SLTD runs a freight and cargo line out of Boise International Airport.”
“They’ve got their hands in a lot,” Tessman remarked.
“Into too much that we don’t want the Chinese anywhere near,” Alpha Team member John ‘Coop’ Cooper agreed.
“Even if the owners are American citizens, unlikely,” Garcia said, “they very well could have ties to communist China. That’s one of the things Smith will be looking into.”
“I’m not sure what concerns me more,” Alpha Team member Madison ‘Xena’ Miller, who was also Cooper’s wife, said.
“The proximity to the Air Force base or the control of our food supply.”
“Both aspects concern me greatly,” Shepherd said.
The meeting ended, and the team filed out.
Tessman went to his office to begin to do the research on what he’d been assigned, the freight and cargo line out of the Boise International Airport.
Three hours in, he was nodding off at his desk.
And he thought turning a wrench on the Power Grid Protection Project was boring!
This was far more boring work for him.
Plant his ass out in the middle of the desert, the mountains, the forest, anywhere with a scope trained on a target and he was in his element.
Desk work and research were not his element.
He got up and went for a walk to revive himself and ended up in the kitchen on floor five where he knew Angel, the Office Manager, and Alpha Team member, Ethan ‘Jax’ Jackson’s wife, always kept left overs from the lunch meals she had catered in, almost daily.
He grabbed several sandwich spirals and a bag of chips.
He was looking through the cookies when Angel entered behind him.
“Don’t finish all those cookies,” she said with a smile.
“No ma’am,” he replied.
“Madison was just down here raiding the cookies. Shepherd has pulled her from the next CIA Mission and replaced her with Mother. Did you know that?”
“He did?”
“Yeah, and she was pissed. Said she’d already done hours of prep. Mother’s in her office with her now and she’s doing a turnover,” Angel said.
“Yeah, I’d be pissed too. I’ve spent the last three hours doing my homework. This is a big case. It’s no wonder Shepherd is having us do a couple days of prep before we ship out,” Tessman said.
“I heard.” Angel stared at him expectantly.
“What?”
“I understand you were over at Wilson and Rae’s place yesterday,” Angel said with a grin.
Tessman flashed her an amused grin.
“You know, don’t you?”
“Yeah, they do live just down the block from me. I was dropping Johanna off at Elizabeth’s this morning and Rae was there too.” Johanna was Angel and Jackson’s nearly one-year-old daughter.
Elizabeth was married to Doc, also on Alpha Team, and she babysat the majority of the children of agency members.
“She said you were there for dinner last night. I know Rae and Lilly moving in with Wilson was a shock to you and I also know that the two of you are close. You’re not losing a friend, you know. I know Garcia felt that way when Jackson and I got together.”
“Yeah, we’ll see how much things change. I know he won’t be going diving with me whenever we have a few days off,” Tessman lamented.
“You never know.”
“Thanks, Angel. I better get back to it.”
He brought the food with him and returned to his office to continue the desk work, which for this case was a necessary evil.