Free Save Me by Heidi McLaughlin Page B

“Carole, Cara, and Master Chief York. I had to tell him, plus Poole. He drove us to the airport.”
    “My parents,” Rask says, quietly. “I still call them and tell them stuff.”
    “Do you think Rask’s parents are in Chesley’s back pocket?” I ask Evan, who nods.
    “It makes sense in my head, but right now the craziest things make sense to me.” He shakes his head and looks over at Rask, who has his eyes focused on the table. Evan bumps his shoulder into Rask. “I don’t mean anything bad, but shit, they don’t give you the time of day. Why would they keep your secrets?”
    “They wouldn’t,” Rask admits regretfully, making me feel even worse about his situation. “They never take my calls. Hell, I’m not even sure why I call anymore. I guess I feel like one day my mom will answer and even if she doesn’t say anything I’ll know she’s listening.”
    The room grows uncomfortably quiet as Rask’s words set in. I feel sorry for him, as I’m sure he feels for me, but I don’t need to tell him that. We’re lost right now. Hell, even Evan is and he has his family back.
    “Can someone please start from the beginning?” Nate all but begs by throwing his hands up in the air.
    “Within days of buying this house, I’m sitting outside minding my own business when a helo shows up and drops off Chesley. Now, I’m thinking it’s not a coincidence, but I’m trying to give the Navy the benefit of the doubt. Except days are going by and Chesley’s not leaving … hell, he’s not even moving.”
    “How do you know?” Nate interjects
    Evan points to the monitor. “I watch there and upstairs on my deck. Plus, the video records so I can watch when I’m bored.”
    “That’s really creepy, Evan.” Clearly Nate isn’t as impressed as I am.
    “Call it what you want, Nate. All I know is that Chesley isn’t leaving that hangar except for the other night when McCoy and I were screwing around with a suspicious trawler. After we scared them into leaving, Chesley and Abigail left in a black car, returning around six a.m.”
    “Isn’t that who we saved?” Rask questions, earning nods from Evan and me.
    “Yeah it is.” I clear my throat and take my turn telling the guys what I learned yesterday from Marley. Between the holy shits and motherfuckers, I think I have them convinced we’re in danger, even if neither Evan nor I can prove it.
    “Who the hell did we piss off?” Nate asks while all of us shake our heads.
    “Wrong CO in O’Keefe? I don’t know, maybe it wasn’t us and someone else,” Rask remarks, throwing out another theory.
    “I can’t think of anyone I’ve pissed off,” I add.
    “It wasn’t us,” Evan states. “It was River. We’ve never had a dirty mission until he married Frannie, or whatever her real name is, and all of a sudden we’re being sent out to rescue the daughter of the vice president because she was kidnapped by the senator she was having an affair with?”
    “Plus, the vice president dies weeks before you guys return, and I’m sent out on a bogus training mission before you come home,” Nate says, adding to the conspiracy.
    “Holy shit, this is worse than one of those books my mother used to read,” Rask says, with a shrug.
    Evan opens a notebook and pulls out a stack of papers, handing each of us one.
    “Here’s what we know. When we left, River had just married Frannie, who happens to be Ingram’s daughter and Lawson’s sister. As far as I can tell, Lawson and Frannie have different mothers, neither of which are or were married to Ingram. River hadn’t known her long from what I remember, and days after they married we’re sent to Cuba on what O’Keefe called a snatch and grab. River tells us a few days, tops. We find the Chesley girl and kill Renato, setting off a chain reaction.
    “At this point, O’Keefe should’ve brought another team in to assist, but doesn’t. We stay and uncover a child sex ring funded by a US man, who we can assume is