Contracted Defense Page 4

  It was a high-tech atmosphere he could appreciate, with a touch of class in the design. He could be as rough and ready as any soldier out there. It didn’t mean he didn’t appreciate a space conducive to productivity.

  Scattered across the floor, employees were working on laptops, sitting or standing at adjustable workstations. There were even treadmill desks scattered here and there. It seemed like too big a space for so few people, but Safeguard’s business meant its key assets weren’t in the office. Those visible here were more likely support staff.

  There was the slightest sound of steps around the corner, the one blind corner in the place. The fact that it was on the approach to the reception area was no accident. “Mr. Hicks. I’m sorry to keep you waiting.”

  Gabriel Diaz stood waiting as Hicks rose. Diaz was dressed in jeans and a black polo, neat and relaxed at the same time. The man’s build was solid. The leader of Safeguard hadn’t gone soft spending time in the office.

  “No worries.” Hicks took Diaz’s offered hand in a firm shake. “Thank you for inviting me to your special night last evening. Being new and all, I’m not properly one of the team yet.”

  He watched Diaz closely. Safeguard wasn’t the first organization he’d spoken to on returning from New Zealand, ready to work. He’d initially reached out to one or two smaller groups that’d accepted other men from his unit. There’d been a strange tension in those talks, even with the mates he’d served with back when they’d all been active US military. He’d eased carefully away from those opportunities, wary of the way his former squad mates had been toward him. Considering how he’d left active service, he shouldn’t blame them. Maybe. But he’d hoped they’d have remembered his good years, at least been willing to give him the chance to overwrite the one last mission.

  No. The memory of the last had been in their eyes. It’d erased trust and left him with cold greetings on his return. So here he was at Safeguard, starting fresh.

  But Diaz was completely relaxed, no sign of wariness or awkwardness. “My fiancée tells me food and drink are an important part of team building. You’re going to be a part of my team, so it made sense to give you the chance to meet and mingle with our people and our partners from the beginning.”

  No mention of the scuffle in front of the hotel. Diaz might be aware of it. He might not. Hicks decided it best not to mention unless his new employer did. It wasn’t something to boast about, and defending the honor of his new team shouldn’t be something he needed to tell everyone he’d done. It was just something a good person did.

  Hicks grinned and nodded. “Fair. I’m eager to get started.”

  Diaz cocked his head to the side slightly. “I think your partner’s arrived. She’s probably headed down the hall now. Might get delayed checking in with my second.”

  She. “I’ll be honest, sir, I’ve got no issue with female counterparts. Met some skilled professionals in the business. But I’ve never been partnered directly with a lady. Any tips you have on how to get off to a positive start would be much appreciated.”

  Diaz had gone still when Hicks started talking, but by the end, one of Diaz’s eyebrows twitched. “Up front and honest is always good. Treat a lady as an equal is a given or you’d be better suited for other organizations. Remember, she’s a proven member of the team. You are still on probation.”

  Hicks set his jaw and nodded. No argument there. When he’d made the decision to enter private contracting, several of his inquiries had been met with cold reception and immediate rejection, even though none of those had been mates he’d served with or anyone who’d know him personally. Those should’ve been neutral opportunities. He’d been surprised. The terse responses hadn’t been accompanied with explanations, but he’d expected his experience would’ve landed him more direct interviews than he’d gotten. At least a chance to present himself as a person beyond the service record.

  He’d need to reestablish a network of contacts in the industry now that he was back. Then he could look into why. In the meantime, Safeguard and Centurion Corporation had been his best option. Any other options were outfits with reputations for shadier ethics. He’d have been faced with the same impossible choices that’d driven him out of active duty in the first place.

  He had a chance here to build a new career. Proving himself first was fair. He just had a feeling there were marks against his name already, and there shouldn’t be. His last mission on record should’ve been buried under so much need to know, no one would’ve bothered to dig for it. Even then, the truth wasn’t necessarily reflected in the report.

  “Why don’t we wait for her in my briefing room. All the conference pods are taken. She’ll find us and join us.” Diaz motioned toward a wall of glass.

  Adam jerked his head in an affirmative and cleared his head of the past. It wouldn’t be constructive here and now. As they walked, the frames of glass doors were visible at regular intervals. Each of the “pods” was separated by equally transparent walls with a horizontal strip of frosted treatment across the middle sections to provide privacy while still giving line of sight from the knees down for anyone inside those pods. People could conduct business in those small conference rooms without feeling like they were in fish bowls, but it was still easy to tell if there was anyone in those rooms.

  In many ways, the entire office was set up to suit professionals who maintained a level of hypervigilance. The layout was wide-open, maximizing visibility to everything in the main area. Diaz paused at a door toward the end of the line, and Adam glimpsed around the corner to a whole different area of office space. Maybe that’s where they were hiding the coffee.

  Diaz opened the door and stepped inside, holding it for Adam to follow. This room was different. Multiple screens were set up and synched with a camera to support videoconference. As they moved to sit at the table, Diaz touched a control panel set on the wall, and the clear walls turned opaque. Nice.

  “My office is connected to this briefing room.” Diaz tilted his head to indicate another closed door. “When you are here, you are welcome at any time so long as I’m not in a meeting with someone else.”

  “You don’t have an admin dragon guarding the entrance to your office?” Adam bit the inside of his cheek. Not everyone appreciated his humor, and it might be too early to test it on his new employer.

  Diaz snorted. “I’ll need to find one eventually. It takes a specific type of dragon to deal with my people. I don’t want them turned away for the sake of a booked calendar, and for the most part, they’d walk right over a normal admin.”

  There was a brief knock and the door from Diaz’s office opened.

  “I cut through. Hope you don’t mind.” The new voice was oddly familiar, unmistakably feminine with a low, husky quality to it.

  Adam stood and kept his face carefully neutral as he looked into her electric-blue gaze.

  Diaz rose as well. “Victoria Ash, meet your new partner, Adam Hicks.”

  Chapter Four

  “So, how have you been?” Adam cleared his voice and shifted awkwardly in the passenger seat. “Since last night?”

  Victoria counted to ten, considering the various things she could say. Ultimately, she discarded pleasantries and got straight to her immediate thoughts. “You didn’t tell me you worked for Safeguard.”

  Adam didn’t bristle defensively as she’d expected. Instead, the big man relaxed. “Technically, I didn’t. Not last night. Today is my first day. I try not to claim what isn’t yet true. A man never knows what can happen from one day to the next.”

  His relaxed attitude and easygoing manner had been attractive to her last night. Today, she hadn’t decided if it amused her or irritated her. Perhaps a mix of both. It remained to be seen whether he could seriously apply himself to an actual contract.

  “Cutting it a bit fine, aren’t you?” She eased her grip on the steering
wheel. He hadn’t put up a fight about which of them was going to drive once they’d left Safeguard headquarters. Which was a good thing because she needed a measure of control over the current situation to regain her composure. “You are coming perilously close to a lie by omission.”

  Negotiating the stop-and-go traffic of downtown Seattle meant driving was going to be tedious until they reached the ferry. Then it was going to be concentrated wait time. Giving him the silent treatment the whole way didn’t appeal to her. She also had no idea how to move forward in any kind of constructive way. She was still too caught up in what he hadn’t told her.

  “Honest truth: I didn’t intend to mislead you.” He held out his hands, palms up within her range of sight. “I was very interested in where we were headed last night and figured to deal with tomorrow’s problems when they presented themselves. It was a very enjoyable night. I hope you agree.”

  Oh, it’d been lovely. She wasn’t going to erase the memory of it with any sort of denial. “Tomorrow is now today, though. And this is a problem.”

  “You didn’t argue with Diaz.” Adam’s tone had gone quiet, sober. The warm geniality suddenly missing unsettled her.

  “No.” She drew out the response as she considered her own reaction. “I decided to follow your lead in the introductions. I wanted the chance to talk to you first before I asked him to rearrange his plans for the current contracts.”

  Adam was silent for a moment. “Does Safeguard have that many? Seems to me, Diaz would listen if you had a problem with working with me.”

  Victoria lifted a shoulder. “Contracts are coming in and our resources are spread to capacity to cover while we bring on new people like you. Diaz would listen, but I don’t raise issues until I’m sure I know what I want and have a mitigation plan to propose. I still need to work out what I’d propose from two aspects.”

  No one appreciated problems, but it was important to identify them early. She disliked people who only found them, though. That sort tended to dump issues into someone else’s lap and walk away having washed their hands of any responsibility. If a person was intelligent enough to anticipate a problem, they could exercise the intellectual effort to come up with a few possible solutions too.

  “And what are those two aspects?” His words had a hint of humor back in them.

  Tension between her shoulder blades eased in response. That neutral tone of his was something to watch for in the future. In some people, it was a lack of commitment or intelligent response. Adam Hicks was neither, and she had a hunch it hid quite a lot going on inside his mind.

  “For one thing, I don’t see a reason to refuse to work with you outright. It took me by surprise, yes, but there hasn’t been any indication we wouldn’t be able to partner well. Quite the opposite, actually.” Well, depending on how one decided to take the wording there. She refused to glance in his direction. He had a way of smiling, slow and devilish. It would be far too distracting at the moment. “The second consideration would be the current contracts. I would much rather take on this situation than oversee security for another wedding.”

  He laughed then, loud and unfettered. It filled the car with his energy and lightened the mood. “You could’ve asked to have me booted to a different job.”

  She shook her head slightly. “If I’d decided to protest an assignment, it should’ve been me to go to a new one.”

  “Thank you.” His gratitude was expressed simply and with sincerity.

  It shouldn’t keep her off balance, but it did. Most of the people she’d encountered in her line of work didn’t express things like appreciation or thanks easily. It was awkward at best, avoided more often than not. It could be considered a weakness, something to be taken advantage of down the line. If you admitted thanks, then a person could claim you owed them. There were less than half a dozen people in the world she’d give such an advantage to. From where she was sitting, Adam had a lot of self-confidence in being able to utter those two words.

  “Glad you decided to keep me on for this one,” Adam continued. He tilted his seat back a few inches and put his hands behind his head. “This is looking to be an easy job, aye?”

  “Tch. This is not going to be easy. Did you listen during the briefing?” As much as she loved his Kiwi accent, she could swear it got stronger just then.

  “I did.” He continued to sound unconcerned. “We’re enhancing the security on a private home, both physical and IT, then training his personal security team on the systems we’ve put into place. Definitely easy. It’s a house, not a compound.”

  “A private home in the middle of a residential area is more difficult. Neighbors make things complicated. Too many innocent bystanders walking around tripping alarms to snoop over their neighbor’s wall.” Victoria sighed. It’d been less than an hour, and her blood pressure was already up. “There are no easy jobs. Take this seriously. Do it right, with every attention to detail.”

  “Easy there. I hear you.” Adam sat up in his seat.

  His change in posture helped ease her irritation, but she still shot him a dubious sideways glance.

  “I do my job and I do it well.” His voice had turned serious again. “I’m also very good at what I do. To me, this is looking to be a straightforward couple of months. It means a lot to know we don’t have an anticipated body count.”

  True. She’d been a part of enough operations where things like chance of survival and potential body count were unspoken assumptions. They might be briefed on those specifically or it might go unsaid. It depended on the briefing officer. Compared to those remembered missions, yes, he had a point. This job had a different level of difficulty.

  She pulled the car in line and glanced at her watch. They’d made it in good time. “Line’s short. A few minutes now and we’ll be on the ferry. Perfect timing.”

  He didn’t press the earlier line of discussion. It made sense. She’d been the one to bring it up. Instead, he leaned forward to look beyond the cars ahead of them. “How long is the crossing?”

  She considered. “Thirty to forty minutes, I think?”

  “Huh. How long would we have waited if we’d missed this one?”

  “Between forty-five and sixty minutes.” She checked her smartphone for the schedule just to be sure. The weekend schedule differed from the weekdays. He didn’t respond but the weight of his regard pricked her temper again. “What?”

  “You are a very detail-oriented woman.” There was no mockery in his words. Actually, he sounded quite sincere, and the heat in his gaze was appreciative.

  As soon as they pulled the car onto the ferry, she was stepping out of the car. It was getting too damned hot in here and they still had business to discuss. “I am and we need to work out another detail.”

  He cocked his head to the side, one eyebrow raised in query.

  “Last night.” Was amazing. But she didn’t say what he already knew. Cocky bastard. “Didn’t happen.”

  His eyes closed and reopened in a slow blink. The warmth leached from his face, and the smile faded until his expression was completely neutral.

  “We are partners now.” Her reasoning was sound. She was sure of it. “We need to be able to work on a professional level. Intimacy complicates things and puts our quality of work at risk.”

  “And we can’t have that.” He wasn’t happy, but he didn’t sound angry or sad either. Instead, his words were flat.

  “Absolutely not.” It hurt, the way his easy camaraderie had been stuffed away somewhere. She wanted it back. Which was childish. This was for the best. “Diaz doesn’t know, and no one needs to ever take it into consideration. We can just put it behind us and build a professional working relationship.”

  She stopped talking then and waited for his response. The cars ahead of them moved forward, and she eased their car onto the ferry in line with the rest. It wasn’t until
the ferry was on its way across the Puget Sound that Adam answered her.

  “Sweet as.”

  “Excuse me?”

  He shrugged. “Means ‘okay.’ Sweet as. I’ll take your lead on this. Once we build a working relationship, we’ll revisit this discussion about what else is between us. Yeah?”

  “No.”

  Hadn’t he said something like “yeah, nah” last night?

  He grinned. “Now you’re sounding like you might be confused.”

  Yes. She scowled at him. “No, we are not revisiting.”

  He leaned toward her, not intimidating, just coming right into her personal space. Her heart kicked in her chest, and she had the urge to grab hold of his shoulder, his arm, any part of him.

  He didn’t come closer though. Instead, his gaze caught hers. “There is this between us. I like it. You have a point about our working together professionally. We’ll get there. Then we’ll come back to this. If you don’t want it then, I’ll back off. But I won’t pretend it never existed.”

  * * *

  “When I forwarded the signed statement of work to Mr. Diaz yesterday, I hadn’t anticipated he would send his team on a Sunday.” Roland Edwards folded his arms across his chest and made no move to open the iron gate blocking the entrance to the drive. “I’d assumed work would begin the next working day, not literally the next afternoon.”

  Adam stood next to Victoria as their new client glowered at them both and decided to let her do the meet-and-greet niceties. His sense of humor had a tendency to tick off men like Edwards. Well, Adam also seemed to have a knack for riling up Victoria, but stirring up her temper was irresistible.

  “We apologize for disturbing you on your weekend, Dr. Edwards, but it was our understanding that you wanted to start immediately. The statement of work also indicated work to progress on weekends whenever possible to bring in the timeline.” Victoria’s tone was low and soothing, but there was a no-nonsense edge underlying the softness.