Headed for Trouble

Headed for Trouble - By Suzanne Brockmann


INTRODUCTION


I started writing my sixteen-book Troubleshooters series in 1999. I’ve covered a lot of ground in the years since then, creating a large stable of characters—some of whom have insisted on being recurring, showing up in book after book, and some of whom who have faded gracefully into the background as new characters were introduced and took center stage.

One thing is for certain: Regardless of how popular a character was, there was no way to include every single member of SEAL Team Sixteen in each and every one of the books. And even if beloved characters did appear, the situation wasn’t always the right opportunity to get readers caught up on what was going on in their lives.

Picture a scenario where a SEAL team fast-ropes in to rescue characters who are being held hostage. The SEAL in command does not say, “Hi, my name is Lieutenant Mike Muldoon, and by the way, my wife, Joan, and I just had a baby boy, and even though we’re not getting much sleep, we’re both deliriously happy.”

I mean, that’s just not gonna happen, right?

And some characters were so … strong, shall we say, that it was hard to bring them into a book for a walk-on or extra role—they would tend to take over the scene and then the entire book if I didn’t remain vigilant. (I’m talking about you, Sam Starrett!) So I often found myself sending them out of town on some important mission or op just to clear the stage for the newer characters.

Long story short, some years back, I started writing short stories to keep readers up to date as to what was happening in these characters’ busy and eventful lives.

But I knew right from the start that I wanted these short stories to have substance. I knew that I didn’t want to write “Sam and Alyssa Get a Puppy.” Instead, the first short that I wrote was a story in which Sam and Alyssa, newly married, are out on a missing persons case, working together for Troubleshooters Incorporated, when they bump into the victim of a notorious serial killer called “the Dentist.”

I called it “When Alyssa and Sam Met the Dentist,” and it was more of a day-in-the-life character study of how previously cynical Alyssa is subtly being changed by her recent marriage to optimistic Sam.

This short first appeared in the back of Flashpoint, and interestingly, many readers didn’t recognize that it was just that—a short story. I got email after email, asking me when the rest of that book about that serial killer was going to come out. (Oops.)

At the same time, I knew that finding evidence of that killer’s handiwork was gnawing at Alyssa, so I wasn’t surprised when the Dentist came up again, in later Sam and Alyssa short stories (included in this collection, too). And for those readers who are thinking, The Dentist sounds familiar …, I finally allowed the deadly killer to go head-to-head with Alyssa (and Sam, naturally) in the full-length Troubleshooters novel Hot Pursuit.

For those of you who like to know exactly how it all fits together, I’ve included a timeline that allows you to see where each of the stories in this collection falls within the framework of the sixteen published Troubleshooters books, and the two e-published Troubleshooters short stories.

There’s also a glossary of terms, FYI, at the back of the book, as well as a special bonus short story called “Shane’s Last Stand,” which features the Navy SEAL hero of my futuristic paranormal book Born to Darkness. (Even in the future, SEALs are still SEALs, and the only easy day was yesterday.)

As always, with all the books that I write, any mistakes made or liberties taken are completely my own.





Suzanne Brockmann

May 12, 2012





TROUBLESHOOTERS SERIES TIMELINE


1999:

When Frank Met Rosie

Timeframe: Thanksgiving Day

Hero: Navy SEAL Chief Frank O’Leary

Heroine: Rosie Marchado

2000:

1. The Unsung Hero

Timeframe: August

First Published: June 2000

Hero: Navy SEAL Lt. Tom Paoletti

Heroine: Dr. Kelly Ashton

Storyline: A SEAL recovering from a head injury spots a believed-to-be-dead terrorist in a quiet little New England town.

Secondary Romance: Tom’s niece Mallory Paoletti and comic book artist David Sullivan

World War II Subplot: Resistance in Nazi-occupied France, a love triangle between Charles, Joe, and Cybele.

2001:

2. The Defiant Hero

Timeframe: Spring

Note: Flashbacks to 1997, with young SEALs Nils, Sam, and WildCard

First Published: March 2001

Hero: Navy SEAL Lt. (jg) John “Nils” Nilsson

Heroine: Meg Moore

Storyline: The rescue of Meg’s kidnapped grandmother and daughter.

Secondary Romance: Navy SEAL Sam Starrett and FBI Agent Alyssa Locke

World War II Subplot: The evacuation of Dunkirk (Eve and Ralph).

3. Over the Edge

Timeframe: Summer

First Published: September 2001

Hero: Navy SEAL Senior Chief Stan Wolchonok

Heroine: Navy Reserve helo pilot Lt. (jg) Teresa Howe

Storyline: The Navy SEAL takedown of a commercial airliner hijacked by terrorists.

Note: This book came out two weeks before 9/11. Secondary Romance: Navy SEAL Sam Starrett and FBI Agent Alyssa Locke

World War II Subplot: The Holocaust in Denmark.

4. Out of Control

Timeframe: This book was written pre-9/11, and is set in that “before” world, even though the action was meant to take place in early 2002.

First Published: March 2002

Hero: Navy SEAL Chief Ken “WildCard” Karmody

Heroine: Savannah von Hopf

Storyline: Kenny and Savannah’s scramble through the Indonesian jungle.

Secondary Romance: Expat David Jones and do-gooder Molly Anderson

World War II Subplot: German Americans as spies in Nazi Germany (Rose and Hank).

2002:

5. Into the Night

Timeframe: Intentionally vague, to catch up to the post-9/11 world

First Published: December 2002

Hero: Navy SEAL Lt. (jg) Mike Muldoon

Heroine: Joan DaCosta

Storyline: The terrorist assassination attempt at the Coronado Naval Base.

Secondary Romance: Mary Lou Starrett and Ihbraham Rahman

World War II Subplot: The battle of Tarawa, and the formation of the UDT units, granddaddies to the SEALs (Vince and Charlotte).

2003:

6. Gone Too Far

Timeframe: June

First Published: July 2003

Hero: Navy SEAL Lt. Roger “Sam” Starrett

Heroine: FBI Agent Alyssa Locke

Storyline: The rescue of Sam’s missing daughter.

Secondary Romance: FBI Agent Max Bhagat and former hostage Gina Vitagliano

World War II Subplot: Tuskegee Airmen and the Women Airforce Service Pilots (Walt and Dot).

When Alyssa and Sam Met the Dentist

Timeframe: Autumn

2004:

7. Flashpoint

Timeframe: Summer

First Published: April 2004

Hero: James Nash

Heroine: Tess Bailey

Storyline: The search for a terrorist’s missing laptop in an earthquake-ravaged country.

Secondary Relationship: Friendship between Jim Nash and former SEAL Lawrence Decker

Waiting

Main Characters: TS Operative Sam Starrett and the wives of the SEALs of Team Sixteen

2005:

8. Hot Target

Timeframe: Late winter, early spring

First Published: January 2005

Hero: Navy SEAL Chief Cosmo Richter

Heroine: Jane Mercedes Chadwick

Storyline: The protection of a Hollywood producer receiving death threats for making a movie about a gay World War II hero.

Secondary Romance: FBI Agent Jules Cassidy and actor Robin Chadwick

World War II Subplot: Jack and Hal, and the ghost army of the 23rd HQ Special Troops.

9. Breaking Point

Timeframe: Summer

First Published: July 2005

Hero: FBI Team Leader Max Bhagat Heroine: Gina Vitagliano

Storyline: The rescue of Gina and Molly by unlikely allies Max, Jones, and Jules.

Secondary Romance: Expat David Jones and Molly Anderson

Sam Takes an Assignment in Italy

Timeframe: Post–Breaking Point

Main Characters: TS Operative Sam Starrett and FBI Agent Jules Cassidy

When Jenk, Izzy, Gillman, and Lopez Met Tony Vlachic

Timeframe: Pre–Into the Storm

Interview with Tom and Kelly

Timeframe: December

10. Into the Storm

Timeframe: December

First Published: August 2006

Hero: Navy SEAL Petty Officer Mark “Jenk” Jenkins

Heroine: Troubleshooters operative Lindsey Fontaine

Storyline: A combined winter training op with TS Inc. and SEAL Team Sixteen gets disrupted by a dangerous serial killer.

Secondary Relationships: Jenk’s SEAL friends Izzy, Gillman, and Lopez all loudly interact.

2006:

Trapped

Timeframe: Early 2006

Main Characters: TS Operative Alyssa Locke and FBI Agent Jules Cassidy

Conversation with Navy SEALs Mark “Jenk” Jenkins, Dan Gillman, Jay Lopez, and Irving “Izzy” Zanella

Timeframe: Shortly after Into the Storm

Interview with Kenny and Savannah

Timeframe: Shortly after Into the Storm

11. Force of Nature

Timeframe: Summer

First Published: August 2007

Romantic Couple One: PI Ric Alvarado and his gal Friday, Annie Dugan

Romantic Couple Two: FBI Agent Jules Cassidy and actor Robin Chadwick

Storyline: An investigation into a Florida crime lord with terrorist ties.

2007:

12. All Through the Night

Timeframe: September through December

First Published: October 2007

Hero: FBI Agent Jules Cassidy

Hero: Actor Robin Chadwick

Storyline: Jules and Robin get married in Massachusetts, and high jinks ensue.

Secondary Romance: Personal assistant Dolphina Patel and Boston Globe reporter Will Schroeder

E-Short-Story 1: When Tony Met Adam

Timeframe: December 2007 through February 2008

First Published: June 2011

Hero: Navy SEAL Tony Vlachic

Hero: Actor Adam Wyndham

Storyline: A romance celebrating the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.

2008:

Home Is Where the Heart Is (Part I and Part II)

Timeframe: Spring

Hero: Reporter Jack Lloyd

Heroine: Army Reserve Sergeant Arlene Schroeder, home from Iraq

Note: Arlene is the sister of Boston Globe reporter Will Schroeder, and the mother of Maggie, both of whom play major roles in All Through the Night.

13. Into the Fire

Timeframe: July

First Published: August 2008

Hero: Former TS operative Vinh Murphy

Heroine: Hannah Whitfield

Storyline: Former Marine Vinh Murphy is the prime suspect when the man responsible for his wife Angelina’s murder is found dead.

Secondary Relationships: The hardened operatives of TS Inc. are forced to talk to a therapist to finally come to terms with Angelina’s death.

14. Dark of Night

Timeframe: Summer

First Published: February 2009

Romantic Couple One: TS Operative and former SEAL Lawrence Decker and TS Inc. receptionist Tracy Shapiro

Romantic Couple Two: TS Operatives Dave Malkoff and Sophia Ghaffari

Storyline: TS Inc. goes up against the shadowy Agency when James Nash is targeted for removal.

2009:

15. Hot Pursuit

Timeframe: February

First Published: August 2009

Romantic Couple One: TS Operatives Sam Starrett and Alyssa Locke

Romantic Couple Two: Navy SEAL Petty Officer Dan Gillman and Jennilyn LeMay

Storyline: Alyssa is targeted by the dangerous serial killer known as “the Dentist.”

A SEAL and Three Babies

Timeframe: Early March

Main Characters: TS Operatives Sam Starrett and Alyssa Locke, and their one-year-old son, Ash; FBI Agent Jules Cassidy and his husband, Robin; FBI Agent Max Bhagat, his wife, Gina, and their children, Emma and Mikey.

16. Breaking the Rules

Timeframe: May 4–9, 2009

First Published: April 2011

Romantic Couple One: Navy SEAL Petty Officer Izzy Zanella and Eden Gillman

Romantic Couple Two: Navy SEAL Petty Officer Dan Gillman and Jennilyn LeMay

Storyline: Mortal frenemies and SEAL teammates Izzy and Dan are forced to work together when Dan’s little brother is in danger.

PRESENT DAY:

E-Short-Story 2: Beginnings and Ends

Timeframe: Undetermined

First Published: June 2012

Main Characters: FBI Agent Jules Cassidy and his husband, Robin Chadwick Cassidy

Storyline: Robin’s life gets intertwined with that of the closeted movie star he plays on his hit TV show, Shadowland, and he and Jules decide it’s time to make some changes in their lives.





WHEN FRANK MET ROSIE


November 25, 1999

New Orleans, Louisiana

The music made him stop and turn around.

It was just a solo voice—a man singing the richest, bluesiest version of Silent Night that Frank O’Leary had ever heard. It drew him closer when he should have headed away from the French Quarter and back toward his hotel.

Where his damn fool of a half brother was no doubt still holding court in the lobby bar. Lord Jesus save him from imbeciles. Of course, he himself could be included in that subset, considering he’d agreed to come to New Orleans for the holiday.

It was their mother who’d been the glue that kept them connected, Frank and Casey. Her constant smile and teasing words lightened the years of bad feelings between brothers who’d been born more than a decade apart. Now, though, they had less than nothing in common.

And yet Frank had come all the way from California on one of the busiest travel days of the year at Casey’s request.

Because he’d thought his mother would’ve wanted him to. Because she’d valued her precious family—her two such different sons—so highly.

Despite being just a few blocks down from the whorehouse-on-heavy-stun dementia of past-midnight Bourbon Street, this narrow road was deserted. A right turn revealed a street just as empty of tourists, but it definitely brought him closer to that angelic voice. Not like Frank was in any danger from the flesh-and-blood demons who crept out of the rotting woodwork of this city at night, no sir.

With his thrice-broken nose, his hair grown out from his usual no-frills tight and square cut, and his PT-hardened body, he knew he looked like the type most folks crossed the street to avoid.

He looked—as Casey had so often scornfully told him throughout his teenage years—as if he had barely a dime in his jeans pocket. Like a drifter. Like lowlife loser scum. Like his father, who’d cleaned out their mother’s bank account when he’d left, back when Frank was nine and Casey was twenty.

The joke was that Casey had asked Frank to today’s Thanksgiving dinner to borrow money. He’d lost nearly everything in bad investments. And since he knew that Frank still had his share from the recent sale of their mother’s house …

And here Frank had thought Casey wanted his company during this difficult holiday season, the first since their mother had passed.

Happy f*cking Thanksgiving to you, too, bro. Yeah, the real joke here was that Frank had left his true brothers behind in San Diego. His SEAL teammate Sam Starrett was hosting a dinner in the apartment he shared with Johnny Nilsson. He’d even roasted a turkey. Nils and the Card were in charge of the vegetables. Jenkins was handling dessert. Everyone else brought beer.

Instead of settling in for a day of food, friends, and football, Frank had shared a grim meal with Casey and his current wife (was Loreen number three or four?) up in their hotel suite. He’d escaped as quickly as possible after letting Casey know he’d already earmarked their mama’s money—all of it—for something special. A down payment on a condo or maybe even a boat.

Still, it didn’t take Casey long to join him in the bar. Could Frank maybe cosign a loan? Or let him borrow just a bit off that down payment …? No, no, no, don’t answer right away, bro. Just think about it …

Fifteen minutes of listening to his brother regaling the waitresses with tales of his own magnificence was all he could endure, and Frank escaped from the hotel bar as well.

But wandering Bourbon Street had been mildly amusing for only a very short time. Preservation Hall was already closed up tight and silent, and the bands playing in the various bars were entertaining only to inebriated ears. Watching grown men acting like frat boys drinking in the street and gazing with calf eyes at the teenage whores was flat-out creepy. And then there was that old woman—probably just an actress wrapped in rags and wearing stage-makeup warts—who’d first enticed Frank closer, offering to read his palm, and then, after only one brief look, had bluntly refused.

She’d shaken her head at him, backing away in alarm.

Which didn’t mean a goddamn thing.

Like anyone with eyes in their head and a lick of sense couldn’t tell from looking at him that he lived a dangerous life …?

Frank glanced at his watch. If he knew Sam Starrett, the meal would have long since been replaced by a deck of cards and a pile of poker chips. There’d be plenty more beer, lots of laughter, and music on the boom box—although nothing that could compare to this solo voice, the owner of which still eluded him.

Silent Night segued into an Ave Maria as sung by an angel who’d done his share of hard time on this earth.

Frank rounded the corner, and there the street singer stood. He was a wiry black man in his late fifties, although, on second glance, he might’ve been younger. Hard living could’ve given him that antique veneer a decade or two early. He was standing in a storefront, the windows creating a makeshift acoustical shell that amplified his magical, youthful voice.

Only a few people had gathered to listen to him sing. A group of older folks—three sets of couples, clearly tourists, laden with Mardi Gras beads—used their cameras to snap his picture. A bedraggled young woman stood slightly apart from them, in a sequin top and a tight-fitting black skirt, looking like sex for sale.

The singer’s voice faltered, and Frank slowed his steps, shortening his stride as the eight of them turned almost at once to look at him. They shrank away as if they all were fortune-tellers and knew that an anvil was on the verge of falling on top of him, out of the clear blue sky.

Cloudy sky, actually. It was definitely going to rain again tonight.

And not all of them shrank from him. The girl—she didn’t look more than seventeen—didn’t seem too afraid. Probably because she hadn’t yet met her pimp’s quota for the night, and saw him as a potential john.

She had to be relatively new to the city, new at her distasteful job. She was still pretty, with long, dark hair and deep brown eyes. Her skin hadn’t yet acquired that unmistakable gray pallor caused by substance abuse and nocturnal living. She gave her top a hike northward as she met his gaze and smiled a greeting.

The Red Hat Club and their spouses weren’t quite as friendly. They quickly scurried off down the street.

“Sorry, man,” Frank told the singer, taking out his wallet and extracting a twenty. “Didn’t mean to chase ’em away.”

He dropped the bill in the cardboard shoebox being used in lieu of a hat. The man clearly couldn’t afford headwear, dressed as he was in Salvation Army castoffs, T-shirt dirty and torn, feet shoved into sneakers with the toes cut away.

“S’okay,” the singer said, still eyeing him warily. “They were twenty-five-centers. It’s been that kind of night. Aside from your twenty, I ain’t got mor’n a buck seventy-five.”

Did he really think …? “I ain’t gon’ rob you, man,” Frank said, slipping easily into the molasses-thick accent of his childhood.

The singer nodded, but didn’t seem convinced. “If you did, you wouldn’t be the first. Like I said, it’s been that kind of night.”

“You take requests?” Frank asked.

“For twenty bucks?” The man’s lips twisted in what might’ve passed for a smile. “Son, I’ll perform unnatural acts.”

Jesus, he wasn’t kidding. “Amazing Grace,” Frank said, “is what I’m hoping for.”

The singer’s eyes were dark with understanding as he looked up from his crouch beside his box. His hands were shaking as he slipped the twenty beneath the newspaper that lined the bottom of his container, and Frank knew the man wasn’t going to spend that cash on either food or shelter, and wasn’t that a crying shame?

“I guess we all need savin’ at some point or ’nother,” the singer said, straightening back up.

“Yes, sir,” Frank agreed. Some more than most. The man closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and started to sing.

It was strange hearing that rich voice coming out of that scrawny, dried-up husk of a body. Clearly the Lord worked in mysterious ways.

Frank closed his eyes, too, letting the familiar words wash over him, the melody soaring and dipping, carrying out into the unnaturally warm Louisiana night.

He sensed more than heard the girl as she moved to stand beside him, and he mentally inventoried his valuables. Wallet was in his front jeans pocket. It wasn’t getting picked without him noticing, that was for damn sure. He wore his dive watch on his left wrist. His hotel keycard was in his back pocket—easy to lose, but not a problem if it got taken. What was she gonna do? Go into the Sheraton and try every room on every floor, looking for the lock it opened? Security would escort her out the back door within thirty seconds.

She shifted slightly, and Frank caught a whiff of her perfume. She actually smelled nice—like vanilla. Mixed, of course, with whiskey. He opened his eyes and as he turned to look down at her—she was about an entire foot shorter than he was—she smiled again.

“He’s incredible, huh?” she whispered.

Frank nodded. Up close, she was even prettier than he’d first thought, with clear, perfect skin and lively eyes in a heart-shaped face.

She opened her mouth to speak again, but he spoke first. “Ain’t lookin’ to get hoovered, Sugar, even by a mouth as pretty as yours. Don’t waste your time on me.”

She blinked at him, clearly confused. “I’m sorry, I didn’t … You said, you’re not looking to get …?” Ah, shit. Her accent and words were pure well-educated Northerner. Her voice wasn’t that of a seventeen-year-old, either. She was closer to ten years older. And Frank could see now that her bedraggled state was merely from being caught in the rain that had poured down a few hours earlier, as if someone had pulled the plug in heaven.

“Sorry,” he said quickly. “I thought … I was wrong.” Just his luck, she wasn’t drunk enough to let it slide. He could see her replaying the words he’d said, trying to figure out the ones she’d missed—or misunderstood.

“Hoovered,” she said with a laugh, comprehension dawning. “As in … Right. Okay.” She quickly turned back to stare, as if fascinated, at the singer, color tingeing her cheeks. “I’m feeling pretty friendly tonight, but not that friendly. Wow.”

Shit, now he was blushing, too. Great. “Sorry,” he said again.

She turned to look at him again. “You really thought I was …?” Amazingly, she wasn’t offended, just curious. Interested even.

Frank tried to explain. “Most women … out alone, this time of night …” He shrugged.

She nodded, accepting the misunderstanding as an honest mistake. And if he weren’t mistaken, she was more than a little thrilled to have been taken for a prostitute. Go figure.

They stood there then, just listening to the music, to the timeless words. I once was lost but now I’m found, was blind but now I see …

Silence settled around them as the last notes of the song faded away. The singer didn’t open his eyes, he just launched into a bluesy rendition of an old torch song. “Crazy.” Another of Frank’s mother’s favorites.

The girl—woman—standing next to Frank cleared her throat. “See, I lost my jacket,” she told him, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “I was with a group of friends and … It’s gone. I don’t know where I left it. I went back for it, but …” She shrugged, an action which did some amazing things to the plunging neckline of that barely there top.

“They let you come out here, all alone?” Frank had to ask, working to keep his gaze on her pretty face. What kind of foolish friends did she have?

“Of course not. But we’d only gone a block when Betsy felt sick, so Jenn flagged down a cab. She told the driver to take me to the bar we just left and then right back to our hotel, and the first part of that plan worked. But when I came out, the cab was gone,” she reported. “It was a toss-up between staying there and trying to flag another while getting hit on by bozos, or walking back. I opted for walking. I attached myself to that group. They were from Ohio.”

“You just let them leave,” he pointed out, and it was weird as hell, because as he held her gaze, something shifted in his chest, something massive that hadn’t moved in years.

“I definitely look less like a, you know, hooker with my jacket on,” she told him.

“I am sorry,” he said again, “that I said what I said …”

“You reminded me of my best friend’s cousin,” she said. “Billy. When you walked up, for a second I thought you were him. Which didn’t make sense, but … He was Marine Recon. What are you? Navy, right?”

How the hell did she know? None of his tattoos showed.

She pointed to his dive watch. “I used to work for a catalog company, and we sold much cheaper versions. Lots of knockoff K-Bar knives, too. And chain mail. You ever need chain mail, I can hook you up with a supplier.”

Frank laughed at that. “Thanks.” Chain mail. “I probably won’t …” He shook his head.

“You never know,” she said, a sparkle in her eyes. Sparkle and spark.

“I pretty much do.” He smiled back. And had to ask. “So, you and, uh, Billy, um …?”

“A thing of the past,” she informed him. “And yes, it was tragic. He broke my heart—he went and married someone else. Of course, I was twelve, so within a week I’d moved on to Chandler from Friends.”

Frank laughed. “Ah.”

“How long have you been out of the service?” the woman asked, but didn’t wait for him to answer. She somehow managed to read his eyes or maybe his mind. “You’re not out—you’re still in.”

Frank nodded. “You really should’ve stayed with that group from Ohio.”

“And missed the chance to be mistaken for a lady of the evening?”

“What if I was dangerous?” he asked, and there it was again. That spark of heat between them.

“Why Amazing Grace?” she countered.

Frank just looked at her, using silence to let her know that he wasn’t going to let her change the subject. Damn, but she was pretty, with those dark brown eyes that shone with intelligence, even though she’d clearly had too much to drink. But she met his gaze steadily, refusing to be intimidated, just letting the singer’s beautiful voice wash over them. Crazy for crying and crazy for trying …

Finally, he spoke. “Got a thing for livin’ dangerously?” he drawled, purposely leaning heavily on his accent. But even though her cheeks again flushed, this time she didn’t look away.

“Actually, no,” she admitted. “I’ve always been careful. Sometimes too careful, I think.”

Frank had always scoffed at the idea of love at first sight. How stupid was that? Giving your heart based only on the way a woman looked, without getting to know her …? But as he held this girl’s gaze, he felt that same seismic shift in his chest that he’d felt before. “No such thing as too careful.”

“Yeah,” she said, dead serious. “There is. If I’d left with the Ohio squad, I would’ve regretted it. Badly.

Maybe I’m crazy, but when I saw you …” Her voice trailed off, and she finally looked away. Laughed. “I am crazy. I must be. I just … I didn’t want to regret not meeting you. Your turn to embarrass yourself. Why Amazing Grace?”

“My mother passed last spring.” The words left his mouth as if on their own volition. What the hell …? There were members of his SEAL team whom he hadn’t yet told of her death, and here he was, telling this stranger.

A stranger who’d just looked him in the eye and admitted that she was willing to risk her own personal safety just to meet him.

Like he was something special, like she’d seen his aura or some kind of halo hanging over his head. Right.

My mother passed last spring really wasn’t a complete answer to Why Amazing Grace? but somehow she understood. Completely.

“Oh, wow,” she said, her eyes sympathetic. “Happy Thanksgiving, huh? It must’ve been such a hard day for you.”

Frank felt himself nod. Whatever it was that had shifted in his chest had moved to his throat. He tried to swallow it back down, but it was lodged there. She put her hand on his arm, her fingers cool and soft against his skin. “I’m so sorry.”

She meant it. Frank didn’t know what to say.

Across the street, the singer finished his song. He started packing up his box. “Sorry, folks. Gotta run. Shelter starts filling this time of night, weather like this. If I wait too long, I won’t get a bed.”

Frank hadn’t noticed until now, but it had started, again, to rain. It was coming down faster now. Harder.

The singer clutched his box to his chest. “Rosie, can I walk you to your hotel?” he asked.

Rosie. She only briefly glanced away from Frank as she answered the man. “No thanks, Odell. I’m okay.”

The singer—Odell—still didn’t trust Frank, eyeing him, edging closer, as if he could do some serious damage to the SEAL, who had way more than a hundred pounds on him. “You sure?”

“Thank you, but yes.” Rosie was sure.

And as the skies opened up, Odell was gone.

Rosie looked up into the deluge and just laughed. She must’ve been even more drunk than Frank had thought, so he grabbed her by the hand and pulled her, and together they ran for shelter.

It was pointless—they were already soaked—running wouldn’t keep them from getting any more wet. Still, the sound of her laughter made him smile, and—go figure—he was laughing, too, when she finally pulled him into a narrow doorway.

She was breathless and soaked. Her face wasn’t all that was glistening wet, but her smile was so damn infectious as they stood there, squeezed together in a space where he’d have barely fit on his own. She was warm and soft against him, the neckline of that clingy top truly amazing from his vantage point.

“This seems like a good time for introductions,” she told him. “I’m Rosie Marchado. I’m from Hartford. In Connecticut.”

“Frank O’Leary,” he said. He couldn’t look down into her face without getting an eyeful of her sonnet-worthy cleavage. Sweet Jesus, he loved full-figured women.

“Do you want to …,” she started, then stopped. She made an embarrassed face. “God, I’ve never done this before. You’re going to think that I’m …” She took a deep breath, which completely renewed his faith in a higher power. “I really never, ever do this, but do you want to …”

She didn’t hesitate for more than a second or two, but that was all the time Frank needed to fill in the blank.

Have sex, right here in this shadowy doorway. He would kiss her, his hands sweeping her skirt up, her leg wrapping around him as they strained to get closer, even closer.…

She was going to ask him for it, and he was going to have to turn her down because she was drunk, except, damn, he couldn’t think of anything or anyone he’d rather do.

But then she finished her question with, “Maybe go get some coffee? With me?”

At first her words just didn’t make sense.

She wanted hot, steaming …

Coffee.

She was looking up at him, her lower lip caught between her perfect teeth. She was feeling trepidation both at the fact that she’d been so bold as to suggest to a near stranger that they go get coffee, and because she thought he might actually say no.

Frank started to laugh. “I know a place we can go.” He took her by the hand, and once again pulled her out with him, into the rain.



They talked.

All night.

And by the time Frank walked Rosie back to her hotel in the French Quarter, he knew that even though she’d given him her phone number—in Hartford freakin’ Connecticut—he wasn’t going to call her.

He liked her too damn much.

She’d told him about her fiancé. Ex-fiancé. The sumbitch had dumped her two months before their wedding because—the a*shole had claimed—their lives together would be too boring.

Boring? In what dimension? She was funny and sweet and smart and—God damn!—sexy as all get out. The entire time they sat there, sipping their coffee and talking themselves hoarse, he couldn’t stop thinking about how perfect and soft her lips would feel if he kissed her.

But when he’d told her—just a little—about being a SEAL, about being stationed in San Diego, about going TDY in places where American service persons weren’t exactly welcome, Frank knew that even though she claimed to be looking for excitement, hooking up with a man like him, who risked his life as a matter of course, would be too much for her.

Oh, she didn’t say it in so many words. And, in fact, it was just after that that she’d given him her business card with her personal phone number in curvy handwriting on the back.

But Hartford to San Diego …? The sheer distance alone howled of unpreventable disaster. And now here they were, with dawn lighting the sky behind them. Standing just outside the ornate gilded doors of her hotel.

“So,” Rosie said.

Yeah. So. Her flight home wasn’t until that evening. She didn’t have to run upstairs to pack. Not right away.

But she was tired. He might’ve been used to going without sleep for long periods of time, but she was unable to hide her obvious fatigue.

Still, she didn’t move any closer to that fancy door.

She was looking, too, as if she wanted something more from him than a handshake and a Nice to meet you.

But no way was he kissing her. No way was he stepping hip deep into that temptation. Except, damn, he wanted to, and he knew she knew because he could not, for the life of him, stop staring at her mouth.

“Do you want,” she started, and he knew she wasn’t going to invite him to her room—she had roommates. That just wasn’t going to happen. Not tonight.

Not ever.

“I better go.” He cut her off, unwilling or maybe just plain unable to turn down whatever she was about to offer.

But she spoke over him. “—to meet for a late lunch?”

“I can’t,” he said. It wasn’t a lie. “My flight’s at oh-eight-thirty.”

“Oh,” she said. “Wow. Well, then, you better …”

“Go,” he agreed, yet still stood there, like a fool. Wishing for things he couldn’t have. Knowing that he had to turn and walk away. He had to go back to the Sheraton and pack—and toss her business card into the trash can under the bathroom counter.

“I know you aren’t going to call me,” she said softly. “It’s okay. Don’t feel bad. I know that … Well, maybe in another lifetime, you know? I just … I loved last night. I loved meeting you.”

She touched him then, only briefly, her fingers cool against his face, and then she was gone, the gilded door shutting silently behind her.

It was for the best. It was definitely for the best. Those words drummed through Frank’s head as he passed the park where artists and vendors, palm readers and bead sellers had been set up, even after dark, even in the rain. It was empty now, littered with trash from the hardcore partying of the previous night.

It was for the best. For the best.

Motherf*cking fool, motherf*cking fool.…

Frank violently kicked garbage—plastic beer cups—out of his way. One wasn’t quite empty and it flew through the air, nearly hitting a woman who still sat by the park’s wall, raincoat up and over her head.

Her wooden sign was still out: Palms read, five dollars. Blind Maggie Sees the Truth was lettered in smaller print beneath the picture of a hand. She started awake—she’d been asleep sitting there—and even though she wore dark glasses, she turned and looked directly at Frank.

“You don’t have much time,” she said, her voice raspy, maybe from age or from sleeping in the rain, but probably from sleeping on the street in the rain at her advanced age.

“Not interested, ma’am.” Frank slowed down, but only to press his spare change and a few loose dollar bills into her hand.

But she caught his wrist, running gnarled fingers across his palm. “She loves you.”

For an old woman, she had a grip of steel. Frank could have pulled free, but not without knocking her out of her seat and dragging her down the street.

“You just met,” the old woman—Blind Maggie, presumably—insisted. “Her eyes … She has such beautiful eyes.”

As did nearly all the women on the planet. Frank was not impressed.

“She sees you,” Maggie intoned. “She loves you already—and you would walk away from such a gift?”

It was foolish. He was a fool. He should have thanked her for her advice. She would have let him go if he’d told her he believed her, and that he was going to get her five-dollar payment out from his wallet. The dead last thing he should have done was argue.

“She deserves better,” Frank said.

And just like that, the old woman kicked him—ow, Jesus! Right on the shin.

“Fool!” she used the same word he’d been using to chastise himself. “What’s better than loving and being loved?”

She’d let him go in the course of delivering a kick with that much force, and he backed away.

For a blind woman—right—she tracked his movement with unerring accuracy as he turned and saw—thank you, Lord—the Sheraton sign. His hotel wasn’t close, but it wasn’t that far either.

“You’ll break her heart!” Maggie shouted at him. “You’re going to break her heart!”

Frank turned the corner, but she kept on shouting. “You love her, too, and you didn’t even kiss her goodbye!”

And he stopped. Just like that. Fool. He was such a fool. Love her, too? He didn’t know. Was that what this was, this tight feeling in his chest, this odd grief at the idea of not seeing Rosie again, Rosie whom he barely even knew. Except …

He knew her.

They’d talked for hours, as if they’d been friends for years. He’d told her secrets, things he’d never told anyone else. She’d made him laugh, made him dream of a life he’d never dared dream of before as he’d lost himself in her beautiful dark brown eyes.

And just like that, Frank started running.

Not toward the Sheraton. Away from it.

Toward Rosie’s hotel.

He was out of breath and sweating when he pushed his way into the lobby, and the clerk at the front desk looked up in alarm.

“House phone?” Frank panted, and the man pointed to a telephone farther down the counter.

Frank picked it up and dialed zero. “Connect me to Rosie Marchado’s room,” he said when the operator picked up.

There was a pause. “I’m sorry, sir”—words he didn’t want to hear—“we have no guests named Marchado.”

Perfect. She was staying with friends and had obviously registered under one of their names.

As Frank hung up, he saw in the mirror that two of the bellhops—big, burly fellows—had come to surround him. Shit. Now he wouldn’t even be able to sit in the lobby, hoping that she’d come downstairs early, in the few minutes he had left before he had to catch his own flight out.

“I’m not here to make trouble, boys,” Frank told them, turning around nice and slow, keeping his hands up and in sight.

But the bigger bellhop was smiling. “Chief O’Leary?” he asked.

Frank blinked. What the …?

“I served twelve years in the regular Navy,” the man said. He was more overweight than muscular, Frank saw now. “I always admired you SEALs.” He cleared his throat, holding out an envelope. “Miss Rosie asked me to give this to you. She said you’d be coming by.”

Frank took it. Opened it.

Rosie had written him a note in her neat, clear hand. Suite 312 was all it said. Short and sweet and all he needed to know.

He ran for the elevator, pushed the button. It took too damn long, so he searched for and found the sign for the stairs. He took them up, three at a time.

And there it was. Suite 312. He knocked, knowing that he was probably going to wake up her friends, but he didn’t give a good goddamn. He knocked again, even louder, and the door opened.

Rosie stood there, and for several seconds, neither of them moved. And then they both did, both at once, and she was in his arms and Jesus Lord save him, he was finally kissing her.

She was sweetness and fire, kissing him back so fiercely, that his heart damn near exploded in his chest. When he finally pulled away, breathless and dizzy, she was laughing and maybe even crying a little, too.

“I’ve never done anything even remotely like this before,” Rosie told him. “I just … I don’t do this.”

Frank didn’t either. Never before this. And probably, in all honesty, never again. “I have to go,” he told her. Words she’d hear from him again and again, unless she came to her senses in the next few hours, days, weeks, months. It was quite probably going to be months before he could arrange a trip to Hartford to see her again. And it would take him far longer, unless he broke into that savings account where he’d stashed his inheritance from his mother—all nine thousand dollars of it.

Still, he kissed Rosie again, longer, slower, deeper this time, loving the way she melted into his arms.

“My email address is on my business card,” she whispered. “Write me, okay?”

“This is crazy,” he said, touching the softness of her cheek, trying to memorize her face, her eyes.

She laughed up at him. “Good crazy,” she told him. “Really good crazy.”

He kissed her again, both cursing and grateful for her roommates. If they’d been in her hotel room instead of out here in the hall, their clothes would already be off. And if there was one thing he was certain of, it was that she deserved better than a five-minute f*ck, culminating with him running out the door to hail a cab, hauling up the zipper on his fly, shoes in his hands.

But Lord help him, because what he wanted and what he wanted were not the same thing.

And she was thinking along the same lines. “Do you want …?”

He waited, sure this time that she was not going to offer him coffee.

“I could …” She cleared her throat. “Come with you to your, um, hotel and … help you pack your suitcase?”

She actually blushed because they both knew damn well that neither of them would pack any kind of suitcase if they went back to his room. Not that he even had a suitcase. He always traveled with his seabag, a duffel that he could just throw everything into—clean clothes and dirty laundry mixed together, because who the hell cared?

But the thing in his chest was swelling even larger. It was way past his throat now. It pushed on the backs of his eyes, making him feel as if—sweet Jesus—as if he might actually start bawling like a baby. Because what she was telling him was …

“You’re that sure about me?” he asked, his voice coming out no louder than a whisper. She nodded. She was.

“Let me grab my sneakers,” she told him now, disappearing to do just that.

Sneakers. With sneakers on her feet, they’d both be able to run much farther and faster. They could get to the Sheraton in enough time to spend ten minutes …

“We should wait,” Frank heard himself saying. “I want to wait.”

She was back in a sneaker-clad flash, looking at him as if he were from Mars, so he tried to explain.

“I want to do this right,” he told her. “How about we meet for Christmas? Right back here, in New Orleans.” He could take her to dinner someplace elegant and romantic. Someplace with dancing and champagne. And only then would they go back to the hotel, where they’d make love—slowly, tenderly—all night long.

“I’d love to meet you for Christmas,” she told him. “And you’re right. We should wait.”

And there they stood, staring at each other.

Rosie held out her hand.

Frank took it.

And together, Rosie’s laughter wrapping around them both, they ran for the stairs.





THOUGHTS ON

WHEN FRANK MET ROSIE


It was originally my intention to write only lighthearted stories using popular characters in the Troubleshooters series—and in “When Frank Met Rosie,” I did neither. I mean, Frank O’Leary …?

Not exactly winning popularity contests among readers, probably because the man is dead, killed in a terrorist attack in a hotel lobby in Over the Edge.

That’s the book, remember, where SEAL Team Sixteen goes to dangerous Kazbekistan to participate in the takedown of a commercial airliner that has been hijacked by terrorists.

At the time I was writing OTE, I purposely chose to kill off Frank for a number of reasons—the first being that someone needed to die. I wanted to make sure that my readers understood how dangerous K-stan was. It’s a fact that SEALs put their lives on the line all the time, as do all of our servicemen and -women. And it’s also a fact that people die serving our country. This was the third book in the series. It was, I felt, time for casualties.

Okay, so I could’ve killed off anyone—it didn’t have to be Frank. But it did have to be one of SEAL Team Sixteen’s snipers. See, I wanted a reason for FBI agent (and former Navy sharpshooter extraordinaire) Alyssa Locke to actively take part in the takedown of the hijacked plane. As a point-of-view character, I wanted Alyssa to move from her role as observer to that of shooter.

Now, instead of killing Frank, I could’ve killed Duke Jefferson, who was also a sniper. But I’d only just introduced the Duke in Over the Edge. Killing a brand-new character wouldn’t have had the same impact on readers as killing an established one. And thus, I found myself eyeing Frank O’Leary. Frank was the perfect character to kill. (Remember, I made this choice long before I wrote the short story you just read!) I’d used his name in a number of books, but I hadn’t spent much time and page space letting readers truly know who he was. I’d revealed that he was a sniper, and he was laconic, and very little else. Killing Frank wouldn’t have been as devastating to readers as killing off a more established character such as WildCard Karmody would have been. And yet, killing Frank was guaranteed to be way more powerful than killing off a stranger such as the Duke.

So Frank got his pink slip. So to speak.

So there it was, and there I was.

Years later.

Summer, 2006.

And I’m wandering around my office, aware that I’d promised readers that my website countdown to Into the Storm, where this story first appeared, would include a collection of short stories featuring Troubleshooters series characters, knowing that sooner or later I’d have to get my butt into the chair in front of my computer and start writing.

But Frank O’Leary wouldn’t stop haunting me. I couldn’t not write his story. The man just wouldn’t leave me alone.

It’s going to sound for a second as if I’m completely changing the subject, but I’m not. See, a few years ago, my editor went to France on vacation and visited the site of the most famous D-Day ever—the WWII Allied invasion of the beach at Normandy. She brought photos back with her, and I was struck by the rows and rows and rows of crosses and Stars of David that marked the graves of the American servicemen who fell in that deadly battle. They stretch out, in a field there in France, as far as the eye can see.

Each one of those markers is a life lost. Each one of those markers signifies a family and friends who mourned the loss of a loved one—a son, a brother, a buddy, a husband—forever gone. It was hard for me not to well up with tears as I looked at those photographs. It’s been more than sixty years since those courageous men died, but I am still grateful and awed and devastated by their sacrifice.

Body counts are part of war. But numbers are cold and hard to comprehend. What does it mean, 9,387—the number of Americans buried so many years ago, in that cemetery in France?

9,387 Americans who never came home. 9,387 lives that did not continue.

9,387 Rosies.

Frankly, I don’t know what makes me more sad—thinking that each and every one of the brave men and woman who have died serving this country had their own Rosie, who grieves for them, or thinking that they hadn’t lived long enough to find their Rosie yet.

So I sat down and wrote “When Frank Met Rosie” because, since we went to war in Afghanistan and Iraq, there have been many thousands more Franks and Rosies. As of July 2012, as I update this piece, the number of servicemen and -women who have died in Afghanistan and Iraq is 6,527. That number may have grown by the time you read these words. 6,527 should not just be a number that makes us shake our head in remorse as we go about our daily lives. Those 6,527 are people who loved and were loved. They are—each and every one of them—stories cut tragically short.

Frank really wanted me to write his story—the good part. The part that happened before he lay dying in helo pilot Teri Howe’s arms on that hotel lobby floor. Before he knew that that fortune-teller was right—that he was going to break Rosie’s heart.

The most important part of Frank’s story was that he didn’t wait.

He ran—at full speed—into a relationship with a terrific woman who saw him clearly and loved him for who he was. Thank goodness for that because, even though he didn’t know it, the blind palm reader hit the nail on the head—he was almost out of time.

Life is way too short, and Frank and Rosie embraced it—and each other—completely.

Since I’ve written his story, Frank O’Leary doesn’t haunt me as much anymore. Oh, he’ll pop in from time to time—he wants me to write a major lottery win for Rosie. And he’s starting to nudge me to introduce her as a character in the main series of books. He’s getting tired of her being so lonely. He also hopes that you enjoyed reading about the start of the very best part of his too-short life.