Headed for Trouble

SAM TAKES AN ASSIGNMENT IN ITALY


2005

This story takes place some time after Breaking Point and before Into the Storm.

“Why,” Sam bitched into his cell phone on Tuesday night, “did Tom have to send me out here?”

His wife, Alyssa, didn’t answer, because she wasn’t on the other end. She was out handling a real case—an important case—so he was just leaving voice mail.

A known sex offender had gone missing. The man’s sister had hired Troubleshooters Incorporated to find him before he hurt anyone else. Alyssa had taken the assignment and was in Richmond, Virginia, tracking him down.

Meanwhile Sam sat here, halfway around the world, the newest poster child for Murphy’s Law. Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong.

And oh, how it had.

And you there, trying to glass-half-full this disaster? It’s obviously not painful enough for you, so let Mr. Murphy supersize it, ’kay?

No doubt about it, Murphy had been riding Sam’s ass from the moment he’d kissed Alyssa goodbye far too many weeks ago. This so-called easy assignment setting up security at a corporate honcho’s big fat Italian wedding had turned into a nightmare. Four days had turned into a week, and then that week had turned into an unbelievable three.

Yeah sure, the little coastal town was beautiful—all blue sky and ocean, gorgeous beaches, bright sunshine. Yeah sure, Sam was making a fortune for Tom Paoletti’s security company—and yeah, all right, he’d earned himself one hell of a bonus for his trouble, too—but come on.

The inefficiency of the honcho’s staff was mind-numbing. Sam could have made bricks by hand and constructed a wall around the wedding chapel himself in the time it took them just to make the decision to set up a temporary chain-link fence and then hide it with a decorative one.

First the ceremony was going to be held indoors. Then out. Then in. Then on the beach. Each time the location shifted, Sam reworked the details that would keep the VIPs safe and the paparazzi at bay. He hadn’t written this many reports since college.

And then—God please help him—there were the bridesmaids from hell. Four spoiled daughters of either the bride or the groom—this was a third or fourth marriage for the client, Sam had lost count—they all had far too much time on their hands. Ashley, Heather, Sabrina, and Chloe.

Ashley and Chloe were the worst. They followed Sam constantly, refusing to let him be. He’d flashed his wedding ring and mentioned his wife when they were first introduced. When they hadn’t seemed to get the hint, he’d flat-out told them that he loved Alyssa more than life itself. He’d even showed them a photo of her, but they just did not let up.

Which led to tonight’s phone call and Sam’s desperate plea for Alyssa to hurry up and find the man she was looking for, get her butt on a plane, and join him.

“It’s like trying to work in the middle of a Girls Gone Wild video,” he complained, and of course, again, she said nothing because she wasn’t there.

“I miss you, Lys,” he whispered, which was, in fact, his biggest problem. He could handle an entire army of Ashleys and Chloes. He could rewrite a report for the hundredth time if he had to. He could attend dozens more meetings that redefined boring.

What he couldn’t do was survive too many more mornings waking up thousands of miles away from the woman that he loved. And it wasn’t just that he missed her in his bed. He missed her smile, her voice, her very presence in his life.

“Please come and save me,” he begged and cut the connection.



Wednesday brought more perfect weather—and another teeth-gritting delay in the impending nuptials. Chloe informed him over breakfast that the wedding had now been moved to Sunday—just a day later than Saturday, but still.

She also told him that her father would be out of touch until Thursday morning—which left Sam with just enough time to not be able to squeeze in a round-trip to Richmond.

Of course, if he’d been told about this yesterday morning, he could have made it there and back.

Sam worked off his frustration—or tried to anyway—with a ten-mile run. It was nearly noon before he returned to the resort.

He was drenched with perspiration, his hair literally dripping with sweat. He would have stuck to the shade and gone straight up to his room without talking to anyone, except there was some sort of commotion by the pool.

The hellsmaids—three of them anyway; Chloe was AWOL—were giving their full, shrill attention to a man dressed in a snugly fitting blue T-shirt and linen pants. He was height-challenged, with dark hair and …

“Hey, sweetie,” he said as he spotted Sam dripping on the stone walkway beneath the arches, turning to greet him with a wide smile. “Rumor has it you need some TLC.”

Alyssa apparently couldn’t make it here to Italy, but she’d called their good friend and her former partner in the FBI, Jules Cassidy, as a stand-in.

He came right over and gave Sam a hug, despite the high sweat and slime factor. In fact, Jules gave him a big hug. A much, much, much too long of a hug.

For once, Heather, Ashley, and Sabrina were wide-eyed and silent, staring at them, definitely wondering …

So Sam cleared his throat. “It’s good to see you,” he told Jules. Which was no lie. But when he cleared his throat again and gruffly added, “Sweetie,” it definitely boosted any potential misperceptions.

Jules laughed his ass off, of course. “Alyssa is going to love hearing about this,” he whispered as he hugged Sam again.

Yeah, she would. Provided they would ever be in the same country at the same time again.



“I was in Dubai,” Jules said, as Sam pulled two bottles of cold water from his suite’s kitchen fridge. He tossed one to Jules. “Thanks. It’s not quite the same neighborhood, but close enough. Closer than Richmond. I had some time off coming, so … Here I am.”

“Checking up on me.” Sam toasted him then took a long swig from his bottle.

“Absolutely not,” Jules said. Up close, the FBI agent looked tired. His usually bright smile even seemed a touch forced. He sank into one of the leather armchairs in the suite’s sitting area. “Your wife trusts you completely. Although, that Girls Gone Wild comment? It was probably not her most favorite thing she’s ever heard you say.”

“I was trying to get a rise out of her. And no offense,” Sam said, half-sitting on the desk where his laptop was out and open, “but I was kind of hoping she’d be the one to show.”

“She sounded pretty pissed off when I spoke to her,” Jules reported. “This guy she’s looking for? He knows she’s looking. He’s been messing with her. Playing games.”

“Thanks. I love hearing that.” Sam’s blood pressure was up so high, his ears were ringing. “Motherf*cker’s a sex offender.”

“And if Alyssa were ten years old, she’d be in danger,” Jules reassured him. “She finally called in for backup, by the way. Lindsey and … damn, I’m blanking on his name … former CIA …?”

“Dave Malkoff,” Sam supplied the name of the Troubleshooters’ operative.

“That’s him.” Jules glanced at his watch. “They’re probably in Richmond with Alyssa right now, cuffing the guy.”

“Good.” Which meant Alyssa could be here by tomorrow night.

“Yeah, you’re way too happy at that news,” Jules said. “You haven’t checked your email, have you?”

Sam shifted his laptop so he could see the screen, jumped on line and … Sure enough, there was an email from Alyssa. Subject: I’m needed in San Diego. “No. No, no, no …”

He clicked on it, skimmed it. The good news was that she, Lindsey, and Dave had indeed caught the game-playing sex offender. The bad news was that their boss, Tom Paoletti, had another assignment waiting for Alyssa. Which meant it would be … What?

“She’s going OCONUS,” Sam told Jules, using the military term for outside of the United States. “Unless I can somehow get home by Friday morning, it’s going to be another two weeks—at least—before I see her.” She’d added a P.S. that Sam didn’t understand. “Tell Jules that Dave’s a maybe? What does that mean?”

Jules took another swig from his water bottle. “Don’t get too excited, because I haven’t cleared it yet with Tom. Or Max. I have to wait a few more hours before I call either of them. But if they give me the thumbs-up, I’ll be able to hang here, hold down the fort for you, until a replacement arrives. Alyssa told me she was going to ask Dave Malkoff.”

Sam shook his head. “As an FBI agent, you can’t—”

“I won’t,” Jules said. “You just told me the wedding’s not until Sunday, and the client’s gone until Thursday. Dave—or someone else—will definitely be here before then. I’m just going to hang here, pass along the message that you had to leave, that your replacement is on his way. I’m not getting paid, I’m just doing you a favor.”

It was one hell of a big-ass favor. “You don’t get much vacation time,” Sam pointed out. “Wouldn’t you rather, I don’t know, go on a cruise?”

“With who?” Jules gazed at him. “Ben?” He rolled his eyes as he shook his head. “Just take a shower, let’s go get lunch. If you really want to hear it, I’ll tell you the whole terrible Ben story. But I definitely need nourishment first.”



“He did what?” Sam said.

“Brought his beard,” Jules repeated. He leaned back to let the waiter take his plate. They sat in a little outdoor restaurant, overlooking the harbor below. The food had been unbelievable, the owner himself coming out of the kitchen to make sure everything was to their liking. “Beard is slang for a woman who pretends to be a closeted gay man’s wife or girlfriend. Ben’s beard is named Amanda. She’s his roommate. His own parents actually think she’s his fiancée.”

Sam struggled to comprehend. “So, this guy lives with a woman, except he’s gay and … she’s okay with that?”

“She’s not really his fiancée. They have separate bedrooms,” Jules told him. “She’s a grad student—they’re friends from high school. Plus, he lets her live in his condo for free.”

Sam had to make sure he understood. “So Amanda helps Ben fool everyone into thinking he’s straight.”

Jules nodded. “Don’t ask, don’t tell—I think you’ve probably heard of the policy? It sounds so innocuous, but it forces servicemen and -women into the closet. They have to hide who they are, pretend to be something they’re not. It’s okay to be gay in the military, as long as no one knows.” He was disgusted. “Ben takes Amanda to all kind of functions—including this date he had, with me.”

“It was really a date?” Sam asked, as the waiter poured them each a cup of coffee. Alyssa had told him that when it came to dating, Jules was remarkably gun-shy—and yeah, okay that was probably an unfortunate expression to use.

But Alyssa’s going theory was that Jules was still hung up on some actor he’d met out in Los Angeles—Robin something. The SOB had hurt Jules badly—their relationship had been a total train wreck. Still, Lys had been urging her old friend to get back into circulation. This Marine captain, Ben, had been calling him for a while—apparently Jules had finally taken that first-date step.

“Ben calls and goes, Hey, how are you? I just got back from overseas. I was wondering if you wanted to get together, maybe have dinner at my place?” Jules reported. “I wasn’t ready for that. So I suggested we meet at a restaurant. It wasn’t even downtown. It was suburban and discreet, and … he brought Amanda anyway. So we all sit down to dinner and it’s way weird. I mean, she was nice, but, what the hell …? She finally gets up to, you know, hit the ladies’ room, and Ben goes, I’m career military. This is how I’ve made it work. He knew I was freaked out. He said, You should’ve come over. It’s easier, more comfortable, and I said, Not for me. I said, I’m not climbing into your closet with you, and … that was that. I haven’t seen him since.” He paused. “The stupid thing is, I really like him. The really stupid thing? I’d be genuinely upset if he resigned his commission. The Marines need more officers like Ben.”

“I’m sorry it didn’t work out,” Sam said.

“Thanks.”

They sat in silence for a moment.

“Thing is, I’m thinking about doing it.” Jules finally spoke. “Calling him and … You know, maybe if it’s just sex, it won’t bother me. As much. You know, keeping it on the down-low.”

Sam took a sip of his coffee, choosing his words carefully. “I guess whether or not you decide to do that should really depend on what you want. If it’s sex …”

“Who doesn’t want sex?” Jules pointed out.

“If it’s just sex,” Sam said, “there’s a waiter over there who’s been checking you out.” Part of him could not believe he was having this conversation. “Personally, I don’t think it’s a good idea, hooking up with some stranger …”

At least Jules wouldn’t get the guy pregnant. Years ago, Sam had had sex with a stranger—a bar bunny—and he now had a daughter, Haley, and an ex-wife, Mary Lou. Talk about careless mistakes. Although Haley was definitely the best mistake he’d ever made. She was a real peach of a kid. It had all worked out in the end, but for years it had been bad. He’d messed up his life, along with Mary Lou’s, Haley’s, and even Alyssa’s.

“Ben’s not a stranger,” Jules pointed out, taking out his wallet and paying the bill.

“What happens when you fall in love with him?” Sam asked. It was another question that he couldn’t believe he was asking. Still, the words needed to be said. “You know, I should pay that.”

Jules shook his head to both the question and the offer. “That won’t happen.” He said it with such finality and stood up as punctuation. “Let’s get back. I want to make those phone calls.”

“How much do I owe you?” Sam persisted, opening his own wallet.

Jules waved him off. “It’s on me.”

“You come out here to do me a favor, and you pay for lunch …?”

“You have no idea how much I appreciate your friendship,” Jules said.

Sam held out several bills. “Yeah, actually I do,” he said. “It’s probably as much as I appreciate yours.”

Jules couldn’t just take the money and be done with it. He had to go and hug Sam. “Thanks.”

Of course, now the gay waiter was checking Sam out, too. He even followed them out into the square as they headed up the road.

Which turned out to be provident, since they hadn’t gone far before a group of men, ranging in ages from teens to much older, blocked their path. They were scowling and grim, and their postures were clearly meant to menace.

Jules stepped in front of Sam, his body language relaxed, a smile on his face. “Good afternoon, gentlemen,” he said in close to perfect Italian. “Is there a problem?”

Sam counted them quickly. There were nine, but only three—red shirt, goatee, and tattoo—looked capable of holding their own in a brawl.

Tattoo let out a stream of Italian that was far too rapid-fire for Sam to understand. He definitely caught the words Rome and the Pope along with what sounded like negative language. He wasn’t quite sure what the man was saying, but there was no mistaking his intention when he roughly shoved Jules.

And just like that, the talking was over. Well, almost over. “I got Tattoo and Red Shirt,” Jules announced in English, as he effortlessly took down the man who’d shoved him.

That left Goatee for Sam. But ouch, the man had a fishing knife. Sam quickly adiosed it, breaking more than a few fingers in the process.

That was all it took. Goatee ran home, crying for his mommy, eating the dust of the rest of the gang. They’d all long since am-scrayed, except for the delusional man in the red shirt, who actually still believed he could get a piece of Jules.

The FBI agent was subcompact and had a far better fashion sense than Alyssa, but he knew how to bring it in hand-to-hand combat. He fought with an efficiency of movement that Sam admired. It was beautiful, actually. Jules fought with his brain, unlike Red Shirt, who’d let loose his inner Neanderthal, swinging blindly, flailing mindlessly—making himself good and winded in the process.

Jules, on the other hand, was breathing about as hard as he’d been during lunch.

Red Shirt came at him one too many times, and Jules dodged him yet again, this time tripping him on his way past, using an expertly placed elbow to help the man greet the ground that much harder. He didn’t get back up.

The gay waiter, meanwhile, had run to get the entire serving staff of the restaurant, including the owner.

As Sam watched, Jules turned to face this new threat, ready to take them all out if necessary. But—again, since his brain was fully functioning—he immediately recognized them for what they were. The cavalry come to save them. Not that they’d needed it.

The owner of the restaurant spoke fluent English. “This is not the first time such an outrage has happened here. Such anti-American sentiment is not helpful to our town. Tourism is down as it is.”

Anti-American? Not anti-gay?

The man ushered them into his kitchen, ordering his staff to bring the first-aid kit and ice for Jules’s raw knuckles. Sam looked at Jules, but he was playing right along, talking about the anti-American protests in Greece and even Dubai, as he helped Sam over to a table and pushed him into a chair.

It was then Sam realized he was bleeding. He’d gotten cut by that knife.

It wasn’t too much more than a scratch, but the restaurant owner—who was also the chef—wasn’t about to let them leave without cleaning them up. And feeding them a sampling of all his desserts, which was fine by Sam.

The man even drove them back to the resort in his little Mini. It was only then, after they said their goodbyes, as they headed down the pathway past the pool, that Sam asked, “Anti-American?”

But Jules’s phone rang. It was his boss’s administrative assistant, Laronda. It was okay with Max if Jules wanted to take a few more days off. Which meant …

“Let’s get you a flight home,” Jules said.

But Sam shook his head. “Anti-American, my ass. I’ve been here for weeks. That was not about us being American. That was about you being gay. I’m not leaving you here alone.”

Jules rolled his eyes. “That’s ridiculous.”

Sam held out his bandaged hand. “No, it’s not.”

“Yes, it is.”

This was going nowhere fast, but Sam couldn’t let it go. “Jules—”

“Don’t you get it?” Jules asked, leading the way up the stairs to Sam’s hotel suite. “This is my life. I could be jumped, beaten, and, yeah, even killed for being gay—not just here, but in any town in virtually any country in the world. Particularly in the United States, by the way. Are you going to follow me home to DC, Sam? Lots of hate crimes happen there, you know.”

“Then maybe you should have a beard.” Sam knew as soon as the words left his mouth that it was the wrong thing to say. But then he unlocked the door to his suite, and the situation went from bad to worse.

Chloe, dressed in only a pair of leopard-print thong panties and some very high heels, was dancing to music on the radio while fixing herself a drink at his wet bar.

A drink? Another drink. Clearly, she’d had quite a few already. “There you are,” she said, as she caught sight of Sam. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

Once again, Jules stepped in front of Sam. “You must be Chloe. I love your shoes.”

She grabbed—apparently just as Jules had hoped she would—for her robe. In fact, he even helped her into it. “Pack,” he ordered Sam over his shoulder, as he led Chloe out onto the balcony. “You remind me of Scarlett Johansson,” Sam heard him saying to the girl. “You must get that all the time—you don’t? Really? You look a lot like her …”



Sam was almost completely packed, but he wasn’t going anywhere without Jules. He stood in the bathroom. It didn’t make sense to pack up his toilet kit, only to unpack it again tonight when he went to bed. His clothes were no problem. He could easily live out of his suitcase. He’d look slightly more rumpled than usual, but …

“I got you on the four o’clock flight to London.” Jules stood in the door.

Sam looked at him in the mirror. “I’m not leaving you behind.”

Jules nodded. “I appreciate your loyalty, but Chloe had a little confession that, well, she asked me to share with you.”

Sam waited.

“The bride and groom have apparently eloped,” Jules told him. “The wedding party is indefinitely postponed. Your services are no longer needed—as of last night, as a matter of fact.”

“What?”

“Apparently Chloe neglected to tell her sisters about this, too. She wanted to stay a few extra days, and … She’s young and misdirected. Apparently she’s got quite the crush on you, cowboy.”

Sam used one arm to sweep what Jules would call his “products” off the sink counter and into his bag. “The four o’clock to London will only get me home in time if nothing goes wrong,” he said tightly. No delays, no canceled flights, no screwups between connecting flights. “And I’m still not leaving unless you’ve got a flight out of here, too.”

“Yeah, about that,” Jules said. “Confession part two. Apparently she hired those men to, well, as she put it, make me go away.”

Sam looked at him. “Young, misdirected—and vicious.”

“She is a little socially disengaged,” Jules said. “But she’s leaving, too. With her sisters. I thought I’d hang for a few days. Maybe get to know Paolo a little better.”

“Paolo?” Sam asked.

“He owns that restaurant,” Jules admitted. “While you were washing out that cut on your hand, we got to talking and … he, um, offered to give me cooking lessons.”

Sam laughed. He hadn’t even realized that the restaurant owner—an older man with gray at his temples, good-looking in an Italian Tom Hanks kind of way—was gay. “That’s a new way of saying it.” He sobered fast. “Are you sure you want to …?”

“Sweetie, the only thing I’m absolutely sure about is that I don’t want a beard,” Jules said.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” Sam told his friend. “I didn’t mean it. But I worry about you.”

“I know. I forgive you. I just … I want a relationship with someone like Paolo who’s not afraid to be himself,” Jules said. “God, I really want someone I’m in such a hurry to go home to that I’ll pack in that horrific way that you just did.” He laughed, but then sobered. “You know, before? When you asked me what I want? I want what you have with Alyssa, Sam. I want what Max has with Gina, what Jack has with Scott. I won’t have that with Ben. Or with Robin, who’s in f*cking London right now promoting his latest movie, so I’m not going to London with you, even if it’s only to catch a flight to New York, thanks but no thanks.”

Maybe Alyssa was right. It sure seemed that all roads led back to this Robin guy.

“I remember,” Sam said, “being in love with Alyssa, but she didn’t want anything to do with me. I was so desperate not to think about her, and … Nobody could compete. Messing around with other women didn’t help. It only made me miss her more. Plus the other women usually ended up hurt, which sucked.”

“I hear what you’re saying.” Jules nodded. “And I appreciate your candor. But you need to go, or you’re going to miss that plane.”

Sam grabbed his bags. Opened the door. “Thanks again for everything.”

“I’ll give you a call in a coupla days,” Jules said. “Kiss the shit out of Alyssa for me, okay?”

Sam laughed. “Absolutely.”



Alyssa wasn’t waiting for him at LAX. She was in San Diego, at the Troubleshooters Incorporated office, organizing the gear her team—Sam included—would need for this next assignment. It was cold where they were going, and they’d need to stay hidden, which meant camping without the benefit of fire.

Freeze-your-balls-off-style camping was definitely not Sam’s favorite thing to do, but this time, he absolutely couldn’t wait. A pup tent, a two-person thermal sleeping bag, and his incredible woman …

Yeah, he’d find a way to keep plenty warm.

Traffic was heavy, not just on the Five, but off it as well. He finally arrived, and, yes. There she was, in the parking lot. His wife. Working to fit three truckloads of supplies into two tiny packing crates. And getting the job done with room to spare.

Sam just stood there for a moment, watching her, just letting his heart swell. Her dark hair was long enough to pull back into a ponytail, but tendrils escaped, curling around her face. She was, without a doubt, the most beautiful woman in the entire world, even without any makeup, dressed down in forest cammie-print BDUs and lumberjack boots for two weeks of stomping around in the woods.

She was using her former-naval-officer voice—no-nonsense with a hint of dominatrix. But then she turned and saw him, and smiled. When she spoke again, her voice was honey. “Sam. You made it.”

“Thanks to Jules,” he said. She seemed happy to just stand there and look at him, too. He was grinning at her like an idiot.

“He called me,” she said. “Told me all about the thong incident. Poor Chloe.”

“Poor Chloe?” Sam protested. “What about poor me?”

“Poor Sam, having such a trying few weeks, in the most beautiful part of Italy, with naked women throwing themselves at you.” She was trying to sound sarcastic, but her amusement bubbled through. She mocked him even more. “It must’ve been terrible, like … like … working in a Girls Gone Wild video!”

That was it for the just-let-me-look-at-you part of their long-awaited reunion. Sam dropped his bag and went for her. She met him more than halfway. He knew she’d missed him badly, too, because she didn’t even bother to look around to see who might be watching them—they were, after all, at work. But she didn’t care.

She just kissed him, and as he kissed the shit out of her, he thought of Jules, of how lonely he was. You asked me what I want? I want what you have with Alyssa …

It didn’t matter to Sam where they slept tonight—in their own bed, or in a five-star hotel, or even in a tent. As long as Alyssa was beside him, Sam was home.





WHEN JENK, IZZY, GILLMAN, AND LOPEZ MET TONY VLACHIC


2005

This story takes place slightly before Into the Storm.

“Weirdest lesbian encounter ever,” Izzy said as he dealt the cards around the desk that he’d helped Mark Jenkins move into the middle of the shabby motel room. “This girl comes up to me. I’m in a bar in Boulder, Colorado, and she is unbelievably beautiful. I’m talking a fifty on a scale of one to ten. Seriously Victoria’s Secret gorgeous. Long dark hair, a face like Natalie Portman, a body like a porn star.”

Gillman rolled his eyes. “You are so full of shit.”

They’d been garrisoned in some low-rent places before, but this one, remote and located in a town that shut down and went to bed at 2030 every night, was about as nasty as Jenk had ever seen.

It did, however, include the essentials: a bathroom, a shower, beds to sleep in, an air conditioner that wheezed and chugged as it cooled down the room, a deck of cards, and a mini-fridge filled with beer.

So okay, the cards were Jenk’s and the mini-fridge was Gillman’s—one of those insulated coolers you could carry in your truck and plug in when you reached your destination.

Izzy turned to Jenk, injury in his voice and on his face. “You didn’t hear me strapping on the bullshit meter when Fishboy here was telling his lesbian supermodels-in-the-airport story, did you?”

Jenk had just been dealt three aces—his best hand all night. There was actually a chance he’d win back the money he’d lost over the past few hours. “Let’s just play cards.”

Now Izzy’s disgusted exhale was for Jenk.

Jay Lopez, as usual, tried to restore harmony. “So she’s beautiful and she comes up to you, and says …?”

“I need a huge favor. And I’m thinking, Well, it’s your lucky night, because I’ve got a huge favor,” Izzy told them. “Only I managed to not say that. Probably because she was stupifyingly beautiful. I think what I ended up saying was Durh …? And I probably enhanced it with a little drool, you know, on my chin.”

Izzy took two cards from Lopez, dealing him two new ones. Danny Gillman took only one—which meant he either had a great hand or he was bluffing.

Jenk stared at him, willing him to do it. Scratch his chin with the back of his hand. Gillman did it every time he bluffed—it was the most obvious tell in the history of mankind.

But Gillman didn’t move, because at the start of the game, Izzy Zanella had let it slip that Gillman had a tell.

In true Izzy fashion, he’d refused to share with Gillman exactly what that tell was. And no one else was going to let on that they knew, so Gillman had sat nearly stone-still for the entire game, terrified that, by moving, he’d subconsciously and inadvertently activate his tell.

He was stone-still, that is, except when Izzy pissed him off. Or when he tried to piss off Izzy in return.

Of course, for the first time in all their years of poker playing, Gillman was winning. Big.

“I’m doomed.” Tony Vlachic, aka Chickie, aka the New Guy, didn’t have a tell. He simply announced whenever his hand sucked. This was his first time playing poker with them, and he’d good-naturedly put up with all of their crap. He had a Pepsi in front of him because they wouldn’t let him have a beer, insisting he was too young.

“Maybe next year, when you turn thirteen,” Izzy had told him.

Now Chick took another slug of his soda and traded the limit—three cards.

“She goes, I told my brother you were my boyfriend. Will you help me fool him into thinking we’ve been together for a while?” Izzy scooped up Jenk’s two discards and gave him two replacements to go with his trio of aces and …

A four and a seven, both hearts. Crap. Jenk kept his face carefully blank as Izzy traded three of his own cards for three new ones.

“And that, boys and girls,” Izzy continued with his story, “was when she kissed me.”

“Yeah, right,” Gillman scoffed.

“She did,” Izzy countered. “Chickie was there. Tell ’em, Chick.”

Tony looked up from frowning at his no doubt unbelievably crappy hand. “She definitely kissed him,” he verified. “For close to three minutes, without coming up for air.”

“And when she finally does surface,” Izzy said, “she goes, Do you have a car, because I really need a ride. So I tell her, yeah, I got a truck, is that okay? And she’s like, You really don’t mind? And something’s up—I mean, besides the obvious—because she’s got tears in her eyes and she’s kind of shaking, and that was when I knew. I mean, I’m a good kisser, but … So we go out to my truck, and she tells me she’s gay, that her parents sent her to this rehablike place to make her straight, and she had to pretend she was ‘cured’ in order to get out. The brother follows her around, making it impossible for her to see her girlfriend, who, by the way, is also gorgeous. Long story short, I drove them both to Vegas. I get email from them every now and then. But Maddy, she’s the one with the brother, right before she gets out of the car in Nevada, she goes, I’m definitely gay. Because if kissing you didn’t turn me straight, nothing will.”

“Really,” Gillman said, clearly not believing him. “If I emailed her and asked, she’d tell me that wasn’t just something you made up?”

Chick raised the bet ten dollars. Was he really going to attempt to bluff after looking at his hand as if it was something he found at the bottom of a year-old pile of dirty laundry?

“Why would I make that up?” Izzy asked as Lopez folded. “Now if I told you that with Maddy and Peg, I’d enjoyed the best three-way I’ve had in years …”

“Yeah, like you’ve had a lot of three-ways,” Gillman scoffed, raising the bid even higher. He didn’t look at any of them, definitely afraid his tell was something they’d see in his eyes. He looked at the pile of cash in front of him, or his cards. Nowhere else.

“What, Gilligan, you haven’t?” Izzy countered, using Gillman’s least-hated nickname. When Izzy called the other SEAL Fishboy, that really pissed him off. “Not on the isle, with Ginger and Mary Ann?”

“We’re not talking about me, a*shole.”

Jenk knew that the not-looking-at-anyone thing was pretty much a tell in and of itself. If Gillman had a great hand, why would he be worried about giving that away? Unless he was bluffing about bluffing, so that Jenk would see his raise and …

“Not even with Thurston and Lovey?” Izzy just did not know when to let a subject drop. Gilligan was going to knock the table over, and they’d have to start the hand again. Of course, maybe that would be a good thing.

“Just shut up.”

“You know, it’s okay that you haven’t—”

Jenk cut in. “I have,” he said. “And it was kind of weird. The other guy had a really hairy back.” Yeah, that had caught their attention. Even Gillman was staring at him. Chickie was the only one who didn’t look up. “I’m kidding,” he told them.

“You scared me for a second there, M.” Izzy tossed his cards down. “I’m out. Too rich for my blood,” he told Gillman, adding, “Even though it’s obvious as shit that you’re bluffing.”

Gillman refused to take that particular bait, his eyes solidly back on his cards.

It was down to Jenk and Chickie, and it was Jenk’s turn to play. See Gillman’s bid, raise Gillman’s bid, or fold …

Chick’s phone must’ve vibrated. “Shit, sorry, I gotta take this call,” he announced, standing up and going out onto the motel driveway, which was fine with Jenk. It gave him a little extra stall-time to try to psych Gillman out.

Jenk leaned back in his chair. With enough time and a little effort—keep talking on the phone, Vlachic—maybe he could get Gillman to forget about the poker game. “My weirdest lesbian encounter was when I spent Christmas with three drag queens.”

Gillman looked up again at that. Eye contact. He immediately looked back down, but it was definitely a start. “Drag queens can’t be lesbians. Drag queens are guys.”

“But they refer to each other as she,” Jenk pointed out. “And if they’re into each other …”

“Whoa, good point,” Izzy said. “So it’s a lesbianish thing on the surface, except they’re really chicks with dicks. As opposed to guys with a surprise.”

“Guys with a …” Now Gillman made eye contact with Izzy. He had to in order to give him a properly disdainful WTF look.

“A female cross-dresser,” Jenk explained.

“There’s no such thing,” Gillman said. He actually put down his cards. “I mean, yeah, maybe back in the nineteenth century, when women had to wear hoop-skirts, sure, but nowadays women wear pants all the time.”

“There’s pants,” Lopez said, “and there’s pants.”

Gillman wasn’t convinced. “But—”

Izzy cut him off. “They exist, Wendy. Take my word for it.”

“Wendy?” Now Lopez was confused.

“I think it’s a Peter Pan reference,” Jenk told him.

Gillman was easily outraged, especially by statements made by Zanella. It was interesting, this intense rivalry or personality clash or whatever it was between the two men. Jenk had been out in the real world, on dangerous ops, with both of them; they worked together in perfect harmony, no hint of any animosity, cogs in a well-oiled machine. But during R&R … Look out.

“Now you’re saying Wendy was a cross-dresser?” Gillman challenged Izzy.

Iz laughed his frustration and disbelief. “I’m saying you’re a f*cking idiot, and that yes, there are female cross-dressers here where I live, outside of Never-never-land.”

“What, do you know this because you’re one of them?” Gillman asked, and Jenk cringed because Izzy unfolded, rising to his feet.

But he just stood there, all six plus feet of him, towering over the table. “Yeah, Dan,” he deadpanned. “I’m a woman. And this girl needs to whiz, wicked bad.” He disappeared into the bathroom.

Jenk exchanged a look with Lopez. Well, that happened. Or, more accurately, didn’t happen. He raised his voice slightly so that Izzy could hear him through the bathroom door. “You know, my three drag queens were at least as tall as you.”

Gillman, the f*cking idiot indeed, actually looked disappointed that the conversation, so to speak, hadn’t been taken outside. He also looked as if he’d completely forgotten about their card game. That was good, and Jenk wanted to continue keeping him distracted. “So I was around eleven years old, it was Christmas Eve. New York was getting hit with the worst snowstorm in something like a hundred years. It was really coming down—like somebody-better-go-find-Rudolph bad. And my dad, as usual, had waited until the last minute to get a gift for my mother—that was his MO. He swore to me, every year, that she would like her present better if he could find it on sale. I was pretty sure she would like it better if it didn’t suck because he’d gotten it five minutes before the stores closed on Christmas Eve, but he was convinced he was right.”

Across the table, Gillman was engaged. “My dad used to do that, too. Mom had this scary I can’t believe you spent our money on this piece of shit smile that she gave him almost every Christmas morning.”

“So it’s four in the afternoon on Christmas Eve,” Jenk continued, “and there’s already a foot of snow, and my dad and I are in the Honda—Mom’s always been into high gas mileage vehicles, so no SUV or truck for us. We’re spinning in circles down Route 35, which is okay, because no one else is crazy enough to be out on the road. We finally reach the Jefferson Valley Mall, and to my dad’s complete horror, it’s dark. The whole mall closed early because of the weather. On Christmas Eve. So we head into Yorktown Heights, but the only store open is this convenience store, over by the motel. But Dad’s desperate, so in we go. And let me tell you, the gift selection was grim. On top of that, the clerk says, Computers are down, no credit card sales. But my dad has cash, and he’s trying to choose between these tacky votive candles, a Yankees mouse pad, and this disposable toilet bowl brush, and I know he’s in serious trouble. I mean, I’m only eleven, but even back then I understand that you don’t buy your wife a disposable toilet brush for Christmas. Unless you don’t want to get any until Memorial Day.”

“Unless, she’s got, like, a toilet bowl fetish,” Izzy suggested, emerging from the bathroom.

“Have you met Jenk’s mom?” Lopez asked him.

“No,” Izzy said. “Have you?” He turned to Jenk. “I’m jealous. You bring Lopez home to meet the ’rents, but you don’t bring me? What am I to you? Just some cheap, easy plaything that you use and discard?”

“So I’m trying to talk my father into the certificate-for-a-romantic-weekend idea,” Jenk spoke over him, because sometimes it was best just to ignore Izzy. “I’m telling him there’s a program on our new home computer that he can use to make it look like he spent hours designing it. Plus Mom will love the idea. My ulterior motive, of course, is to be allowed to stay home alone with Ginny, my older sister—who had some extremely hot friends.”

“Ginny’s pretty hot herself.” Izzy turned to Gilligan. “You ever meet Ginny?”

“Yeah, once,” he said, and it was clear he wouldn’t have used the word hot to describe her. “She came to San Diego. She was kind of, well … large. I mean, short, like Jenk, but … round. No offense, Jenkins.”

“Yeah,” Izzy said. “No offense, Jenkins, but Gilligan thinks your sister is freaking fat.”

“She was pregnant,” Lopez pointed out, ever the voice of calm.

“She was?” Gillman looked to Jenk for confirmation. “I didn’t know she was married.”

“Yeah. Gin’s got three kids,” Jenk said. He put his cards down on the table and, stretching, stood up. Chickie was still out in the driveway. Jenk could see him through the window, pacing back and forth out there as he spoke on his phone.

“Wow,” Gillman said.

Jenk opened the mini-fridge and pulled out another beer.

“Wow,” Izzy echoed. “For someone with three kids, she’s not just hot, she’s freaking hot.”

Jenk popped the top and held the bottle out to Gillman. Who took it, alleluia, and took a long swig. “Iz?”

“Nah, I’m good,” Izzy said.

“Jay?”

“Thanks.” Lopez drained his bottle, and Jenk traded him for a new one, putting the empty in the growing pile with the others.

“So we’re in this store,” Jenk continued his story, “and these three huge woman—I mean they were really tall. They come in, and they’re dusting the snow off their coats and their hair, and they’re really disappointed at the no credit card news. One of them—Sherilee—overhears my conversation with my dad.”

“Sherilee,” Izzy repeated.

“Sherilee, Rhonda, and Marcia,” Jenk said, sitting back at the table. “Sherilee goes, Last-minute Christmas shopping? And my dad takes, like, four steps back. He’s staring, and I think it’s because, well, he’s height-challenged like me, and this woman is about six four. She’s also wearing a tiara. How many women shop at the SuperQuick in a tiara? She goes, Not to be pushy, but I make jewelry. And I’m looking at that tiara, thinking, No way. But she calls one of her friends over, pulls back the other woman’s sleeve. And there’s this bracelet that looks as if it were made for my mom. It was silver and turquoise and … It was beautiful. It was beyond perfect. And my dad, he’s clearly freaked out, but he has to ask. How much? She looks at me, she looks at him, says, A hundred dollars. She hands it to Dad to look at more closely. Dad goes, Fifty. She says Cash? And he takes out his wallet. And she says to her friends, Go, girls. And they start gathering armloads of chips and Yodels—there’s not a lot of real food in that store. Turns out the trains stopped running, so here they are, at the Yorktown Heights Motel, with three dollars cash between the three of them. If my dad hadn’t bought that bracelet, they wouldn’t have been able to buy anything to eat until the computers came back on line. And from the way the lights were flickering, it wasn’t going to be soon.”

The door opened, and Chickie came back into the room. But he looked as if someone had jammed a pole up his ass. He made a beeline for the cooler, grabbing another Pepsi, before disappearing into the bathroom.

“So I’m talking to them,” Jenk continued, “and they’re really nice. They’re actresses, and they do a cabaret show, traveling around the country. Marcia plays the piano, and they all sing. And I’m looking at those bags of popcorn they’re holding, thinking about the lousy Christmas Eve dinner they’re going to have, so I say, Why don’t you come have dinner with us? And my dad kind of freezes, and I don’t know why. We’ve always had a strays-and-orphans policy at our house—there’s always someone from outside of the family at our holiday meals. So I say to my dad, You know Mom won’t mind. And Sherilee says, Thank you, honey, you’re so sweet, but … we’ll be just fine. And Dad’s got the bracelet in one hand, and me in the other and he drags me out the door.

“It wasn’t until we were in the car, when he goes, Mark. Those are men in women’s clothes. I think I actually argued with him. You know, Why would men wear women’s clothes? I remember him saying, Because they want to. And I just didn’t get it, but I was a kid, so it didn’t freak me out the way it did my dad. I mean, I thought it was crazy, but if they wanted to wear high heels, it was fine with me. And I said, But they’re nice. Mom would love them. And he didn’t say anything. He didn’t pull out of the parking lot either. We just sat there, in the car, watching them through the store windows. They were probably trying to decide which brand of beef jerky was the most edible. And I said, It’s Christmas. And they saved your butt. And he’s all pissed, but he hands me the bracelet for my mother, huffing and puffing as he’s getting out of the car, muttering to himself about stupid kids and stupid ideas. But he goes back into the store, and when he comes out, Sherilee, Rhonda, and Marcia are with him. We all pile into the Honda, and with the extra weight we don’t skid once on our way home.

“It was a great Christmas,” Jenk told them as Chick came out of the bathroom and rejoined them at the table. “Mom loved the bracelet, and we had our own personal cabaret show. And maybe I was wrong—I was only eleven—but it sure seemed like Rhonda and Marcia had a thing for each other. Thus, my most interesting lesbian encounter.”

“Can we please finish this hand?” Young Vlachic had definitely just had a Dear John phone call. He looked at Jenk. “Will you f*cking do something besides talk?”

Ouch. Jenk let the harsh words roll off his back, considering the circumstances, as, across the table, Gillman picked up his cards and …

He scratched his chin with the back of his hand.

Yes! He was bluffing. Or … was he? Gillman also sent Jenk what could only be described as a furtive look. It was over almost before it started, but Jenk saw it.

Except it was clearly intended for Jenk to see, which meant …

“I’m in,” Jenk decided, tossing his money into the pile in the center of the table. Gillman was back to not looking anywhere but at his cards.

“How much to call?” Chickie grimly asked.

“Twenty-six dollars,” Lopez said in a voice that recommended Chick fold.

“No, it’s only sixteen to him,” Izzy said. “Vlachic was the genius who raised the bet ten fricking bucks in the first place.”

Chickie put in the cash. And sure enough, Gillman revealed that he was holding a whole lotta nothing. Total train wreck. The highest card was, appropriately, a jack.

“Nice attempt to bluff,” Jenk told him, revealing his three aces. “But you know, you tried just a little too hard. You were too obvious with your eyes and—” He was already reaching for the pot when Izzy stopped him.

“Dude.” Izzy pointed at the cards Chickie was lovingly placing on the table. Holy crap.

It wasn’t just a winning hand. It was a kickass, once-in-a-lifetime, mother-of-God miracle of a winning hand. A straight flush; spades, Queen high. Even Lopez sat forward and stared.

“No f*cking way.” Gillman was the first to overcome the shock and put voice to their disbelief. “Dude. You took three cards.”

“I guess I’m just lucky,” Chick said in that same grim voice. But then he looked up and smiled, and Jenk knew they’d all been conned. By the twelve-year-old new guy. Who’d gone through BUD/S and was probably closer to twenty-three—and completely capable of conning the unconnable. Yeah, Chick was lucky as hell, but he’d totally fooled them into thinking he still held a crappy hand.

“Who was on the phone?” Jenk asked, suddenly suspicious.

“No one,” Chick admitted, starting to put the huge pile of bills and coins into neatly organized stacks. “You just seemed as if you needed a little more time to decide to stay in.”

“Brilliantly done,” Jenk said.

“What I said before,” Vlachic started to explain. “I didn’t mean—”

“I know,” Jenk reassured him. “It was a nice touch. Very authentic.”

“Thanks,” Chick said. “That means a lot, coming from you.”

Jenk was the team’s best liar, which meant that he also had the most accurate bullshit meter. Although it was entirely possible that he was now the team’s second best liar.

“Hey, Iz.” Jenk turned to Zanella. He didn’t need to say anything more, since Izzy was on the same wavelength.

As Lopez shuffled the deck, Izzy took a beer from the fridge. He opened it. “Welcome to the team,” he said.

And handed it to Chickie.