“Apparently not,” Sam said. “Agent Woods has been given the unenviable task of tracking down and capturing Magpie. They’ve moved him to the San Diego field office so he can be close enough to reach out if he decides he needs tactical support. We deploy the second we get confirmation they’ve found Magpie.”
“But the Treasury Department has to know there’s almost no way they’re ever going to find Magpie,” Noah said. “They never had a clue who he was to begin with and now that he knows someone is after him, they never will.”
“Agreed, but Woods drags us into daily intelligence briefings to go over possible sightings anyway,” Wes said. “There’s no other word to describe it except painful, but Chasen wants us on alert for whenever Woods calls. Speaking of which, we better get back before the chief gets suspicious.”
Noah nodded. He definitely didn’t want Chasen finding out he was doing this bodyguard gig, especially since he’d already lied to him about it. The chief always took care of his Team, but it still wouldn’t end well for Noah.
“Hey, before we go,” Lane said, “do you think you could introduce us to Peyton Matthews? I mean, since we’re here and all. I’m sort of a fan of hers.”
Noah stared, stunned Lane read the kind of books Peyton wrote.
“Maybe some other time,” he finally said. “Peyton has a book due soon and is trying to finish it on time.”
“Okay, that’s cool. I get it.” Lane’s shoulders sagged for a minute before he grinned. “Hey, why don’t you can bring her to the party Friday night? She can’t write all the time.”
Noah frowned in confusion. “What party?”
“It’s a platoon promotion party,” Sam answered, giving him a grin. “Nash got promoted to Petty Officer 1st Class and I made Petty Officer 2nd Class. We’re pooling our money and having one big party. You should definitely bring Peyton. Hell, invite Laurissa, too. We’re going to find a restaurant with a private room, so we can let loose.”
Noah doubted Peyton would want to go hang out with people she didn’t know, especially when she had a book due. Inviting Laurissa along might help, though. And he definitely wouldn’t mind spending some time with the Team. He was barely two weeks into his medical leave and he already missed the camaraderie.
“I’ll ask her,” he said with a shrug. “Laurissa, too.”
His buddies left a little while after that, but not before Sam got another promise from Noah that he’d call if he needed help.
Grabbing his bag, he headed for the front door. Thinking he should let her know he was back inside, he set his bag on the floor beside the sectional couch and headed upstairs to her office. He heard the clicking of the keyboard before he even reached the top of the stairs. Damn. If the sound was any indication, she typed fast. Like a cheetah-on-caffeine fast.
He poked his head in the open doorway to see her sitting at her desk, her back turned three-quarter to him, iPhone AirPods shoved in her ears, head moving rhythmically to whatever tunes she was listening to, fingers moving in a blur across the keyboard of the laptop. If he wasn’t seeing actual words appear on the screen, he would have thought she was typing gobbledygook.
Noah was about to walk away, not wanting to disturb Peyton when she was obviously on a roll, but then she started singing softly in time with her head bobs…something about X’s and O’s. The sound was so breathy yet adorable, it was impossible not to watch.
He must have stood there a good five minutes, entranced at the sight of Peyton typing away on her book, singing along with her music, pausing every once in a while to lift her hands up and dance around in her seat.
Damn, it was adorable.
Back downstairs, Noah considered turning on ESPN, but worried the noise might bother Peyton, even if she was listening to music. Then the bookshelf along the wall caught his eye. He walked over to graze a little, immediately becoming intrigued when he realized one of the shelves was full of book Peyton had written. Thinking about what Lane had said about reading them, he pulled one out deciding to give it a look.
The cover was a smaller version of one of the posters upstairs in her office, featuring a good-looking guy with a pretty girl. Admittedly, it wasn’t his usual reading, but curiosity made him flip through it. It only took him a second to find the first book in the series, and when he had it, Noah moved over to the couch and sat down. If nothing else, maybe it’d keep him occupied for a bit.
Before he knew it, he found himself lost in the story. It might have started simply as a distraction, but Noah soon admitted it was good. Damn good. Having enlisted in the Navy right out of high school, he never went to college like the characters in Peyton’s books, but he could relate to them anyway. Maybe because when you got right down to it, a lot of the crap the characters went through wasn’t so different than what he’d dealt with as a young SEAL. Figuring out who you wanted to be, the kinds of people you wanted to associate with, the path you would take in the world, where you even wanted to go with your life. He guessed those were universal issues, no matter where you were in the world and what you were doing.
Then again, it could also be because he had a younger sister who’d spent a lot of time talking his ear off about her time in college, friends, boys, course loads, and the various life crises she went through.
Noah finished the first book and was heading for the second when he realized it was almost 1730—five-thirty. He’d been reading for quite a while. He thought about asking Peyton if
