Chapter 3

B aron looked over at Brittany and added, "Not to mention that I'm still looking for that War Dog."

"Which is also interesting." She stared at him with a puzzled expression. "Just that dog?"

"No, not just that dog, but I have been asked to look for that War Dog in particular."

"Ah, maybe that makes more sense, but a lot of dogs go missing in hurricanes."

"That's true. Tons of dogs go missing, but that doesn't mean they deserve to go missing." She frowned at him, and he burst out in a chuckle. "I don't mean to sound mysterious, but—"

"You're definitely sounding mysterious," she stated, "so something is still bothering you."

"Probably something here does bother me, especially considering my brother is gone," he admitted. "I'll deal with my current world, but it'll take a day or two."

"I understand," she said. "I've been trying hard to not invite my grandmother to come live with me, and I'm feeling pretty rough about that. Honestly I don't really want the responsibility, but I'm not sure how to make her life happen any other way."

"It is a huge responsibility," he pointed out.

"I know, which is a big part of my hesitation," she murmured. "And I feel terrible for not jumping on it. What kind of a person am I? My grandmother goes through a terribly traumatic loss like this, and I'm not jumping up to saying, Hey, come live with me , you know?"

"Well, if I am not overstepping,… why haven't you?"

"I know I should—"

"I don't deal with the emotional side of it all. The military sucked all the joy out of all that for me. What's your real reason?"

"There are a lot of reasons, plus a lot of questions and need for options."

"One being that she may not even want to go to your place?"

At that, she laughed. "You're right there. And I haven't even talked to her about it. Yet I don't want my life to change. And this would be drastic." Brittany shook her head. "Yet the same could be said for Grandma. Thankfully she's over at Camille's in the interim."

"Camille? Camille Rogers?"

She looked at him. "Yes, do you know her?"

"Yeah, I sure do. She's been here a very long time."

"She has, and she's pretty fascinating in her own right, but I think she may also be struggling a little bit financially. Maybe, I'm not sure. She's been very welcoming and generous with my grandma, but every time I try to cook or make her something, she refuses it and insists that I eat, but she doesn't."

He frowned at her and asked, "So it could be financial distress. Could she also have a health issue?"

"She's not really talking, so I don't know, though she did acknowledge how expensive things have gotten," Brittany shared. "So many times these older people aren't exactly open. They are of that generation that you don't talk about money, politics, or religion. So they won't really share what their concerns are. I did bring up the idea that if she could look after my grandma,… or if my grandma could stay with her, I could pay her as the caregiver, even sharing some of the responsibilities."

"How old is Camille? Plus, if you don't know how her health is, do you think that is wise?"

"She's younger than Grandma. If they could come to an arrangement, it could end up being a shared thing between us, but we'll see." Brittany waved it off with her hand. "I have time yet to finalize things."

"Good, because sometimes these things come up, and a snap decision has to be made—or worse yet, the person is unwell and doesn't have much time left."

"Oh God," she murmured, "I would hate to think that my grandmother was that close already."

"How old is she?"

"She's eighty-three."

"So, she is old enough for that to be a concern," he noted. "You never know when something could happen."

Just the thought of losing her grandma was enough to make Brittany's heart seize, and she nodded. "I guess I know that intellectually, but she's also a tough old bird and could go another twenty years."

He smiled. "I would like to see that. Plus, if she's anything like Camille, she is a tough old bird. Gosh, Camille's got to be," he paused, frowning, then asked, "what?… Late seventies?"

"I would think so," she agreed. "I don't know how bad Camille's financial problem is, or if it's even a thing. It's not as if she was opening up to me about it or anything."

"No, but maybe we need to do more to push her to open up, so we can get a better idea of what the problem is."

She glanced over at him, and, with a crooked smile on her face, she asked, " We ?"

He chuckled. "Sorry. My mother would say, Give me an inch, and I'll take a yardstick ."

"Oh, and I thought that was just men in general," she teased in a sharp tone.

He stared at her and blinked for a moment, before bursting out laughing. "That could be true."

"Could be?" She just grinned at him.

"By the way, I don't mean to be insulting."

"Neither do I," she pointed out, "but sometimes it just ends up being that way."

"Me too. I apologize. This is entirely not my deal. It's your deal."

"Still, any suggestions would be welcome."

"Are you sure?" he asked, giving her a look. "I don't want to butt my nose in where it's not needed."

" Not needed doesn't apply in this situation," she murmured, "since we have an awful lot going on right now. Any ideas would be appreciated."

"Speaking of right now," he said, "you should be going home and dealing with your own issues for a change."

"Really? Do I look as if I have that luxury?"

"No." He brushed a big chunk of dirt off her face. "However, it does look like you've had a rough day."

She reached up, checked her cheek, and chuckled. "I really am in rough shape, aren't I?"

"I don't know about that, but you look like you've had a rough day."

" Rough life is more like it," she pointed out.

"I'm sorry to hear that. So, tell me. Are you ill?" Then he shifted uneasily for a moment.

She frowned and asked him, "Did you hurt yourself?"

"No, just that my prosthetic is causing me some trouble. I've been on my feet too much." When she stared at him, he shrugged. "You're not the only one with health issues, or at least people with issues," he murmured. He pulled up his pant leg so she could see his prosthetic.

"I had no idea," she said, looking at it.

"Good." He smiled. "It's not exactly the first thing I want people to think of—or worse, the only thing."

"No, of course not, but I don't think anybody would think less of you for it."

He raised an eyebrow and asked innocently, "Seriously?"

She flushed. "Okay, so any decent person would not look at you differently."

"Maybe, but, in that case, an awful lot of people are in this world who don't look at things the same way as you do."

"I understand," she muttered. "And I get some of that myself because my grandma's been on her own for quite a few years. I know she doesn't want to live with me, and, what's more, I don't really want her to. That's not all that easy to admit. Don't get me wrong. We love each other very much, but we'll probably kill each other if forced to live together." She gave a nervous laugh. "Yet now,… well, there may not be another option anymore."

"That's why you need to just rest and relax a little bit," he stated. "You don't have to make that decision right now. Give yourself a chance to sleep on it."

"It still feels like it's the only way though," she said, looking at him.

He smiled, then nodded. "I get that too, but I'm pretty sure you'll find other issues in life you'll need to solve too. So maybe you can let this go for now and let some of that settle to the bottom. You need some time to process things, and, to do that, you need to relax."

She shook her head. "Wow. Do you say shit like that to strangers all day long?"

He burst out laughing. "Well, I try. I mean, I'm trying to be supportive."

"Yeah, well,… I'm not sure it's working out for you."

He shrugged. "Hey, at least I tried."

"You did, and now, since it's too dark to do much more out here, we're leaving," she declared, with a big grin on her face. As she walked over to her car, she added, "On the other hand, I could use some food. How about you?"

He nodded. "I was thinking I needed to figure out something for dinner. It's too late to go home and join my mother. She'll have eaten already. I texted her I wouldn't make it earlier. But now I'm getting hungry."

"Let's head down to the mainland. I know a joint that serves a mean burger, if you want to go get one together."

"I would like that," he said, nodding at her.

She flushed. "Yeah, I know. I don't usually do shit like this."

His grin flashed. "Well, I, for one, am delighted."

"Good," she said, "but, if you ever tell my grandma, I'll deny it forever."

At that, he burst into laughter. "So, what then? She's on your case over that too?"

"Yeah," she confirmed, rolling her eyes. "There are just some things that grandmothers apparently think you're supposed to do, and to have, and to be. Mine at least, anyway. And, right now, I seem to be failing her on all fronts."

"Not failing," he clarified, "just making her wait."

She grinned. "Definitely making her wait."

"Any particular reason?" he asked curiously.

"Yeah," she replied, not missing a beat. "The last guy I had a long-term serious relationship with left me at the altar," she muttered, "so I'm not planning on going down that pathway again."

He stopped, studied her with his all-knowing eyes, and asked, "Clive?"

She winced. "Oh great ," she muttered. "You know him?"

"This is an old stomping ground for me," he shared, with a smile. "I'm sorry he did that," he murmured. "I heard something about it and couldn't believe he did it."

"Yeah, neither could I," she grumbled, "but it's not as if I had any choice in the matter."

"I don't know whether it makes you feel better or not, but I don't think Clive's any happier for it."

"I would like to say that I don't give a crap. And then I would like to say that I hope he's suffering," she added, scrubbing at her face. "Yet that's just not who I am," she declared calmly. "So I'll just leave it at that and hope he gets his shit together before he goes out and breaks somebody else's heart."

"I can get behind that," Baron noted, "and I think that's a pretty fair response."

"Too fair," she muttered. "I probably should be calling him out for being such an ass."

"You should," he agreed cheerfully, "but I don't think he's grown up a whole lot yet."

"No, he hasn't," she confirmed bitterly, "and that was the problem in the first place. I wanted to get hitched, but apparently he didn't. Yet he went along with it, until he couldn't go along with it anymore," she shared. "I just wish he'd mentioned it ahead of time. If he had just told me, I would have understood."

"Of course," he replied, "and that would have made your life a whole lot easier."

"A lot easier and a whole lot less painful," she added, suddenly emotional and red in the face. "Being stood up at the altar isn't fun."

He stared at her with a shocked expression and asked, "Like, stood up at the altar, for real?"

She nodded. "Yeah, after buying the dress, delivering the cake, the preacher in place. Yeah. The whole deal."

"Oh, crap. That must have been brutal. All your friends and families there, I suppose?"

"Yep. Hey, if you're going to be humiliated, you might as well do it at the maximum level."

He burst out laughing at that, to the point that she had to grin at him.

"I don't know what's so funny," she said, with a smile, "and I'm glad you're enjoying a laugh at my expense."

He immediately stopped. "Not at your expense at all," he corrected, his grin widening. "You have such a great attitude, despite Clive being such an idiot. I'm just loving the fact that you landed on your feet as well as you have."

"Well, my grandma thinks I should have been out crawling the town and already found somebody else by now," she explained, "but, since I haven't, according to her, I'm still dealing with it."

" Nah ." He waved his hands animatedly. "You're not still dealing. You just don't trust yourself."

She stopped in the act of opening the car door and stared at him. He shrugged. "Can anyone blame me for that?" she asked.

"No, I am not saying that at all. You made a choice with Clive, and it turned out to be a bad one. So now you're afraid that, every time you look at someone, you'll just repeat the experience," he stated simply. "But you won't because you'll look at it from every angle, one million times over, before you put yourself in that situation again," he pointed out, with a big smile she thought was infectious. "So, trust in yourself a little more. I'm pretty sure you'll come out smelling like a rose."

She shook her head, just as another vehicle drove down the road, very slowly.

He watched it go by with a narrowed gaze. "Any idea who that is?"

She studied the vehicle and shook her head. "No, but it's come through here before," she muttered. "I sure hope it's not looters again."

He shot her a hard look. "That wouldn't be good."

"I know, but some of the people who have been out here are up to no good," she murmured, "and what we're looking at here is an awful lot of people looking for a chance to make some easy money."

"I'm not into anybody making money off other people's hardships," Baron declared, looking back to the vehicle. "Look. You go on ahead to the hamburger joint. I'll just check out what he's up to and get that license plate."

"Oh no you don't," she countered. "If you're heading off to do that, I'm coming with you." He stopped and stared at her. She nodded. "I get it. Not the response you expected, but that's just part and parcel of being in my world," she muttered. "So, guess what? I'm coming with you." He frowned, then opened his mouth to argue, and she cut him off. "Don't even bother. I've been trying to keep track of everybody who's been coming around here too," she shared, staring at the vehicle as it continued down the road. "I don't like anything about somebody coming at this hour of the night."

"And yet, if they think we're following them," he pointed out, "they'll just come back later."

"I know." She turned to face him and asked, "Suggestions?"

"You won't let me go find out on my own, will you?"

"Nope, I'm definitely not doing that," she stated.

He felt admiration for her stance but also a certain degree of frustration because she wouldn't pay any attention to what he preferred, though why should she? She didn't really know him either. He really wanted to head over to the burger joint with her, just to spend a few hours thinking about the good things in life. Yet, if these guys were up to no good, an awful lot of people had already suffered, and they sure didn't need any losers coming by and taking advantage of the hardship they were already in. "Let's take one vehicle then."

She smiled at him and then nodded. "That makes more sense. Let's take your truck, since it can handle the roads a whole lot better with all this storm debris."

Together they got into his vehicle. He turned on the engine and began, "Listen. If it gets dangerous—"

"Don't worry," she interrupted. "I don't have a death wish, but I also don't want to see everything people have worked for go up in smoke because of some asshole."

He just smiled and headed down the road after the vehicle. He hadn't gone too much farther when he shut off the headlights. She looked at him and whispered, "Why did you do that?"

"I don't want him to know we're coming up behind him."

She stared ahead. "We can hardly see the road."

"Your eyes will adjust in a minute. I can see quite a distance ahead," he shared.

"Fine," she muttered, "but it's not exactly comforting."

"No, but doing this stuff is never comforting."

"This stuff?" she repeated, slowly looking over at him. "Have you done this stuff before?"

He nodded. "I've done all kinds of this stuff before," he quipped, with a knowing smile. "That's what happens when you're in the military. You're called into different situations, including natural disasters. You're called into places to help out with whatever needs to be done and with all that comes with it. Lots of times I was on missions overseas. Sometimes on peacekeeping missions, sometimes active missions that weren't so peaceful," he shared in a casual tone. "But something like this guy?" he muttered, nodding ahead. "I have an odd feeling about him."

"I did too, both the first time and the second time." She opened her phone and added, "I'm not positive, but I think I have a picture of his license plate that I took the other day."

He handed her his phone and said, "Send that license plate number to a guy named Badger, will you?"

She hesitantly opened his phone and then asked, "You really think it's something we should keep an eye on?"

He looked at her and smiled. "Didn't you keep track of that license plate for a reason?"

"Well, yeah, but…" Then she laughed. "One of those things where you feel stupid because you did it, yet maybe it's a good thing I did."

"Of course it's a good thing you did," he stated, with a casual wave. "Just send it to Badger, and, if it's nothing, we'll hear back from him, and we'll know."

"Oh good." She had to get his pattern for the swiping of the phone to open it up, and, as soon as she did, she shared, "You have a couple messages here from him."

"Read them, would you?"

She quickly read them out loud, feeling a strange intimacy in doing so. "He's just looking for you to check in."

"That would be him."

"Is he the one,… the one you mentioned about the War Dog?"

"Yes, he's the one who specifically asked me to find the War Dog."

"Interesting," she murmured. "I never think of things like the War Department looking after retired War Dogs."

"I'm not sure that it's the department itself, as much as the job was handed to Badger and his wife, Kat, and they've taken to it very personally."

"That's good. I'm glad somebody out there cares enough to do it," she murmured.

"And that's why they've taken it on because they do care enough," he declared, glancing at her. "Nobody really wants to think about these animals out there suffering, after having given so much of their lives to the service."

"True," she murmured. She quickly copied over the license plate numbers and sent it. "I didn't send a message with it."

"That's okay. I'm pretty sure he's used to that," Baron replied, with a smile.

"Were you in the military with him?"

"Not with him but with several mutual friends," he replied. "A lot of us came out less than 100 percent, and he's been helping a lot of us get on our feet and get back out there. Kat designed my prosthetic," he added, as he tapped his leg by way of acknowledgment.

"Oh, that's fascinating. I thought about doing something like that, but I didn't really have the smarts for it."

"What is it that you do?"

"I do a lot of data analysis," she murmured. "It's something I can do remotely, and I fell into it. It seems I have an affinity for it, so I've been working for the same company for a long time."

"So, it's a work-from-home job then?"

"Yeah, most of the time. They send me all kinds of reports. I sort through them and give them the bottom line. Sadly, most of the time, it's not happy news, but it's the truth. It's a valuable situation for me," she admitted. "They also hire me out to other companies at times, and I give them the bottom line at the end of the day. In some cases I go through stocks and different products that they have and point out which ones are doing better than others and why they should be streamlining their product lines," she shared animatedly.

"Sounds interesting."

"It's something that I would have thought people instinctively do, but they get emotionally attached to various products, so they keep them around, even though it's costing them. At some point in time nobody can afford the cost, so I'm like the sledgehammer, the final straw that says out loud what they already really knew was unavoidable." When he looked over at her, she shrugged. "I just fell into it. I have no idea what I would do if I ever got fired."

"Doesn't seem they can afford to fire you," he offered, with a smile. "Sounds to me as if you've got yourself a niche part of the world, and they're glad to have you. And you have the smarts to do anything you would want to do."

"Maybe so. I've been working for them for a long time, so we're generally on the same page when it comes to this stuff, and I make good money, so I'm happy there."

"Well, if you're living down here, you can't be doing too badly."

"And my place is paid for," she added. "I made that a priority years ago."

"Good for you," he murmured.

"But …" she began.

"But what?" he asked.

"While I make good money for me, it's not enough for me and Grandma. And it's certainly not enough to put Grandma in a fancy retirement home where they would take good care of her no matter what. Plus, this might sound selfish, but I want to continue working. I like my life as it is. I don't want it to change. I guess freelancing and being my own boss and setting my own hours makes me set in stone, reluctant to change. Maybe I'm in that first stage of denial still." She turned to face him. "This is not how I saw myself living out the rest of my years."

Baron nodded. "I understand. Change is upsetting, even temporary ones. Big changes that are long-term are even worse. Just give yourself time to adjust, to take it in, to look at options. Thankfully you have Camille to take a little of that pressure off you in the interim."

Brittany sighed, seemingly calmer, then asked, "What about you? Do you have your future planned out?"

"I'm good. I've got money from the military, not that anybody in the military makes great money," he noted, shaking his head, while keeping his gaze on the road. "No one does, unless you're higher up, one of the brass. Yet the thing is, I saved almost everything I made because everything was pretty well covered." He shrugged. "I did a lot of traveling on the military's nickel, and I saved as much as I could the rest of the time."

"I'm like that too," she said. "Not everybody is big on savings, but that's how I managed to get my place paid for early." She fell silent, as she realized that they were still continuing on in the sheer darkness. "So, do you have some special talent for seeing in the darkness?"

"I do, not that it's 100 percent foolproof."

"They would hear our vehicle though, wouldn't they?"

"They would, depending on where they are," he noted, "but the fact that we haven't seen them and that we've only got a couple houses left is interesting."

"Well, up there is one of those spooky houses," she muttered.

"You're talking about the Gorman place?"

"Yes, I am," she confirmed, with a laugh. "Now I know you're a local."

He chuckled. "It's one of those places where we used to scare each other when we were young," he murmured. "We used to come down to the beach and ride a bicycle around these blocks, but that was one of those houses we all stayed away from."

"Yeah, I always stayed away from it too. It's definitely the scariest house on the block."

"It was, for sure. I'm surprised it's still standing."

"Have you seen it yet? Is it badly damaged?"

"I've driven around since I've come back these last few days, but I haven't really spent too much time at this end of the street." He pulled off to the side of the road, and he called her attention to something, pointing discreetly. "People are moving around up there."

She peered through the windshield, and then turned to look at him, not really sure what she was looking at. "I can't see."

"In that case, you're staying here," he pointed out. "If you can't see what's going on, I don't want you in harm's way, much less any danger."

"What makes you think it's dangerous?" He gave her a lopsided grin that she was starting to recognize and could almost anticipate. "You think they're looters?" she asked.

He nodded. "I would say so. Let me go see what they have to say for themselves."

"You can't just walk up there and talk to them," she cried out.

"I didn't say I would, but we have to do something. Otherwise they'll strip this place clean."

"We could call the cops."

"Yeah, we could, but do you really want to bring them in, knowing that we're not supposed to be here either?"

She winced. "Right, I forgot about that part."

He chuckled. "Let me go talk to them, and we'll see."

"Letting you go talk to them sounds like a fool's mission."

He stared at her for a long moment. "So, what would you like to do?"

"I don't know." She looked around the place, squinting hard. "Part of me wants to turn around and run."

He nodded. "That's the smart part, but the hero part is the part that wants to do good in this world, and it's out there waiting to act in a way that will help protect things."

"They're just things," she pointed out.

"Do you think they're armed?" he asked her curiously.

She stared at him, her stomach starting to scream. "I would hope not," she whispered, "because now you've got me really worried, and I don't want you going out there."

"Is that because you don't want me to get hurt or because you're scared to be left alone?" he asked, and such curiosity filled his tone that she just looked at him for a moment, unable to say anything.

"I can't believe you're even asking that," she said. "Of course I'm worried about you."

He gave her the warmest smile that she had probably ever seen. "I do like to hear that." Then he opened the door, stepping out. "So, I say that, and then you go anyway?" she cried out.

"Well, somebody's got to do something," he said, "and I highly doubt that it'll go bad." But he didn't have the door opened for more than thirty seconds, when something slammed into his truck.

Hopping inside, he closed the door and pulled her down, so they were leaning under the dashboard.

"What the hell was that?" she whispered.

He looked over at her, his face grim. "Bullet."