Chapter 1

Gideon Warrick stepped off the plane, hoisted his backpack, and walked several steps forward, realizing he was almost in the exact same position Mason would have been when he'd been shot. Gideon glanced around, assessing the shooting capabilities of anybody who would take him out. Was the injury a mistake or just a bad shot that didn't kill Mason? Was it deliberate? Was somebody just warning him? Were they warning somebody else? Maybe they were playing the long game, like do this or else.

Gideon looked around, but nobody seemed to care or notice that he was here. He half smiled at that. He was usually pretty good at blending into the crowd. Another dozen guys got off the transporter with him. He moved over to the side, waiting to see whether anybody interrupted him or questioned his movements.… Nobody did.

Shaking his head at that, he kept walking until somebody stepped directly in his path. Surprised, and yet happy to think somebody might be challenging his movements. Jasper . Gideon reached out for a handshake. "Hey, I wasn't sure whether you got my messages or not."

"Got them," Jasper confirmed, "and we're heading straight to the hospital."

"Why? Is Mason worse?" he asked, concern in his tone.

"No, but there's a chance that Nicholas is able to speak."

"Nicholas, as in…" Gideon frowned, as he tried to recall what Masters had told him, then remembered, "Ah, the investigator who was held captive?"

"Exactly. His sister is also at the hospital. She's under guard with Nicholas, Tesla, and Mason."

"Sounds like I'll get to meet the whole family."

"You will, and you also get to meet Masters."

"I already know Masters." Gideon shook his head. "I've worked with him a couple times."

"You okay with him?"

"Absolutely. He was good to work with and stayed out of my way," he noted, as if that meant more to him than anything else. "That's as important as anything else."

Jasper laughed. "That is so you." Then he slapped him on the shoulder and added, "Let's go."

As Jasper headed over to a small car, Gideon snorted. "What the hell is up with the tiny car?"

"It blends in a little easier."

"Ah, good point."

"I do have a truck assigned to you."

"Thanks. I was just wondering whether anybody was keeping track of my movements or has been completely oblivious as to who came and went off this base."

"Whoever is coming and going here should already have clearance," Jasper pointed out. "Yet I understand what you're saying. Nobody is stopping you or checking your credentials. Correct. Though you are on camera, of course."

"Sure, but—"

"That's among quite a few recommendations I'll be making for future safety of our personnel after this," Jasper grumbled. "The fact of the matter is, what happened to Mason shouldn't have happened, but it did, which usually means that somebody on the inside gave away some top secret intel."

"I'm not sure any top secret intel was involved to give away," Gideon countered. "It was a simple open-and-shut case. A sniper and his target. What we need is the motive."

"What we can't find is the sniper."

"You'll find him all right," Gideon replied. "Did you check for John Does in the hospital?"

Jasper turned and stared at him.

"If I hired a sniper, you could bet that he wouldn't live five minutes after his kill shot, and he couldn't be ID'd either. I would cut off his fingers and his toes, take out his eyeballs and teeth, the whole works," he explained, with a bark of a laugh. "And if anybody out there is as serious as I suspect they are, they would do the same thing—unless of course the sniper was the mastermind behind it all."

"Your version sounds too professional for me," Jasper noted, with a headshake. "Which is why I'm on this side of the line, thinking Mason's attack was some novice at work."

"I hate to say it, but, to me, it sounded like drugs were involved, but addictions are everywhere these days. Every base in the world has a drug problem to some degree," he said. "Hell, every town does too. However, this is pretty big deal for it to be"—he winced—" just drugs."

"And that's a whole other discussion," Jasper stated. Then he smiled. "It's good to have you around, man."

"You just want somebody to bounce ideas off of?"

"I sure do. Plus, you know Mason."

"I sure do, and that's another reason I'm here. Mason and I go way back."

"Seems like Mason goes way back with half the world." Jasper sighed. "We've had plenty of volunteers asking for guard duty, off the payroll, so that everybody can get in and do something to help out."

"You shouldn't turn that down," Gideon replied in a serious tone. "As long as you've got men you can clear, that you're certain aren't part of this, that we can trust, then you should take them up on it."

"I've got a roster going, and Tesla is working with it as well. At first, she was against any guard, but we've talked her into it now."

"She never did like being corralled, did she?"

Jasper laughed. "She hasn't changed."

"Good. She's one hell of a woman. She and Mason are the only couple out there who've ever made me rethink the whole marriage thing. I never thought it would have worked in our line of work, probably because I've seen more marriages destroyed on these bases than people coming together in any good and lasting way."

"You and me both," Jasper agreed. "I've got to tell you though, I found somebody too. So did Masters."

Gideon stared at Jasper as if he had sprouted horns or something. "Seriously?" Gideon scoffed. "Is that Mason's luck spreading to all his men once again? What were they called… the Keepers or something?"

"I don't know," Jasper admitted, with a grin. "That's a legendary joke, but I don't think anybody is laughing right now."

"Maybe not, but it sounds like there's still some influence, joke or not."

"The Keepers are real, alive and kicking," Jasper said, "although I haven't heard too much of them lately. It's one of those things where people are teased about finding love, but nobody ever has a serious conversation about it. Still, all the men in Mason's group seem to wind up happily married. So, prior to this, I would have laughed if anybody had predicted that I would find somebody myself. Yet I did, so it is what it is."

"Good enough. So, how did you meet her?"

He winced. "She was an ER nurse at the hospital here, when Mason got shot. I made the mistake of telling her that, if she saw anything suspicious, to let me know. However, instead of letting me know, she thought she'd go one better and videotaped somebody."

"Oh, crap."

"Yeah, Oh, crap is right. Anyway, she's under guard herself now and laying low, staying out of trouble until we can get this solved."

"So, that's your Keepers story, but you mentioned that Masters found somebody too?"

"He did. Elizabeth . She's the sister of the investigator who was held captive."

"Wow." Gideon dropped his head as he laughed. "So all I need to do is find somebody in trouble and enlist the help of other people, is that it?"

"That might work for you," Jasper said, with a laugh, "but I wouldn't count on it. We've had a lot of people involved, though I can't say any marriages have come out of this yet."

"Yeah, I hear you there." Gideon waved his hands. "It figures all the luck would run out just before I got here."

"Oh, I don't know about that, but I don't particularly know of any prospects who'll be in the picture for you this time."

"You never know," Gideon noted casually.

As they pulled into the parking lot of the hospital, Gideon looked up and sighed. "The one person I was ever close to worked right here, but she up and moved back East before I could formalize the relationship. I always figured that she ran before I could ask. That she knew I was gonna pop the question, and she ran instead."

Jasper stopped on the sidewalk. "Seriously?"

He nodded. "She was a physiotherapist, but she'd done her five years and was itching to relocate. I'm a military lifer," he said, with half a smile. "Still, I figured we could work it out. It's not as if she couldn't work in town, going private or whatever. It just didn't work out," he muttered, with a shrug.

"I doubt that she's here."

"No, she isn't.… She went back East."

Jasper didn't say anything. "What was her name?"

"Pearl, Pearl Laverne." He laughed. "She hated her name growing up, but it was her grandmother's name—a very good old-fashioned name, according to her mother."

"Sounds like it. I like it though. Is she tall, with black hair?" Jasper had a smirk on his face.

At that, Gideon stopped and asked suspiciously, "She is. Why?"

"I thought I saw somebody with that name tag, and that's an odd name, so it stuck," he shared. "Yet I've seen so many people around here, and I'm looking so much more closely now because we can't afford to take any chances. I just thought that her face was striking, as well as her name, which stood out."

"I doubt that it's her," Gideon snapped, a bit harsher than he intended.

"You got a picture of her?"

Frowning, Gideon grabbed his phone and swiped through his photo gallery.

"What?" Jasper asked. "I figured you carried a photo in your wallet."

Gideon shrugged. "I did, until I lost my wallet and that picture." He clicked on the last photo he had of her. He held it up for Jasper to have a good look. "See? I told you that you couldn't have seen her."

Jasper looked at it and whistled. "That is her."

"No way, she was dying to get out, man." He shook his head, but, inside, hope and dread warred for supremacy in his heart. "She wouldn't have come back."

"Unless she thought you would be here."

"I went off and did a bunch of missions as far overseas as I could get at that point in time," he shared, with a wry smile. "Not exactly the easy way to mend a broken heart, but it worked, more or less."

"I wonder if it worked though," Jasper countered, "or whether you're still open to her."

"I'm not open to anything in that direction. I never go backward."

"Maybe not, but I'm not sure she even went forward."

"That's her problem," Gideon stated briskly. "What's over and done with is over and done."

As they stepped into the hospital, Jasper led the way to Mason's room. As they took the stairs up to the second floor, the door to the second floor opened, and a woman stepped into the stairwell. As she passed them, Jasper lightly punched Gideon, who was checking the stairs below them. Gideon looked up, took one look at her, his gaze brushing past, only to come swinging back to her again. He sucked in his breath.

The woman gave them a polite blank look, then she froze.

"Jeez," Gideon whispered.

One of her eyebrows slowly rose. "Gideon?" she asked softly.

He nodded, otherwise frozen, wondering how the hell fate would have done this to him.

She looked over at Jasper, back at Gideon, and her smile fell away. "Nice to see you," she replied formally. With that, she picked up her gaze and raced down the stairs gracefully, leaving Gideon standing there, dumbfounded, as he stared after her.

*

Pearl raced to the bottom of the stairs, appearing calm, but, once out of his sight, she ran all the way down to the basement level, her breathing harsh, her face flushed. She'd finally come face-to-face with the man she'd returned to Coronado for—only to find out that he was long gone, having left soon after she had. Since then, every time she turned around, it seemed as if he was here, only to find out he wasn't. Now that he was truly here, what did she do?… Like an idiot, she ran as far and as fast as she could. Now she was huddled in the basement, desperate to reenact those last few minutes all over again.

She closed her eyes and wrapped her arms tightly around her chest, as she tried to control her breathing.

The stupidest thing she'd ever done was to walk away from him five years ago, and now, when finally given an opportunity to rectify her mistake, he'd stared at her blankly, as if she wasn't even there. It had broken her heart. Yet she realized that he might have been just as shocked as she was. He didn't even know she was in town, whereas she felt like she'd been looking for him forever. That was so typical of the way her world went these days, as if nothing was in sync. It hadn't been ever since she'd walked away five years ago.

It hadn't taken her long to realize it was the biggest mistake of her life. She'd heard he'd gone back overseas into the war zones, and she wondered if she had pushed him there, as he headed into some of the most dangerous areas possible. He was an investigator, a hell of a good one, but he'd often told her that the only good investigators were the ones who understood how things worked out in the real world. Therefore, as long as he hid away behind a desk, he couldn't understand what these men were going through.

When she and Gideon were together, she had pleaded with him to not go back out on these missions. She couldn't face losing him. Yet, when push had come to shove,… she'd been the one to walk away—not sure that she was ready for the commitment, not sure that she was ready for whatever it would take to keep him at home. Even if she kept him at home, surely he would hold it against her, especially if he wasn't ready to set down roots. She knew she wasn't ready, but, damn it, watching him go off to war wasn't her thing.

When her time was up here, five years ago, and an opportunity had come for her to transfer, she'd taken it, barely giving him any notice. She'd just run. She sold off her furniture, not having that much to begin with, and had raced back East. It had been a good thing in terms of her career, as she'd picked up new training opportunities. However, as far as her heart went, it had been brutal. It had been so very depressing because it was not at all the way she'd thought it would be. Not having him in her life had left a huge void that she hadn't expected, didn't want, and would now do anything to fill. Yet, seeing him just now, what had she done to fill that void?

Absolutely nothing.

She had accomplished nothing, leaving behind the one good thing in her life. Again. She couldn't even get her voice to work properly and had bolted, just like the scared rabbit she was. Maybe she'd done it once, but now she felt as if she was doing it all over again. She gave herself another few minutes and a hard talking to, then pushed herself back out in the direction she'd intended to go in the first place.

As she walked up to the main floor and entered the chaos in ER, one of the nurses walked over and handed her the material she had come to get.

"Thanks for picking it up."

She smiled at her. "No problem."

"Are you okay? You look like you just saw a ghost."

"Yeah, I did." She shook her head. "Somebody I used to know."

"Oh, everybody transfers out, then, for whatever reason, it seems they can't get enough, and they all come back," the nurse replied, with a knowing smile. "Stick around long enough and it's almost as if we recycle them." With half a laugh at her own joke, the nurse headed back into her department.

Pearl stood here, staring down at the material she'd come to collect, wondering at just how pathetic her words had sounded. As soon as she realized she'd made a mistake—which was basically immediately, some five years ago—she should have come back, like a homing pigeon. But, unlike a homing pigeon, she returned just to find out her home was no longer here, as Gideon was gone.