Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 143382 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 717(@200wpm)___ 574(@250wpm)___ 478(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 143382 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 717(@200wpm)___ 574(@250wpm)___ 478(@300wpm)
I trained them at the road beside the massive lot where the camp sat and saw a handsome, middle-aged Black guy waiting for a pretty, same-aged Black lady to take his outstretched hand.
I felt Eric come up beside me (the car doors must have woken him), so I lowered my binoculars and looked up at him.
“Shit,” he murmured, he dropped his binocs and looked down at me. “That’s gotta be Johnson’s parents.”
“Johnson?”
“Chris Johnson. The General.”
Shit.
I turned to the camp as Eric ordered, “Pack the shit, babe, we gotta try to head them off.”
I looked back at him to see he’d already folded up a camp chair and nabbed the tripod with camera.
“I’ll hoof it to the car,” he said. “Gather the rest of this, I’ll swing by and pick you up.”
He didn’t wait for my response. He took off.
Although I agreed we needed to intervene ASAFP (who knew how the General would respond to his parents suddenly showing?), and I was happy not to run back to the SUV laden with stuff, “the rest of this” included a couple of pairs of binoculars and a chair.
I was also mildly embarrassed that he knew I’d slow him down.
But only mildly.
I didn’t dally in folding the chair, dropping the strap on the night vision binocs around my neck alongside the regular ones, and getting down the stairs.
I hid in a shadow in the doorway until I saw the Denali roll up. This took far less time than I expected, which told me Eric hadn’t jogged back to the truck, he’d run. And he’d done it carrying a camp chair, tripod and long-range camera.
I headed out and wasted no time opening the back door, shoving the camp chair in and pulling the binocs from around my neck before I dropped them on the floor. Then I hauled myself up into the front passenger seat.
I turned to him while doing my belt as he circled out, and I expected him at least to be sweating.
He was not.
I mean, really.
Did Zeus have jet black hair?
We pulled up behind the General’s parents’ shiny, white Ram, parked and got out.
Homer had exited his tent and was standing, staring into the camp.
He turned to us when we approached.
I alternately smiled at him and scanned the camp looking for the Johnsons.
They were not to be seen, and this meant they’d wended their way deep into the camp.
I hated the idea that the General went on patrol, and why he did, but I hoped he was out of the camp now.
When we stopped by him, I greeted, “Hey, Homer.”
“Are those General Grant’s parents?” he asked.
I nodded. “Where did they go?”
He turned toward the camp. “They went in. But I don’t think he’s here. And I don’t know if he wants to see them.”
Yeah. As mentioned, I didn’t know that either. And that was the worry.
I tipped my head back to look at Eric. “Were the boys planning an extraction today?”
He shook his head. “Don’t know. Do know, when they figured out who he was, they reached out to his parents to see where they were at. But we didn’t invite them to the party.”
From what I could tell through the binoculars, where they were at was out of their minds worried about their son.
Which meant they learned where their son was and came looking for him.
Understandable.
But not optimal.
“I called Cap and Mace on the way to you,” Eric told me. “They’re en route.”
I switched back to Homer. “Do you think you can find him? Bring him back? We’ll handle his parents.”
“It’s time to go get him anyway,” Homer said. “I’ll grab some guys.”
He took off, and Eric and I followed him into the camp.
Once our paths diverged from Homer’s, I said to Eric, “I really want to talk to Scott and Louise about seeing if we can help Homer.”
This made him stop, stopping me as well by catching my hand.
I looked up at him again.
“I get he’s touched your heart too,” he said carefully. “But you need to manage your expectations, sweetheart.”
“I know,” I whispered. “But it’s worth a try, right?”
He squeezed my hand, said nothing, and set us again to moving farther into the camp.
We found the Johnsons deep in the bowels. Mr. Johnson was staring off into the distance, a haunted look on his face. Mrs. Johnson was staring at someone’s grocery cart filled with junk, openly struggling with tears.
Mr. Johnson turned to us first, then he wrapped his arm around his wife to hold her close while we approached.
“Mr. Johnson, I’m Eric Turner. I work with Nightingale Investigation and Security,” he said, holding out a hand for Johnson to take.
Johnson let his wife go and shook. “The firm that found our son.”
They disengaged as Eric nodded and looked to Chris’s mom. “Mrs. Johnson.”
“Is he here? We can’t find him,” she said.