Page 20 of In The Trenches (Owens Protective Services)

“I thought you’d say that,” I grinned. Walking around behind my desk, I set my things down. “So, what was so important you had to come chase me down?”

“Fox is back.”

My head snapped up and I stared at her in question. “Is he…”

“Same. I really didn’t think he would come back this time.”

“Neither did I.” Dropping what I was about to do, I stormed out of my office. “Where is he?”

“Where do you think?”

“I don’t have time for his crap today,” I muttered.

“Well, the guys aren’t exactly encouraging him to leave.”

“Of course not.”

Fox had worked for me since I first started the company. The man was deadlier than anyone I knew, but I couldn’t put him in the field. He was cunning, a quick thinker that was always ten steps ahead. But he could be very secretive also, which put his team in a dangerous position when they couldn’t be sure he’d follow the strategy previously set out.

As I pushed open the doors of the training room, I shook my head at what I saw. Fox was standing behind the line at the target practice for knife throwing. Everyone was standing around watching as he picked up a knife and flipped it in his hand.

“These are a few of my favorite things,” he sang, then grabbed the knife by the blade and flung it at the target, hitting it dead center. He moved on, continuing to sing. I rolled my eyes, walking over to where Jerrod Lockhart from Team One stood.

“How long has this been going on?”

“About half an hour,” he grunted.

“And how many show tunes is he on now?”

He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. “Well, we’ve been through “Steppin’ Time” and “It’s The Hard-Knock Life” so far. I’m expecting he’ll start taking requests at any time.”

“Christ, why today?” I grumbled.

“Is today not a good day for Fox to return?”

“Is any day?” I asked, instantly regretting it. I liked Fox. He was a good guy, if only a little eccentric. I didn’t know a whole hell of a lot about him, other than he was very ruthless, and really liked show tunes. Hell, that was really all anyone knew about him.

“Still haven’t gotten his file?” Jerrod asked.

“I have his file,” I muttered. I just wasn’t sharing it. Everything about his military career was in there. It was his life before the military that had me questioning him.

“I take it that means you aren’t sharing.”

I shot him a side glance. “Do you want all your personal shit aired for everyone?”

He cleared his throat. “Maybe it’s best to keep that locked down.”

“That’s what I thought.”

“What do you want to do about this?”

I sighed, rubbing my hand over my eyes. “I’ll handle this.”

“Uh…you might want to approach carefully. Thumper nearly lost an eye when he tried to give him a hug.”

I laughed at that. “He deserved it then. Who in their right mind would try to give Fox a hug?”

We both looked at each other and burst out laughing. “Thumper,” we said at the same time. I walked over toward the table Fox had set up. “Hey!” I shouted, ducking when he spun on me, ready to throw his knife.