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“This is my Chief, Mason, and Everlee, our Use of Force consultant. Mase, Ever, this is Elle Picket. Which is not her real name.”
This brought a scowl to his superior’s lips.
Joe sighed. Why did higher-ups always have a problem with her? Of course, it didn’t help that Mike had chosen to introduce her the way he had. She needed to implement some damage control. Joe jumped in to take charge, as was her norm previous to meeting Mike.
She stepped forward with her hand extended. “My real name has been redacted for security purposes,” Joelle quipped with an edge of truth. “But I answer easily to Elle, so feel free to use it.”
The woman Mike had called Everlee walked forward with a true smile and took Joe’s proffered shake. “Pleased to meet you. I’m Ever Sothard, and this is my husband, Mason.” Her grin turned impish. “I can’t wait to hear the story behind all this.” She waved her hand at a dour Mike and his entourage.
“It’s not too complicated.” Joelle decided to go all in. “I’ve been watching Mike’s behind…” Oh, if they only knew how much. “…because I uncovered intel that he’s been targeted by—” That’s right, drangit. Mike hadn’t yet told the rest of his team about Melanie walking out on him. Joe quickly amended her statement. “…a certain faction who wants him dead. You’ve probably been briefed about the cameras on his property and the tag on his truck?”
When Mason nodded, still not smiling, Joelle continued.
“That was me. I needed to make sure these…people didn’t get to Mike without him having backup.”
“We’re normally Mike’s backup,” Mason stated, crossing his arms over his chest. “Why would he need you?”
Everlee slapped him on the shoulder. “Lighten up, Mase,” she told him. “Look at Mike’s posse. Do their faces make you think something is seriously wrong?”
Joe turned to where Ever pointed, and sure enough, the five musketeers were all beaming like loons.
“If there was a problem,” Everlee continued to her disbelieving hubby, “Elle would be restrained. Not coming in under her own steam.”
Mason stink-eyed both Joe and Mike. “If that’s the case, it means I don’t have nearly the whole story. Would one of you like to fill in the missing details?”
By now a crowd had formed around them, and Joelle—again, atypically—stepped back, letting Mike take the heat on this one. It was mostly his story to tell.
Mike blew out a breath. “Goddammit. This wasn’t how I wanted to disclose things to you, but… In a nutshell, I might have forgotten to let you know that Melanie left me and the kids a year ago.”
He paused. Waiting.
Mason’s dour expression didn’t budge, and except for a twitch of one eyelid, Joe would have thought the information didn’t affect the man, at all.
Mike sighed and kept going. “We’re divorced now, but in the interim, I neglected to change my will and life insurance policies. She and her fucker boyfriend found out somehow…”
Not throwing the kids under the bus.
“…and have decided to kill me.”
So far so good. Mike’s chief had gone from mildly PO’d, to irate, to contemplative.
Mike resumed. “Elle is undercover as a server at the Local Moose for some agency or another which she won’t divulge, and that’s how she overheard the pair plotting,” Mike apprised the group. “She didn’t feel like outing herself to the local cops once she had her intel, or to us.” He gave her a disapproving look. “So she took it upon herself to become my watchdog.”
“Why is she here, now?” Mason asked evenly.
A reasonable question, which Mike once again answered.
“Because the tracer she put on Mellie’s car, showed her heading toward mine earlier, and Elle drove to the rescue. Sort of.”
Welker jumped in. “Shit. I wish I could have seen your initial meeting.” For those not in the know, he clarified. “Mike’s motion alarm, as you all know, had already clued him in to the fact that someone was messing with his truck.” He tried, and failed, to tamp down his amusement at the unorthodox meet-cute. “But Mike, of course, thought the perp was Elle.”
Joelle, listening avidly and ignoring the fun facts, shook her head. “That’s why you were already under your vehicle. You put a sensor on it.” It was intel they hadn’t shared yet, and it had her snickering. “You thought that whoever was touching your baby was the same person—me—who’d tagged your truck and put up the cameras.”
“An easy mistake to make,” Mike defended himself.
Joelle agreed. “Occam’s razor. The simplest explanation…” She trailed off. There was no need to school a smart crowd like this on philosophy.
Mike sent her a real smile, and goosebumps rose on her arms.