Operators

I’d like to thank
Rhiana Larsen, LaLa, M, Chris, and Ann Rhodes for their confidence and reviews
on FF.Net and Adultfanfiction.net. I’ll tell you right now I’m unsure how to
end this, but that’s whole point of writing a story. Now on with the show!

Lise kicked the
door in waking Jeanne from her nap on the front desk. She pounded up to the
only working shower for a hundred miles in the Food Distribution Center.
“What’s with her?” She pointed to the stairs with a pencil. Richard shrugged.

“Don’t ask.” The
van and personal effects were returned, but their work was a different story.
If those Mad Max extra rejects just gave back her chain in the first
place the incident by the humvees could have been avoided.

* * *

“Y’know Elise, for
someone who resents the military as much as you do you certainly have
interesting taste in jewelry.” Sanderson dangled her chain from his long, broad
fingers. /Grandpa! / That Delta sonofabitch from the market was
disrespecting the Colonel. AND he called her ‘Elise’! Lise resisted
admiring his impressive forearms, but that was an entirely different matter…
She took a deep breath and without missing a beat she said: “Give me my shit
back you wannabe North Carolina cracker!” Gordon immediately unthreaded the
chain from Sanderson’s hand and tossed it to her.

“Here you go.” She
caught it in her left hand and stalked to Grimes’ office.

“Goddamn Delta! ‘
Dreaded D’ my ass! Dreaded certainly… Arrogant bastard!” That among other
colorful language echoed in the hangar until she slammed Grimes’ door behind
her.

“That went well.”
Busch said.

* * *

Lise stood under
the lukewarm spray, the tiny golden links settled into the crevices in her
crumpled fingertips. She memorized the inscription of her grandfather’s old
battalion so long ago, sitting in his lap toying with his chain. He paid no
mind. She always assumed it was the first thing she ever read, reciting it in a
sing-song voice playing in the doll corner of Miss Kroeger’s kindergarten
class. She was so impressed that Lise knew big words like, ‘ battalion’ and ‘
airborne’. It wasn’t like Miss Kroeger thought, growing up using GI speak was a
part of the military family’s way of life and it was Lise that had to
assimilate when she first started school. Lise was trilingual, if you wanted to
categorize her under ‘ unique’ and not ‘ crazy’. Her mother Marina was born in
Archangelsk and came to the United States when she was eight-and-a-half. Her
grandparents were Ukrainian but because of their jobs they moved the family all
over eastern bloc Europe. Her grandfather Aleksandr was an engineer with the
Red Army, her grandmother Nadezhda was a teletype operator with the Soviet news
agency TASS. For a while the family relocated to Bulgaria, bothboth her
mother and Uncle Stanislav spoke passable Bulgarian. They were also fortunate
enough not to have an accent when speaking English after settling into a
predominantly Russian community in southern New Jersey, unlike their parents
whose English was patchwork at best. After so many years, practically the
entire family migrated to the Mid-Atlantic Sates and New England, it was a big,
loud and meddlesome Russian family, and that was her mother’s side alone!
Lise’s parents met attending Northwestern University, Evan Davies was, to say
the least, charmed by Marina Deverenko’s exotic Slavic beauty and the faint
inflection in her speech. Her frequent slip-ups until this day were ‘ zis’ ,
instead of saying ‘ this’ . Her father’s military family living scattered
around the United Sates couldn’t help but be a little suspicious, that was more
of a reflex if anything. Lise was convinced that her paternal grandfather,
Colonel Jonathan Davies developed a little crush on her mother as time passed.
He always went out of his way for her, maybe it was because of her petite size,
but Marina, like her daughter fooled everybody taking on a teaching position,
running a household, and raising four children with a globetrotting husband
jumping from a coup d‘etat in Haiti to a governmental standoff in Nicaragua,
then onto some sub-Saharan African nation where red flags waved and so-called ‘
freedom fighters’ posed before a torched American embassy seemingly all in a
month.

The wedding was an
elaborate religious affair, at Saint George the Redeemer’s Russian Orthodox
Church in Baltimore, one that the Davies clan and extended family couldn’t
quite follow during the three-hour service. But her father was delightfully inundated
with these cultural intricacies, it was also where Lise and her older brothers
were baptized under their Russian names: Fyodor, Ivan, Grigory, and Yelena. To
everyone else they were Ted, Ian, Greg, and Elise, but those names would never
be used at home. Lenochka was the nickname her mother would use when drying her
tears and smoothing her hair.

It was a deadly
mix, and after her father killed himself Lise withdrew more and more. She was
frightened that it would begin to effect her professionally, and if this wasn’t
a telltale sign that she was starting to lose her grip maybe it was time for a
holiday after all. On the other hand, some Kevlar sporting asshole
wasn’t about to poke fun at her, with or without the ripped biceps! Well, not exactly
ripped… Sanderson was obviously someone who was health conscious and
enjoyed bench pressing. Perhaps it was wise to pull her head out of the gutter
and the water since it turned ice cold, having wasted her time and limited hot
water supply thinking about that Delta. It was more than likely to be a
diversionary tactic to prevent her from pressing the matter about returning
their paperwork. He must have graduated top of his class from PSYOP School,
because it was working. Lise disgustedly threw her chain across the stall, it
smashed against the wall and clinked on the concrete floor, she felt guilty
immediately and considered herself just as bad as Sanderson who toyed with it.
Lise twisted the claw knob to shut off the shower and listened to the inch deep
water swirl down the rust-ringed drain, she unclasped her chain and whipped it
from the catch loop. Wrapping herself in her white terry cloth robe and sliding
into sandals she went to her little room and flipped the lid of her make up
case open. Dropping her chain into the tray she snapped a red plastic coin
purse open, dumping the contents on her bed. A tarnished pair of dog tags was
tangled in another gold chain, Lise sat at the edge of the shabby mattress
picking the steel beads from the Figaro links with her nails for nearly a half
an hour. Finally twisting them free, Lise put the pendant on its original
chain; she let it hang from her fingers a moment before putting it on. The
Figaro men’s chain was thick and sturdy, the way she resolved to be from now on
if she were to go up against the big green wall again. Her hair would air dry
and she chose her outfit carefully, a navy blue skirt suit, a hand painted
carnation pink sleeveless silk blouse, white silk stockings and tan French
heeled shoes.

Down the hall
Richard was sashaying about packing his bags and reloading the truck at the
same time. The only thing he was thinking about was getting back to his
girlfriend Michelle Rosen, who worked in CNN’s PR department, and ordering a
happy family meal from Emperor Wang’s Wizarding Wok as soon as he ran down the
terminal at D.C. International. Who gave a shit about the tapes, they got Atto
and that would be the ticket out of their basement office. It was not fun being
the jokes of CNN because Lise had a hard-on for everything in camouflage, and
she still worked the war desk. Did this logic make any sense? Only to her and
rumor had it that she was as crazy as daddy and granddaddy. It had been a
whirlwind year for Richard traveling around with Lise; the only cameraman willing
to work with her and this was not their first assignment in Africa. When they
were crossing the river between Kinshasa and Brazzaville the twin capitals of
Zaire and the Congo, the jeep they had hired crashed into the filthy water when
the rickety bridge they were on fell through the middle. And they along with
their guides were unwittingly dumped in a mosquito breeding ground. Two days
later they were airlifted to a hospital in Johannesburg for malaria, Richard
spent the duration of their recovery jumping off the beds hallucinating that he
was Batman and Lise pranced around thinking she was Ann Margaret in Viva
Las Vegas. When Stu came to pick them up there was no way he could manage
them onto a plane, it was hilarious and pathetic something Richard didn’t want
to repeat any time soon. Then the phone rang. He stopped dead in his tracks;
unexpected phone calls were never a good omen.

Jeanne picked up.
“Red Cross Relief Center, Mogadishu.”

‘ Do you have a
Miss Elise Davies and a Mr. Richard Kellner staying with you?’ Stu asked.

“They are. Who is
this?”

‘CNN station
manager.’

“One moment
please,” she put her hand over the speaking end. “Richard!”

“Yes?” He sang
from the top of the stairs.

“I think your boss
wants to talk. Is Lise done in the bath?” Richard knocked on Lise’s door.

“What?!” She
snapped.

“Stu’s on the
phone.” Lise opened the door.

“Jeanne! Put it on
speaker!” Jeanne pushed a blinking yellow key, Lise and Richard trampled down
the steps.

‘ Davies! At
the risk of repeating myself, I think I should share this with you. Got an
interesting wire from the Pentagon just a few hours ago and it reads: » With
the authorization of the Department of Defense, Major General William F.
Garrison is cordially inviting any CNN correspondents to spend a week with the
3rd Battalion of the 75th Ranger Regiment in Mogadishu, Somalia.« Did you
get that?’

“Yeah.”

‘ You taking
it?’

She sighed
massaging her temple. “What’s the expiration date on that?”

‘ Refrigerate
after opening.’

“Can I call you
back in an hour?”

‘ Make it 15
minutes.’ Stu cut the connection. Richard bristled having predicted Lise’s
response already.

“No, no and no.”

“Richard….” But it
was useless and she was exhausted.

“I’m sorry Lise,
but no! We’ve been here four motherfucking months,” he made a sweeping
gesture spreading both hands out, “and I have had enough. This place is falling
apart at the seams, and the only reason why you want to go back is because you
can’t wait to tear into Bruce Willis back there!” Sheepishly Lise poked her
tongue around the inside of her cheek. True enough Sanderson was at the top of
her hit list and they did have her trunk, and that would land her in a tight
spot if word got out upon their return to Fort Bragg. Could she trust
them to keep her secret? Should she trust them at all in the first
place? If she ever needed some good advice it was now, but standing around
listening to Richard’s bitching ate up ten of her 15 minutes and she had to get
back to Stu. There was no time to call her cousin. She hit redial and the
British embassy helped her patch through to D.C.

“Stu? We’re movin’
out.”

* * *

Captain Steele sat
in his office embroiled in a staring contest with the pewter bulldog
paperweight on his desk. He mentally ticked off the names of the most
trustworthy men to ‘ baby-sit’ Miss Davies: Eversmann, Kurth, Schmid, and above
all, Grimes. For that Hippie cameraman Beales would be sufficient. He sat
through the most awkward on-camera discussion with the other officers including
the General with Miss Davies about Somalia’s political climate and what they
hoped to accomplish, soft shoeing around sensitive matters such as missions.
She had no business being here, and being female was incidental. No
journalists should be allowed anywhere near a hot zone. During his Vietnam
tours he watched his commanding officers waste their time directing authorized
and unauthorized reporters tailing troops, pulling out their bodies, even
teaching them how to fire weapons. That was insane! To phrase a term coined by
his Rangers, it got Hollywood out there and civilians were strongly proscribed.
There was one thing that Steele had going for him, the Deltas were sent back
out, for the night at least. It was one thing with his chiefly adolescent
Rangers being bowled over by Davies; they were on a short iron leash and knew
better. But if any incident came to his attention, he would rise to the
occasion, God-fearing man or not and tear them apart. Those cowboys on the
other hand were a whole different kettle of fish, and something was definitely
afoot between her and Sanderson. He caught her sidelong glares at the Delta
Sergeant who was hovering over her deliberately, though she did not speak to
him or any of his team as for as he knew. It would make for juicy gossip by the
number of nurses who cared for her in the infirmary and Schmid who flapped his
lips after being interrogated by friends when he was looking over Nelson. It
was not even lights out and it spread like brushfire in 110° degree heat, and
that’s all he hoped it would amount to. ‘ Old Undersheets’ reputation didn’t
make things any better, Sanderson was 38, unmarried and still playing around.
What a man did on his own time was their business, but if it spilled over on
assignment he’d be forced to shut him down. It encouraged unprofessionalism,
and worse yet the Rangers. He got up and opened his door. “Eversmann! Beales!”
The Second Lieutenant and Staff Sergeant double-timed it.

* * *

It was a shame
Lise couldn’t open the window; it was one of the clearest nights she’d ever
seen in Mogadishu. Eversmann and Beales showed her and Richard back to their
detention cell rooms, this time with cots that had mattresses and pillows.
Richard was more pleased, but Lise knew they weren’t rolling out the red carpet
for her ‘ celebrity status’, she couldn’t be sidetracked. The Rangers showed
them how to put up the mosquito netting on their cots, poles roughly a yard in
length was wired to each corner of the cot. Lise was taught well in advance but
was kind enough to keept tot to herself, she also gave them back the puke green
net, she favored the white one she ripped off the Red Cross. Too bad she
couldn’t hang it from the ceiling as she did over there, it was pretty and gave
her ideas how to redecorate her own bedroom. She sat on her bed barefoot,
stripped off the stockings hours earlier and decided not to wear them agin
in
this climate. The Deltas were not there when she returned, she couldn’t help
but look to their space directly to the left of the hangar’s entrance, but
Garrison pulled her aside before the interview and instructed her that she was
under no circumstances to question the operators at any time. It threw him when
she said that was one order she was more than happy to comply. It was well past
lights out when she saw the headlights glide across the wall, she froze and
listened. There was no noise save for the slamming of car doors and boots
scraping sandy pavement.

Lise deftly padded
from her room and opened the back door just enough for her to see through. Over
a dozen men dressed in civilian clothes jumped out of jeeps and tarp covered
flatbed trucks. There were no overhead lights, just a grimy yellow bulb above
the door. Guys like them normally avoid women like her, but this was going to
be a shootout. /Make no mistake Sergeant, the Colonel taught me well./ She
shut the door softly behind her. Sanderson stood behind one of the flatbeds, he
saw Lise but said nothing.

“Jeff?” Randy
asked.

“Nothing.” He
slung the shotgun over his shoulder and followed him into the hangar.

* * *

~U.S. Army
Headquarters, September 21 5:44 A.M.~

Lise was up well
before anyone occupying the office bathroom, freshened up and dressed in her
room. First up on the itinerary Eversmann would drive her out to tape drills
and interview the men, then she would spend the afternoon at the shooting
range. In about a half hour they would have P.T. and that would give her ample
time to prepare a few notes. To combat the heat she wore a white polo shirt and
matching white denim mini. She briefly contemplated pulling out her favorite
pair of white pumps, but the Keds would be more practical. Sitting at a
card table by the truck, she scribbled in her notebook sipping coffee, Richard
was in the truck setting up the camera and eating his breakfast, a mish-mash of
eggs, hash browns, and toast. Schmid walked over to her. “Good morning,
Schmid.” Lise said without looking up.

“Morning ma’am.”
He said brightly. “Aren’t you going to eat anything?” It was her turn to smile.

“I usually don’t
have anything in morning, thanks.” Before she could pick up her pen a plate of
buttered toast was dropped on the table. She was certain it wasn’t Schmid, his
arms were folded in front of him, Lise looked up and saw Gordon walk by. He
smiled at her albeit apologetically and went to join his teammates.

“What Master Sergeant
Gordon is trying to say in so many words, is that doesn’t fly around here. And
since you spent a better part of the day in the infirmary yesterday might I
suggest that you’d better load up on the protein.” It took her a solid moment
to backtrack but she had been so frustrated by Sanderson she didn’t even look
at the others. And regretted it. What Scandanavian tree did that apple
fall from?! Lise was seriously reconsidering the ‘ No Uniforms’ clause in her
dating contract- no that was immature and ridiculous. If she wanted
reassurances she could go back home and look at all the conformist idiots
sitting around the back porch swapping war stories glorifying violence, death,
and U.S. global domination. No, she was just a healthy woman that wasn’t dead from
the waist down and really did take her sister-in-law’s cruel criticisms to
heart that she will be lonely and desperate for the remainder of her life
because of her attitude. She shoved a triangle of bread in her mouth and
chewed, it was good. The Rangers filed out for their daily torture on the sand
and Lise didn’t even notice.

Tossing her paper
plate into a bin Lise walked into the empty office, even Grimes had to endure
the five mile ‘ fun run’ , the extent of any action he’d see, he griped the
other night. She put her purse on Grimes’ desk and rooted around for her
cosmetics bag. Lise lined her lips and filled them in with a deep coral, then
rubbed drops of lilac oil on the backs of her wrists and a little in her hair.

“So that’s what
that stuff is.” The glass bottle ejected itself from Lise’s hands and she
fumbled for it. Luckily it landed on the ‘ IN’ basket on Grimes’ desk or it
would have been a calamity being $45 dollars per seven ounces. Sanderson stood
leaning on the doorframe and calmly drained his mug after having watched her
undergo her whole beautifying ritual. He went for the pot on the file cabinet
and Lise slowly backed away from the desk, clutching the perfume to her chest
like a talisman. Not two minutes ago she walked down the corridor and entered
the office quite alone making little noise, then somehow this HUGE asshole
materializes out of thin air just in time to observe her applying lipstick.
That was… disturbing. How he did that, she’d never find out- they don’t exist-
and all she did was stand there like a slack-jawed yokel looking at him refill
his cup, mosey to the fridge and dump in the half-and-half. Lise wondered why
he was still hanging around, but remembered that Deltas don’t have a daily
required physical fitness regimen as a group to avoid detection, instead each
man is responsible for himself. Sanderson saw how her eyes drifted past him to
the right of him and knew she was thinking about something, but would not make
a retort. Lise did exactly what he’d anticipated shadowing her down the
corridor, keeping a distance and walking light on his feet, she spun around and
fiddled with her bag. “So, c’mon what is that?”

It took every
scrap of restraint not to get into his face and say that she knew all about
their mind games and how they would not work on her. It’s what he wanted to
hear and that would open the door to mind games. “The General has put me under
orders not to speak with anyone in your unit.”

“Said Little Red
to the Big Bad Wolf.” Lise stuck the white scrunchie between her teeth and
pulled her hair in a ponytail to the top of her head. Sanderson grinned, there
was something about the bare flesh of this woman’s neck or maybe it was the way
she gracefully raised her arms, tension outlining her supple back. He caught a
serious vibe off her when she called him a ‘ wannabe North Carolina cracker’,
true his was a subtle adopted drawl, and Jeff was a Long Island native. But if
he wanted to be honest with himself, he hadn’t seen a real woman in a long
while taking on assignments without adequately recharging his batteries in
between. Lise could feel Sanderson studying her. Body language?
Assessing the little she said? Thinking she might have nice legs? Real women
have curves, her Cajun grandmother always said. And that’s what men truly
looked for when spotting a woman for the first time, they need something to
hold onto especially at night when it got cold and uncertainty sneaks up on
them.

/Men and women,
dey out dere minds. You ain’t supposed to like each other dat juss wastes time.
You supposed to love each other. We ain’t perfect, dat wasn’t in His plan. We
have faults and dat’s why we love each other, to correct those faults, Chere./ style='font-family:"Palatino Linotype";color:black'>The daughter of the New
Orleans mayor, Elise-Marie Brissard met a nobody Army lieutenant from Cleveland
on shore leave during a USO dance her family hosted. He took her for a twirl to
the Tennessee Waltz; she curtsied and thanked him kindly then went to
resume her place near the sisters from St. Ursula’s Girls Conservatory. But he
reached for her arm and said he wanted to marry her, she grinned and said she
didn’t court fools. The following Christmas she was merrily calling herself
Mrs. Fool. No, she didn’t like Lieutenant Jonathan Davies and his bland
Midwestern ways but color in his cheeks would deepen when she was around. But
all that color bled from his life when Lise was 13. There was one enemy that
all the Colonel’s training couldn’t take out, cancer, and Grandmere left this
world as she had come into it with quiet dignity. But Lise believed that
Grandmere’s kind was truly extinct when she died, in today’s world women
couldn’t afford to be ladies, they were preyed upon, used, and
discarded. Maybe the men here didn’t do that, but she knew plenty in and out of
uniform who did with no shame.

That’s not to say
strong women weren’t targets. Her Aunt Flora, one of the Colonel’s elder
daughters was an Army nurse with talents in field surgery, she was in medical
school when she was called up to Vietnam. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d
encounter SF, after all the Old Man was somewhere in the bush. What she didn’t
know was that one of his men- one of the worst- would be pursuing her
vehemently. Yes, Brick MacKenzie whored. Yes, Brick Mackenzie drank. Yes, Brick
MacKenzie had a flashpoint temper and loved to brawl. And yes, Brick MacKenzie
was helplessly in love with Flora Davies. So it became legend how one
disgustingly balmy day in Nha Trang, the Colonel picked the lowly Staff
Sergeant up by the scruff of the neck and gave his consent. From that day forward
Uncle Brick never picked up a drink, looked at another girl, and resolved to
become a model officer all under the penalty of dishonorable discharge and a
swift demise. Not only did they marry with few setbacks but Aunt Flora became a
doctor, he gave her a beautiful home to put her practice in, and two sons to be
proud of. Both of her cousins Kyle and Luke were in the Navy, Kyle was in NCIS
and Luke worked in the Internal Affairs Division. Before she came to Somalia,
Lise spent a week in Fayetteville for Kyle’s wedding; he married a high school
music teacher named Brianne. During the post-reception party back at the house
Uncle Brick cried his eyes out. He looked so sweet.

Ambition was also
an intoxicating aphrodisiac, just ask Aunt Suzie. She, like her big sister was
an Army nurse but determined to change the face and stereotypes of it. She was
attending Cornell for her doctorate in nursing when she was called up. Then in
Da Nang she met Marine Force Recon Captain Harold Wrentmore, a West Point grad.
He like his father was fanatical about being a Marine, but Uncle Harry went
that extra mile to become one of their more elite soldiers. He also was a fan
of the 007 novels so he felt right at home in the MFR’s intel branch.
But he always made it clear that after his glory days were over his sights were
set on Washington, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff wouldn’t be what they are
without Commandant Wrentmore. His biggest supporter throughout was Aunt Suzie
and she did it all: wife, mother, and officer. Today, retired First Lieutenant
Susan Davies-Wrentmore R.N., PhD is on the administrative staff of Bethesda
Medical. Their son Martin was a Marine Captain in the JAG Corps; his dream was
Attorney General while his younger sister Teena was taking a leave of absence from
the Air Force to attend Stanford. Her dream was the North Carolina senatorial
seat. Then there was the wild card, Uncle Rodney the oldest of the Colonel’s
foursome. He and Lise’s father remained close until the very last day, and she
had a pretty good idea why. The little she knew about Uncle Rodney’s military
career said enough. He spent the majority of his Vietnam tours stationed in
West Germany, he dated then married the American consul’s interpreter Mitzi
Braun, and they had no children. After he left the Army he became an agent in
the CIA and made Frankfurt am Main his home. None of these made the Colonel
happy. To make matters worse, Rodney would show up in Fort Bragg from time to
time dressed in that same drab, grey three-piece suit chewing the fat with the
other Old Men about the Atlanta Braves. But the Colonel wasn’t stupid. The
Colonel was never quite ready to retire and despite the fact that NCO’s mainly
staffed it he was more than welcome in Camp MacKall to kick around the Q Course
wannabes. It was enough that that turncoat Beckwith was systematically
undermining the entire SF philosophy (not to mention chain of command) by
starting up his own rag tag band, but his own son? Candidates and enlisted men
were vanishing; women from intel were lining up to volunteer.

The world was
changing and the armed forces had to change with it. The Colonel wasn’t sure if
he could cope with the post-Vietnam era, and the stigma that SF was branded
with. Was the whole affair a mistake? He didn’t like to think so; too many
friends and good men didn’t walk out of the jungle. It was the bureaucracy that
was a bitch and should have been made to pay, and his son was one of their yes
men, he just carried a sidearm and badge. The CIA and SF share the same genetic
lineage, but like all aspects of a family tree they were supposed to branch out
in separate directions. Both were established post-WW II growing out of the
wartime Office of Strategic Services; CIA in ‘47 and SF (officially) in ‘54,
though it was argued that the unit’s roots could be traced back to the American
Revolution. Ties were never fully severed and one way or another managed to
clash. SF’s purpose was to train foreign armies guerrilla warfare, the CIA’s
job, essentially, was to make sure the U.S.’s dirty laundry doesn’t fly off the
line and into the neighbor’s yard. They didn’t need all these suits running
around asking annoying questions, SF had their own people. Professional
frustration was the Davies’ axiom for many generations, and was Sanderson given
what he might know, about to use that as a personal attack? Lise
had no choice.

She turned right
around to see Sanderson patiently seated on one of the rolling chairs, his big
arms folded one over the other on the backrest. “I’m going to be honest. Back
at the market I thought you were cute, but then you opened your mouth and
ruined it.” He simply raised his nearly invisible blonde brows and finished his
coffee. Jeff wouldn’t argue with that, he was imperfect. But he had his
opinions too.

“You know what,”
he put his cup down somewhere and got up, shoving his hands in his pockets, “my
sentiments exactly.”

~I'm driving in
my car, I turn on the radio

I'm pulling you
close, you just say no

You say you
don't like it, but girl I know you're a liar

`Cause when we
kiss, Fire

Late at night
I'm takin' you home

I say I wanna
stay, you say you wanna be alone

You say you
don't love me, girl you can't hide your desire

`Cause when we
kiss, Fire…~

Outside, Richard
slammed the van’s rear doors shut. “Yeah, me too man.” Randy remarked, being
married he knew all too well what women were like. He also knew his friend very
well, and Jeff was hardly the relationships authority. Hoot just turned up the
radio, this was not kosher. Jeff sidled out, unpolished combat boots scuffing
the floor and dropped beside Busch. He propped his elbows up, hands clasped
against his nose. A cloud crash and slam made Gordon and Wex flinch; Lise
smashed the cup against the wall and closeted herself. As anticipated Gordon
spoke up.

“I know she’s not
the most agreeable person on the planet, but neither are you.” Gordon pointed
to Jeff with his pen. “Was that truly necessary?” Jeff reached under his
folding chair and threw something on the table. It was a brown leather book
thick with overuse; bits of paper were sticking out of it. It was tempting to
say to Gordy, ‘ Back the fuck off, I saw her first’ but if he wanted to make a
play he wouldn’t stop him. It was too late, the news lady was hooked. Busch
picked up the journal it looked vaguely familiar from when they rifled through
her files.

“She’s her own
worst critic. Confront her with this and she will become more malleable, making
things a helluva lot easier for us.”

“Are you the new
team psychologist?” Wex asked. Hoot laughed.

“Yes.” Jeff paused
intentionally. “That I am.” Busch clapped him on the back. Everyone knew
Sanderson was a Sean Connery fan, but he was no Sean Connery.

Lise sat on her
bunk, head bowed on her knees. She didn’t hear the radio playing until now. She
panicked; they knew everything there was to know about her. The best part about
being a journalist was keeping the mystery but being able to put the other
person on the spot and watching them squirm. Now the tables were turned in the
worst way, Sanderson was not about to put the brakes on and there would be no
way to keep him at bay without the games. It’s a good thing she was a quick
study.

~...You had a
hold on me, right from the start

A grip so tight
I couldn't tear it apart

My nerves all
jumpin' actin' like a fool

Well your
kisses they burn but your heart stays cool

Romeo and
Juliet, Samson and Delio:p>o:p>

Baby you can
bet their love they didn't deny

Your words say
split but your words they lie

`Cause when we
kiss, Fire~

* * *

Fresh from the
showers Eversmann put his jacket on and left the RBA on his cot. He rapped
twice on Lise door. “Ma’am? Miss Davies?” He waited the obligatory 35 seconds
and tentatively opened the door. Lise sat in the same position since that
morning with Sanderson, it perturbed the young Staff Sergeant but it wasn’t his
place to meddle. “Umm, Lise we’re ready to roll?” She picked her head up,
brilliantly smiling and eyes bloodshot.

“Let’s get it on.”

TBC