Page 4 of Marshall

“I do as well.I’ve been looking at footage from the satellite images and also finding out where the bullets came from, as well as the idea of who they were coming from.I’ve sent out a team to have a look.So far, they’ve only found one shell casing, but they did find a cigarette butt too.I don’t know if it’s one of theirs or not.Do you know if any of them smoke?”He told her that he’d only seen them one time, and they all smelled of cigarettes and body odor.“Yuck.I cannot stand body odor on someone.Especially when they have the means to do something about it.All right.I’ll let you get back to what you were doing.I’ll get with you as soon as I know anything.Before I forget, you have guard wolves on the house that you purchased as well.”

After closing the connection with Lauder, he pulled out his laptop and began working on some investments that he’d been putting off until now.He’d been around a very long time and had invested in things when they were just starting out.A computer company that he owned stocks in, as well as a couple of satellite companies that now were more prominent in people’s homes than they’d ever been before.He began moving money around and was deep into it when someone knocked on Meggie’s door.Instead of answering it, he stood up and put his hand on his gun at his side.The man who opened the door said that he was unarmed and that he needed to speak to him about his home.Allowing him in the room but not giving up his position of keeping his gun ready, he asked him what he wanted.

“The president said that you needed extra security on your home.”He nearly laughed when the younger man, seemingly only about twenty years old, asked him if he’d please not kill him.“I’m a computer expert and I was sent to go to your home and make sure that you have a secure network as well as up-to-date internet service.”

“And he sent you?Do you have any paperwork on you?”The man, a sergeant in the computer science lab in D.C., handed over a thick, sealed file that had his name on it.After opening the seal, he could see that things were correct in the paperwork that he’d been given.There was also a picture of the person that was sent.“It says here that you’re to make a call.While I don’t have any idea who that is, if you pull out anything other than a cell phone from your pocket, I’m going to rip your throat out.Not even being in the hospital will save you.”

“Yes, sir.”Meggie sat up in the bed then and then laid back down.If she was awake, he didn’t know, but she was telling him to behave himself and let the man do his job.Before he could ask Meggie if she was all right, she closed her eyes and told him again to behave.“He also said to tell you that he’s got your back on anything you need to do.I’m hoping that doesn’t mean that he is going to be all right with killing me.I have a family.I don’t like them all that much, but I have one.”

“What don’t you like about your family?”It was just small talk, something that he did now to put the man at ease.He had come across a little too rough with him.He about half listened to the younger man, Phillip Stars, until he mentioned that his mother was a drug dealer and his father was a deadbeat dad.“Does your commanding office know this?”

“I don’t think that he cared all that much so long as I don’t bring my homelife to work.I believe he was more set on my computer skills and what he could get out of me rather than my home life.”He immediately reached out to Lauder.“There’s something else that you should know.I put all that information on my app, and he made me fill out another one without my family on it.He had me put them down as deceased.”

Marshall told Lauder everything, even going to far as to tell her what he knew of the young man and his personal information.His address, phone as well as his social security number when he gave it to him.

“I really like my job, General Morton.I do.But every day, I have a feeling that I’m going to be sent away for good.I think that when people find out what is going on, I’m going to be in front of a firing squad or something.”He asked him the questions that Lauder wanted him to.“Oh, yeah, I dothat already.Every time I go to see him, I record everything.I record it on my phone, but I don’t leave it there.As soon as I get someplace on my own, I upload it to the account I have in the cloud.I’m really afraid…you’re a wolf, aren’t you?I know that because he called you scum of the earth.His name is Director Jamison Patterson, by the way.He has an office at the White House.Not far from the Oval Office.”

“Ask the little shitter if he knows that he’s going to be dishonorably discharged when people find out?”He did just that and the kid sat down on the floor, more like he collapsed there.Once he started talking, Lauder popped into the room and took him by the hand.“I believe that you planned to tell all today.Any reason why?Or did you just find out about how this was going to affect you, so you fessed up?”

“I’ve known all along.I just…today he told me that I was supposed to go to the house and make sure that I clone General Morton’s computer.He told me that he was going to make sure that I never worked again if I didn’t do as he said.I figured that I was safer by coming here and telling the general so that he could…I don’t want to lose my job.It keeps me here and not with my family.They’re a horrible lot.I didn’t even know that I was going to get promoted, but Director Peterson told me that he couldn’t have his best boy getting so little pay while being a private.”

“I can save your ass if you tell me if you’re willing to go before his boss and let him know what’s going on.”He said that she didn’t have to ask him twice.He’d been looking for a way out for some time now.“All right.I’ll go to bat for you.However, if you screw me over, I’m sure there are ways that I can take care of you that you’ll be wishing for the firing squad instead of me.”

“He knows about you, too, Agent Perry.He said the w…his words, the w goddamned army is here at your disposal, and they’re all fuckers not helping him out.”She asked him if she knew what that meant.“I’m sorry, I don’t.I have learned not to ask him anything.He made it so that I couldn’t get any food for a week, and he held up my pay for three weeks one other time, too.I don’t mess with him anymore.”

After the two of them left him, both of them popping out of the room at once, he was notified by Micheal ten minutes later that he’d not sent the computer guy to him, but he’d come directly from the office of Patterson.

“You should check into a couple of things then.Somehow, your signature ended up on the paperwork that I have in my possession, a letter of recommendation on your letterhead as well as some very good-looking notes that you put on it.”He asked if he could send someone to come and get it.“Never mind.I don’t know that I’d trust them any more than I did Patterson.Christ.I should have known something was up.It’s an election year, and they’re working behind me to get me out of office.I won’t go into details but you make sure that you keep an eye on your family for me.All of you are going to be sitting ducks until this thing is taken care of.You keep that paperwork, and I’ll come and get it soon.If I can get in touch with one of those women who can pop in and out of places, I’ll…Christ, one of them just popped into my office.Hang on.”

About the time that Meggie was waking up, Michael popped into the room with Becka.He knew that she was pretty powerful in her own right.She and her mate Brad lived in the other world with the queen of faeries as well as the queen of all magic.But to be able to just go to DC and return the man and herself to the hospital was mind-boggling.

“What the ever-loving hell?”They all turned to stare at Meggie.“I fall asleep, and I wake up to having everyone in my…Sir?What the hell are you doing here?Didn’t I tell you to lay low for a few weeks?”

“You did.You even told me that Patterson was after my job.Did you know that he’d filed to run for my spot on the ballot?Well, you did, and it’s not as funny as I thought it would be.He wanted access to your home computers and that of everyone else in your new family.”Meggie laid back down and then asked for something to take the edge off.“You’re not to hurt yourself anymore.By the way, your new family is finding out all kinds of things about your father and his brothers.More than I could have found with an army of men.”

“They have an army of faeries at their command.So do I.And you know what?They’ll die before coming back empty-handed.Not that I’d order it, but they’d be so…that’s what we’re doingthere.Finding a way to keep them with enough self-esteem to not feel like a failure if they can’t…Sorry.I do love the little creatures and can’t stand it when they’re hurting.”Becka smiled.She had a twinkle in her eyes, too.“You need some dirt on Patterson?I have just the group that can find it for you, and he’ll never know what the hell hit him.”

“I believe that I’d like that.”Meggie snorted and told Michael that she’d offered to do that, too.“You did, but then you went and got yourself shot up, and now I’m having to worry about you too.”He looked at him.“Or I might well have been if not for you having the entirety of Perry’s nest involved with you.You’re a lucky woman, MJ.I envy you that.”

“You want them?Then you do just what I told you to do.”She looked at him and he could see the anger there but also pain.“Marshall, I think that I’d like to leave here.There is just too much going on that I can’t properly rest.Even the dumbass president is bothering me.Can we go to your home?I miss my sister and grannie.”

“I’ll make those arrangements right away.I do have a bit of furniture coming later today, but the bed will be put up first and foremost.Grannie, as she insisted that I call her, is having the time of her life with DJ, staying at a local hotel to be close to you.”She nodded and closed her eyes only to open them quickly.“I need my gun, too.I can’t believe that I’ve not asked you for it before now.But I think that I’d rest easier if I had one.”

“Here.You can have mine.”He handed it out to her butt first.“Just be careful with it, Meggie.I don’t want you to accidentally shoot me.It has silver in it.I’ll remind the others about it as well.”

“MJ.Okay.”Her eyes fluttered closed, but she wasn’t quite finished speaking to him it seemed.“Marshall, just so you know, I don’t know if I like you yet, but you’re starting to grow on me.”With that, he heard her soft snores and turned to look at Michael.

“You like me.”With a clap on his back, Michael said that he’d gotten that too.But worried what her state of mind was.“Oh, you’re just jealous.She likes me, and that’s perfect.”

He’d never felt so sappy than he did in that moment.Marshall made arrangements for Meggie to be able to go to their new home and it was Rosie who backed him up by saying that she’d be her personal doctor when they go there.

This family was something else.He knew that.But the way they came together for him was something he’d not expected.Of course, he thought that he’d not expected anyone to be in his corner anymore, so it was a nice surprise that there was someone there for him.

It took them nearly two hours to get things set up so that not only could she go home, but there was medical equipment there for her to use as well.In addition to a bed, which would be easier for her to get in and out of, there was an IV pole, a mobile tray for her to use to eat with as well as several gowns so that she’d not have to wear her own clothing to keep them from being stained.He thought about what she might be wearing in her gowns and had to take a cold shower.Marshall had a feeling that with her living there, he was going to need a lot of cold water until they could work things out for themselves.

A nurse was waiting for them when they arrived.As soon as he had Meggie in the bed, she begged for medication.They had given her some to tie her over, knowing that she’d be sore, but once she was home, he thought that she might have been hurting worse than he could have imagined.

Once she was asleep and resting better, he decided to go and pick up Grannie and DJ.They could do what they wanted and decided to call them before leaving.But the hotel told him that they’d left earlier, and he didn’t think they were returning.It nearly gave him a heart attack, thinking that they’d been kidnapped when they were ringing the doorbell.