Page 73 of Delta Force Defender

“What does that mean?” Koa asked quietly, his dark gaze on his wife. “Because I don’t think that what’s normal to you is going to strike me as particularly normal.”

The two women looked at each other again, as the toddler pulled herself up to cling to her mother’s knees. Lindsay smoothed her hand over her daughter’s hair, and when she looked up, she was somehow soft and made of steel at once.

“A normal amount of freaking out would be like a backhand.” She looked at her sister. “Right?”

“The back of his hand, sure,” Caradine confirmed. “Or he would throw something at you. Or grab the back of your head by your ponytail and slam your face into the table if you weren’t paying proper attention.”

“Little stuff,” Lindsay agreed. “Just a couple of bruises to get your attention.”

Isaac met each one of his friends’ and colleagues’ gazes, then Koa’s, and saw the same stark, murderous gleam in each one of them.

The sisters didn’t seem to notice how tense and furious their audience had become.

“If you were paying attention the way you should have been, you could ward off any glasses or plates he threw at you.” Caradine lifted up her arms, moving her forearms as if she were batting away missiles with them. She and Lindsay even snickered. “Do you remember that time—?”

“Oh my God.” Lindsay laughed again. Then remembered the men enough to explain. “He was yelling at Julia, about, I don’t know, how ungrateful she was.”

Caradine smirked. “A common theme.”

“So he picked up his dinner plate, loaded with food, and threw it at her.”

“Again,” Caradine said dryly, “common.”

“But, and she swore up and down this was an accident, she kind of caught it.” Lindsay demonstrated, putting up her hands as if she were preparing to hit a volleyball. “Then winged it back at him.”

They both laughed again, and even sank into each other a little while they did, touching shoulders.

And Isaac took another survey of the lanai, not surprised to find that everyone was as appalled as he was.

“Totally worth it,” Caradine said after a moment, wiping at her eyes. “Really.”

“What exactly did he do to you?” Isaac asked mildly.

He did not feel mild at all. More like lethal.

Caradine sobered. “That was less fun. That took a few days to recover from.” She considered. “Maybe a couple of weeks, now that I think about it.”

“I hate that you both lived through this,” Koa said then, dark and furious. “It’s sick. And that you think it’sfunnymakes me want to break things.”

“Cosign,” Blue belted out.

“Tell us about that night,” Templeton invited the women, even pulling out a grin—likely because he was the only one who could manage one just then. Isaac was with Koa. He wanted to raze a city or two. “It was weird in the room...?”

“Right,” Lindsay said, smiling down at her daughter. “What I keep coming back to, over time, is who was closest to the door. Just in terms of getting to the kitchen, getting their cell phone, and getting out of the house, they would have had to be close to the door. Because I left the den, Julia texted when I got to the kitchen, and I ran outside. The two of us talked for maybe a minute? Two minutes?”

“Not much more than that,” Caradine agreed.

Lindsay shrugged. “So whoever did it had to be right behind me.”

Isaac considered. “Do you think they followed you out? Meaning, whoever it is has known you were alive this whole time?”

“No one followed me out. I went out the front door, and if they’d gone to pick up their phone, it would make sense to go out the back and call in the ignition code more quickly.” The look Lindsay aimed at Isaac was level. Steady. “And I would have known if someone was right behind me. You get attuned to that kind of thing, or you get hit.”

“So you’re out front with Caradine,” Templeton said. Lindsay and Caradine nodded. “You think someone went out the back door.”

On the coffee table, he set up a little scene, using the coffee that Koa had brought out when the whole team had appeared. One mug for the house. One mug for Lindsay and Caradine. Another for whomever they were talking about.

Templeton pointed to each mug in turn, then looked at the sisters. “Theoretically, could you have lived throughthe explosion and then walked away from it without someone coming out of the backyard to see you?”

---