Page 12 of Bernadette
“Oh, yeah.” Lucas nodded and went to the front of the room. “First, I need to know how much you’re going to charge me.”
Hank didn’t hesitate to tell him, “Let’s hear what you have to say first, then I’ll come up with a price.” He looked at the people that had come with him and smirked, before turning back to Lucas. “I need to know exactly what you need us to do, and how much danger we are facing before I can put a price on it.”
Lucas nodded, then looked at the women before turning back to the people from the Brotherhood Protection Agency. “First, I’m not going to step on Aunt Morgan’s toes with her investigation. I will tell you that she and the other ladies are like neck deep in their work. I hired you because the day I called you, some very disturbing news regarding my family had been revealed.” He looked at Morgan, and nodded when she handed him a thin folder. He looked at it, then nodded to Astrid. When he received a nod from her, Lucas stepped to the side and pointed to the wall behind him.
“Instead of explaining it, I’ll have you read it. This is why I contacted you.” He stepped out of the way and watched the faces of the people as they read the letters that June and Alfie had read out loud only a few days ago. He didn’t know whether he should be shocked or not when he saw their varying degrees of shock, dismay, and even anger.
“What the fuck?” Hank demanded as he jumped to his feet, and whipped around to glare at Morgan.
“What type of shit are you neck deep in?”
“Bad shit, but we have a handle on it. As you can see, Lucas became concerned enough to call you when his family was threatened. With the wedding coming up, I’m going to be occupied and can’t keep an eye on everyone. The ladies, along with the J’s and A’s will keep an eye on me and Wyatt. I haven’t gotten the direct number yet, but we are allegedly supposed to be having at least twenty off-duty undercover agents from BCI, FBI, ATF, DEA, and even Homeland Security.”
“Holy shit, then whatever you’re involved in is big?”
“Yes, I can give you a brief rundown. It involves a corrupt police force, along with several lawyers and judges where some women have been pulled over, ticketed, then they disappear. We are also working with three undercover police officers from Canada that say they have several of those missing women in their morgues up there.” Morgan reached out and patted a stack of folders and looked at Lucas. She sighed in relief when Hank turned and looked at the younger man.
“Who are these people?” Hank demanded as he walked up and punched the names on the letters on the wall.
“Debra Erwin was my mother. She disappeared when I was almost one, and DJ, my brother was almost three. She left us with Uncle Wyatt when Dad was deployed with his Marine unit.”
“You know Morgan, she’s the one that is mentioned in the letter of having no memory. I don't know if you met Uncle Wyatt, but he's her fiancé and he gained possession of the entire Flying E ranch when my grandparents died, which, if you can believe this letter, they were killed. We have someone looking into it as we speak.”
“And these others? April and Dillon?”
“Dillon is my father, and April is his fiancée, my soon to be stepmother, and she is pregnant, she’s due around Thanksgiving.”
The room was so silent you could hear a pin drop. “Tell them about DJ,” Janice said from her spot at her usual desk.
“What about him?” Hank demanded.
“Two minutes after reading these letters, he called us and was standing outside the house upstairs. We had locked the doors and he didn’t have his key. He was sent home because the original dorm he had been in was shut down due to carbon monoxide being detected, and apparently a couple of students were taken to the hospital. It turned out those students were in the room that we had moved him into. Then the other dorms had gas leaks in them.” Lucas saw anger come over the faces of the others, and held up his hand to hold off the questions. “DJ was told that he had been issued the wrong dorm room, because they were going by his first name. There is another student there using the initials DJ and he is a junior. The dorm that had the carbon monoxide detected was for juniors and seniors. Our DJ had to be moved, because he had to go to the dorm that housed the first-year students and sophomores.”
Someone in the crowd called out, “Any chance of changing the wedding until these fuck-wads are caught?”
“No,” Wyatt said as he stormed down the stairs, unconscious that his cowboy boots sounded like bullets even on the carpeted treads. Once he was down with the others, he immediately went to Morgan, bent down, kissed her, then with a hand on her shoulder he straightened up to look at everyone in the crowded room. “I refuse to give that fucker the satisfaction of thinking he bested me in something yet again. There is a significance to the day of our wedding. Oh, I don’t care what day of the week it fell on, but it’s the date that is important to me. It just so happened to fall on Saturday this year. If it had been a Wednesday, then we still would have gotten married that same date.” Wyatt looked around the room, and with his hand still on Morgan’s shoulder, he nodded once and continued with his explanation.
“It was the day I walked into the hospital room, and Morgan opened her eyes for the first time after Lucas found her alongside the road. The minute I say her blue eyes, I fell hard for her. Saturday will be three years from that date.”
No one said a word, but Lucas rolled his eyes with Chuck when all the women seemed to melt at his explanation of why the wedding was important to him. It took several minutes to get everyone’s attention back on him.
“Anyway, that’s why I hired you guys. It’s not that I don’t trust the government, hell, who am I trying to kid? I don’t know those guys, and they are probably good at their jobs, but I want someone who knows Aunt Morgan to help protect her.”
“Where will you be during the wedding?” Hank asked as he strode forward and picked up a marker for the whiteboard before him.
“Up front with Aunt Morgan. I’m her man of honor, and Dad is Uncle Wyatt’s best man. In the front row of the groom’s side will be Dolly and Wilson, April and DJ. Then behind them, the ranch hands. It’s going to be a small ceremony, but a gigantic reception.”
“And the bride’s side?”
“Grandma and Grandpa Stuart, Uncle Chip, Aunt Peggy, and all of them.” Lucas threw his arm out to indicate the others in the room. He grinned when they all gave him either a grin, a raspberry, or a small wave of their hands.
“Why?” Duke asked.
Morgan laughed and waved her hand at the others. “Raise your hand if you are my brother.” She watched the people from the Brotherhood Agency stare in shock when six men raised their arms.
“Holy shit, you have six brothers?”
“Seven if you count Chuck. He’s been best friends with the J’s since the first day of kindergarten, and has been like a brother to me ever since. And…” she paused as she looked at her family. “They are hooked up with my operatives. Not that I don’t trust my brothers with my life, but they have never been in the military, but we have trained them in weapons and hand-to-hand.”
