Come, come back to me WHO Brent Lawson WHAT Brent gets some very, very interesting news. WHERE His apartment, Order Headquarters WHEN September 6, 2016; 12:45 AM RATING Um, yelling and allusions to nakedness?
Jeremy Hanson had been recruited into the Order when he was 15, after he was found hiding in his closet by the squad dispatched to eliminate the vampire coven that had just murdered his family. Traumatized and with nowhere else to turn, the Order’s offer of a home and a chance at revenge - or at least preventing another tragedy - had seemed irresistible. But as time had gone on, it had become apparent that he wasn’t cut out to be a hunter; proficient though he’d proved in training, in the field he found it was a lot harder to execute a werewolf when they looked like a human. So the young man had been shuttled over to Operations, which was how he found himself currently standing outside the door to Commander Brent Lawson’s personal apartment, a manila folder held tenuously in his shaking hands.
“Couldn’t this wait until morning?” he’d asked his watch commander, when he’d first made the discovery.
“Kid, you ever seen Commander Lawson when he’s real pissed off?” the watch commander had drawled, kicking his feet up on his desk. “Trust me, he’ll want to be woke up for this.”
So Jeremy had left the Ops Center with a hard swallow and made his way through the complex to the residential side. Lawson had still been training recruits when he’d first joined, and he remembered very clearly watching the towering instructor casually breaking another recruit’s nose to prove a point. That night after light’s out, the rumors had swirled around the barracks: that he’d once killed a recruit in training (no, two - no five!), that he’d go easy on the girls if they slept with him, that his mother had been so afraid of him she’d killed herself. Jeremy tried not to believe any of the gossip, although it had managed to worm its way to the front of his mind as he raised his hand and knocked sharply once, twice, three times on the door.
“WHAT.” The commander’s voice was muffled by the door, but Jeremy could already tell he wasn’t happy.
“Uh, the watch commander sent me, sir,” Jeremy stammered into the intercom located next to the door. “There’s been a development with Operation: Honey Pie.”
The com crackled into silence. Jeremy swallowed again, raising his hand to press the talk button again, thinking he hadn’t been heard. But the door flew open and he suddenly found himself face-to-face - well, face-to-chest - with Brent Lawson, one of the most notorious men in the history of the Order. For a long moment, all Jeremy could do was blink and stare up at the very annoyed face of the Order’s Commander, until he remembered why he was there.
Flustered, he dropped the folder as he tried to hand it over, the contents spilling across the hallway floor and into the apartment. With an embarrassed and apologetic stammer, he dropped to his knees to collect everything, only to find himself face-to-face with the fact that elite commando wasn’t just a position Lawson had held. Now beet red, his mouth gone totally dry, he finally managed to hand the file over, averting his eyes as he got back up to his feet.
At first Brent had been unbelievably put out to have been interrupted for a skittish kid. He remembered Hanson, having been disappointed the young man hadn’t fared better in the field. Revenge was always a strong motivator for success within the Order, at least for the new recruits, but it just hadn’t been in enough the kid’s case. Better for him to be an errand boy for the Ops Team, he supposed, although he wasn’t holding out hope for him there, either. Given all the past “updates” he’d received that had been worthless, he assumed Hanson had drawn the short straw to be the sacrificial lamb to deliver the false news.
Instead, Brent had gone very quiet as he flipped through the pages in the folder, studying the photos and brief reports. Behind him, a lithe blonde had stumbled out of the bedroom into the brighter light of the living room, just as starkly naked as he was. Jeremy tried his best to avoid staring as she molded herself to Brent’s side, lazily resting her head against his arm.
“Come back to bed, baby,” she purred, nuzzling against his bare skin. “This can wait until later, right? But I can’t -”
“Get out.” Brent’s eyes hadn’t moved from the documents, his voice calm as he continued to read through them.
“What?” the blonde asked, blinking as she tried to put the pieces together. When it took her too long, she found herself being shoved out into the hallway, Brent’s hand tangling in her hair until she was out of his way.
“I shouldn’t have to tell you twice,” Brent growled as he slammed the door shut in their faces. Jeremy offered his jacket to the woman with an apologetic look, and offered to walk her back to her own quarters.
In the living area, Brent sank down into the old leather armchair that had been his grandfather’s, staring in near disbelief at the file in his hands. It had been seven years, but the Ops Team had finally found her, right under their noses. He stroked the photograph of her that was enclosed, remembering the way her skin felt under his fingers with a fond smile.
“Didn’t I promise I’d always find you?” he murmured, scanning over another page of notes that had been collected. Emma Swinton, AKA Emily Sawyer. Detective Inspector. Havenwood, NY. Additional assets: Tyler Swinton, Joseph Harding, Ana Harding.
“Cheating bitch,” he growled, his fist slamming down on the overstuffed arm of the chair as his eyes narrowed at another photo. Emily, her new boytoy, and two kids. The girl looked like the bearded bastard, but the boy… Brent’s heart skipped a beat as a grin began to blossom.
“Hang on, son,” he murmured. “Daddy’s coming to bring you home.”