Way of the Warrior (Troubleshooters #17.5)(113)

Jay felt his phone buzz as a text message came in, but he ignored it—preferring to smile back into Carol’s eyes as the first wave of fifth graders came storming into the room.





CHAPTER 4


    Izzy


Something weird was up with Jenn.

Or at least that was what Danny had just stated as an irrevocable truth. Dude believed it, too. While his body language was all slouchy and playing-it-cool as he sat beside Izzy in the hard plastic airport chairs, Dan couldn’t disguise the fact that he was wearing his trying-not-to-freak face.

Izzy sighed, because, Jesus. Jenn’s ninth and please-gods-final month of baby-cooking was going to be one long, trying endurance test for all of them.

Danny being Danny, Izzy’s tiny little barely-there exhale pissed him off. “Look, I was talking to her,” Dan said, heavy on the affronted. “And something was definitely up. She just suddenly had to go. And she hasn’t called me back.”

“Maybe she had to pee,” Izzy suggested, while across the waiting area Senior Chief Wolchonok turned to scan the group of SEALs as if he were counting heads. His patience was much like that of a kindergarten teacher or a den mother, only he was far more world-weary and grim. He saw that Izzy was looking at him and as their eyes met, Izzy realized the senior was holding his phone to his ear.

Izzy was just about to leap to his feet and say, You need sump’n, Senior…? But Wolchonok’s gaze shifted to Gillman, and then back, and then the man shook his head, just a little, like a pitcher shaking off a signal from his catcher. Hmmm. So instead, Izzy kept his convo with Dan-bo going—what were they talking about? Ah, yes. Urination. “Pregnant women frequently have to—”

“She would’ve told me.” Dan cut him off, completely oblivious to Izzy’s and the senior’s little charades game. “I have to pee. Or she would’ve just taken her phone with her into the bathroom.”

“Maybe it was number two,” Izzy said as he watched the senior chief pull the phone from his ear and gave it his best death glare, after which he pointed at Jenkins and made a come here gesture. Jenk snapped to it. “Women can definitely be all private and weird about doing number two while on the phone and—”

“I’m pretty sure she’s with Eden,” Dan interrupted again. “First Jenn goes Oh, my God, and then someone else—Eden—goes Oh, my God, and suddenly Jenn has to hang up.”

Yeah, something was definitely up. Across the room, Senior and Marky-Mark were in a deep discussion, and now Mark had his phone out, too. Right in front of the senior.

Even though they weren’t supposed to bring personal cells on a mission, the SEALs nearly almost all did it anyway, carrying international phones with SIM cards—because they subscribed to the Navy SEAL adage “Two is one and one is none.”

As Izzy watched, their XXL CO joined them, and then he got his phone out, as well.

But Danny hadn’t noticed—he was in his own oblivious, miserable world.

“Oh, my God is an appropriate exclamation,” Izzy pointed out, “for everything from an apocalyptic mega-earthquake to finding an awesome deal on a newborn-sized Star Trek uniform onesie. With Ben coming home from school with an A on his latest English paper somewhere in the middle there.”

Dan and Eden’s younger brother Ben was still in high school. Izzy and Eden shared custody of the kid with Danny and Jenn. It worked out nicely, with Ben bouncing between their two apartments, and Eden, Jenn, and Ben hanging together for extra home-fires-burning support when the SEALs were out in the world, doing their sea-air-and-land thing.

“And there has not been an earthquake,” Izzy quickly continued as he realized he’d put a bad idea into Dan’s already too-noisy head. “At least not the Big One. We would’ve heard about it by now—it’d be all over Twitter. Seriously, bro, what’s the absolute worst that this weirdness could be? That Jenn’s gone into labor, right? Oh, my God, I’m having this massively giant Gillbaby, right—aaahhh!—now—uuuhhh! Well, if that’s the case, then good news! Someone’s with her. It’s definitely not Eden, though. I got an email, said she’s driving out to the desert today, to some wannabe resort town called something appropriately silly like Idiot Springs, to check out some potential wedding reception site for Tracy and Deck. And frankly? I should be the one yowling about weirdness. Whatever’s up with Jennilyn, at least she’s not doing the bridesmaid thing for one of your exes.”

Long before Izzy had met Eden, he’d briefly collided with the somewhat ditzy but surprisingly tough-as-nails Tracy, who had finally found a forever home with former SEAL chief Larry Decker. They were planning a big wedding, and Tracy had asked Eden to be a bridesmaid.

“That is weird,” Mark Jenkins agreed, sitting down on the other side of Danny. Somehow he’d made it across the room without Izzy noticing. But, yup. The senior and the CO were still leaning against the far wall, still working their phones. And the tadpole, Tony Vlachic, had just joined them, his phone out, too.

Curiouser and curiouser.

Izzy turned his attention to Mark, who was purposely mimicking Dan’s faux-whatever body language. He looked equally loose and relaxed. And barely legal, with his golly-gee freckles, boyish face, compact frame, and lean build. One of these days, dude was gonna Ron-Howard. He’d pull off his hat, be balding underneath, and suddenly look his age. But until that day, probably well into his forties, Mark Jenkins would continue to get carded.