“Or you’ll have avoided a friendly fire incident that might get you charged with manslaughter.” Pinto gestured to the paintball-splattered target. The ability to make the correct split-second decision was critical in this line of work. Troy should have developed the skill while he was in the military. But then again, that might explain why he was a civilian now.
“All right, folks,” Pinto called out to the recruits hanging out in the waiting area. “That’s it for today. Don’t leave the building until you check your gear in with Navarre. We’ll see you at seven tomorrow morning.”
As the guys headed for the weapons station, Hatch crossed to stand beside Pinto and lowered his voice to avoid being overheard. “You were kind of hard on Troy, don’t you think?”
Pinto gave his partner a pointed look. “Imagine how that would have gone over if Austin or Wade were here.”
Truth be told, Austin was one of the best bosses that Pinto had ever worked with. He was fair, firm, loyal, and consistent, and he tended not to play favorites, even among members of his family. But he also held his employees to a high standard, and he had a low tolerance for bullshit. If you pissed him off, he’d let you know it, but he always gave ample opportunity for you to make things right in his world.
As for Wade…well, he mostly scared the crap out of Pinto, though the love of a good woman had softened the worst of his jagged edges. Still, there was plenty of jagged to go around, which was why Pinto made a point of staying off the guy’s radar.
Hatch shrugged, the closest he’d ever come to conceding the point. “Think he’ll be able to clear the course?”
“I don’t know. It could go either way.” Ultimately, Troy’s attitude would have the greatest impact on his future at Six Points. If he showed genuine promise and a willingness to learn, the Flints would likely work with him to develop his abilities.
If not…well, he wouldn’t be the first recruit to wash out of the training program.
As Pinto left the warehouse, he switched on his phone, and it immediately chimed to indicate there were text messages waiting to be read. He tapped the icon and scrolled through the list, deleting the spam that clogged his inbox on a regular basis. One message from his sister, two from his mom—he’d read those when he got home. Then he spotted a text from Fiona, and a smile stretched over his face.
They were supposed to have had another tactical planning session over the weekend, but a raging case of food poisoning had forced him to cancel at the last minute. He should have known better than to try his luck with the leftover Chinese food in the back of his fridge. So instead of meeting over pizza and beer, they’d traded texts and filled in the details of their fake relationship.
Her message popped onto the screen:How are you feeling?
He’d never been much for texting—it was too damn hard to hit those tiny letters with his big fingers—so he called Fiona instead.
“I’m alive, though I might have puked out half my body weight,” he said when she answered the call, and then cringed. “That was too much information, wasn’t it?”
“Not at all,” she said on the heels of a laugh. “You keep forgetting I teach eighth grade. What you said is tame in comparison to what comes out of their mouths on a daily basis. Are we still on for tomorrow?”
“Good question. Hold on, let me check.” If everything had gone according to plan, his family had arrived in Orlando this afternoon and checked into their hotel. Quickly, he pulled up his mother’s messages, and the lurch in his stomach had nothing to do with his earlier case of food poisoning.
“Yep, they’re here and looking forward to seeing us. Are you still okay with dinner tomorrow?”
“Of course,” she said. “A deal’s a deal, right? Besides, I already told Dennis we were dating, so it’s only fair I live up to my end of the bargain.”
The note of worry in her voice triggered protective instincts that caught him completely off guard. They weren’t in an actual romantic relationship, but he considered Fiona a friend, and friends watched out for each other. “How’d your ex take the news?”
“About as well as expected.”
“Do you think he believed you?”
“I don’t know. I hope so.”
“Don’t worry, Fi. We’ll make sure he believes it.” He switched the phone to his other ear and dug into his pocket for the keys to his car. “Would it make you feel better if we had another tactical planning session? I’m free tonight.”
“I’d like to but I can’t. I’m supposed to meet Liz in an hour.”
That disappointed him more than he was willing to admit, and he brushed the feeling aside. That kind of emotion had no place in their arrangement and could only lead to trouble. “No worries, I’ll just see you tomorrow. We’ll have plenty of time to talk then.”
The hotel where his family was staying was an hour’s drive away, maybe longer if traffic sucked worse than usual. That would give them ample opportunity to make sure they had their ducks in a row.
He doubted there’d be any problems. The framework they’d built for their fictional relationship was relatively simple and easy to remember: after meeting in the laundry room, he’d invited her to his place for dinner, and they’d been head over heels with each other ever since. The rest were minor details about places they’d been together and things they knew about each other.
Knowing his mother, she’d be ecstatic to see that he wasn’t wasting his life away on cheap booze and fast women. He was also fairly confident that she’d approve of Fiona. Honestly, how could she not? The woman was the complete package: brains, beauty, a sharp sense of humor, and a genuine desire to help those around her. The only possible strikes against her were that she wasn’t Italian and didn’t live in New Jersey.
He swiped at the screen to end the call, and his phone immediately chimed again. The caller ID showed Sloane’s number.About damn time, he thought, as he slid behind the wheel of his Mustang. Yes, he knew she was doing him a favor, and he understood that she was squeezing it in between all the other work she did for the cyber security unit, but he’d been growing impatient for the results of the background check on Fiona’s ex.
He put the phone back to his ear and slid the key into the ignition. “Hey, Sloane. You got something for me?”
