Espionage and Eggs - Part 6

He leaned against the outside of the building, under the eves to stay out of the rain.  It was the only door out of the makeshift barracks that they had used to clean up in after the training operation.  The session had finished about thirty minutes ago and it was now about five in the morning.  He was tired.  By all rights he should have crawled into the dorm and gone straight to sleep.  Instead he was standing outside waiting to drive back into town, hopefully with company.  Ward had showered and changed in record time.  He had left the locker room and had been standing in the rain for fifteen minutes waiting for her.  Even if the dorm rooms were just fine for him, he had already checked and knew she had arranged to go back into town.  He hoped he would find a better spot to sleep today.

Glancing at his watch he saw that it was still an hour before sunrise.  They were ten miles out of town and deep in the woods.  He watched the drops of water drip from the edges of the roof, and wondered just how much longer he would have to wait for her to come out.  His skin began to tingle, the hair rising on his arms.  For some odd reason, he couldn’t read her mind, but he knew she was near.  Ward could sense her breathing and her heartbeat, just not her thoughts.  It was an odd, yet compelling feeling, and in some ways far more personal.  He turned just in time to see her walk out of the door and out from under the cover of the roof into the rain.  She turned to smile at him, and stopped.  Her hair was still wet from the shower, and she had brushed it back off her face into a ponytail.  Her face was free of make-up.  Even without the conventional trappings she looked wonderful.

“That’s how I did it,” and he immediately knew what she was talking about.  She had listened in on their conversation in the locker room without them knowing it.  It wasn’t fair but he should have expected it, she was that good.  How much she had seen he began to wonder about, but not for too long.  Ward had intrigued her as much as she intrigued him.  She had felt that invisible pull the first time she had seen him.  When the training mission had been assigned she had also done her work and known he had had a hand in setting it up and including her.  From that moment on the game had begun.

“Interesting,” may have only been one word but it covered the array of feelings and thoughts he was having.  He hadn’t moved from the side of the building.  Jan took a step closer, intentionally increasing the heat between them.  “Be interested in discussing it some more over breakfast?”  Ward didn’t move, just smiled.  Yes she was his match in more ways than one.

“What do you have in mind?” Jan stood in the rain and Ward watched the rain dribble down the side of her face, all the while she ignored it.  Ward was having a harder time ignoring it.  He wanted to reach out and wipe it off of her cheek.  She must have known because all she did was smile again as she looked him in the eye waiting for an answer.

“In about a half an hour a great little place in town will open up.  It will serve just about anything you have in mind.  We can catch the sunrise as we go in,” Ward couldn’t read anything in her mind.  For that matter he wasn’t allowing her to read anything from his mind either.  At least he thought he wasn't.  The word play was getting to him though, and for some odd reason she seemed to be enjoying the banter just as much as he was.

“How’s the coffee?”  Jan ran her hand through her hair, pushing the pieces that were beginning to wash back into her face behind her ears.

“Better than most, worse than others,” Ward stood up and took the keys from his pocket.  He wanted to pull her under the eves and out of the rain.  Somehow she seemed to thrive standing in it, and she looked at home in it as well.

“Then shall we go before the rest of the genetic freaks get out here and they have to come along,” she smiled and started to walk to the small parking area.  With that one sentence she allowed him in on a secret as to whom she had been reading in the locker room. "By the way. . ." was all he got out before she continued talking.

"If you get lucky I just may let you pay the bill," she had driven one of the department’s cars and assumed Ward had done the same.  To her surprise they climbed into a small nondescript, but adequate four-door sedan.  Most likely a department car, but of a different class altogether.  As they drove off Bobby walked out of the small building that housed the locker rooms.  Neither one of them saw him.  He took a few minutes to watch Ward drive away with his prize, and a curious feeling he couldn’t quite identify went through him.

They hadn’t said a word since they had left the training area.  Jan sat at the table across from Ward waiting on her order.  It was a waiting game now to see who was going to talk first, and she didn’t have time for it.

“So, were you wondering just how good my hands were as well?” and she smiled.  It was a flash of something that crossed his face and the sudden stillness of a hunter that had been discovered that let her know that his thoughts had not been about her training.  They had been purely about other things. 

"The water pipes make great speakers," she continued.  Slowly it dawned on him and he laughed. 

“I should have known,” he picked up his coffee.  "I'll keep that in mind for the next time though."   

“I take it that this was the first time you included a girl in your little group,” it wasn't a question.  Picking up her cup she took a small sip of the hot liquid as she looked at him over the rim.

“Not so,” and he smiled back mischievously.  He waited while she put her cup back down and then continued, “My first handler was a woman and she trained with us a few times out here.  Obviously she didn't want to let that little secret slip.”  It had been a long time since he had been able to talk about Melissa without being overwhelmed with sadness.  They had never been anything more than friends, best friends.  She had always been there for him.  More to the point they had always been on the same track when they were working together.  He hadn’t had that for a while.  His new handler, Gregg, had been a waste of time and as soon as Ward could he had requested someone new.  Not something that was normally done, but Ward had proven himself enough of an asset that they had done it.  Normally once assigned a handler there had to be something of a catastrophe for a change to occur.  Even though he knew it would happen sometime, Ward wasn't going to wait for that to happen.