Shawland Security: Book 2 (Shawaland Security) Read online

  SHAWLAND SECURITY:

  BOOK 2

  BY

  KM LOWE

  Author History

  My name is Kelly McMullen Lowe and I was born on March 19, 1986 to the proud parents of Christine Greenlees Beaumont Steedman and Hugh Patrick McMullen. My parents taught me the value of life and they showed me how to succeed. I married David Lowe, on December 30, 2006 and we have two wonderful children named Dylan and Tianna. Over the last couple of years, I was unwell, and I put all of my time into my family and reading. In 2012 I wanted to commit myself to writing my own novel. I have put a lot of time and effort into all of my books. I hope that you all enjoy them, as much I did writing them.

  Acknowledgments

  First of all, I would like to thank Abigail Davies for helping me to create a beautiful cover for my 22nd novel. This series of covers has got amazing branding thanks to this lady. She’s amazing.

  Secondly, I would like to thank Karen Sanders for editing my book. This process is always so much easier with you on my side. I could not ask for anyone better to polish my manuscripts. You turn an ugly duckling into a beautiful swan. And you’re such an amazing person.

  Also, I would like to thank my family and friends for putting up with me over the last couple of years. My husband will get some sense out of me for a couple of weeks, until I start writing again. This book would not have been possible if it wasn't for the support of my husband. I love you to the moon and back.

  Next, I would like to thank my children for being my little angels. I love you dearly and you mean the world to me. I hope that one day you will be able to read mummy's work. In the meantime, Dylan, you can read the blurb. My son is my little book worm. I hope when he gets older, he will still enjoy reading just as much.

  Finally, to all the ladies in my street team and review group, I can’t thank you enough for sticking by me lately. I love you all. I can’t possibly mention you all, because I would be sure to forget someone, and each of you mean so much to me.

  Dedication

  This book is dedicated to every fallen soldier out there. It’s also dedicated to every soldier who returns from war feeling broken and out of sorts. We see you. We see the hero you are. The dedicated person you were to your team and your country. We salute you.

  Prologue

  7 Months Earlier

  Shay

  "What do we do, Sarge?" I yell over the blasts that rock the ground around us.

  Debris is flying in all directions, smoke is billowing into the sky, and people are running in all directions to protect themselves. The piercing screams will haunt me for life, if I get out of here alive. Everything is like a scene from a movie, only this is reality for me. This is my life. This is what I signed up for. This is what it’s like for the United States Army.

  We've been out in the field, in Iraq, for ten weeks. We've faced gas attacks, shootouts, and now bombings. Our squad members are getting lower by the day, and if we get out of this anytime soon, I don't know how we'll come back from it. Each day is a struggle to stay sane. Each day is a struggle to keep our hearts beating. This place is quickly killing us one by one.

  It’s at moments like this when I think about all the stupid decisions I’ve made in the army. I wish I’d taken my leave when Clay did. Maybe I would have a regular nine-to-five job, settled down with kids, doing school runs and soccer practice, living a life. Clay was the one person who got me. He understood the way my mind worked, what made me tick, and what pissed me off. Yet, when it came down to it, he couldn’t understand why I choose to stay here when I’d served my time. I could have walked away to live a normal life, but I didn’t. I signed my own death certificate. I stayed in active duty.

  Clay was my boss for four years. In fact, he was the best boss anyone could ask for. We worked alongside each other for two years before he was promoted to my boss, but he never changed. That’s why he had everyone’s love and respect. It was a sad day when he announced he was leaving, but everyone got it… apart from me. He was my best friend. My confidante. My lover when I needed him. He was just my go-to person when I had a problem or special moment to share. We all need one of those people out here. Even now, I want to reach out to Clay and give him a run down of my day. I want to hear him tell me how everything will be okay. Let him hold me until my fear subsides. But he isn’t here. He got out. He has a life on the outside, and while I’m happy for him, there’s also a part of me that’s jealous of his bravery to leave. It’s harder to leave this life than it is to stay. For some of us, this is the only thing we’ve ever known. Some of us entered the forces right out of school. We have nothing else to fall back on. That’s what goes through my head… What would I do on the outside? Who would I be? I have a purpose here. I know what I’m doing. The thought of having no routine, no normalcy, scares the shit out of me. That’s why I chickened out and stayed in the armed forces; fear of the unknown.

  "Take cover, Shay!"

  "Josh... " I cough and try to clear my lungs from the soot and smoke. My chest feels heavy, like a whole ton of bricks is lying on top of me. I’m struggling to breathe because even the air around us is polluted with smoke, gas, and dust.

  I can hear my commander in the distance, but I can’t see much amongst the rubble, smoke, and debris raining down on us. Where do I take cover when I don't have anywhere? Every building is hanging by a thread. Everything is chaos. Our lifelines are running out extremely quickly and we don’t get a second chance here. You get in, get out, or get left behind to rot, as harsh as that sounds. You’re fast or you’re last.

  Right now, I’m far from fast. I feel like I'm drowning. It doesn’t matter what I do, something is blocking me every way I turn.

  What would Clay do? He would run like the wind and never look back.

  “Fucking run, Shay!” I hear Clay’s words echo in my ears.

  There’s nothing else I can do here apart from run. And that’s what I do. I sprint as fast as my legs can take me, trampling over bodies and piles of rubble, never stopping to see who is dead or alive. Never looking over my shoulder because that will only slow me down.

  “Never take your eyes off the direction you’re running, Shay. If there ever comes a time when it’s your life or someone else’s, you fight. You never give up your own life for someone else.”

  My life is important, and I need to get out of here.

  I need to focus. I've got a lot of confessions to make when I get out of here, starting with confessing my love to Clay. My old commander. My old lover. My best friend. I haven't seen or heard from him in a few months because our contact on the phone or Skype dwindled down to hardly anything. It kills me with each passing day, but I made my decision. I wasn't ready to be a civilian. I wasn’t ready to leave the chaos that I live for.

  A blast sounds behind me, getting closer and closer to my moving form. I can't run as fast as the chopper is dropping bombs. It's impossible. I’m failing my sole mission to stay alive.

  The earth under my feet shakes, I stumble, and I land on all fours, hovering over a dead woman. She’s limbless and covered in blood. I scream and jump to my feet, stumbling along, never losing the image of that woman's body, or what’s left of it. That could happen to me if I don’t fucking run.

  Boom!

  My body is thrown into the air and I feel myself freefalling onto the ground. My hearing is gone, my body feels weak, my vision is blurry. I can't feel anything. I lie here, looking up to the dark night sky, praying for a miracle, or a little piece of hope that will keep me going. Anything.

  "Shay! Get up! Move! Don't give up. Don’t you ever give up."

  "Clay," I whisper.

&nbsp
; I must be in a bad way. I can't see anything but black, but I can hear Clay yelling at me. Is he here? Has he come to save me?

  "Clay."

  I feel the life draining from my body, and I can't keep my eyes open anymore. Everything around me is getting darker, the noise is calmer, and the ground is still. I never expected to take my last breath out here. I’ve lived and breathed the army and it has sucked the life out of me piece by piece.

  Another fallen soldier.

  ***

  I open my eyes slightly; the stinging makes me realize I wasn’t just having a nightmare. Every part of my body aches and protests as I’m shaken around in someone’s arms. Where am I? Who has me?

  Every memory comes back to me and I remember the bomb, my short conversation with Clay, and then nothing. I look up slowly, hoping to see Clay, but I see Josh, my commander. He looks a little worse for wear, but he's walking. It’s more than can be said for me.

  "W-what happened?"

  My mouth feels like sandpaper. I can't swallow; my throat feels like it has razor blades stuck in it. My head is pounding. I can’t even pretend to feel okay. I’ve never felt this bad in my life.

  "We were bombed. I have no idea where we're going, but we need to keep moving. We can’t stop. It isn’t safe for us."

  We’re in enemy territory. We’re basically walking around with red targets over our hearts.

  "Where is everyone?"

  "We're the only two here. I don’t know where anyone is. I’m guessing they didn’t make it."

  "W-what?" I feel my heart shatter all over again. My squad mates are gone. My family. The only people who have kept me sane over the last few years.

  A sob catches in my throat. The pain radiates through my body, inch by inch. The burning in my legs is unbearable. I have the headache from hell. My stomach feels like a washing machine, like I’m about to vomit all over the place.

  "Stop. I can't do this. Stop!" I scream.

  “Sshh! We don’t want to attract attention to ourselves. Two American soldiers stuck in the middle of a warzone doesn’t bode well for us if we’re caught.”

  He doesn’t need to tell me what will happen if we’re caught by the enemy. I’ve watched, or rather hid, while people lost their heads at the hands of the bad guys. It isn’t pretty out here. The enemy is ruthless.

  Josh lowers me to the ground, and his hands move tangled hair out of my face. I doubt there’s any part of me that isn’t covered in dirt, blood, and grime. Concern washes over his features, but I’m too tired to care.

  "You need medical help, short stuff."

  I feel the tears fall down my cheeks at his nickname for me. It was a name Clay gave me when he first met me. My five feet three build amused my friends here. I might be short, but I’m a spitfire. I let nothing stop me… ever. Not even the fucking enemy chasing our tails now.

  “I am the medical help.” I cough, trying to hold my ribs in the process.

  Over the years, my medical training has saved limbs, drained lungs, patched holes here, there, and everywhere. I’ve saved more than I’ve lost, but now, there isn’t anyone to help me. I’m on my own.

  “We’ll get out of here, just hang in there for me.” He places a gentle kiss on my forehead.

  "My legs are burning," I cry.

  "You were caught in a blast; you have bad burns. I lost any medical supplies we had. I'm hoping by walking this way we'll find somewhere we can get help. The bastards weren't shy this time." He coughs and clenches his own ribs.

  "Are you hurt?"

  My medical training kicks in and my pain and misery are quickly forgotten about. I’m a born healer. I hate to see people hurting, especially people I care about.

  "I'll live. We need to keep moving. You good?"

  I nod. I bite down on my lip to help tolerate the pain of moving, but it’s useless. Nothing is going to take my mind off the agony apart from strong opioids that preferably knock me into oblivious bliss.

  “No locals are going to help the U.S. Army. You’re kidding yourself if you believe otherwise.”

  “Don’t be so negative. Miracles do happen.”

  "You should go on without me. You have a better chance alone..."

  He shakes his head and cuts me off. "I'll pretend I didn't hear you say that, babe. Close your eyes and let me worry about how we get out of this. It certainly won’t be from me leaving you behind."

  And that's my problem. I hate being a burden to my team. I feel like I've let them all down by being here when they're not. I should be saving them from their injuries, not being saved. For all I know, they’re lying in a ditch somewhere, praying I get to them first. And that will haunt me for the rest of my life… no matter how long I have left.

  Chapter 1

  7months later

  Clay

  I sit back in my chair and swivel around like a child would do. Closing a file on my desk, filing it away as case closed, is always a good feeling. A job well done. Time to move on to the next. That’s my routine lately; eat, work, sleep, repeat.

  For nearly nine years, my two brothers and I have been running our own business here in Chicago. I guess the change was exactly what we all needed. Caleb left his career as a detective in CPD, I left the military, and Chris left his personal training behind. We come together as Shawland Security. It hasn't been an easy road, not by a long shot, but we get through everything as a team. We have each other’s backs, no matter what the situation is. We’ve faced our fair share of shit over the last few years, but we’re still a united front.

  I’ve always been close to my brothers, even when we had our own separate careers. We were there for one another. If one of us was hurting, we were all hurting. Our mother made us the way we are today; she would have spanked our asses if we ever had angry words with one another. Now, our unity is something not many families have these days. My parents are proud of the men we’ve become. They tell us often enough.

  “It’s an honor to have siblings. It’s not a burden like some think. Be there for one another, because then you’ll always have someone in your corner.” Those were my mother’s favorite words to us all. It worked, because all these years later, I remember them clearly. I can hear her say them, and it’s a reminder to me how much I love and need my family. I’m not ashamed to say that. Without them, I’d be a nobody. We’re only here today because of our family unit.

  The last two weeks have been crazy for us all, because Caleb and his girlfriend have lived in hell, with her kidnapping, rape, and then the birth of her daughter a month early. Today is the day they got to become a proper family, with no threats hanging over their heads, because they brought their baby girl home. They’re finally safe and ready to face the rest of their lives together. Finally. We all knew they were meant to be together. We just didn’t expect them to go through the hell they did to get here.

  Life throws curveballs, but sometimes those curveballs are so far off the mark, we’re left with emptiness.

  That brings me to here and now. I got a call from Shay’s brother, Carrick. I hadn’t heard from him in months, not since the army stopped searching for Shay and any of her remaining squad members. When I say, ‘stopped searching’, they didn’t say that in so many words, but I’ve been there, and there comes a point when they can’t do any more. As much as it pains me, I get it. Why search for the inevitable after so long? There are only so many times they can comb through the area the team was deployed in before they have to say enough is enough.

  I can’t wrap my head around never seeing Shay again. I don’t want to. Every night she haunts my dreams. Every day she plagues my mind. My short stuff. My reason for fucking breathing. I just wish I never left her there. I should have kicked up fuck, thrown her over my shoulder, and signed her discharge papers myself, but I didn’t. I walked away and left her there. I thought I was doing the right thing at the time, but all these years later, she took her last breath fighting for her country. I keep telling myself she died doing something she loved, bu
t how could she love something so much that was killing her, taking her away from her family. You need to recognize when it’s time to move on. I did. Some soldiers, Shay included, are blinded by the life they lead in the army. They’re sucked in to the point they can’t get out. It’s like an addiction, one that will eventually kill you.

  Why didn’t you fight for us, Shay?

  I throw down my pen and growl. That call from Carrick left me in a bad mood. I hate myself for feeling like this because, just an hour ago, I was getting cuddles from my baby niece, Sharlynn. She’s adorable. It’s amazing how holding a baby makes everything feel better. It makes all your cares wash away. Nothing matters apart from that tiny bundle in your arms. You’d do anything to protect that little life. Anything at all.

  “You’re working late, bro. You okay?” asks Chris as he enters my office.

  I take in a deep breath and lean my head back against the chair. I’m always working late, just to ease the painful memories and the nightmares that follow. I’ll do anything to keep busy.

  “I’m good. Do you fancy getting a drink or two?”

  Chris widens his eyes at me and folds his big arms across his chest. If you didn’t know Chris, you’d think his size was intimidating, but he’s a big teddy bear. He’s my younger brother, and I love him dearly, even though he’s a pain in my ass.

  “I’ll have as many drinks as you want, but I want you to talk to me first. You look like death, and after the good outcome we’ve had with Caleb and Aria, I thought you’d be jumping for joy.”

  I nod weakly and smile. “I’m over the moon for them. If anyone deserves some happiness, it’s those two. They were meant to have a happy ever after.”

  “So, what’s got you looking so doom and gloom?”

  “I was talking with Shay’s brother. He’s not doing too well. I guess it just brought it all back, you know? The uncertainty of everything. Where is her body? Why didn’t they find her?” I shrug.