Beginning: A PAVAD Prequel Novella (PAVAD: FBI Romantic Suspense) Read Free

threat, ensure the deputy director and his family are safe. It’s what I’ve been trained to do. Period. It’s my job to do just that.” 
    Her eyes flashed dangerously, and for the first time, Royal wondered if maybe Deputy Director Dennis’s personal assistant was a bigger threat than anyone had ever expected. Maybe the lovely little nerd everyone dismissed was more than a mousy little secretary?
    Deputy Director Dennis’s personal security detail, perhaps?

Chapter Two
    JERK. He’d looked down her dress, at least twice. Not that surprising, everyone knew Agent Royal’s playboy tendencies. Some women found them charming. Not Len. She admired businesslike dedication. Skill.
    Still, he was the best she was getting for this. She picked her way over the manicured lawn to the destroyed gate. Matthew’s Transformers were still lying abandoned on the lawn, where the little boy had obviously engaged in a great battle with imaginary enemies. Matthew. Who had been inside, sleeping in the nursery while someone laid in wait for his grandfather.
    She would find those bastards and take her five minutes alone with them. How dare they threaten that little boy? Thank God they’d had the decency to leave the kid alone. Len would make sure Mattie was never threatened again.
    “So how did they get through the gate?” She asked the man at her side. He’d been quiet for a few minutes, and she appreciated that.
    “Looks like they sheared the bolts, then rammed through with their vehicle. Crude, but effective.”
    “So why didn’t Rosa hear? The gates not that far from the house.”
    “No,” Royal said. “But if she was doing something else and they had a quiet enough engine, they could bump, then back-up, then repeat until it is done. And she may not have noticed, especially since they cut the power to the house while they were at it. She was probably focused on getting to Matthew and finding out what was going on with the power. Even if she looked out the window, with no security lights, she wouldn’t see a damned thing.”
    “If they cut the power, why is it up and running again already? It was on when we pulled in.”
    “Maybe they didn’t cut the connection. Maybe they circumvented the power, so that it would be off for a small amount of time? With the right skills, that would be possible."
    “But who would have those kind of skill?” Len asked.
    “We need to see the threats he’s received. Why would he be targeted right now?”
     “As the deputy director, he’s been targeted before.” She’d killed to protect him before, too. But that was something only she and Ed, and a few select individuals above them, knew about.
    “I understand that, but something made these people target him right now. If we can isolate their motivation, that will give us the first direction.”
    “True. It may have something to do with PAVAD. There has been some opposition in recent months.”
    “And what exactly is PAVAD?”
    “Ed’s pet project. Hush-hush, still. So everything I am telling you is in the strictest confidence. It stands for the Prevention and Analysis of Violent Acts Division. Ed created it, and will be heading it up. If the funding goes through and everything goes according to plan. It will be located here in St. Louis, and will be a unit that features a diverse and extreme mix of skills and talents. Only the very best of this field office will be kept here, and we have a short list of prospects to head up the units and teams.”
    “Wow.”
    “Yes. That’s another reason you were called in tonight. You are on the list to stay here. Ed picked several agents personally based on his observations, despite any weaknesses in the personnel files. You were one of them.”
    He smiled, his teeth flashing white against his dark skin, made even darker by the night surrounding them. “There aren’t any weaknesses in my personnel jacket.”
    “That you know of.”

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