she had started it before she even finished high school. She was selling her own designs online long before her senior year. To that she had given her father credit and she had been right to do so. He imagined the admiration she felt for her father made it that much more difficult to see the man he had become—or the man that he always was. Alex could sympathize, but he couldn’t empathize with her position. He was never really close to his parents. If the situation was his and it turned out that his father was the one betraying the country it wouldn’t devastate his world the way this was devastating hers. The relationship she had with her father was a relationship Alex would never know with his. That love, closeness and complete familial love wasn’t something he had been blessed to experience.
Carissa had heart, spirit and courage. It took a lot of courage to see something wrong and try to make it right. It took a lot of courage to keep fighting to be heard when everybody kept shutting the door in her face. It took a lot of courage to agree to help the Feds after what they’d threatened her with if she didn’t. Carissa struck him as the kind of woman who would have said no simply because they tried to intimidate her, but she had agreed because she knew what her father was doing was wrong. Those characteristics alone had pulled him past sexual attraction and started opening his mind to the possibility of having something a little deeper with this woman. Of course he had to figure out what was going on and how to save her from the situation she was now locked into. OTG was one of the fastest growing “militias” as they liked to call it, or domestic terrorists as the government liked to call them. They were also one of the most deadly. This wasn’t just some backwoods training camp. These men and women were experts in weapons, bombs, security and more. Not to mention the fact that some of the ones on the watch list were sitting very comfortably behind big corporate desks by day. They weren’t what people thought of when they thought of terrorists. They blended, which probably was part of what made them so dangerous. They were the teller at the local bank, the executive at the fortune five hundred company, the doctor at the religious hospital and even the mother breastfeeding her kid by day and making bombs at night.
He had heard some things about the group, but he wasn’t closely watching the progression of their activity. He had his own job and quite frankly stopping domestic terrorists was an FBI, Homeland Security joint mission effort now and he wasn’t a part of either organization. When the president insisted on creating a special task force Alex had heard about it. He had received a proposition to join and he had refrained. He loved what he was doing and being private sector was a heck of a lot better than going back into government work. He hated the politics of government work and he didn’t want to go back there. The team was still fairly young as a functioning group, only within the last couple years had they been established, but each of the men and women involved in monitoring OTG had been in the trenches of either agency for several years beforehand. They were seasoned, skilled and ready to take the group down whenever they could. Everybody thought that would be swiftly—everybody involved with the team that is. He knew differently. Even if he had joined them and gone in undercover as a decorated Marine tired of the political rat race, there was no way they were going to crack an organization this big and this strong overnight. Anybody who thought they could was seriously delusional.
He hadn’t had a chance to ask Carissa what she liked to eat before Julian went to get food. He figured he would keep lunch simple with a turkey, asparagus and light cream sauce Panini sandwich along with some fries. If she wanted some other kind of food he would have to see what he could do later in the
Carissa had heart, spirit and courage. It took a lot of courage to see something wrong and try to make it right. It took a lot of courage to keep fighting to be heard when everybody kept shutting the door in her face. It took a lot of courage to agree to help the Feds after what they’d threatened her with if she didn’t. Carissa struck him as the kind of woman who would have said no simply because they tried to intimidate her, but she had agreed because she knew what her father was doing was wrong. Those characteristics alone had pulled him past sexual attraction and started opening his mind to the possibility of having something a little deeper with this woman. Of course he had to figure out what was going on and how to save her from the situation she was now locked into. OTG was one of the fastest growing “militias” as they liked to call it, or domestic terrorists as the government liked to call them. They were also one of the most deadly. This wasn’t just some backwoods training camp. These men and women were experts in weapons, bombs, security and more. Not to mention the fact that some of the ones on the watch list were sitting very comfortably behind big corporate desks by day. They weren’t what people thought of when they thought of terrorists. They blended, which probably was part of what made them so dangerous. They were the teller at the local bank, the executive at the fortune five hundred company, the doctor at the religious hospital and even the mother breastfeeding her kid by day and making bombs at night.
He had heard some things about the group, but he wasn’t closely watching the progression of their activity. He had his own job and quite frankly stopping domestic terrorists was an FBI, Homeland Security joint mission effort now and he wasn’t a part of either organization. When the president insisted on creating a special task force Alex had heard about it. He had received a proposition to join and he had refrained. He loved what he was doing and being private sector was a heck of a lot better than going back into government work. He hated the politics of government work and he didn’t want to go back there. The team was still fairly young as a functioning group, only within the last couple years had they been established, but each of the men and women involved in monitoring OTG had been in the trenches of either agency for several years beforehand. They were seasoned, skilled and ready to take the group down whenever they could. Everybody thought that would be swiftly—everybody involved with the team that is. He knew differently. Even if he had joined them and gone in undercover as a decorated Marine tired of the political rat race, there was no way they were going to crack an organization this big and this strong overnight. Anybody who thought they could was seriously delusional.
He hadn’t had a chance to ask Carissa what she liked to eat before Julian went to get food. He figured he would keep lunch simple with a turkey, asparagus and light cream sauce Panini sandwich along with some fries. If she wanted some other kind of food he would have to see what he could do later in the