The Shadow of Mudflap (A Foxtrot Team Novel #1) by Christi Snow, M.F. Smith Page A

of months. I’ll find a house after football season is over, but until then, I need a place to crash. This is a four bedroom house so you have room for me. You aren’t gonna be the one to throw the Tech football program into jeopardy are you?”
    Hell, how could he argue with that? “Fine, but you’re going to be sleeping on a lumpy futon, because that’s all that’s left.”
    “No worries. I’ll just have my bed delivered here.” And TC walked down the hall like he owned the place.
    Mudflap looked over at Derek who asked, “Want me to make coffee?”
    “Hell, yes. Lots of it.” He glanced over at the clock. He had to get to the fire station for work and he needed to check on Grant, who’d miraculously survived the attempt on his life, but was still in a coma. Life had gotten incredibly complicated over the last few weeks.
    How exactly had he gone to having his own place to living with two other guys in three months? Fuck, at this rate, his place was going to be like a frat house by the end of the year.
     
    Shanae
    Later that morning, Shanae held a death grip on her coffee cup, daring anyone to take her caffeine from her today. She’d take them out with a stir-stick if she had to. She knew how to do that. Having to function on so little sleep made her feral.
    When she stepped into the war room, the frenetic energy was even more crazy than normal. Her boss, Daniel, immediately saw her as she walked in and waved her over to the table where most of the rest of her team was already sitting. “Sit down and I’ll give you a quick briefing. Then you all have a new job to report in to.”
    She glanced around the table, but most everyone looked as confused as she felt as she took her seat.
    Daniel began, “We’ve had several developments over the last twenty-four hours and we have our analysts trying to connect the dots, but right now things are very sketchy. First, there was an attempt on the life of the firefighter who’s currently in a coma from the cotton gin fire. We don’t know if the two things are related or not, but we’re moving forward on the assumption that they are since the fire was the first incident tying ALT to the current situation.”
    He turned toward Shanae. “His partner, Mudflap Davidson, was there when the attempt was made and is the entire reason why the attempt was thwarted. He has paramedic training and realized his partner was poisoned via his IV. Mudflap also saw the person who administered the drug and he is still at large, so I need you to watch for any threats. His life could also be in danger.”
    Daniel pushed a button and a police sketch flickered on the screen of the assailant.
    A ball of dread built in the pit of Shanae’s stomach. She didn’t like the idea of Mudflap in danger. She hadn’t seen him since their date, but that hadn’t kept her from constantly thinking and obsessing about him and where their night might have gone if she hadn’t been called into work.
    “To increase the complications in this case, we have an additional situation. Yesterday morning the head coach of the Texas Tech football program suddenly resigned. He’s been receiving threats from an undisclosed group. He’s been extremely uncooperative with authorities on what exactly those threats entailed, stating he won’t risk the safety of his family. It’s believed he wouldn’t have reported any of it, but he doesn’t want to have to pay the millions of dollars he’ll need to break his contract with Texas Tech. We can’t make him talk, but something or someone has sent this guy running scared to the point where he’s just destroyed an extremely lucrative career. Combined with the increase in terrorist chatter, we’re thinking the incidents are related.”
    Murmurs around the table increased. Living in Lubbock, they all lived and breathed Texas Tech football, especially this season. It was simply the way of life out here, even for transplants. To say this was a surprise was putting it