It was obvious to me Karen had a lot to think about. I understood what I left her with was going to take a while to process. Over the next week I tried to give her some space. We hardly spoke. I got the feeling she was at least to some extent avoiding me. She was well capable of doing her own home work on me. And I hoped in doing so it would help to verify what I was telling her, she as much as admitted she already had. I did worried that flags were being raised. I knew there were those from my past that paid attention. Not only to me, this is how it was. Teams looked after each other. But if people were asking questions about me. It would attract attention.
I needed to do some homework on my own.
***************
"We aren't getting any younger Jim, you would think we would be able to come up with an easier way to get together."
"Ha! You know the penchant I have for fresh Yellowtail." I replied. "Now come on don't stop paddling it will be light in a half hour and best I could tell from the sat image we've still got a half mile before we'll start seeing kelp paddies."
We paddled our ocean kayaks another twenty minutes and started seeing kelp. "It's going to be light pretty quick," Chris stopped paddling and threw out a line and put the rod in a rod holder. I scanned the horizon looking for boats and also for birds working the surface as I rigged one of my rods and threw out as well. It was getting light and we both knew we could expect our lures to get hit any time as we trolled them close to the kelp.
"Hook up! Whoo hoo!" Chris was bit.
And I knew I wouldn't hear the end of it...wham! My rod had a deep bend in it. "It's a double!" I shouted as I took the rod out of the holder and set the hook. I leaned back hard on the fish trying to turn it before It reached the kelp. I pumped the rod a couple of times gaining some line each time. I looked at Chris and he had his gaff in his lap as he brought his fish in close to his kayak. Then with the smooth coordinated expertise I had come to expect from him he held his fishing pole with one hand and stuck his fish with the other.
Chris had his binoculars out and was scanning the area While I was getting my fish close. I knew I wouldn't hear the end of it if I wasn't able to match his dexterity in gaffing my fish. This was a nice yellow I guessed at fifteen lbs. or better and I knew when I got him to pass by my boat I needed to be on my game, because it would happen fast and I might not get another shot at it. It had pulled me close to the kelp and it was a race. "Got him!!" I held up a three foot long yellow tail with the gaff.
We paddled close to each other to check out the others catch. When I held my fish up Chris's grin told me all I needed to know. As I cut the gills on my fish to bleed it out (a trick I had learned from a deck hand here in San Diego.) Chris held up a very nice fish that looked to be at least six inches longer than mine. "So what ya got there?" He smiled chewing his gum.
"You know what I have, as I slid the fish in my insulated bag with ice in it. Chris was competitive, like I could talk. It was part of the personality type. Chris had been a tier one operator as a seal. And we worked together in the security force after he left the teams.
Because we were such good friends he knew this wasn't just a social trip. But also because even with his age he still had maintained some of the cockiness that was part of being a seal. He let his competitive nature take over and cast his lure toward the kelp and made a comment these fish weren't going to wait on us.
After a few more fish Chris paddled over to my kayak and looked over the top of his sunglasses making eye contact with me and decided it was time to get down to business. "What are we fishing for here Cuz?" Chris's nick name for me. Since were worked together.
"I have started seeing a woman. And, well...if I don't screw it up things are getting a little serious. We met while on vacation in Oregon and, well...she is... its hard to explain." Chris was grinning from ear to ear as I stammered my way through telling him about Karen. I looked at him in a way that showed I didn't appreciate him enjoying my discomfort.
"It seems Karen is quite a catch Cuz." He was beaming and continued chomping on his gum with that same grin. I hadn't said her name yet, but had a pretty good idea how he knew it. I'm sure this was amusing for Chris though, knowing he possibly knew more about her than I did. "You know how it is when people start sniffing around asking questions about one of our own. We pay attention and do some sniffing around our selves. We came up with Al." Now it was starting to making sense.
"Al was in the teams a generation before me." Chris continued. I'm not seeing anything to be overly concerned about. "Your girl is in good hands. Al is a good man she is lucky to have him. I'm not sure how she landed one like him though, they don't grow them on trees you know."
"Yah, well money can buy you good help."
"Are you sure you're in your league here Jim? She's rich. I mean really, really rich. When we started looking into who was behind the inquiry's into you, we ran into a lot of dead ends. And you know that's either big government or big money. We're not seeing any government, just lots and lots of money." Chris continued.
"Do you know anything about Kyle?"
"Very little, his name was mentioned by one of Karens friends. Maybe a boy friend or husband. It sounds like he was killed or something." I shook my head indicating I didn't have many details.
"Killed in action. It seems Kyle was an EOD tech. He did a few tours all over the Middle East, even was attached to the Secret Service at one point." Chris was still looking at me over his sunglasses. That could explain Karen maintaining some distance. I thought to my self.
We had been sitting there so long drifting motionless that the wild life started to act like we weren't there. Bait fish were coming up and boiling all around us. We both knew what it was and that the race was on. Who could get to his rod first. I dropped my plastic bait first with my reel in free spool and in an instant I could feel the line start to peel off the spool. I slammed the reel into gear and my rod doubled over and my kayak started to turn to follow the fish. "Big fish." I said under my breath.
I looked at Chris and could see that he was seething that it was my bait the fish choose and not his. He reeled up as fast as he could and in one fluid motion let the bait fly toward the kelp paddy. Immediately he was bit as it hit the water. "Bigger fish." Chris smiled as he said it loud enough for me to hear.
Chris landed a log of a barracuda and I was still engaged in a tug of war. "Might want to stay handy with that gaff." I told him "I might need a hand with this one." Looking at me and laughing he threw his bait at the paddy. It was just like him. And I cant say wouldn't have done the same thing. If there is one barracuda there is a school of them. In seconds he had another on.
I was struggling with this fish, taking up some line and then losing some. It was going on the half hour I was in this battle. Finally I was gaining on it. Chris got another barracuda and had just shake it off the gaff as I brought the huge home guard yellow tail up next to me, and with the same motion Chris made a perfect gaff to the head and hoisted a forty pound fish on to his boat. "I'm here for ya buddy."
He was, and always had been as long as I knew him. My mind went back to the first time we were in a fire fight together. I wasn't an operator, I was there to gather intelligence. But the op went south and it was all hands on deck, if you could shoot, you needed to. There was a threat we could be overrun we were out numbered three to one. Early on I took a round to my shoulder and with all the adrenaline I barely noticed it.
After all the bad guys were dead one of the operators came over and took my M16 from me, I started to protest and he calmly said "You can't have it while we fix you up." I hadn't even noticed the blood soaking into my sleeve.
It really wasn't serious, I just got "trimmed" Chris said and after half a dozen stitches he had me "good to go."
Chris threw the fish into the well on my kayak. And gave me a fist bump.
"Karen has been uncharacteristically quiet. We have only spoken a few times this week and I have texted a few times and barely received a response. I'm afraid she's having trouble with the news of my former vocation."
"Does she know about Kim?" Chris asked.
"No, things really have moved fast between us. We are just now getting into our lives before we met. I'm in a much different place now than when Kim left me."
"I know buddy, but she is going to have to know if its getting serious. She has to know."
"You are right, she does, but I dropped such a bomb the other day about what I used to do and she didn't take it well. I hope another wont be a deal breaker." Chris was beginning to see how much Karen was starting to mean too me.
***************
"Al, you said Jim checked out. "He's solid." Is the term you used. Now he tells me all this spy, intelligence stuff. And you knew? And didn't tell me?" It was obvious Karen was upset and had been crying, Al had paused in his morning routine checking in on her to see what was wrong. In the years he had worked for Karen they had grown close and she trusted him. He had proven himself to be a wise counsel for her.
"He is solid and he deserves to be the one to tell you his own story. Let him have that. Have you told him about Kyle?" Karen looked down starting to feel like all of this was unraveling faster than she could stop it. "No...I, no I haven't." She started to cry again. "Jim can't even tell me where he has been, what he did, I don't even know if what he has told me is true!"
"Talk to him!" Al took her hand. "And you do know. You know. Karen what do you know about me?" She looked up at him. Puzzled. "Karen you hired me knowing I was a Seal. Beyond that you have no idea about what that means. Where I have been and what I did there. You cant know. I cant tell you."
