Chapter 1:

I stared at the report in shock. I really hadn’t expected this. No one had. But here it was in front of me. There was no denying it any longer. I leaned forward and pressed the button for the intercom.

“Everyone report to the conference room immediately.”

Through the door, I heard my voice echoing over the loudspeaker. No one was going to believe me. But we had to accept what was right in front of us. I slid my hand into my pocket and clutched onto Betty. Anger rose inside me as I realized we’d all failed in protecting one of our own. I wanted to find whoever did this and kill them.

Then again, I knew Rafe was responsible. Everything that had gone wrong recently was because of him, and my team would be out for blood when I told them what was in this file. I shoved back from my desk and made my way to the conference room. Eva met up with me along the way and shot me a weird look.

“Is it what I think it is?”

“Yes.”

Her hand gripped mine and squeezed. “It’s not possible.”

“That’s what I thought too.”

“No one’s going to believe it.”

“Trust me, I know this is gonna be a shitshow.”

I shoved the door open to the conference room and made my way to the head of the table. Eva stood by my side, never straying. I was grateful, because this was going to be hard enough as it was. The banter going around the room made it difficult to interrupt.

“I’m just saying, if we all shift one seat to the left, then there’s a more symmetrical seating arrangement,” Lock argued. “It’s not that hard.”

“Except that every one of us has to get up and move to make your OCD feel better,” Scottie retorted. “Enough is enough.”

“You had no problem with my seating charts when you met Quinn and wanted her to sit next to you at the table,” he shot back.

“That was different. She was new to the group, and my date for the evening. I don’t see anyone dating someone in here,” Scottie snapped, making a point of looking at every person around the table. 

“Hey, everyone, quite down!” I shouted over the chaos.

“Boss, tell them to move,” Lock glared at me.

“Boss, I’m not moving anywhere unless it’s out the door,” Scottie argued.

“You’re acting like a petulant child,” Lock shot back.

“Says the man that wants everyone to move so he can have his spot.”

“Enough!” I shouted, silencing everyone. They all stared at me in shock. It wasn’t like me to raise my voice. I was usually one of the guys whenever I could be. We had the type of relationship in which they listened and respected me, but didn’t treat me any differently. 

Fox shoved his chair back and whistled loudly, despite the room already being quiet. “Alright, the boss has something to say, so everyone be quiet!”

“Thank you,” I said, rolling my eyes internally. “I just had a report come in—”

The whole room groaned. Reports were never a fun thing.

“From the coroner’s office. They’ve finally positively identified that the remains on the plane were those of FNG.” The whole room was silent as the news sunk in. “I know this is a shock and a lot to take, but—”

“Nah, that’s not FNG,” Dash said. 

I stood there with my mouth gaping, then looked back at the file. “Uh…yes, it is.”

“No, it’s really not. FNG can’t die,” Dash continued. 

“Look, I know this is hard. You spent the most time with him before his untimely death—”

“I spent a lot of time with him too,” Thumper said, raising his hand.

“Then you know this really is FNG.”

He shook his head. “Nah, I’m with Dash on this one. It’s not FNG.”

“Rae saw him on the plane! So did Fox!” I argued.

“It was an illusion,” Thumper said. “I’m telling you, it wasn’t him.”

I pulled out the coroner’s report that clearly identified the remains, then showed it to all of them. “It says right here! The dental records verified it was him.”

“Dental records can be altered,” Fox spoke up, lifting his feet up onto the table. He opened a bag of Funyuns and popped one in his mouth. “Have you ever seen some of those mafia movies?”

“This is not a mafia movie,” I said in frustration.

“It could be,” IRIS said. “Let’s look at this from an explosives standpoint. Yes, there was an explosion. Yes, it would take out anyone on that plane. But was he really on that plane?”

My brows furrowed in confusion as murmurs of agreement filled the room. “How is that from an explosives standpoint? What does him being or not being on the plane have to do with explosives?”

IRIS laughed at me. “Well, boss, I think you would know by now that in order for an explosive device to take you out, you have to be close to it. You were by the plane when it exploded.”

“I know!” I shouted in frustration. “So was FNG.”

“You know, I’ve been thinking about this a lot,” Fox said, licking the yellow dust from his fingers. “There’s always the idea that he plastered a picture of himself to the window.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose, irritated by the insanity of this conversation. “He plastered a picture of himself to the window of the plane to trick us all into thinking he was on the plane so we would all assume he died. Then, he faked the coroner’s report and added in his dental records for good measure. Is that what you’re telling me?”

He shrugged. “It’s a working theory.”

“And why would he do that?”

He chuckled as he stared at me. “Boss, I think that’s pretty obvious.”

Everyone else in the room nodded in agreement. “Okay, tell me because I have no fucking clue what you’re talking about.”

“Well, obviously—”

“Here we go,” Dash sighed. “This is just like the argument I had with FNG. Only that time it was over the word clearly.”

“Clearly is a good word,” Thumper agreed. “You know, at the time I was annoyed, but now that I think about it, I think clearly is underused in the English language.”

“Not if you’re arguing with FNG.”

I squeezed my eyes shut to drown out the stupidity. This was not the way this was supposed to go. I was going to come in here and tell them about how FNG tragically died. Then we were going to plan his funeral and mourn the loss of our colleague. Instead, we were arguing over the use of the word clearly.

Fox interrupted their bickering. “Hey, can we get back to what I was saying? Obviously, if you want a turn to speak, you need to raise your hand.”

“This isn’t elementary school,” Dash snapped at him.

“No, but the rules still apply in any decent society.”

“And you know what that is?” Thumper snorted.

Eli shoved back from his chair, whistling loudly. “Can I just point out that this is beyond absurd?”

“Thank you,” I said in exasperation. “Finally, someone with a voice of reason.”

He nodded to me. “Clearly, FNG didn’t stick a poster of himself to the window to trick us all into thinking he was on that plane.”

“Thank you!”

“I mean, come on. Any of us would have realized that the image on the poster wasn’t moving.”

“Exactly what I was thinking,” I said, though I hadn’t thought of that at all because the whole idea was ludicrous.

“Obviously,” he said slowly, nodding to Fox. 

“Thank you.”

Eli winked and continued. “Obviously, it was a face mask.”

I rolled my eyes and slumped down into my seat. It was like none of them were even interested in the science that was right in front of us on the piece of paper.

“You mean like in Mission Impossible?” Kavanaugh asked.

“Exactly! Remember, we’re talking about Rafe here. If anyone was going to pull off a job like this, it would be Rafe.”

“For what reason?” I shouted, shoving back my chair. “Do you even hear yourselves? The evidence is right the fuck in front of you, and you’re all coming up with excuses as to why this isn’t FNG!”

“Because it’s not,” Rae shrugged. “I mean, I was all on board at the beginning, but this makes more sense.”

I stared at her like an idiot. “Really? Someone put a face mask on FNG and boarded him on a plane to kill him?”

“No,” she said with a bite of attitude. “Obviously, someone else was wearing the face mask. Otherwise, FNG would be dead.”

“Ooh, or it was one of those hologram things,” Slider said excitedly.

“Wait, are we talking like a Star Wars thing?” Scottie asked.

“Exactly like that!”

“New movies or old movies? Or is it more like Mandalorian?”

“Does it matter?” Slider asked.

Scottie scoffed, staring at Slider like he was an idiot. “Does it matter? Are you kidding? Of course, it matters! The CGI was so much better in the new ones.”

“Yeah, and Rafe would cheap out on something like that,” Brock added.

“If Rafe was involved,” Thumper sighed. “How do we know he had his hand in this? Maybe this is FNG’s big plan to make us all believe he finally died, but then he comes back from the dead.”

“That’s exactly what I was trying to say!” Fox yelled. “Nobody listens to me!”

Thumper nodded to him. “That’s what I say happened.”

“With a hologram?” I asked testily.

“Obviously, he has some really good equipment,” Scottie chuckled. “I mean, he wouldn’t go to all the trouble of pretending to kill himself only to do a bad job of it.”

Pressing my fists to the table, I did my level best to regain my composure so I didn’t pull out my gun and shoot all of them. I was getting tired of the arguments, and this wasn’t helpful to any of us. “Alright, here’s what we’re going to do. First and foremost, we’re going to ban the use of the words clearly and obviously. Second, we are going to accept that FNG is dead and plan a funeral for the man. He deserves that much.”

“Yeah,” Edu laughed. “If you think it’s not a waste of time to plan a funeral for a person that’s still alive.” 

“He’s not still alive!” I snapped. “The records are right the fuck in front of you! Is there a single person in this room that actually believes what the evidence in front of us is saying?”

They all looked around at each other, but none of them raised their hands. My eyes locked on Eva, who was doing everything possible to ignore me, averting her eyes to a spot on the wall.

“Seriously?”

She finally looked at me. “What?”

“You believe this nonsense?”

“They make some very valid points. Besides, I’m not sure FNG would be very happy if we actually believed he was dead.”

“He won’t care because his body is about to live with the worms!”

“Geez, that’s not a very nice way to talk about our teammate, boss,” Fox said.

“I’m trying to get you all to see that FNG is dead. I’m sorry to have to keep harping on this, but he’s gone. And the sooner you all accept that, the easier this will be on all of us!”

I eyed them all one last time before I turned and stormed out of the room. I wanted the records to be a lie, but these were straight from the coroner’s office from a trusted colleague. There was no way to spin this in our favor. The fact was, FNG was gone. We had failed him, and now we had to give him a proper burial.

✯

Eva looked gorgeous in her black dress. With her belly bump showing proudly, I couldn’t help but get a woody when looking at her. It was wrong. We were headed to a funeral, but that didn’t mean my cock would listen to me when I told him to be sad. She stood in front of the mirror and adjusted her earrings, then smiled at me.

“Are you ready for this?” she asked.

“As ready as I’ll ever be. I haven’t had to bury someone in a while. And never someone that worked for me.”

She turned around, shooting me a sad smile. “I know this is hard, but FNG wouldn’t want you to be sad.”

I sighed and took her outstretched hand. “I appreciate that.” I pulled her in for a hug, then frowned as I thought about what she said. I stepped back and looked at her questioningly. “Wait, are you saying that because you truly think he’d want us to be happy, or because you don’t think he’s dead and wouldn’t want us to believe it?”

She bit her lip, trying not to show her embarrassment. “Do you really want to know?”

“Christ!” I shouted, turning around in anger. “Does anyone actually feel sad today?”

“Not really. I doubt anyone sees the point in going.”

Huffing, I grabbed her hand and stormed out of the house, ignoring everyone else around me that was pretending to put on a glum face so that I didn’t yell at them. It was ridiculous that a member of this team died and no one seemed to care. 

They all followed Eva and me outside to our vehicles. I gently placed Eva in the passenger seat, then closed the door and glared at all the men around me. “A good man died. Let’s remember that today.”

I got in and drove to the cemetery, still fuming over our current predicament. Since FNG had no family, there was no point in having a service at the funeral home. It was only us and a few people that knew him from town attending. When we pulled into the cemetery and found his grave, a heavy weight pulled at my chest. I stared at the casket still raised above the ground and swallowed the feeling of failure I hadn’t let go of since the moment I saw the report from the coroner’s office.

“Hey,” Eva said, stepping out of the minivan. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah. Let’s just get this over with.”

We made our way across the grass, through the hundreds of headstones that were well-maintained by loved ones. I’d have to be sure to hire a service to take care of his plot. I stopped in front of the casket and stared at the lid. Underneath was just a pile of bones. It wasn’t right that no one could even see him to say goodbye.

As the rest of the guys gathered around and the women stood stoically beside them, the minister stepped up and the ceremony began. At first, all I could hear were the birds chirping, but then I heard what sounded like some kind of slapping. Discreetly, I glanced over my shoulder and glared at Fox and Dash, who were taking turns trying to slap each other’s hands like ten-year-old boys.

“What are you doing?” I hissed.

Dash’s eyes widened as he cleared his throat and straightened up. “Sorry, boss.”

I narrowed my eyes at Fox, but he just shrugged with a smile. I shook my head, heaving a big sigh as I turned back to the ceremony. The father looked at me to continue and I nodded. Leave it to the guys to behave like immature teenagers when we were supposed to be respecting their friend.

The ceremony droned on, and as I looked around, I caught a few of the guys playing on their phones. I should have taken them away when we got here. Slider was leaning against Edu, his head on his shoulder as he snored. Fuck, did no one have respect for anyone else?

“At this time, I would ask if anyone would like to step forward and say a few words.”

I was the first to step up. After all, he was my employee. It was only right I say something. I faced all of them and cleared my throat, pulling at my tie that felt like it was strangling me.

“Um…It’s hard to think of just one time that stands out in my mind about FNG. He was…a pain in the ass. I mean, the lengths he would go to prove he couldn’t die were ridiculous.”

I heard a snort in the crowd. “Like now?”

I couldn’t see who spoke, but my lips tightened in anger as I stared them all down. “As I was saying, FNG was well-liked by everyone, even if he didn’t have a team.”

“Because he saw your woman with Rafe,” Thumper snorted. Again, I narrowed my eyes at him. “Sorry, I forgot that was still a sore spot.”

“He was…” Christ, I couldn’t even remember where I was. I cleared my throat again and tried to get back on track. “He was a good friend to us all. He…loved beer and…jumping out of planes.”

Yep, it was official. This was the worst eulogy ever. I sucked at this. I really should have practiced more, but I had assumed that someone else would participate. 

“Ooh, and he loved shawarma!” Fox shouted out.

“Yes, he did,” I nodded, looking desperately into the crowd for anything else.

“And the word clearly,” Dash shouted. “I’m not saying it’s a great word, but clearly it’s better than obviously.”

I rolled my eyes as Fox strolled to the front, stopping right in front of Dash. “What exactly are you saying?”

“I’m saying that clearly is a better word, just as I already stated. Obviously implies that something is easily perceived, but perception is in the eye of the beholder. Clearly indicates that it is clear to all.”

“Yeah? So, if I were to say that Eva is obviously pregnant, would you say that’s in the eye of the beholder? Maybe you just think she’s fat.”

“Hey!” Eva snapped.

“Eva, you know I love you,” Fox grinned at her. “And you’re not fat,” he said, turning back to Dash, “which anyone can obviously see.”

“They can clearly see that because she has a belly bump consistent with pregnancy.”

I stepped forward and held up my hands. “Hey! We are not arguing over which word is better at FNG’s funeral!”

“I actually think he’d enjoy this, boss,” Lock chuckled.

“Hey, you know what he’d really like?” IRIS asked. “An explosive send off.”

“No!” I snapped. “We are not having explosions at a cemetery!”

“What about sparklers?” he asked.

Red laughed. “Yeah, because you set them up so well at the wedding. As I recall, you burned down our flower arch.”

“It was an accident!” IRIS shouted.

“You did it on purpose, and you know it! You just wanted to blow shit up!”

“Take it back,” IRIS snapped, rushing Red. My eyes widened as I ran forward to stop the fight, but Red side-stepped IRIS, then shoved him directly toward the casket. I was caught in his path and tried to get out of the way, but my ankle twisted and IRIS fell into me. And I fell onto the casket.

I heard it topple backward and then heard the sound of the lid popping open and bones rolling out. I sat up and looked behind me, wincing when I saw the casket completely upturned. This was not good.

I brushed off my clothes as I got to my feet. Kavanaugh stepped up beside me and we stared down at the bones scattered on the ground. “Fuck.”

“I know exactly how you feel, boss. It’s like when we were in the plane with that mummy and it flew against me. Creepiest fucking feeling in the world to see a dead guy pressed up against me.”

“You didn’t know that guy.”

He sighed. “Yeah, well, since that’s not FNG, you don’t know him either.”

He slapped me on the shoulder and walked away, along with everyone else.