Paul R. West
Simon Hardman is back in the sequel Old Tides. He finally feels like he has won life’s lottery. With his home on the western tip of the Choctawhatchee everyday is just another day in paradise. His daughters are now living with him and their mother has accepted his marriage proposal. Paradise is interrupted when two of his closest friends are brutally murdered. It doesn’t take Simon long to understand someone is out for revenge and that the past can never be hidden for long. The brother of a man Simon killed has tracked him to Fort Walton and wants revenge. It all comes to a head in the middle of a thunderstorm on a small island located in the middle of Biscayne Bay.
Paul R. West was an U.S Navy airdale, construction worker and presently a senior engineer with a major defense contractor. Paul spent many years living abroad and traveling in the Mediterranean. He spent three years living on the island of Sicily before moving to New Orleans and then South Florida. During the mid-eighties he moved to North Georgia where he still lives today. Paul decided several years ago to create a group of characters and now has a series of books started called the ‘Tides’.
It was a cold day for the panhandle of Florida during the third week of January. A cold wave pushed down from the north out of Alaska across Texas reaching to Georgia including the top half of Florida setting record low temperatures for over a week. The orange crops were at stake and the growers were working hard to prevent heavy losses. Most were veterans when it came to the once or twice a year freezes and were prepared to battle Mother Nature.
Christian Bell flew into Fort Walton on the fifth day of the cold front. He would land at Hurlburt early Friday morning before the base revved up for the day. Hurlburt Field is named after 1st Lieutenant Donald W. Hurlburt was killed during a training flight on October 1, 1943. The airfield is the home of the Special Operations Command and the 16th Special Operations, the greatest Spec Ops group in the world.
It was also a great place to land when you didn’t want a lot of questions asked or people seeing you come and go. People kept their mouths shut on this base. Chris preferred to land at military bases for another reason. In his job as head of the DEA drug operations for Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi, death threats were a way of life and it was safer coming and going through a military base versus commercial airports. He was in charge of a large area of America’s coastline.
Christian was waiting in the building next to the ramp where his personal plane was parked. The agency took care of Chris. He and his people were the best in drug enforcement business. In the never-ending saga of fighting the smuggling of illegal drugs into the country, the southeastern sector was the most famous for large drug busts and money found in banks squirreled away by the drug cartels. Chris’s team of accountants were just as good as the undercover teams like Simon’s. You had to go after the cartels on both fronts.
Chris put his bags in the back and got in the front with Simon.
“Hey boss, welcome to the North Pole.”
“I have to say that’s the most clothes I have ever seen you wear. Damn its cold here, its seventy-five degrees in Miami.”
“Hey don’t rub it in boss.”
I was dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt and underneath was a pair of the new lightweight thermal gear used by runners and football players. The stuff was better than the old style cotton long underwear. I also had on a light green flight jacket. I was wearing my pistol in a shoulder rig, instead of behind my back like I normally did when it was hot weather.
“So, who’s at your house this morning, are the girls in school?” Chris asked in a concerned voice. He looked straight ahead out the front window. His eyes scanned the area in front him like radar.
Chris caught me off guard with that question. It had an ominous sounded to it. I wonder what he carrying in his brief case. He has quite a grip on it.
“Just Lori and me, the girls are at school. Marty and my sister Sue will be in later today. They are making their plans on getting married.”
Chris looked at me and with his best boss look and said “Great, maybe you should do the same thing with Lori.” He sounded more like a father than a boss.
“That decision is up to Lori boss, I am ready anytime.”
Was I ready to make the leap into marriage? I’ve been a loner for thirty-four years and now instant family. The decision was Lori’s. We had talked one night after she had moved down to my house and I told her when she was ready to take our relationship to the next step to let me know. That I wasn’t going to put any kind of demands or pressure on her. I loved her to much to do that to her. No doubt about it, I would marry Lori in a heartbeat if that’s what she wanted.
