While he sensed a potential storm brewing between them, Brantley didn’t have the time or patience to delve into their problems.
“Good,” he told them. “I’ll check in with JJ, see if she has any suggestions on where to go next. Grab some food, and I’ll let you know what I find.”
“And I’ll call Z,” Reese announced. “See if he’s heard anything.”
The six of them stood there for a moment, and Brantley wondered what the problem was, but again, he didn’t care to ask.
It wasn’t until Evan, Becs, Slade, and Atticus headed in the opposite direction that Reese spoke up. “You realize what you just did there, right?”
“I split up the teams so we can cover more ground,” he said, staring at his partner.
“No, you poked the bear.”
Brantley glanced behind him in the direction the group had gone. “What bear?”
“Evan.”
“What’s wrong with Evan?”
Reese fell into step beside him, Tesha walking between them. “Nothin’s wrong with him, per se. He’s just got a thing for Becs.”
Brantley frowned. “Really? I thought Slade had a thing for her based on the way he ogled her last night.”
“There’s a good chance that’s true, too,” Reese muttered.
“Are they fightin’ over her?”
“Nope.”
“You know that for a fact?”
Reese’s eyebrows rose slowly. “Nope.”
Brantley didn’t get it. “It bother you?”
“What? That they’re fraternizin’? No.” Reese looked over as he pulled out his phone. “You call JJ. I’ll call Z. Let’s see what else we can do before we lose daylight.”
With more questions than answers, Brantley grabbed his phone and dialed JJ’s number. He hoped like hell she had an idea of where to go next. Otherwise, he saw no reason to stick around. And based on Reese’s reaction yesterday, Brantley knew he was the only one.
Chapter Fifteen
“Honestly, Z, I don’t know what morewe can do.”
Reese stared at Brantley while the man finished the conversation with Z. Reese had called his brother, but when Z told him he didn’t have anything more for them to go on, Brantley had taken over the call. Evidently, JJ hadn’t come up with anything else, either.
For the time being, they were standing still with no direction to go in. Now, as they sat at the table in the small hamburger joint they’d come across, Reese wondered if anyone had been doing the same thing when he was missing. He’d never gotten a full account of the search, and he figured that was because there hadn’t been one. Not an official one. Reese had been one of many fallen soldiers who were left behind.
Had his teammates sat at a table like this one, trying to determine where, if anywhere, they should search next? Or had they hoped that he’d surface on his own?
“Give it a little more time,” Z replied, his voice sounding through the speaker.
“Twenty-four hours, Z. That’s all we’ve got,” Brantley stated firmly.
“Fine. I’ll file the flight plan for tomorrow afternoon. If you don’t come up with anything by … let’s say two your time, head to the airport.”
“Will do.”
Brantley disconnected and passed his phone back to Reese.
