Chapter Two
Dalton
He slammed through the metal door and yanked at the Velcro holding his tactical vest in place.
“My office, now,” Ace snarled.
Dalton scowled toward the far end of the brightly lit room they called the bullpen to where his boss stood.
The man’s big shoulders filled up the doorway to the office on the far side. Fluorescent lights flooded the room and a window that lined the wall near the top of the bullpen sent a smidge of light from the Southern California moon reflecting into the room. It was the only window they’d carved into the place, which was a bunker, really. All concealed beneath the Stone Ground Brewery.
Ace had told them gathering here was temporary. Yeah, and that had been several months ago. It no longer felt short-term. Truth be told, he didn’t mind; the place Pegasus called headquarters was growing on him.
Tossing Mason, Gage, and the two FBI asshats a dark look, he stalked through the desks in the wide room and entered Ace’s office. Reaching the far end of the large room, he dropped down into one of the vacant chairs that sat in front of his boss’ wide oak desk after Ace took a seat behind it.
That they were meeting to debrief in Ace’s office instead of the bullpen spoke volumes and he didn’t have to wait long to hear why.
“Ventura County PD reported shots fired in the vicinity very near where you were,” Ace growled at him, his booming voice cutting deep. And fuck if Dalton’s stomach didn’t sink a bit. “What happened to a peaceful meeting?”
Just fucking great. He squeezed his hands into fists and scowled. So much for staying under the radar of the local cops.
“Yeah, well,” he said, jerking his head toward the two FBI agents who’d followed them into the room. “Those two clowns started shooting the minute Sphinx showed up.”
“He’s a wanted fugitive,” FBI Agent Swather snarled, running a hand over his shiny black comb-over.
“That’s right,” Agent Sweenie said, backing up his partner, puffing out his chest in an attempt to look bigger.
Dalton scowled and Sweenie glanced away.
“Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum are out for blood,” Dalton snapped.
Someone moved from the corner of the office, and Dalton had his weapon pulled out of his holster before the person even registered. Old habits from his military days kept him on his toes.
“Put that away,” Ace ordered, and he tucked the gun back.
“You remember Agent Farnsworth,” Ace continued.
Dalton squinted at the flat-faced, sixty-something, pudgy man with a mustache that curled over his top lip. The guy twisted the end of the hairs like he was some character from Sherlock Holmes, the wannabe motherfucker.
He gave the guy a dark look before turning back to Ace.
“You want Sphinx alive or dead?” he rasped.
“Dead,” Farnsworth said.
“Alive,” Ace snapped, throwing Farnsworth an annoyed look.
“Then next time, you might want to keep the team to in-house staff only,” Dalton said.
Through the exchange, neither Mason nor Gage spoke a word, but he knew they felt the same. Pegasus worked well when they didn’t have outside help, and after six fucking weeks of playing cat and mouse to a national traitor, Sphinx had finally agreed to a meeting. They’d even gotten close enough to exchange words. Albeit, the words were shouted, but that was a fuck ton closer than ever before. And it had all been for nothing.
“These two are more like hired guns than agents.” He jerked his head to the FBI agents.
“Fuck you!” Sweenie snarled, still puffed up.
“You seemed to be in an awful hurry to kill him.” Dalton’s voice dripped with innuendos. “I wonder why that is?”
“Rein your man in or I’ll do it for you,” Farnsworth snapped at Ace.
And holy fuck was that the wrong thing to say to the boss.
Ace went still, much like a cobra would. His boss locked those silvery eyes on Farnsworth.
“Get the fuck out of my facility.” The words were growled.
It took a moment for the order to register to the Special Agent-in-Charge and when they did, the man’s face turned a deep shade of purple.
“This is my case! You were brought in because I was told you were the best.” Farnsworth fisted his hands. “You can’t fire me.”
“Get out,” Ace repeated, half rising from his chair.
“This is bullshit! You haven’t heared the end of this,” Farnsworth sputtered, tripping in his haste to back away from Ace.
“Tell it to the SecDef at your next luncheon,” Ace said between clenched teeth with a tiny muscle ticking in his jaw.
After Farnsworth beat a hasty retreat, Ace slowly settled back in his chair.
“You two might as well join your boss,” Dalton said to the other two FBI agents, beating Ace to it.
Sweenie and Swather stood, chairs crashing back. Both tossed angry glances their way before stomping out the door.
Gage shoved out of his chair and followed the three men out to the steps that would lead them to the entryway and back up to the brewery above. When it sounded like they weren’t moving fast enough, Gage’s deep voice rang out, “I’ll shut the door after you.”
Gage was the team’s enforcer. Well, one of them, anyway. Typically, people left when Gage got in their faces and today was no exception.
Dalton turned his eyes back to Ace and held his boss’s silvery gaze until the outer door closed and Gage resumed his seat in the office.
Mason, who’d been abnormally quiet so far, stood and booted the office door shut with a crack before sprawling back in his chair.
“Fill me in,” Ace ordered.
“We met at the place Sphinx suggested. Before we could get close, the two agents opened fire,” he told Ace.
“Was Sphinx hit?”
Dalton rubbed his fingers over the hair on his jaw; he wore it too short for a beard, but too long for a full-on stubble. “I don’t know.”
“He was hit,” Mason said.
“How do you know?” Dalton snapped his gaze to Mason.
“Blood on the railing at the apartment.”
“We need to get Sphinx before the FBI kills him,” Dalton responded, pulling a hand down his face. Something about the former CIA agent unsettled him. He rubbed at his chest through his shirt.
“We also need to find out what the hell is going on,” Ace reminded them.
“We’d already have that information if we worked alone,” Mason said, earning a hard look from their boss.
“Just saying.” Mason shrugged.
“Don’t say,” Dalton growled.
Mason shot him a death glare, but fuck it, Mason was in enough trouble with Ace without popping off. The guy had gone off half-cocked on a few missions. Right now, though, Mason was keeping his wildness in check, but Dalton had a feeling it would only be a matter of time before Mason went off the rails. The guy was a hothead and not a team player.
Dalton wasn’t much of a team player either, but he’d taken a job with Pegasus and would act accordingly. No sense in being a thorn in the team’s side.
Ace was right, they needed to find out Sphinx’s side of the story.
Ace caught his attention. “Can you reach out to him again?”
He let out a breath. It had taken weeks to get Sphinx to agree to a meeting—only to be shot at—so he was pretty sure the former agent wouldn’t meet again.
“I can try. He probably won’t respond.”
“Let him know where you’ll be,” Ace suggested.
“And if he shows up and shoots me?”
“Wear a vest.”
“I have a feeling he’ll take a headshot.” Dalton smirked at Ace.
Ace squinted. “You serious?”
“I don’t know, but he’s got to be pretty pissed,” he said.
“If Sphinx sold that list, then he has no right to be pissed,” Mason interjected. “He’s got to know someone is coming for him.”
The list Mason spoke of was filled with names from the intelligence community that included several US operatives and also assets. The only problem was that, according to ASAC Farnsworth, Sphinx’s name was on the list he stole and sold.
Which posed the question: Why sell your own name to the enemy? Farnsworth’s answer was that Sphinx must have deleted his name from the list before selling it. Dalton didn’t buy it. There was also the fact that Sphinx had agreed to meet. Why agree to that if you’re guilty? Shit didn’t add up.
His phone buzzed with a silent reminder and he stared down at the calendar alert. Adam’s birthday . He’d set the alert for yearly. Should he try to find Adam’s new number and call? He nixed the thought the second it happened. Adam had changed his number, hence his desire not to be bothered. Not that the guy ever knew he’d called in the first place, but the bottom line was that Adam was happy, and it was best to leave him alone.
“See if Jacob can send Sphinx another message through that message board you used.” Ace’s voice jogged him back to the wide office and he nodded, tucking his phone and thoughts of Adam away.
Jacob Burns was the unit’s technical genius. He’d been the one to find out how to contact Sphinx in the first place. Dalton shoved from his chair and filed to the door along with Mason and Gage, but before stepping through, he paused.
Usually, when someone stole secrets, the government wanted the guy caught to get information. Important information, like who Sphinx sold the list to. This didn’t seem to be the case. The FBI wanted Sphinx eliminated, and that bugged the shit out of him.