Chapter 10 #3
Jamie leaned up and nipped at Kyle’s mouth, pleased when he immediately parted his lips to let Jamie kiss him.
Jamie slipped his tongue into Kyle’s mouth, very thoroughly mapping out the taste of him, swallowing the soft moan Kyle couldn’t help but let out.
He vaguely heard the door behind the couch they were seated in slide open before someone let out a strangled cough.
Jamie broke the kiss with an irritated sigh.
“We’ll be right out,” he called over his shoulder, never taking his eyes off Kyle.
Kyle buried his face against Jamie’s neck, laughing, his whole body shaking with it. Behind them, Jamie heard Donovan heave out a sigh and make their apologies for them. The door slid shut, and Jamie let himself finally crack a smile now that no one could see him in the three-way mirror.
“You’re impossible,” Jamie said, pushing Kyle off his lap.
“Yeah, but you like me that way.”
Jamie reeled him back in by the sleeve of his tuxedo jacket for one last kiss that was just as deep as the last. “Yeah, I do.”
* * *
At 2137 on a Tuesday evening, Alpha Team got the green light to continue with their mission.
The UMG, after an emergency meeting with their counterparts in the United States and the European Alliance, agreed to the parameters of the job that Nikolaas Jansen wanted them to do.
That it would possibly destroy a family’s business and reputation, to say nothing of the people the Presnenskaya Bratva hoped to get their claws into, was a small price to pay, objectively speaking.
If the means to an end resulted in unearthing the location of the labs where Splice experiments were being performed by the criminal alliance, then the governments of more than a dozen countries believed it was worth the risk.
Kyle knew he should be appalled at the way the brass weighed out the decision—who was worth more, in the end, and who wasn’t—but he’d seen the same sort of decisions made in war.
He’d made them himself in the uncertainty of battle.
The majority outweighed the minority in democracy, and while this fight wasn’t a democracy, the results were still the same.
None of them would sleep easy, despite the decision being taken out of their hands. There was no clear conscience to be had with any of them as they accepted their orders to proceed. Alpha Team was the bullet, even if someone else was pulling the trigger, and they couldn’t ever escape that.
Casualties were inevitable in war.
When Katie initiated an uplink with Jansen in the home’s office Wednesday morning at 0900 sharp, the rest of the team was on hand to listen in and watch out of view of the camera feed as she greeted Jansen with a smile.
“Niko, good morning. Thanks for taking my call,” Katie said pleasantly.
“I’m surprised to hear from you so soon,” Niko replied. He looked tired through the uplink, as if he’d had another long night as a professional partier.
Katie shrugged and folded her hands together on the desk. She seemed cool and collected to Kyle’s eye, though it was anyone’s guess what Niko thought of her.
“I would have reached out to you last night, but it was after business hours, and I thought you might be otherwise occupied. We’ve accessed the solid state drive you gave me during our lunch on Sunday, and Root Source, Inc. is willing to work on the Saunders Kyle wasn’t sure who.
Katie gave Niko a closed-lipped smile. “I did say we would get the job done, did I not? While I didn’t realize when you assigned it to us that it would be a two-stage job—the encryption was a nice touch but not impossible to overcome—we’re more than capable of completing something like this.
I can set up a meeting with Mr. Saunders today if you like? ”
“I—let me reach out to Mr. Saunders first.”
“If you think the introduction will go more smoothly that way, then by all means, get in touch with him.” Katie lifted one hand to tuck a stray piece of blonde hair behind her ears.
“The testing of their firewall and other security systems will take several days before my company can recommend a viable fix. I understand, from your instructions on the drive, you’re looking for remote surveillance options? ”
“Yes. Mr. Saunders, ah, travels a lot for his job. He’s very hands-on, however, and likes to check in from wherever he’s staying, especially if there’s a problem. The remote access would be helpful, especially if the avenue itself is encrypted.”
Madison raised her hands and made air quotes while mouthing check in before rolling her eyes in an exaggerated manner. They all knew who’d really be doing the remote accessing.
“That won’t be an issue to set up.”
“I suppose not if you managed to crack the solid state drive’s security.” Niko didn’t exactly sound happy about that fact, but it was the job he asked them to do. He probably hadn’t thought they’d be successful.
“Now that you know my company can do the work you require of us, we do need to know who we will be contracting with. You mentioned before that it wouldn’t be Oksana but that a meet could happen at the gala. Jamie wants that meeting to go forward.”
“I was under the impression this was your company, Ekaterina.”
“It’s my company, Niko, but Jamie is my captain, in or out of the Marine Corps.”
“I see.” On the uplink, Niko pasted a wide smile on his face. “Please let Jamie know that we expect to see you all at the gala Friday night. A meeting with my employer isn’t guaranteed—”
“I’m sure whoever it is wouldn’t dream of passing up a chance to meet Jamie Callahan. He’s quite the businessman, after all. They’ll have plenty to speak about.”
Niko’s momentary pause before speaking was telling. “We’ll see. I’ll have you down on the list as a party of two?”
“Four,” Katie corrected. “My COO and CFO will also be attending. A networking chance like this in a foreign market is not one I’m willing to pass up. We’ll all be on hand to work.”
“You strike me as an exacting boss, Ekaterina.”
“You haven’t seen anything until you’ve seen Jamie giving orders in the field. Thank you for the gala invite, Niko. We look forward to meeting with your employer.”
Katie cut the uplink before he could respond. Only then did she wipe the bland smile off her face. “I don’t think he expected us to hack the drive.”
“Probably not so soon, but he should’ve known the gala would be a good incentive for us to try,” Sean said from his seat on one of the leather armchairs situated in front of the desk. The chair was angled enough that he’d been out of eyesight of the uplink feed and camera.
Jamie straightened up from where he was leaning against the wall near the door. “Good job, Katie.”
She propped her chin on her hand and closed down the holoscreens with the other. The spread of data on the screen embedded in the desk went opaque. “You realize I’m going to need a dress?”
“You realize you get to wrangle Alexei into a tux?”
Kyle cackled at his brother’s squawk of indignation from farther down the hall. Katie wrinkled her nose. “Dress shopping was supposed to be fun. Now you’ve turned it into a punishment.”
“You find your dress. I’ll find Alexei and me something to wear. I’ve been to a few things like this before. I know what the dress code is like,” Sean said.
“Pretty sure working the streets for drug deals as a member of the Irish Mob isn’t a job that would lend itself to high-class gala fundraisers,” Kyle said, unable to help himself.
It was a little reflexive, to be honest. His own history with his biological father and the Irish Mob meant he was biased in a big way against that criminal organization.
“That’s not the only cover I’ve held.”
“You’re just full of surprises.”
Sean made a face as he stood up but didn’t seem inclined to argue with Kyle. He slipped out of the office to go do his own preparations for the day. Kyle caught Alexei’s eye over Trevor’s shoulder and rapidly hand signaled him to watch his back.
Alexei rolled his eyes but signaled back an affirmative, then flipped him off.
It was still early enough that the shops they needed to go to weren’t open, but the 24/7 customer service lines most design houses manned for their rich clients meant Katie was able to book an appointment on extremely short notice, as was Sean.
They ended up name-dropping Jamie in order to be seen right away, with the design houses verifying their ties through the credit card company handling the account Jamie was using to fund this mission.
The reimbursement of everything was going to be killer for the government when it was all said and done.
Jamie wasn’t skimping on cost when it came to what they needed.
After the others left for their appointments and Jamie holed himself up in the office Katie had vacated, Kyle immersed himself in doing some groundwork on the gala.
Liam had dropped off another solid-state drive last night, along with their approved orders, detailing out the history of the type of fundraiser someone like Jansen would frequent.
They weren’t exactly on the up-and-up, but a mix of civic-minded people helped hide the men and women who led double lives as criminal entrepreneurs.
Jansen’s skill in blackmail ensured that even people who didn’t want to be there showed up, lending an air of legitimacy to the whole thing.
The Fifth Annual Winter Gala was overseen by a charity that was transparent in their dealings—to a point.
Administrative costs were through the roof compared to other charities that put together the same kind of fundraising drives that brought in the wealthy for a night of schmoozing in historical places.
Last year, they’d held it at some lord’s country estate.
At least this time, it would be held within London, but monitoring and securing the area was still going to be a logistical nightmare.