Chapter Six
Alpha
Standing over my desk, I opened my laptop and dialed my cell before putting it on speaker.
November answered immediately. “Alpha.”
“Are you in the command room?”
“Yes.” His ever-present typing filled the background.
“Is the Falcon back from scheduled maintenance?” I could’ve checked myself, but I was testing him to see if he’d mention Bravo.
“Yes. Fueled and ready at Executive. Do you need me to file a flight plan?”
One of the cagiest former SEALs I had working for me walked into my office.
“Call you back, November.” Eyeing Blade, I hung up and shut my laptop. “Thought you were offline.”
“I was.” He crossed his arms.
“Now you’re not.” He hadn’t told me he was back on the schedule, and November hadn’t mentioned it.
“I’m in Miami.”
Translation, he was standing here, and that was all he was committing to.
“Good copy.” When I’d hired Blade, I hadn’t expected him to give me more than a year.
We were well past that mark. “What can I do for you?” Blade did nothing that wasn’t calculated, and he never stepped foot in my office unless summoned.
He tipped his chin at my laptop. “You know.”
Thrown, I played it close. “You’re referring to…?”
“Cut the bullshit. You know damn well what I’m talking about.”
Third-generation SEAL, Blade was Navy Legacy. He was also inked, lethal, and loyal if he liked you. The latter was what gave me pause.
Assessing, wondering how long he’d known about Bravo, I sidestepped. “You came into my office to allude to what, exactly?”
After two beats of a dead-eye stare, he shook his head. “Handle your shit, Trefor.” He pivoted to walk out.
“You knew,” I accused.
Glancing back, he leveled me with a glare. “You should’ve.”
“I suspected.”
“Fucking great.” Turning to face me, he crossed his arms. “Now you don’t have to suspect shit.” He nodded at my laptop again. “November’s software confirms it.” His angry gaze met mine. “Your move.”
Blade was always blunt. To the point that he skipped half of what he should’ve said, which was the exact trait that ironically made him cagey. Over the years, I’d learned when to take what he said and put it into context with what he didn’t say.
This was one of those times.
Blade had been watching November’s facial rec software. Now he was here, asking what I was going to do about a FUBAR situation that had all the markings of a covert CIA op, a deceased Vice Admiral, and a rogue operative.
Putting it all together, it pointed to one thing. “Bravo approached you. He wants you to work for him.” And Blade wanted no part of it.
“Fucker doesn’t call himself Bravo anymore.”
“What does he go by?”
“Phoenix.”
Rising from the ashes. Jesus. Now I wondered how literal to take Maila’s comment about this not being her brother. “What am I dealing with?”
“Don’t know, but same as me, you saw that footage of him standing on that dock in Spain. You think after ten years of zero digital footprint, that wasn’t purposeful?”
“No.” Not for a second.
“Me either. What are you gonna do about it?”
Grabbing my cell, I dialed and put it on speaker.
November answered immediately. “Alpha.”
“A sixty-five-meter Heesen with a black hull, no port of call or name designation, fueled in Marina Port Vell, Barcelona, twenty minutes ago. I need the current location and a directional heading on that yacht.”
“Initiating a trace now…. Looks like the ship’s AIS transponder is turned off, but from the port’s security feeds, I can see it left heading northeast. Possibly toward France. I need some time to track it.”
“Understood. Hold.” Putting the cell on mute, I glanced at my watch, then at Blade. “Second chair?”
He tipped his chin.
I took my cell off mute. “Blade and I are flying out on the Falcon. I want that yacht’s destination once we’re up in the air.”
“Copy that.” November hung up.
Blade and I were already walking out of my office.