Chapter 24 #2
“Monday, February twenty-eighth at twenty-two hundred hours, I need to be in Monaco.” Harper swiveled in the chair and gripped the chair arms.
February twenty-eighth. Why does that date sound so familiar?
“Uh, why?” Finn asked with a small smile, waiting for her big reveal.
“The gift card was purchased at a Starbucks in Monaco,” she began, her eyes wide as if equally surprised and also terrified.
What in the hell was going on?
“I’m still not following along with that big brain of yours.” Finn stroked his beard, which happened to be the thickest on the teams right now.
Finn and Asher usually went back and forth on the “best of the beards” contest. They were competitive at just about everything. And damn, Roman would miss the teams if he had to leave.
If. Hell, that was the first time in years he hadn’t considered leaving the teams a foregone conclusion.
“Sorry.” She went for the knot of her bun and unleashed her long locks, shaking out her silky mass of hair. “I’m a bit frazzled.” One quick breath, and she added, “Twenty-eight dollars and twenty-two cents was loaded to the card.”
Finn tossed a look at Wyatt and Roman, searching for a clue from them as to what Harper was talking about.
She stood. “This is how Ezra made contact with me in the past. When he had intel about the Dumas case, he’d load a gift card with a specific amount.
Twenty-eight represents the day, and twenty-two represents the time.
Twenty-two hundred hours. I used to backtrace the location of purchase to find which coffee shop to go to on that date and time,” she quickly explained.
“And then I’d spend the balance to let him know I received the message. ”
Wyatt strode her way and reached for the card. Simplistic but effective to arrange a meet with a source. “Did anyone, including Zack, know this was how Ezra made contact with you?” he asked.
“No, I didn’t share my trade secrets with anyone.” She pointed to the card, excitement now in her eyes. “I think Ezra is alive, and he’s reaching out for help.” And then her shoulders slumped a moment later. “Or it’s a trap. But we have three and a half days to figure out which it is before I go.”
“Like hell you’re going to Monaco,” Roman said, unable to stop the order from slipping free. He clamped down on his teeth and firmly shook his head. “Hell no.”
She crossed her arms and stared at him.
Oh, game on. This was a fight he’d happily partake in and win.
“You think you’re in a position to tell me what to do?
” She lifted her chin as if trying to add a bit of height to help her stand her ground.
“You lost the right to bark orders at me.” A dark, perfectly arched brow lifted in challenge.
“Think again, sailor.” Her crisp words were meant to cut him, not turn him on.
With all the stress he was under, he shouldn’t have been aroused.
But his Harper was back. The sad, distressed woman from the room that morning was gone, and the CIA operative on a mission stood proudly before him.
He dipped his head so he could look right into her eyes when he dragged out with extra emphasis, “You’re. Not. Going.”
And yeah, that was going to piss her off.
A rosy color crawled up her neck and into her cheeks.
Anger, yeah. Maybe also slightly hot and bothered like he was.
This wasn’t the time or place for his dick to be getting hard, but they had a history of these back-and-forths.
And they always ended with them naked, usually on the floor, while she rode him into orgasm.
Roman didn’t have to check the room to realize they were now alone, that Wyatt and Finn had bowed out. He could feel their absence, and Harper’s determined gaze had him filling his lungs with a breath of air, dragging in her perfume with it.
“This case is about me,” she said, her tone softer this time as if she sensed he was two seconds away from forgetting everything, including why they were arguing.
“You’re right.” Emotion pushed through her tone this time.
“I’m either going to take Ezra down or save him.
Jury is still out on which way the wind is blowing. ”
His eyes dropped to the floor as a horrible sinking feeling filled his gut.
He turned to the side and ran his hands through his hair, his thoughts moving like a bullet fired at a target. Fast, hot, but focused. “That motherfucker,” he seethed. “Wyatt. Finn,” he called out.
“What is it?” she asked, but he wanted to wait for the guys to rejoin them before he shared the news that had been staring them straight in the face, but they hadn’t noticed. Too distracted. Purposefully distracted by someone who knew them damn well.
Wyatt and Finn strode into the room a moment later.
“Will Hobbs and Talon Fox were friends. That’s how I know Talon, not from overseas.
Whenever I was on leave back when I was new to the Teams, there was a dive bar in Virginia Beach I used to hang out at, and I met Will and Talon there.
We were all from different platoons, but Will and Talon seemed close.
” He paused for a second to give them time to process.
“Will lost his wife a year before we first began putting back beers together. It was Valentine’s one night, and Will was drunk, talking about how much he missed her and how she’d died in combat. ”
“You happen to remember the exact date she died in that big brain of yours?” Finn asked.
Maybe pre-concussion, but . . . “I feel like my gut is saying February twenty-eighth, but that could just be because that number is now in my head.”
“Let me look it up.” Harper went to the laptop, and Roman couldn’t help but hang over her shoulder as she worked, anxious for confirmation. “What if Will and Brandon were in the same TH black site?”
“Before they were sent to the so-called super-light versions?” Finn came up alongside him, and Roman set his attention on his friend and nodded. “You think Brandon and Will swapped their, uh, conviction stories?”
“And after they were sent to new prisons last year, maybe Will used Brandon’s intel to throw us off his tracks.” Wyatt swiped a hand over his mouth as it came together.
Maybe the puzzle had been there all along, but they’d been assembling pieces in the dark? “So, there’s most likely no connection between Talon and Brandon, then.”
“Based on the fact Roman is right, and Denise Hobbs did die on February twenty-eighth, I’m going to agree with Roman.” Harper stood from the chair and faced the guys. “This all centers around Will.”
“Plus, where was it that we took Will down and he had Harper shot?” Finn pointed out. “Fucking Monaco.”
Yeah, Will was giving them two major clues with the gift card. But why?
“And with Will and Jessica as the inventors of our teams before they ever pitched the idea to Luke, well, this all adds up to him.” Finn dropped a few expletives under his breath.
“That means the man who helped give us our current jobs,” Roman began, his stomach twisting, “is the one now coming after us.” A hot breath left his mouth. “And Will Hobbs wants us all to pay.”