CHAPTER EIGHT
Camden sat at the bar on the far barstool in one of the restaurants that his teammates weren’t likely to frequent.
He wasn’t sure where the avoidance came from.
He rolled a glass half-filled with Coke between his palms and studied the upscale space.
Titan Group’s Abu Dhabi headquarters was as far away as Amelia Stone likely imagined.
Camden tried to conjure up what she might think of his workplace, but no matter what she came up with, it probably wasn’t going to be a two-tower gilded skyscraper hotel.
The building served as an exclusive hotel that catered to princes and billionaires, at least on the surface.
In reality, it was an elaborate cover that brought in money and provided a safe place in the somewhat inhospitable, unpredictable Middle East region.
Jared started Titan Group out of sheer willpower, strong connections, and an unflappable sense of right and wrong.
But Titan also played in the gray.
They took jobs that weren’t necessarily paid for, and that hotel helped to foot the bill.
Titan’s Abu Dhabi headquarters was hard for Camden to absorb.
Growing up in New Jersey, he hadn’t known anything like that existed.
He’d joined the army after a recruiter promised he would see the world.
Naively, he’d believed the man.
Yeah, he’d seen the world, but where he was currently was a better fit: more flexibility, more adventure, more excitement.
He was an everyday guy living in the land of more, more, more, where Maseratis were a dime a dozen.
Most people were probably like him and couldn’t fathom the place.
Could Amelia? She’d mentioned a creative, vivid imagination.
Her words lingered in his mind and tightened the muscles in his chest. He couldn’t explain why.
He didn’t know anything about her and purposefully hadn’t searched the internet for her picture.
That hadn’t stopped Shah and Amanda, though.
Shah reported on Amelia’s lack of social media with the exception of an event-planning company she owned.
Amanda had needed only a fraction of a second to find Amelia’s picture.
Still, Camden had refused to look.
He could explain his indifference to social media.
People posted only what they wanted the world to see, and it was rarely the truth.
Amelia Stone didn’t want anyone to see much.
What did that say? He was curious.
Amanda had also found pages of internet hits on Amelia’s company, Events and Occasions.
Many corporate and philanthropic organizations appeared to have utilized her services.
Events and Occasions was also often mentioned on society pages that showed off weddings and parties of the who’s who in Washington, DC.
Camden had scrolled through a few of the company’s online hits.
Without dropping Amelia’s name, they managed to share that she was an excellent event planner.
She liked to be behind the scenes.
She was successful and well regarded.
He could see that in the woman he’d spoken to on the phone.
He also sensed from her success and their brief conversations that she was someone that wouldn’t be told a cover story without pressing for the truth.
Out of the corner of his eye, Camden saw Liam walk up to the bar.
He sighed, not in the mood to talk.
It wasn’t because he’d been assigned to desk duty for what felt like a hellacious amount of time, it was that desk duty had given him a puzzle he couldn’t stop thinking about.
Maybe Camden shouldn’t have taken a break in that restaurant.
If he’d really wanted to be alone, he could’ve gone to his apartment.
Liam pulled himself onto a barstool and ordered a Coke.
Camden raised his chin when the bartender asked if he wanted his soda topped off as well.
“What’s going on, man?”
Liam thanked the bartender for his drink and turned to Camden.
“What the hell are you doing in here? Didn’t think this place was your scene.”
He shrugged in agreement.
“I didn’t think this place was anyone’s scene unless the ladies wanted a celebration or a party.” He was astounded by how their team had morphed from a gathering of single men to family guys.
He didn’t begrudge anyone their happiness but did find it perplexing.
“Yet here you are,” Liam pointed out.
He nodded. “What’s up, man?”
“I don’t know. Boss Man wanted me to feel something out, and here I find you hiding.”
He shot Liam a glance.
“I’m not hiding.”
“If you say so.” Liam took a long drink and set the glass down.
“You feel like going back to the US for bit?”
Camden’s eyebrow arched.
His heart kickstarted.
“What for?”
“To have a sit-down with Beth Tourne.”
“From the CIA?”
“Do you know another Beth Tourne?”
“I don’t know any Beth Tournes. There’s probably a better person to meet with one of their people.” If not Liam, then Chance, Hagan, or Sawyer would be a more responsible Titan representative.
They were dependable, trusted.
They were the ones assigned to complicated jobs that required more gravitas than he had ever been interested in giving to a project.
Liam narrowed his gaze and scrutinized Camden.
“Huh.”
“What?”
“What the hell is going on with you?”
“Nothing.”
“Then since when are you not raring to go on assignment?” Liam pressed.
Camden raised his shoulders with feigned indifference.
He couldn’t shake his fascination with Amelia Stone, and that was enough that he wanted to avoid Beth Tourne.
Liam sipped his soda.
“I’m not one to question Boss Man. He usually has a plan and a dozen backup plans.”
That, Camden knew all too well, which made him even more uncomfortable, especially since he wanted to learn more about Amelia with each passing moment.
“Jared could find someone who’s on the same continent as her.”
“Obviously, Cam, but he said you.”
Camden pursed his lips.
A hundred thoughts ran through his head.
He drummed his fingers against the sweating soda glass.
“Any update as to why the CIA had to farm out its call center?”
Liam shook his head.
“Ask Beth.” He gave him a hard look.
“Any reason in particular you don’t want to take a cushy job?”
He batted the drink between his palms and wished it were a football instead.
At least that would help him think.
“You know the girl? Amelia Stone? She was thrown into all this without any information. No one’s debriefed her. She sees the bullshit cover story, yet no one is telling her a damn thing.”
“Maybe they want you to do their dirty work.”
“Maybe.” Would that be such a bad thing?
Yeah, it would. He didn’t realize it until right then, but he’d put Amelia Stone on one hell of a pedestal.
“It’d be a no-brainer if you wanted me to haul ass into a building with some terrorist trying to blow my brains out. But the CIA? I don’t know if I have the stomach for their particular blend of bullshit.”
“Do you think Amelia has what it takes to stomach it?”
Camden half laughed.
“I think that woman can handle anything thrown at her.” He lifted his shoulders again.
“Whether she should have to or not? I don’t know. That’s a different story.”
Titan’s private jet touched down at Dulles Airport outside Washington, DC.
Camden scrubbed a hand over his face and into his dark tousled hair.
The time change wouldn’t bother him.
Neither would the solitude of a solo gig.
But he wasn’t sure about an assignment that was more talk than action.
His work preference could be summarized as: get in, get the job done, get out.
Talking to spooks wasn’t the least bit interesting.
The jet came to a stop at a private terminal.
He glanced out the oval window.
A standard black Suburban with government plates was waiting for him to deplane.
His mind skipped through his upcoming day.
The Suburban would take him to meet Beth.
Parker had briefed Camden on her but hadn’t had much to say.
Beth was new to the CIA.
She had a redacted personal history that had led her to a job in which she could reinvent her life and live it up as a party girl.
Beth was doing her damnedest to be photographed at exclusive parties on the arms of DC’s diplomatic and political crowd.
Camden wondered if any those parties had been handled by Events and Occasions.
All in all, Beth and Camden wouldn’t have much in common.
A US customs inspector boarded the jet.
He had a quick conversation with the flight staff then Camden.
Their paperwork and passports were processed, and he was free to deplane.
Camden thanked the flight crew and retrieved his duffel bag.
The crisp fall air was refreshing, even if tinged with diesel fuel and burnt brake rubber.
The bright morning sunlight reflected off the runway.
A man wearing a suit and dark sunglasses jumped out of the driver’s seat and opened the back passenger door.
Camden cleared his throat.
“Hey. Morning.”
“Mr. Brooks.” The driver scanned their surroundings as he waited for Camden to get in.
“I hope you had a nice flight.”
“Slept through most of it.” He reached for the door, but it was closed for him.
Camden shifted uncomfortably on the leather seat.
“You know,” he said when the driver sat behind the steering wheel, “I’m normally the guy who scans the perimeter for threat assessments.”
The driver nodded as if he understood Camden’s background and eased the vehicle toward the private terminal exit.
“Just doing my job. You work for Titan Group?”
Camden nodded.
“Yeah. Ever work with us?”
“Absolutely. Chauffeur duty isn’t my usual. There’s a Titan team based nearby. They’re rowdy but a good bunch.” He glanced in the rearview mirror.
“Where are you based out of?”
“Abu Dhabi.” They passed through a security checkpoint.
“Very different from where I used to call home.”
“Where was that?”
“New Jersey.”
He laughed.
“How’d you end up out there?”
Camden shook his head.
“Sometimes, I don’t look before I leap. But it’s worked out pretty good.”
They rolled out of the airport and onto the express lanes toward Washington, DC.
The CIA had offered an upscale apartment near Beth’s, but when given the choice between a swanky place in DC or a more private small house in Virginia, he’d chosen the suburbs.
Small and private trumped swank every day of the week.
But before he could check out the housing arrangements, Camden had to deal with Beth.
He wore dark pants and a shirt that could transition from a twelve-hour flight to a boardroom meeting without much headache.
Almost an hour later, they pulled up to the Hay-Adams Hotel.
Camden had known what to expect of the fancy hotel and the people that would go in and out of its sophisticated space.
He had only guesses about the CIA’s goals in meeting him.
“You can leave your belongings here.” The driver slowed near some construction barriers and pulled into a handsome horseshoe driveway.
“Pretty good-looking place.” Camden eyed the strategic cover of the column-flanked portico that protectively guarded the hotel’s entrance, then he studied his surroundings.
Meticulously tended landscaping painted a beautiful barrier between the hotel and the taxi-lined street.
Considering the gilded hotel where he lived and worked, Camden wasn’t sure why he felt so out of place.
“Definitely nothing to sneeze at.”
The driver laughed.
“That’s one of the best ways I’ve heard this place described.”
They parked in front of an arching door flanked by gaslit candles.
Camden jumped out before the man behind the wheel could try to get his door.
“Thanks for the lift.”
The lobby reminded Camden of his hotel home in Abu Dhabi.
The two hotels didn’t look alike—the Abu Dhabi hotel lobby was gilded and gleaming in a way that couldn’t touch the Hay-Adams’s old money sophistication.
Both hotels held an air of expectation.
Those who crossed their thresholds were people who did things in the world—some for the better, some for themselves.
But they were both places where access and privilege were both expected and guarded.
Beth waited in the lobby for him.
Even without Parker’s briefing and her headshot, Camden would have known her the moment his gaze landed on her.
Though understated, she stood out in a way that demanded notice.
She had a great smile, and her presence probably made anyone whose hand she shook believe every word that slipped out of her mouth.
Camden didn’t trust her.
She walked toward him with the confidence of a woman without a worry in the world, hand outstretched, eyes sighting him like a cruise missile locking onto a target.
“How was your flight?” Her grip was strong.
The corners of his lips rose.
“Uneventful.”
“Those are the best kinds of flights.” She led them through the posh lobby to a restaurant where she bypassed the staff and brought Camden to a private room set with a small table for four.
Beth closed the glass-paned French doors behind herself and gestured for him to take a seat.
“Are we expecting others to join us?” Amelia?
Anticipation percolated in his chest. Of course she wouldn’t join them.
There would be no reason.
But that didn’t quell the odd hope that she would appear.
“I just like room to spread out.” Beth tilted her head.
“And, if I’m being honest…”
Camden doubted whatever she’d say next would be true.
“This room makes me feel like a princess.”
All right.
No Amelia. That was good.
Also, maybe Beth had told the truth.
Who wouldn’t feel like royalty with the starched white linens and crystal glasses?
The window treatments could’ve been hung in Buckingham Palace.
The table setting was fit for dinner with a king.
Camden chose a seat that faced the French doors and gave him a good angle on the windows.
If someone had to have their back to the world, it would be Beth.
She didn’t seem to notice and easily took the spot across from him, asking, “Have you eaten here before?”
“Nope.”
Beth picked up the menu placard placed artfully on their plates.
“I hope you’re hungry. I really love the kitchen here. The—”
“You’ve been in the kitchen?” He hated the pretentious way she was buttering him up and wished she’d cut to the chase.
Her eyebrow crooked, and a smile curved.
“I love their menu. If you’re a mushroom guy, their mushroom omelet will make your eyes roll to the back of your head. But if you don’t mind the wait, the oatmeal soufflé is so good.”
“I’m more of a bacon-and-potatoes-breakfast kinda guy.”
“You could do both. Uncle Sam’s treat.”
He tried to gauge her behavior and sense what she wanted, though she wasn’t easy to read.
“So, whom am I talking to right now? The CIA or the socialite?”
“Can’t it be both?” Beth followed his gaze and turned as their waitress arrived with a friendly greeting and an offer of still or sparkling water.
He went with still. Beth asked for sparkling—no big surprise there.
They both ordered the oatmeal soufflé.
He also asked for side orders of bacon, ham, and potatoes.
Beth requested espresso.
Camden asked for coffee without bells and whistles.
Their predictability was nearly comical.
“All right.” He crossed his arms. “Consider me adequately wined and dined.”
Beth scowled.
“Our order hasn’t even been called into the kitchen yet.”
“Why did I fly halfway around the world to meet with you?”
“You’re not even going to pretend to have a good time first?”
He forced a smile so large and fake he could’ve been on a toothpaste commercial.
“Loving every moment.” His face returned to normal.
The waitress returned with coffee service with as many bells and whistles as were possible.
Fresh fruit plates arrived.
“We didn’t order that,” Camden pointed out.
Beth rolled her eyes but speared her melon with her fork.
“Back to the business at hand.” She nibbled.
“I’m mostly here to answer your questions and let the powers that be know if you’re too nosy.”
His eyebrows arched.
He found her honesty disarming, which only made him more suspicious.
“Is that right?”
“More or less.” She shrugged dismissively.
“We’ve had quite the clusterfuck on our hands, and I don’t know when it will wrap up. The fallout’s been scattershot and bad .”
“Do you know if Hailey Dumont is still alive?”
Beth chewed thoughtfully.
“I don’t.” Her next shrug was far less unencumbered.
A heaviness pulled her shoulders down even as she tried to hide her reaction.
“I hope she is. I wasn’t their handler, but I spent a lot of time playing intermediary between them and…” She gestured blankly with her fork as if the Dumonts’ social network was hard to explain.
“They were your friends?”
Her eyebrows arched as her eyes went down and searched for the best piece of fruit.
She used her fork to scoot each piece around.
“Yes.” She swallowed hard and stabbed a grape, which she ate quickly.
Beth sipped her sparkling water.
“We circulated in many of the same social circles. Though they worked on assignments that I didn’t go anywhere near other than to meet the movers and shakers. Hailey and Jonathan were hands-on in a way that didn’t work for my cover.”
What kind of work could art people get into that a socialite wouldn’t want to associate with?
“You going to leave me hanging like that, or what?”
Her lips curled as if she had a secret that amused her to no end.
“I’m going to introduce you to someone who worked with them. It’ll be easier than reading you in from a redacted report. She can explain things in a way that I quite honestly don’t know how to.”
“Why isn’t she here too?”
Beth grinned.
“Lots of reasons. But the biggest one is that seeing her office makes her job… easier to appreciate and less scary.”
He laughed.
“I don’t scare easily, Beth Tourne.”
“Ohhh, big surprise, Camden Brooks. But you’ll have to trust me.”
Agitation fueled his foot, which tapped under the table.
He wasn’t the person who needed to meet anyone.
He wasn’t the one searching for answers.
“Why aren’t you talking to Amelia Stone about this?” He didn’t want to ask why she wasn’t there, since she had no reason to be at their breakfast meeting—except she was the one with all the questions for the CIA.
“You have two agents breathing down her neck. They’re unhelpful and making her problems worse.”
Beth took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
She set her fork down, pursed her lips, and looked out the window.
“I really wish Amelia hadn’t been there.”
“Well, she was.” Camden took a bite of melon.
“I bet she wished nothing happened to her family to start with.”
Beth nodded.
“You guys need to rein in your bulldogs. The ones who have been knocking on her door, asking her asinine questions. She’s a civilian.”
Beth demurred, fanning his aggravation.
He tried to recalibrate his attitude.
Camden lifted his coffee cup, which was delicate enough that he might crack it if he didn’t pay attention when setting it down.
“What’s going on? What actually happened?”
Beth laser focused her attention on the lone strawberry left on her plate.
She moved it around with her fork and eventually ate it, at which she point she chewed methodically and bought time to formulate her answer.
“You’re aware that we are dealing with an ongoing breach in our network?”
“Yeah. That’s how I was pulled into this whole mess.”
“Many covers were blown. Everyone was on a heightened alert. One of the Dumonts’ targets likely realized they were under surveillance and…” Beth frowned.
“They turned the situation around and eliminated the Dumonts.”
“That doesn’t make any sense. Why take Hailey if they killed Jonathan?”
“How do you know it’s a they and not a singular person?” Beth volleyed.
God. He disliked the way the CIA did business.
Everything was fun and games.
Camden smirked. “Other than what Amelia saw, I meant the royal, all-encompassing they. Because I don’t know jack shit.”
Beth studied him.
“If Amelia’s story is to be believed—”
“ If it’s to be believed ? I was on the phone with her.”
“You heard what she wanted you to believe.”
“Oh, give me a break.”
“I’m simply pointing out that you don’t know who she is and only believed her because she added tears to her voice and panic to her words. She could’ve played you—”
“Are you out of your—” He caught himself and bit the inside of his cheeks.
“ They went after her and the Dumonts simultaneously. They probably see her as a potential witness. Their worst-case scenario was probably Amelia reaching out for help, which she did. I don’t know why you don’t have her in protective custody.”
Beth ignored his jab.
Camden shook his head.
He wasn’t going to get anything from Beth.
He ran a hand over his face.
“Other than your harebrained idea about Amelia, you don’t know who they are?”
Beth shook her head.
“Not the slightest clue. But remember, I’m not a handler. I wouldn’t be privy to that information.”
He lifted his palms, frustrated.
“Why isn’t their handler here?”
The corners of Beth’s eyes tightened.
Her expression faltered almost imperceptibly before she neutralized it.
“She’s dead.”
“Well… shit.”
That caught him off guard.
The Dumonts weren’t the only victims.
“I’m guessing natural causes have been ruled out.”
“They have.”
“Are your powers that be assuming the same person who went after the Dumonts went after the handler?”
“That’s so far above my pay grade that I haven’t asked.”
Camden sipped his coffee and thought over the situation.
“Their handler’s dead. Jonathan’s dead. Hailey is missing. They took her because…?”
Beth shrugged as if his wildest guesses could be valid.
Camden continued, “They’ll interrogate her until she breaks. And if she doesn’t, it’ll be the same fate as if she had.”
Beth nodded.
“Survival is unlikely.”
“And you have no idea what they want to know?”
“Not a clue. No one read me into the information they were passing along.”
How did this all circle back to Amelia?
Why had investigators asked if she was aware of her sister’s location?
“What’s going to happen with Amelia?”
“The public-facing investigation will turn up as many salacious possibilities as possible. Names will be muddied, and motives will be tossed around like confetti.”
“Anything to murk up the investigation,” he concluded.
“Bet their families will love that.”
“That’s the ugly truth of things.” Beth swept her hair off her face.
“Collateral damage will be small and manageable. It’s really just Amelia.”
“No parents or other siblings?”
“Hailey and Amelia have a distant aunt who begrudgingly fostered them when they were teenagers. From all reports, it wasn’t a happy home, and there hasn’t been contact in years.”
Amelia didn’t have any family other than Hailey.
He shook his head. “What about his family?”
“His parents have lived in France for years.”
Beth wasn’t telling him something.
Camden scrutinized her.
“And?”
“I assume they’re devastated about their son. I haven’t spoken with them.”
Camden waited for whatever Beth was dragging out.
Beth relented. “They’re familiar with the possibilities that might unfold during this process.”
He gave Beth a sidelong glance.
“They’re spooks too?”
Her facial expression confirmed his assumption.
“You know I couldn’t tell you that even if I knew.”
“Which, of course, you don’t,” he muttered.
“Of course.”
The waitress arrived and served their main course.
If decadence was a dish, it was oatmeal soufflé with fresh fruit compote.
He wouldn’t have guessed oatmeal could look as regal as the room in which they were dining, but it did.
Camden tried the piping hot, light-as-air soufflé and had to give Beth credit for all but demanding he order the dish.
This thing was treat enough for him to ignore the bacon and potato side dishes he’d ordered.
They finished their soufflés before talking shop again, as though the rough-and-ugly world they lived in shouldn’t touch their meal.
Finally, Camden picked at his bacon and potatoes while Beth sipped her espresso.
“I think Amelia needs to be read in as much as she can be.”
Beth laughed.
“What purpose would that serve?”
“She knows a lot more than—”
“And she’ll forget it.”
“Oh, come on. That’s bullshit. She knows what she knows, whether you confirm anything or not.”
“I have no influence whatsoever when it comes to the spin.”
“Your spin masters have agents asking questions like if she’s seen her sister. What kind of crap is that?”
“Like I said. It’s going to get ugly before it gets better.”
He’d learned all he could from meeting Beth.
“Why the hell am I here? We could have had this conversation over a secure line.”
Beth studied him and lowered her gaze to her espresso, forehead pinched as though trying to work through calculus.
“What is it, Beth?” He laid his napkin on the table.
“Because I’m done. Thanks for the great meal and all, but you’re holding back, and I’ve wasted my time.”
“If we tell her about her sister, it will change everything about their relationship.”
“Do you think Amelia cares?” He scoffed.
“Hell, since when does the CIA care about emotional fallout?”
“I don’t know her, but for whatever reason, you seem to know what she thinks about. Care to explain that?”
Her accusation stopped him cold.
He should push back and demand Beth stay in her lane.
He could tell her to worry about the relatives of their agent, but that wouldn’t help Amelia.
She wanted answers, and he wanted them for her.
“She deserves to know.”
“If she learns about Hailey, Amelia will open herself up to a world she didn’t know about. To dangers she’s otherwise inoculated to.”
“I think she wants to find her sister and doesn’t care if you pull back the curtain on whatever seedy, sketchy situation you’re so worried will sully her worldview. Give the woman an opportunity to handle the information instead of gaslighting her with a bullshit cover story?”
Beth gave a small shrug.
“Again, none of this is my call, but I will pass along your thoughts.”
He smiled flatly.
“Are you going to see her while you’re out here?” Beth asked.
“No.”
His answer surprised them both.
Beth eyed him expectantly and cupped her hands around the espresso.
“Stick around for a couple days. We may need Titan’s help closing up loose ends with the Dumont investigation.”
“Aye, aye, captain.” But Camden didn’t take marching orders from the CIA.
He would follow whatever directives Boss Man handed out.