Beatle #3
His admittance was alarming to Beatle. That's an interesting choice of words.
Beatle filed that observation away with the precision of a mind trained to catalogue things he didn't yet understand.
A private contractor? Not affiliated with a government.
But obviously connected enough to know that we are government.
And connected enough to already be executing an extraction.
“And finally,” Gil continued, leaning back again, “since I am honor-bound by my contract, there is an operative undercover in that group whom I plan to find. He's affiliated with the marine biologist. My team pulling this off is a win-win for me.” He paused. His blue eyes were steady and entirely serious, but his smile didn’t falter.
“Which is why I can’t risk you two jeopardizing my operation or getting injured.
I appreciate what you are trying to do, and you can tell the one digging around,” he paused to look at the watch on his wrist, “Tex, that we know he’s pulled classified information.
However, we are willing to waive the consequences if you two leave the city. Am I understood?”
The market moved around them—vendors calling, children running, the radio from the shop front shifting into something slower and sadder. The two men beyond the food stall had drifted further away. The grey pickup truck had not made a third pass.
Beatle waited for a heartbeat. Let the silence do what silence did—separate the men who could hold it from the ones who couldn't. He was typically the one who put others on the spot like this, who sprang shackles of silence on a person, watching them sweat and worry before they conceded.
He knows everything. That’s impressive, and somehow he almost knows what choices we will make. He decided to take a risk.
“Do the words 'The VEIL' mean anything to you?” Beatle asked, careful to watch the man’s reaction.
Only a slight twitch of his eye gave him away. “Never heard of it.”
Tex said to pull out if they were involved. He had seemed pretty worried, but if this man is part of that covert operation, somehow I feel like he’s still telling the truth about wanting to save the girl.
Beatle glanced at Casey before looking back to Gil. “I was getting a little homesick, anyway.”
Casey made to protest, her breath drawing in sharp, but Beatle turned to press his lips to her cheek—warm skin, the faint salt of the afternoon on her, the smell of her that lived underneath everything else and always, always steadied him.
“He knows too much,” he murmured against her skin, low enough for only her.
“About us, about this group that has Gabriella, their numbers, their location, who is in charge. This guy and his people are in a better position to help than we are. I think we have to trust him.”
Think? No, this wasn’t thinking. He didn’t know enough about Gil or what “The VEIL” stood for to have a clear and logical line of thought.
This was instinct, plain and simple. In the absence of intel, instinct is king.
And his instincts had kept him breathing through things that should have killed him dozens of times.
If Beatle had been alone, he would have insisted on being part of whatever Gil and his people were planning. If they’d refused, he’d have stayed anyway. That’s how he was built. He knew that about himself. But …
Casey is here. She’s here, and he knows who she is. That changed … well, that changed everything.
Beatle slid his phone out with his other hand, angling it below the table's edge—a casual movement, the kind a man made when he was checking the time—and caught Gil's face in a clean frame.
One tap. The image disappeared into an automated encrypted message to Tex.
A precaution they had set up on their phones in case they were unable to make calls or send out texts.
He hoped it was enough to get more information from Tex on how this man was connected.
Gil clapped his hands together once, the sound sharp and satisfied, and rose from the bench with the fluid ease of a dancer. He stood at his full height against the Panamanian sky, blue eyes bright in the afternoon glare, and grinned down at them with a cheerful energy.
“My friend, the best solution for homesickness is to go home.” He spread his hands wide, a gesture that encompassed the market, the food, the afternoon, the entire absurdity of the situation. “But I do hope you have enjoyed your vacation!”
Beatle watched him go—tracked him through the crowd until the dried-blood polo disappeared around the corner of a stall selling hammered copper jewellery—and then sat with the stillness of a man who was running numbers he didn't yet have all the variables for.
Who are you, Gil? And how did you find us before we found anything?
Beside him, Casey's hand was still in his under the table, her thumb moving over his knuckles—the same gesture as before, the same private display of affection. Except now her grip was a fraction tighter. He turned his hand over beneath hers and held on.