9. Angel
Chapter nine
Angel
“Vinny, are you sure these coordinates are correct?” I ask. “There’s nothing but trees and snow. It’s been two days of the same thing. Dead leaves and dead ends.”
I squat down, swiveling my head as far from left to right as it will go.
Daisy notices the same thing I do and takes the liberty of informing Vinny of the situation.
“There are fresh deer tracks heading toward the bottom of the mountain and a set of bear prints heading in the direction you’re leading us.
No human boot prints or any sign that there are any that have been covered up.
The cave is likely a bear’s den. We’ll follow the tracks to confirm. ”
Sure enough, the tracks lead to a cave with a four-foot opening. “I’m not about to poke a bear by shining a light in its face. We should move on.”
What we really should do is stop wasting our time searching for potential areas where someone can hide. The area is far too vast. Instead, we should be scouting the campsites.
“I can hear your thoughts from where I’m standing,” Daisy says without a hint of sarcasm. “No need to shine a flashlight; you’ll wake the bear with how loudly you’re projecting.”
“And what am I thinking?”
“That this is a waste of time. That we should be canvassing where the people are rather than the unknown.” Daisy huffs. “Though I loathe to admit it, you might be right.”
I chuckle. “I didn’t actually say any of that.”
“Your facial expressions and body language screamed it. It was the slight dip of the chin and closing of the eyes before you said, ‘We should move on’ that gave you away.”
Daisy starts heading back the way we came, already making up her mind that this day is a bust. After cinching my pack, I jog to catch up to her. “You have an uncanny ability to read people.”
She shakes her head and adjusts her pack. “Not really; just the people I care enough about to pay attention to.”
I grin and bump her hip, singsonging my words. “You care about me.”
“You know I do, so don’t let it go to your head.”
Vinny’s voice rings loud and clear. “You have company. Approximately 500 meters out. I’m going in for a closer look.”
Daisy and I both draw our weapons: my issued Glock and her Browning .
380 Black Label Medallion 1911. “There’s no way a BBLM 1911 is standard issue for the Southern Knights,” I say with a pang of jealousy.
The fact that Daisy loves weapons as much as I do—maybe even more—means that if we ever get married, I’ll never have to ask if I can buy a gun.
She’d agree as long as she could get one too.
I’m silently laughing at the thought when she whispers, “It’s not.
We don’t have a standard issue because every gun feels different for every person, as I’m sure you well know.
However, we do have to register which of our personal weapons we want to use for work in the event it’s used in the line of duty.
Do you prefer the Glock in your hand, or is that just what you’re used to? ”
I’m about to answer that I prefer a Beretta 9mm because of its size and weight versus the smaller Glock 22 when Vinny starts yelling, “No! No! No! Don’t….”
Crack! Boom!
Instinct takes over at the sound of gunfire, and I tackle Daisy to the ground. Heart pounding and blood pumping fast, I act as a shield while pointing my gun down the animal trail. Her backpack presses against my chest, but it also provides leverage for my arm as I take aim and steady my breath.
“You could have at least cushioned my fall,” Daisy says as she shifts her weight. I keep my gun pointed down the animal path we’re on while I get to my feet. I extend my hand to help her up, but she simply places her weapon in my palm while she pushes off the ground.
She takes her weapon and puffs away a strand of hair. “The gunshot was….”
“An AR-15, 5.56 NATO round,” I finish for her. “If I had to guess, 55-grain, which means….”
“The shooter isn’t hunting big game,” Daisy says. “If that’s the case, then why would he….”
“Need a gun? Good question. Let’s go ask him.”
“Are you two done finishing each other’s sentences?” Vinny asks. “As cute as it is, both of you need to be on your A-game. There’s a threat in the area and I don’t have visual.”
“What happened?” I ask in a hushed voice. I move in front of Daisy in case we’re the intended targets; taking slow, measured steps.
“The guy from the diner appears to have been following you before he shot my drone,” Vinny says more calmly than I expected.
The drone wasn’t CIA property; it was his personal equipment.
It set him back the cost of a small car.
“The good news is that I got an image and am running it through facial recognition. We’ll know who he is soon enough. ”
When she hears that it’s that man from the diner, Daisy sidesteps me and takes off running in the direction the shot came from. “Or we can find out now!”
Even with a rucksack strapped to her back, she’s quick on her feet. By the time I catch up to her, the man in the forest is long gone. “Haven’t you ever heard of the word ‘stealth’?”
“Or patience?” Vinny asks.
Daisy looks at me with determination—and a bit of defiance—in her gaze. “Patience? I’ve waited 20 years. I’d say I have it in spades. As for stealth, there’s no point. He shot a drone, Angel. It’s no secret he knew where we were. Nor was it a secret that we knew of his presence.”
She gestures toward the remnants of the drone on the ground, then adds, “The evidence of that fact is lying at your feet. Slow and steady only gets you so far. Sometimes you need to sprint to the finish line. I want the win.”
I reach up and cup her cheeks, reddened from both exertion and frustration. “I want you to win as much as anyone else, Daisy, but not at the expense of getting yourself killed. Promise me you won’t go running headfirst into danger.”
Her callused fingers rest against mine, her eyes turning downcast. “That’s not a promise I can make.”
As soon as we walk through the front door of the cabin, I toss my pack against the wall and remove the comm device from my ear. Daisy huffs, tossing her pack on the bed before heading straight toward the bathroom.
The door slams.
“Trouble in paradise?” Vinny asks me.
I open the refrigerator door, looking for a beer that isn’t there. Now I’m regretting not picking up a six-pack from the store when I went shopping to stock the cabinets. Instead, I opt for a berry-flavored sparkling water. It’ll have to do.
“Paradise implies Daisy and I are more than friends, but she’s reckless and impulsive. If she continues down the path she’s on, then we’ll never get to be more than friends. I asked her to promise me that she wouldn’t purposefully put herself in danger. Can you believe it? She refused.”
Vinny walks over to me and lowers his voice.
“Have you considered that Daisy’s recklessness might be because she just wants her current journey to end so that she can start a new one with you?
One without the baggage of a life she hasn’t been able to fully leave behind her?
How does one move forward if one is always looking back?
In Daisy’s case, she still has to look over her shoulder until her abductor is caught.
I honestly believe that she’s tired of having a crick in her neck. ”
“What do I do?”
“Try to put yourself in her shoes. Daisy survived weeks in the wilderness—alone. No one was there to help her, guide her, or comfort her. She was truly lost and on death’s door when the Grahams found her.
My advice: don’t let her feel that way ever again.
Be there for her when she needs you most. Trust me, you’ll know when that is.
In the meantime, try to keep a level head and keep some patience in reserve for those moments. ”
I remove my beanie and run a hand through my matted hair. “I don’t know if I can stand idly by while she needlessly risks her life.”
“Then don’t,” Vinny says, as if it’s that simple.
“You’re a protector by nature. It’s why, against my advice, you joined the CIA.
But you don’t need a badge to prove you’re one of the good guys.
So do what you were born to do. Protect.
Protect Daisy, even if it’s from herself.
Give her a reason to think twice before risking her life.
Remember, this case isn’t needless to her. It’s personal.”
We both fall silent when the door to the bathroom opens and Daisy walks out. She looks at Vinny, then at me. “My ears are burning.”
I won’t lie to her and say we weren’t talking about her. She wouldn’t believe it anyway. Instead, I tell her the truth. “I’m worried about you. There is a right way to handle this, and then there’s your way.”
Vinny coughs, then grumbles. “Not helpful.”
“My way? What’s that supposed to mean?” she asks. Her pointed glare, widened stance, and hands on her hips suggest that I should tread carefully with whatever is about to come out of my mouth.
“Off the cuff. Without intelligence.”
“Are you calling me dumb?” she asks.
Vinny raises his hands and steps back. “I’m going to go outside and remove myself from the line of fire.”
I roll my eyes and wave him away before facing off with Daisy.
“No, I’m not calling you dumb. I’m saying that you’re operating without gathering intelligence.
Do you know who you were even chasing on that trail?
What’s his name? What’s his profession? What’s his skill set and capabilities?
You knew nothing about the man—a man with a rifle, I might add—and went running after him without waiting for backup! ”
“That’s what this is really about, isn’t it? You want to play the hero,” she says with a slight sneer.
I want to be her hero, but that’s neither here nor there.
“It’s not about being the hero, Daisy. It’s about playing things close to the vest. My role within the CIA was as a sniper for counterterrorism operations, which is more paramilitary than being a spy like James Bond.
That said, I didn’t go after a target without knowing everything there is to know about him, her, or whomever.
Data collection was paramount so that I knew where to hit, when to hit, and how to hit.
I certainly didn’t chase an armed man without backup in a place where he could easily ambush me or shoot me from behind cover.
Nor did I blatantly question someone in the middle of a diner, giving away my intentions. ”
“I was going to get that information direct from the source,” she says, a little less defensively this time.
“Riiight,” I drawl out. “Because he was so forthcoming the first time you peppered him with questions. We know he’s involved, but we need to figure out how. We need to figure out who he is before we engage him. Together, Daisy. Not you. Not me. We.”
Daisy walks past me and whispers, “I just want this all to be over.”
She opens the door for Vinny, who is sitting on the steps, saying, “It’s safe to come in now. No shots have been fired.”
“The night is still young,” he jests, blowing his warm breath into his cupped hands.
When the laptop pings with a search hit on our mystery man, all joking stops as we rush over to find out his identity.
Daisy is the first to reach the computer. “His name is Kenneth…. What? No! Where did it go?”
Vinny nudges her aside and starts pecking away at the keyboard.
When that proves futile, he presses the power button.
“It’s a shutdown virus. It can be triggered by accessing a web browser or a specific file.
This shouldn’t have happened while using my credentials or with the antivirus software we have running. ”
“Can you remove it?” I ask. Vinny isn’t the most adept with computer systems, and neither am I. Our skills are useful when it comes down to tracking a target and neutralizing a threat. We leave the spycraft to the spies, while they leave target acquisition to us.
Vinny gives up when nothing happens. “No, not if it’s the kind of shutdown virus I think it is. This one has turned our laptop into nothing more than a paperweight. But that’s not what concerns me at the moment.”
Daisy leans forward and looks for any sign of life, pressing the power button again as if her touch were magic.
It’s not, and no amount of her banging on the keyboard is going to change our situation.
“What could be more concerning than losing access to our system?” she asks.
“Will the virus spread and shut down the servers at the Shining Knights HQ in New York?”
“No,” I tell her. “I’ve seen this method employed before. We sometimes use it at the CIA when a person is of interest to us and we don’t want interference because the person could be an asset, an informant, or a target.”
Vinny rubs his chin. “This particular virus not only powers the computer down. It logs the IP address and sends an alert to whoever embedded the malicious code. It doesn’t spread.
However, it won’t be long before someone comes knocking on our door.
Daisy, did you happen to see Kenneth’s last name before the screen went dark, or anything else that may be useful? ”
Frustration wars with despair as Daisy drops to her knees and bows her head. She murmurs one word. “Johnson.”
I do a quick Google search on my phone, then understand why Daisy is dismayed. “There are an estimated 5,200 Kenneth Johnsons in the U.S. alone. That’s like finding a needle in a needle stack.”
“I’ll give Owen a call. If anyone can fix the laptop and retrace the virus to its source, it would be him,” Daisy says.
Vinny and I glance at each other. We both know that whatever happens next, we’re going to be stepping on toes.
This has CIA written all over it. I tilt my head toward the door in a silent offer for my mentor and uncle by choice to bow out.
With only a few months left until retirement, he has everything to lose.
He shakes his head and turns toward Daisy. “Don’t just call your brother. Call your entire team.”