Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
By late morning, Shaun had reached the point where staring at the same four walls was going to make him lose what remained of his fucking mind.
Zenko had disappeared somewhere into the compound after telling him he had work to do, which Shaun understood perfectly well, but understanding it didn’t make sitting around waiting any easier.
He needed something to occupy his brain before boredom did what ISIS hadn’t managed and finally fucking broke him.
More importantly, he needed a sat phone.
Rock had to be looking for him by now. The Ghosts would have known something had gone wrong the moment Shaun missed his first scheduled contact, but knowing he was missing and knowing where the hell he had ended up were two very different things.
Red Squadron’s compound was locked down tight enough that Shaun hadn’t found a way to make contact without exposing knowledge and skills an ordinary civilian truck driver had no business possessing.
Sooner or later, he needed to get his hands on a secure phone long enough to let Rock know he was alive and where to find him.
Finding Zenko gave him a perfectly reasonable excuse to get out of the room and, with any luck, put himself somewhere near a sat phone without looking like he was deliberately hunting for one, or worse, like he was spying on Red Squadron.
He stepped out of the room and walked the short distance to the war-room. He’d barely reached the door when voices carried through it, and he slowed as one rose above the others.
“I have a mission brief coming through for you on a secure channel. I need your team wheels up within the hour.”
Shaun stopped.
Well, fuck.
That definitely sounded like something he had no business walking into.
He should turn around. But when had he ever really done what he was supposed to do?
Instead, he found himself listening when Noble answered, his voice controlled enough that Shaun immediately suspected the man on the receiving end was someone he would much rather tell to go fuck himself.
“Okay, send me the information, and I’ll carry out the checks.”
“I have already done the checks, and it fits within our priorities,” the other man insisted. “Send your tactical and incursions team.”
Shaun frowned. Whoever Noble was talking to had enough authority to hand Red Squadron a mission and expect them wheels up within an hour, but must have thought that authority extended to choosing which operators Noble put on it.
“Sir.” The single word came through the door with enough restraint that Shaun almost smiled. He’d heard that particular tone from Rock and Grif more than once. It usually meant somebody was approximately five seconds away from being invited to perform a physically impossible act upon themselves.
“That is not how this task force works. You are fully aware that all missions must fall within our parameters. You are also aware that my team and I decide which team we send out. Our requirement is that we send a team. JSOC does not get to decide which team has boots on the ground for which mission.”
“But…”
“Send me the files, and you will have our decision within the hour.”
Shaun heard movement inside the room, followed by silence.
Interesting.
Whatever Red Squadron was, their relationship with people way up the chain of command clearly gave Noble considerably more operational autonomy than most units could have gotten away with.
Someone high enough up the fruit salad chain could hand him a mission, but Noble still controlled how his people carried it out.
That’s useful information.
It was also none of his fucking business while he was pretending to be a truck driver. But Shaun figured it would be useful intel for Rock when he finally managed to get home. He waited another few seconds before lifting his hand to knock.
Should I knock? Do I just walk right in?
Would they shoot him if he did? Nah, probably not. Right?
Oh, for fuck’s sake, you are acting like a dumbass.
He knocked. It couldn’t hurt to be polite, especially when he was about to tell his rescuers and hosts that he was bored out of his fucking brain while hoping for an opportunity to palm a sat phone from under their noses. The low murmur of voices inside stopped almost immediately.
Shit, maybe this was a bad idea.
The door opened before he could reconsider, and Noble appeared on the other side.
“Shaun, um?”
“Am.” Shaun stumbled over the word before mentally kicking himself in the ass. “It’s actually you that I was looking…”
He caught sight of the main screen behind Zenko, and everything else disappeared. A photograph had replaced whoever Noble had been speaking to, and Shaun knew the face staring back at him.
Holy fucking shit.
“How do you know that man?” Shaun stepped farther into the room without waiting to be invited. “Why do you have his picture on your screen?”
Noble looked over his shoulder toward the display. “What man?”
“The man on the screen behind Zenko.” Shaun pointed toward the photograph. There was no fucking doubt. He knew him. “How do you know him?”
Noble caught Shaun by the arm and pulled him the rest of the way inside before closing the door. “Do you know him, Shaun?”
“Yeah, I’m positive.” Shaun moved closer to the screen, studying the photograph even though he didn’t need another look to be sure.
“He was one of the truck drivers on the run I was taken from. We stopped at a tea house for something to eat before we were supposed to head back to the base.” The room went quiet as he felt Zenko move closer, but kept his attention on the photograph.
“That’s probably where he was taken from.” Noble looked toward Max. “Can you check if we have any footage from that area on that day?”
“Sure.” Max turned back to his station, and lines of code began moving across one of his screens as he typed. “But it’s Baghdad, Noble. Footage coming out of there is spotty at best.”
“Just do the best you can.” Noble turned back to Shaun. “You started to say it was me you were looking for?”
“Yeah.” Shaun was still staring at the photograph, his stomach churning hard enough to make him swallow.
Nerves, that’s all it was, because he refused to call the fucking feeling fear.
He was a Ghost, and Ghosts didn’t get to fall apart because somebody put the face of a man connected to their captivity on a screen.
He clamped down on the reaction before it could show.
The last thing he needed was to embarrass himself in front of these men, especially when maintaining his cover was already becoming harder by the fucking day.
“First, though.” Shaun nodded toward the screen. “Who is he?”
Noble didn’t answer immediately. Shaun watched him consider the question, and that hesitation told him the information wasn’t something Noble should be sharing with a civilian.
When the answer finally came, Shaun understood something else.
Noble trusted him enough to give it to him anyway, or at least trusted Zenko’s judgment where Shaun was concerned.
“He’s our HVT for an upcoming mission.”
“Your HVT?” Shaun let his eyebrows rise.
How the hell was Red Squadron given this guy as an HVT? This doesn’t make fucking sense.
“High Value Target,” Noble explained. “We received orders to eliminate him.”
Shaun forced himself not to react to an explanation he didn’t fucking need.
“Okay.” His brain was already moving through the implications.
The man on that screen had been on the run where he was taken.
Now their superiors, most likely JSOC, had handed Red Squadron a mission to eliminate him, and the person on the phone had been pushing Noble to get a team wheels-up within the fucking hour.
That was enough to make every instinct he possessed start screaming.
“If he’s the dude who arranged for me to be given to ISIS, then why is our government sending you to take him out? ” Shaun looked at Noble. “Why now?”
“Yup.” Noble nodded. “That’s the million-dollar question, isn’t it?”
“I want in.”
Fuck.
The words were out before Shaun could stop them, and the reaction around the room told him exactly how badly he had fucked up.
“No.” Noble’s refusal was immediate. “You aren’t trained, and even if you were, I still wouldn’t bring you.”
“Why not?” Shaun clenched his fists until his fingernails dug into his palms.
Because I’m as fucking trained as you are.
The words nearly came out, but he stopped them just in time.
This was the asshole who had given him to fucking ISIS, and Shaun wanted him.
If these were his own men standing around him, there wouldn’t even be a debate about whether he went on the retrieval team.
Rock would know better than to try leaving him behind.
Except these weren’t the Ghosts. They were Red Squadron, and as far as everyone in this room was concerned, Shaun was a civilian truck driver they had pulled out of an ISIS prison cave.
Zenko knew there was more. Shaun could feel his attention from across the room, and the memory of Zenko standing beside the bed with his eyes fixed on the K-Bar flashed through his head.
Are you trained, Shaun?
He still hadn’t answered that fucking question, and he freaking knew that Zenko hadn’t forgotten it either.
“Because you’re a civilian,” Noble answered. “One who was held captive by the same people this man may have helped hand you over to. You’re not going on an operation with my team.”
Shaun bit down on the inside of his cheek. “Is liathróidí camaill é sin agus tá a fhios agat air.” The Irish escaped beneath his breath before he could stop it.
FUCK.
“Excuse me?” Noble’s eyes narrowed.
“Nothing.” Shaun carefully kept his expression blank. Thank Christ the man didn’t understand Irish. Telling Noble his decision sucked camel balls and he fucking knew it probably wasn’t going to improve Shaun’s chances of getting onto the mission.
He needed to hit something. Or shoot something.
Preferably both, because this pretending-to-be-passive shit was getting fucking old.
Rock needed to hurry his ass up and find him, but Red Squadron kept this place locked down as tightly as Rock kept their Virginia Beach or South of the border properties whenever Grif and Shar were both there.
The chances of Rock simply happening upon Shaun or realizing where he was were somewhere between slim and winning the sweepstakes back home.
Which was exactly why Shaun had come looking for Noble in the first place.
He needed a fucking sat phone. Except asking to borrow secure communications immediately after demanding a place on an operation, demonstrating knowledge he shouldn’t possess, and swearing at Noble in Irish probably wasn’t the brightest move he could make.
Shaun looked back at the photograph. “Kick his ass for me?” He turned his attention to Zenko and nodded toward the man on the screen.
Zenko held his gaze, and for one dangerous second, Shaun wondered exactly how much the man was putting together behind those eyes.
Too fucking much, probably.
He turned toward the door before he gave Zenko anything else to work with. His fist slammed against the frame on his way out, the sharp burst of pain across his knuckles doing fuck-all to improve his mood.
Another show of temper he couldn’t afford.
Fantastic.
Hopefully, by the time Zenko and Noble returned, he would be long gone.
Yeah, you just keep telling yourself that, dumbass.