Chapter Eleven #5
It wasn’t like the man was wrong. Jinx had wooed him. Oh, and he was damn grateful for that.
“What’s the dealio?” Zayn asked, as he was tying his boots so they could head out.
Maura told them what they knew.
“This asshole took out one of Elizabeth’s Marines, trying to get her.”
Zayn actually growled.
Yeah, he did NOT like that.
Not.
At.
All.
“Which one?” Rogue asked.
She had the information that Gene had just emailed her to her work account. She scanned and found the information so she could vet them in on the flight out.
“Jet Donato.”
Zayn sighed.
“I liked him. He was really nice, and a good Marine. The dude was decorated. Yeah, this pisses me off. I hate assholes who kill Marines.”
Well, yeah.
Likely because they were MARINES, and someone was always trying to kill them.
It went with the job.
“She also lost her secretary when he sent flowers that were dosed in poison. The poor woman sniffed and handled them. It killed her. The asshole is picking off anyone he can get to, and Gene is afraid she’s next—or she’s going to lose her mind and go nuclear.
We’re heading there to make sure that explosion is minimal. ”
Zayn was curious.
Nuclear had a whole variant of outcomes.
So, he wanted to know.
“Like minimize a sanitarium stay, or we’re going to have to contain Elizabeth at some point? I don’t want to have to put her down.”
Rogue actually laughed.
How could he not?
“Fat ass, she’d be on you before you even saw her coming. She sneaks up on us all the time. If she wants to gun us down, or evade us, she knows how to do that. Stop being ridiculous. She’s our boss.”
It was clear Zayn didn’t like that.
What did he like less?
“Besides,” Rogue said. “She’d be able to take all of us down quickly by hitting us where it hurts—our families. She knows everything about us.”
He gasped.
“Oh, that’s not something I like at all.”
Maura reassured him.
“She’d never hurt us. We’re family. They just don’t want her going off the reservation, so to speak—and ending up in the looney bin. We have double duty. We’re watching a director, and handling a mess, but we do have one problem, though.”
All three men waited.
This didn’t sound good, and when the Major said ‘problem’ it was always bad.
ALWAYS.
“What?” Rogue asked.
She gave them the bad news, and it was probably the worst thing for them.
“They don’t have anything to tie to the dude.
We’re starting a fresh hunt and going in with nothing to help us.
Gene is still working on it, but from what he just sent me, the guy is really freaking good at playing hide-and-seek.
He’s filthy rich, and gunning for Elizabeth.
Our job is to keep her safe, and find him with no intel so far. ”
Yep.
Maura was right.
They didn’t like that.
“What do you mean they have nothing?” Zayn asked. “We run on bad intentions and intel. That’s kind of how we do our job. You can’t do one without the other.”
Yeah, she was aware.
Maura told them what was in the actual intel they got.
“Gene mentioned in his notes that the dude hired a good hacker to delete the trail. They can’t find anything to latch onto so we can begin tracing him. All bank accounts are scrambled to waste time, and she hasn’t figured out how he’s moving city-to-city to leave clues. There’s no trace of him.”
They all looked at Rogue.
“What?” he asked.
She smiled.
“I need a favor.”
He lifted a brow.
“When you say that, it’s always EXPENSIVE. Like, drain the bank accounts expensive. Like, do something really stupid expensive.”
Oh, she was well aware.
And he wasn’t wrong.
“We need a lead. If he’s hired a hacker, find the person for me. He likely went where?” she asked.
There was only two places someone would go to hire that kind of help.
So, Rogue told her the only two places that a hacker that good would call home—basically, looking for jobs.
“The Dark Web, or The Underground,” Rogue stated.
Yep.
That was what she was thinking.
“If they went to the underground, he had to be in NOLA at some point. That’s our stomping ground, and Mikey O’ is king there. We can use that to help us. Chances are, Devon Slater doesn’t have a clue about us, so he won’t see us coming.”
Okay, well, then, they kind of had a lead. It wasn’t much, but they’d taken down bad guys with far less, and for people they’d not cared nearly as much about.
For Elizabeth, they’d get shit done.
“As soon as we get on that flight, contact Calyx, and see if she can find a lead that way. Tell Remmy to go deep diving on the web. He plays on that playground all the time.”
That worked for him.
If there was a point of contact, they could buy the information.
And would.
“Use part of the fifty million we got for taking out Von Donore. I meant what I said when I told the Blackhawks this was on us. We don’t charge our friends. God knows Elizabeth has covered for us, and gotten us help when we were in over our heads. We owe her and the family one.”
On that, they agreed.
“On it, Major.”
Picking up their things, they headed to the carriage house and got into one of the cars there. Oh, the Bentley looked tempting, but there was no way to get it back to the castle.
Instead, they got into a different one.
She’d text Poe and tell him where his car was so he could have his butler retrieve it tomorrow.
As they pulled out, Zayn was curious.
“Can we stop for something to eat? I’m feeling peckish,” he stated, as he leaned in between the two seats.
Rogue laughed from beside him in the car.
Know who wasn’t amused?
The little guy.
Instead, Jagger stared at him like he’d lost his damn mind once and for all.
“Where would you like to stop in the middle of the night?” he asked.
The man shrugged.
“I don’t know. A coffee shop? A convenience store? A drive-through burger joint? Is this your first day eating? Do you recall what food is? I know you don’t eat much because you’re small and all, but…”
Jagger flipped him off.
“Seriously, can I get a coffee at least? We’ve been going nonstop the last four days. A guy needs food.”
Dealing with Zayn was like managing a toddler who played with guns and shit that blew up. It was a fulltime job for the Major, and Jagger.
Instead of saying anything, Jagger reached into his bag, and handed the man a granola bar. It was one of the ones he carried for Maura since she was pregnant.
Ironically, she ate far less than their homicidal toddler, Zayn Thundercloud.
“That should hold me off a minute or two. Is that all you’ve got in that bag?” he asked.
He sighed.
“Callen’s jet has snacks. You’ll live until then. Sit down, eat the Granola bar, and stop being a bottomless pit for the next twenty minutes.”
Zayn did, but he mumbled under his breath something about ‘the little guy wasn’t so much fun at this time in the morning’.
Or something like that.
“Are you pregnant by chance?” Rogue asked him, busting his ass.
The man flipped him off.
“When we’re going to hunt and kill people who murder Marines, I have an appetite. Sue me. I can’t help it. If you remember correctly, we don’t exactly eat three meals a day like a person is supposed to.”
Rogue opened his mouth, and Jagger pointed at him.
“Don’t,” he warned, as Maura floored it out of the gate, and onto the road.
She was driving like they were being timed to get to the air strip.
When he turned to focus on the road, he freaked the fuck out and grabbed the dash.
“WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD!” he shouted, bracing his boot on the dash too.
She just laughed.
And hauled ass.
The Hunters were teaming up with the Blackhawks. It was going to be a wild one.
They could bet on it.