LITMIR.BIZ

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outstretched before it sank under the sea.

      Inside the Pentagon

       Months later

      General Joseph McGill didn’t earn his three stars without hearing a lot of carefully worded bullshit. This time the pile was getting deep, and considering his company, it was almost natural for them to color information. Just not this brightly.

      He’d been acting Deputy Director of the CIA Special Operations for less than a month, something he’d lobbied against till the Secretary of Defense ordered him into the position. McGill thought the SOD wanted to shake things up, scare some people. A recent intelligence leak to the press had him clamping on his people so hard their necks hurt. But that would have been an easy job. McGill wasn’t certain the President was aware of this meeting, or who was covering their ass and what for. But his number one target was less than ten feet from him.

      On the other side of the long conference table, Elizabeth Jacobs sat erect, her spine stiff, eyebrows high with indignation. At forty-eight, the sharp red suit and carefully applied makeup was just a smoke screen. She was a cobra who was off the map when it came to understanding how special operations worked. To her, they were all expendable. Oh, she’d bemoan the loss of a service member, but that didn’t stop her from pushing to send more into a dangerous situation. She was the tactical director on a mission that had failed miserably. Even stripped of her clearance and control, she couldn’t stop behaving like an operative in the field. Everyone was an asset and expendable. Including her.

      It turned his stomach to look at her.

      “Are you suggesting I leave this to the good ol’ boys, General?”

      There’s a reason I wear three stars, cupcake.

      With a light shove, he pushed the folder to the center of the table. “Your strategy was deeply flawed. You should have aborted at the first shot fired. You went forward with bad Intel, people are dead. Now you want to leave him there?”

      “He understood the consequences and, while regrettable, he knew the dice before he rolled them. You’ve read the data, the psych reports. He was more than willing to take this assignment.”

      “At your behest.”

      “I’m paid to get the job done, General, and my career speaks for itself.”

      He scoffed. “I’ve read it. It’s pretty shaky in some spots, even before this.” He flicked a hand at the two-inch-thick file between them.

      Her expression turned as snotty as a rebellious teenager cornered by a parent as she said, “Operations always have kinks that must be dealt with in a matter of seconds. I did what needed to be done. And frankly, I wasn’t aware that you had full authority over the matter.”

      Seated around the room, men sat back collectively and attention shifted to the Secretary of Defense.

      “Liz.”

      She looked at the Secretary, her skin reddening as if she just remembered his presence.

      “While this was initially your operation…”

      Her shoulders tensed, too smart not to know she was being stiffed out.

      “It’s not anymore,” he added. “Ensuring that our man is brought home is our only consideration now.”

      “Then a clean sweep is wiser.”

      The SOD tilted his head. “You’re not being asked to participate, you’re being ordered to turn all remaining documentation over to the general.” He stood and she rose slowly. “Today.”

      She didn’t look anywhere but at the Secretary. “Sir, I must argue your decision. I’m prepared to return and rectify this problem myself.”

      “That’s not an option.” He nodded to somewhere behind her and a young man moved to her side.

      He didn’t touch her; they’d allow her the dignity of that. She showed nothing. Not a flicker in her expression nor twitch in her body.

      She’s a cool customer, McGill thought.

      “We’ll discuss your future after the holiday.”

      She only nodded and with her escort, left the room.

      The Secretary looked at McGill. “End this, tie it off. Go outside if you have to. The U.S. can never be implicated. Never. With the present state of unfriendly attitudes from this country’s leader, we have to come away clean or the consequences will be insurmountable.”

      McGill saw the stress on his friend’s face, how he’d aged in the last four years. It wasn’t a job he wanted, ever. Right now, he wasn’t liking this one, either.

      “Joe, it’s your game,” the Secretary pressed.

      McGill looked down at the files. He hated cleaning up his country’s messes.

      Too often, we’ve become our own worst enemy.

      Two

      South Carolina

      Logan stared out the window of his house, watching the helicopter lower to the lawn, its blades stirring up the live oaks and palm trees, and gobbling half the flowers like an alien craft sucking up victims.

      I’m not gonna like this.

      Within moments, General Joseph McGill, a man he respected, climbed out of a plain black chopper. He’d wanted to speak to the team. ASAP. Although McGill gave nothing away as to the reason, he’d been overly polite. A three-star didn’t have to be nice to anyone except the President.

      Logan sipped his beer as the general headed to the sidewalk, a memory shadowing; Cassie on her bike, reaming him for sulking like an “ol’ sour puss.” His lips curved. She’d been right. Around then, he was just about everyone’s pain in the ass.

      His smile fell, her bloody handprints making a comeback in his mind.

      Justice, that’s all she’d want. But Logan was thinking; severely avenged. This was too cleverly done to be anything less than a much larger operation than two men. Not with the total annihilation of the ship and witnesses. Pirates, my ass. They would have raped the ship clean and sunk it. It was too big and slow for the speed they needed.

      What was in his hand? flickered like a taunt. He was still waiting for the inventory of the ship’s contents down to the cellophane-wrapped toothbrushes. It was the only way they’d be able to tell if whatever the diver took came from the crew or guests, or the ship itself. He rubbed the back of his neck for a moment. That attack was Mach 1 overkill.

      Directly behind him on a desk once owned by Robert E. Lee, a laptop computer ran through photos, searching for a match from his admittedly vague composite of the killer. His partner, nearly blown in pieces by the exploding tank had a handprint. The time in the water and the explosion left little evidence for forensics, but Interpol’s face match gave them Felix Carona, Aymara Indian, born in Venezuela and once a captain in its Army. He’d been discharged with full honors, and like Dragon One, worked for the private sector. Though morally, there was no comparison. Carona and a few of his buddies had been linked to more than one assassination of anyone in power who opposed President Gutierrez’s “communal socialist” philosophy. Well executed and no witnesses.

      Where have I heard that before?

      He pinched the bridge of his nose. Scrape it as clean as they wanted, he could still smell it.

      “It’s got to be serious shit for McGill to come himself, without his aides,” Max said from somewhere behind him.

      Or his security, Logan thought. “Time to find out.”

      Logan moved away from the window, taking his beer and heading to the door. He opened it before McGill met the sidewalk. In jeans, loafers and a polo shirt, he looked more like his own father than a man who commanded thousands.

      “What?” Logan asked. “You couldn’t hop a cab?”

      “Too

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