by Lila Dubois
“Something we didn’t realize until they brought you in,” Owen acknowledged. “However, the Bellator Dei and their associates have made moves on U.S. soil, so they are now a threat to all of us.”
Percival had composed himself. He cleared his throat and Owen motioned for him to take over. “Mr. Fraser and I are the joint heads of this combined task force. The Masters Protection Force.”
“MPF,” Selene said.
Percival nodded. “This is the first time we’ve been called on to act, and our original mission was to apprehend Mr. Campisi.”
“Well, you did a shit job of that,” Oscar said, sounding weirdly cheerful. “A computer nerd and an academic did that for you.”
“Not helping,” Selene hissed at him.
Owen’s lips twitched. “Now that we know that Mr. Campisi—can I call you Luca?”
Luca nodded.
“Thanks,” Owen continued. “That Luca isn’t really a member of the Bellator Dei, our focus has shifted.”
“There are two main issues,” Sebastian said. “One that matters more to the Masters’ Admiralty, and one that’s more pressing for us.”
“We need to dismantle the Bellator Dei,” Percival said, making it clear which was their priority.
Beside her, Luca stiffened.
“There are innocent people in that cult,” Selene said hotly.
“They beat children, murder people,” Oscar added with a snarl. “We need to get those fuckers, but rescue the kids.”
“We are not proposing slaughter,” Percival said. “But the Bellator Dei has grown many heads since we disposed of the man who was manipulating them.”
“What?” Luca demanded. “Who was it? How did you—”
“Go back and read the earlier books,” Franco said.
“Dismantling the Bellator Dei, and helping people who were brainwashed or coerced by them, is what the Masters’ Admiralty is focused on. We have a smaller but connected issue. Who were the mercenaries who attacked you in Pennsylvania?” Sebastian asked.
“At first, our assumption was the Bellator Dei hired them to find Luca,” Owen said.
Luca nodded. “They think I am loyal to them and the cause. I may not be a full numerary, living on the compound, but my profession is one they chose, and I tithe fifty percent of my salary, as is expected of everyone in our congregation. There should be no reason for them to suspect me. They shouldn’t even know I’ve left Italy, as I told them I had to go no-contact for several weeks.”
“Someone clearly knows,” Percival pointed out.
“The Serbians,” Oscar added.
Luca whispered what sounded like a prayer, or maybe a curse, in Italian.
“We had to turn over the people we captured to the authorities, but before we did, we discovered several things that concern us. First, all but two of them were American.” Owen raised his finger.
“Boss and Henchman Two,” Selene said. “Those were my pet names for them.”
“You gave them…pet names?” Percival looked alarmed, probably for her mental health.
Owen ignored them both. “Second, they had Serbian passports but have no ties that link back to Bellator Dei. They do have some very distant ties to Serbian dissident groups. But the connections are tenuous. One of them is the neighbor of a man whose brother-in-law’s cousin is a paramilitary rebel in the ultranationalist Serbian Action Organization, who are believed to be neo-fascist and neo-Nazis. They have the resources of a small government and have used bombs.”
“Did you design bombs for them?” Percival asked.
“No.” Luca shook his head. Then paused. “Not that I… I don’t make car bombs or suicide vests, if those were what was used.”
“If they have the resources of a government, I’m thinking they have access to components.” Owen raised both eyebrows.
Luca sat back, blinking behind his glasses. “I was never told where the Bellator Dei got the bomb-making materials. I had some in the lab I used for my job, but that is a known facility, and everything I brought in was regulated,” Luca said. “But I overheard a few things that made me suspect weapons and bomb supplies were purchased from a Serbian or Ukrainian source.”
“A paramilitary organization would be a good source for those kinds of things,” Owen said.
“You never interacted with them directly?” Percival asked.
Luca shook his head.
Percival leaned forward slightly. “But they might have figured it out. If I was selling bomb supplies to someone, I might get curious as to who was designing and building the bombs for them.”
Luca rubbed his jaw wearily. “But I am not the only one they trained to do it. I focused on experimental bombs. There are others who build package explosives, car bombs—”
“They’re still rebuilding the villa that particular device destroyed.” Percival sounded stiff once more. “And of course, the families of those who died are still grieving.”
The table went silent, and while her heart hurt for what those people must have suffered, Selene’s thoughts were focused on putting together pieces of what she knew, and what Owen and Percival had said.
“The neptunium.” Her voice broke the silence.
“Fuck.” Oscar sat up straight. “Of course.”
Luca looked back and forth between them, realization stamping his features. “If they supplied it…”
“Much better to have that for themselves,” Selene said.
“Exactly,” Oscar echoed.
“Would you like to share with the rest of the class?” Owen asked mildly.
Selene turned away from her lovers to look at the rest of the people around the table. All of whom, with the exception of the Grand Master, were leaning forward with either frowns of concentration or confusion on their faces.
“Let’s say I’m the leader of a military rebel group—”
“Aka, a supervillain,” Oscar said.
“—and I’m selling guns and explosives to a funky little religious cult. That’s fine. They’re terrorists, I’m a terrorist, it works out for both of us.”
Luca didn’t flinch when she called the Bellator Dei terrorists, and she was glad she hadn’t hurt him, even if she was, unfortunately, correctly labeling both him and his sister.
“Then one day, they ask for something different. Neptunium. You get it for them, but then you start to wonder why they need it.”
“Ahhh, yes. Shit.” Owen sat back. “Nice one, Selene.”
She nodded, but kept going in case the others hadn’t figured out where she was headed. “So I do some research, realize it could be used in a nuclear device. Suddenly the little cult I’ve been supplying has something I don’t—the ability to make a nuclear bomb, using an element that isn’t as heavily regulated as uranium and plutonium.
“I want that bomb. But how to get it?” Selene continued. “I could go to the cult and offer to buy a bomb or two. Or…I figure out who’s playing the role of Oppenheimer and kidnap him. If I have the bomb maker, I have as many bombs as I want. I don’t have to pay for them, and the threat from those bombs isn’t diluted by another terrorist organization having the same thing I do.”
Owen tapped his fingers on the table. “Luca, do you have neptunium?”
“Yes. I didn’t make the bomb, but I could. I had everything I needed.”
“How did you actually get ahold of the neptunium?” Owen asked.
“It was delivered in person. The courier never spoke. I cannot confirm he was Serbian.”
Owen clearly believed they now had a lead they could work with as he continued with one follow-up question after another. “But it would be a logical assumption…if the Bellator Dei gave the address of your lab to the Serbians so they could deliver it—I assume special handling is needed?”
“Yes. In addition to being radioactive, it’s pyrophoric, which means it’s capable of spontaneously catching fire at room temperature.”
Owen closed his hand, lightly hitting the table with the side o
f his fist. “It’s possible, even probable, that they know who you are, and given that your actual job is bomb analysis and forensic disposal, they could assume you were also, secretly, the man who created bombs for the Bellator Dei.”
“The Serbians may have tracked you to the U.S.,” Percival said. “The risk of kidnapping you in Italy may have been too great.”
“But if they have ties to an organization we’ve labeled terrorists, then their known members can’t enter the U.S.,” Owen pointed out.
“So they find someone who isn’t on our watch lists,” Sebastian said. “Send them over.”
Owen nodded slowly. “The Americans in the group are part of the Serbian gangs of Chicago.”
“So the two who come over recruit some Americans with ties or sympathies to act as muscle,” Sebastian added.
“That would explain why they were so fucking dumb,” Oscar added.
“This changes things.” Owen looked at Percival, who nodded.
“How?” the Grand Master asked softly, less as if she needed an answer and more as if she were prompting him to explain.
“Now we have three issues. The Bellator Dei, the Serbians, and the bomb plans themselves.”
“It doesn’t work,” Luca reminded them. “My calculations were wrong.”
“But no one knows that besides us,” Sebastian pointed out. “And frankly, Luca, even if you told your people that it didn’t work, they might not believe you. And the Serbians will probably assume it does work, even if they’re told it doesn’t.”
“Because they want it to work. And even if they kidnapped Luca, and he told them it didn’t, they would assume he was lying to stop them from having a nuclear bomb.”
“Exactly.”
“We release the plans,” Oscar said. “Put them up on the dark web.”
Sebastian nodded. “Alert the intelligence community first to be prepared to track the sale and movement of neptunium.”
“Find the bad guys when they go shopping,” Oscar added.
The Grand Master stood, and they all turned their attention to her. “Owen, you coordinate with Percival to address the issues of the Bellator Dei and the Serbians.”
“Yes, Grand Master.”
Beside Selene, Luca stiffened. “My sister is innocent. She doesn’t know what they really are.”
“Our goal is no loss of life,” Percival said, not unkindly. “We would like your assistance in listing their members and describing their compound.”
“If you save them,” Luca said quietly. “The ones you can. My sister, the people who never had a chance to learn anything else. The children.”
“With your assistance, that is a likely outcome,” Percival said.
Selene noticed neither he nor Owen promised that Joli would be okay.
“Oscar, Luca, and Selene. It’s clear the three of you function well as a tri—together.”
For a heart-stopping moment, Selene thought the Grand Master was going to say “trinity.” The overwhelming sense of disappointment that washed through her when she didn’t told Selene exactly how bad this was going to hurt when they all parted and returned to their homes and jobs.
“You will work with our primary CIA contact to orchestrate the release of the plans.” While the hood hid her face, it was clear the Grand Master was pleased. The hood turned as she looked at each of them. “Well done.”
With that, the Grand Master turned and walked away, Sebastian and Franco at her back.
Chapter Fourteen
Oscar gave Selene a casual one-armed shrug when they found themselves back in the same hotel they’d left…fuck…was it really just five days ago? It felt like they’d lived a lifetime since.
After Luca’s hours-long meeting with the leaders of the MPF, Sebastian had ordered them to return to the Boston Park Plaza. They’d been set up in the penthouse suite his brother Langston had shared with Mina and Rich a couple weeks earlier. Apparently, this suite was reserved for the Trinity Masters year-round.
Franco said it was typically used by newly formed trinities, part of their get-to-know-you month right after the initial binding ceremony.
In their case, Oscar, Selene, and Luca were here because it was a three-bedroom suite, and the Trinity Masters knew how to protect it. There was currently one of their Warrior Scholar dudes, Andre, standing sentry in the hall.
Sebastian had pointed out they’d probably only use one of the bedrooms. Luckily, the Grand Master hadn’t been there when he’d said that because Oscar wasn’t sure how Juliette felt about him and Selene hooking up, let alone how she felt about them adding Luca.
Of course, Oscar had been taking his cues on Trinity Masters stuff from Selene, and she just laughed at Sebastian’s joke, so it was probably cool.
“This is a very beautiful room,” Luca said, taking in the kitchenette, the mini baby grand, the bar. Given what he’d told them about his upbringing, it was safe to say there’d been precious few luxuries in Luca’s life. Not that Oscar was accustomed to this kind of high living, either.
“Oh!” Selene cried out. Oscar followed her line of vision and understood her sudden happiness. Their luggage had been retrieved from the safe house and was sitting at the end of the hallway, waiting for them, along with…
“My laptop. Fuck yeah.” He rushed over and picked up his battered laptop case. “Come to daddy, baby. I’ve missed you, girl.”
Selene rolled her eyes at him, but he didn’t give a shit. The past few days were the longest he’d ever gone without touching a computer, and he had been about five minutes away from some serious DTs.
Luca’s eyes widened when he realized his suitcase was amongst theirs.
Selene recognized his surprise. “The security team who captured the Serbians must have gone through your rental car and recovered your belongings as well.”
“I suspect they searched it all first, but I don’t care. I’m grateful to have clean clothing. And dry shoes.”
They’d been forced to put their cold, damp shoes back on when they’d arrived at the library. The first thing Oscar had done when they’d walked into the suite was kick his shoes off by the door. Glancing down, he realized Selene and Luca had done the same.
Selene reached for the handle, intent on dragging her suitcase down the hallway, and Oscar started to follow suit. They both stopped when Luca sank down on the couch, his elbows on his knees, his head in his hands.
“You okay?” Oscar asked, walking back to the other man.
Luca started to nod, then released a shaky breath and shook his head. “No. I’m still struggling…trying to make sense of…”
Though Luca seemed incapable of gathering his thoughts, of forming a complete sentence, Oscar understood immediately.
How many months had Luca spent finding a way to accept that he could be killed for his actions? Oscar tried to put himself in Luca’s shoes. While death was inevitable, he was still young and, because of that, he assumed he had decades left before he had to worry about dying. He wasn’t sure he would have been able to come to grips with the idea of living on borrowed time, sacrificing his life before he’d even gotten close to hitting forty. As far as he was concerned, he still had a shit-ton of stuff to do and too much life to live.
Oscar sat next to him on the couch and gripped his shoulder tightly, trying to comfort Luca. “I get it, man. You weren’t expecting this. Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’ve been running with the wrong crowd. It’s skewed your perception of people. Not everyone in the world is a psychopath, seeking to cleanse those they deem evil through explosives.”
Luca laughed, and Oscar could hear how rusty the sound was. Luca hadn’t had a lot of stuff to laugh about in his life. “That’s good information to have,” Luca joked.
Selene claimed the other side of Luca. “You’re one of us now, Luca. The Trinity Masters will protect you, help you.”
“I still don’t understand why your Grand Master invited me. It seems…strange to me.”
Selene smil
ed. “You’re brilliant. The Trinity Masters seek out the best and the brightest. You definitely qualify.”
“But my bomb design didn’t work.”
Selene waved that argument away. “Yet. The concept is solid. What doesn’t work is our current technology. You were wrong about the speed an atom could obtain with that particle accelerator, based on current particle accelerators, even modified ones. You’re like John Michell, predicting the existence of black holes long before we had the technology to see them.”
Luca’s face hardened. “Even if the technology existed, I will never try to make that bomb work.”
She grasped his hand and squeezed it. “I know that. But that doesn’t mean you can’t design something amazing that could change the world in a positive way. I think that’s why the Grand Master invited you to join. You can help me try to make a fusion energy generator.”
“Isn’t that the thing you said could blow a crater in the Earth?” Oscar asked in alarm. “How about no?”
“I hope you are correct, Selene,” Luca said softly. “I was wondering if it was Tieni i tuoi amici vicino…ed i tuoi nemici…ancora più vicino. Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.”
Selene shook her head. “No. Our society doesn’t work that way.”
“I figured she was just nabbing Luca before the Masters’ Admiralty could,” Oscar added. “Like you said, our dude here is brilliant, and the Grand Master is still pretty tweaked at Eric, the fleet admiral, for stealing Sylvia away.”
“Tweaked?” Luca asked, unfamiliar with the expression.
“Pissed off. Mad. Annoyed,” Oscar clarified.
“That’s also not how the Trinity Masters works,” Selene said though Oscar could tell she was less confident his argument was wrong.
“You saw how that Percival guy reacted when the Grand Master told him she’d recruited Luca to the Trinity Masters.”
Luca shook his head. “I don’t believe the Masters’ Admiralty would ever want me. I am their enemy. It is different here. The Trinity Masters don’t have the same violent history with the Bellator Dei.”
Selene tilted her head. “I think you’re wrong, but it’s a moot point. You’re ours now.”