I more than likely would. “Wes, come on man. You know I didn’t have much choice. It was a shot I took. It blew up in my face but I had to take the chance.”
“I know, but it was still fucked up. Ethan was freaking.”
“What is he doing now?”
“He went back to liaise with his people. I think he was just happy you were alive. He did lose his shit though when we realized you’d been captured and I told him what happened.”
“I know he must have.”
“Didn’t get to speak to your girl. I tried to call her a few times.” He looked defeated. “But… prior to your message the other day, intel spied on Giovanni and listened in on a conversation with Armand. We heard Jia was missing. Also that Frankie took her, and helped you escape. We did the math and assumed she was with you.” He raised his brows.
“Yeah. Lots has happened. I’ll fill you in later. ”
“Later? Come on Xander. I’ve been worried sick.”
I could imagine that being true. “This first.” I pointed to the house.
He looked over. “Well, what’s this about?”
I thought it was best to wait until he got here to talk to him about why we were meeting Dorian.
“I just need some answers. This guy can do some backtracking. Jack thinks something was off in the beginning. He thinks The Ra got involved via someone higher. Like from the CIA or SMF.”
Shock filled his face and his mouth dropped. “What the fuck?”
“Yeah I know, it makes sense. That’s why I’m here. I just figured since I was unsuccessful I could still help in some way. I figured if he’s right then that would be really bad.”
“Fuck, of course. It would mean Ethan got hired and got used as a chump. All of us.” He brought his hand to his head.
“Yes. All of us,” I agreed trying to tamp down the anger that stirred at the thought.
“Well let’s do this.” Wes grit his teeth.
We walked up to the door and rang the bell. A thin wiry-looking man with red hair opened the door. He wore thick rimmed glasses that made his eyes look bigger.
“Hello.” He beamed. I detected a hint of a Scottish accent. “I suppose you’re Xander and … Xander’s friend?” Yup I was right, he had a Scottish accent.
He looked from me to Wes and smiled.
I put out my hand to shake his.
“Yes. I’m Xander and this is my friend Wes. Great to meet you.”
“Same here.”
Wes shook his hand too.
We walked inside the house and it was clear that the classic homely look stopped at the door.
The house reminded me of being in The Pentagon but with a mixture of what Tony Stark’s place would look like, very, very high tech.
That was just the sitting room.
He led us to his office and it looked like it had been pulled from a scene in Iron Man. He even had robots.
“Jesus, what a place you have here,” I stated.
“It’s totally my kind of place,” Wes agreed with keen appreciation.
Dorian smiled. “Glad you like it guys. This is what you call years of design.”
I smiled at that. I could just imagine the years he must have put in.
Dorian took us over to a seated area. The computer was holographic and moved on a glass screen at the touch of his fingers.
“So, what can I do for you? Who are we spying on?” he asked.
I glanced at Wes then looked back to him.
“I’m not sure.”
“This isn’t gonna be one of those things where you can’t tell me what I’m looking for because of some breach of protocol or shite like that, are ya?”
“No.”
“Good, because I exist now outside of the system. I get the juice on things if the price is right. But some things I do for free. Like for friends like Jack. So this is a freebie.”
“Thank you. We’re looking for intel on the Ra. I think I want to see if we can find anything from somewhere, or someone in the CIA office or SMF that looks off. Maybe an email.”
He inclined his head to the side. “I get it. That’s deep shit though. You think there’s a double agent amongst them?”
“Possibly. The correspondence would have gone out around seven or eight weeks ago. The name that should pop up is Giovanni Marchesi. And blue prints. Some blueprints containing nuke designs were stolen from an envoy in transit to Arizona.”
“Okay. Let me see what I can find.”
He tapped a few keys, his hands moving so fast I couldn’t tell what he was writing out.
He tapped away and the screen populated with a lot of code. It was just programs he was hacking. Then I realized he was looking through a trail in the liquid file links.
It was a good thing Wes and I understood what he was doing because he wasn’t one to explain as he went along.
“I’m not seeing anything that stands out on email. I’m gonna search on the phones linked to people in charge. Maybe I can pick up a text or something.”
I raised my brows. “You can do that?” I hadn’t done that before. Didn’t have to. I’d mostly hacked government systems for information they were hiding.
“Oh yes. I can totally do that. I have this set up wired to give me all the juice. There is no tea spilling anywhere that I can’t find. The hard part is the search. If we had a name it would help.” He inclined his head to the side.
I was still impressed. It made me wonder what he’d done in his line of work.
“There’s shit loads of info here.” Wes stated.
There was a shit load. It was files Dorian had searched with the reference blueprints. That was just the last few weeks.
“Dorian, how about localizing to one department at a time. SMF is smaller. How about focusing on the senior team maybe.” There were five senior members of management.
Dorian looked more curious. “Got your focus on someone in particular?”
“Nah just trying to narrow the search. I was thinking that the information about the prints would have cascaded from the CIA. There may be something you can pick up there.”
“Good thinking.” He nodded.
“There’d be a lot of messages with the word ‘prints’ bouncing from Ethan however. Some to me, some to Wes. So don’t focus on him.”
Now he narrowed his eyes. “Xander, I leave no stone unturned. That’s just me. I don’t pussyfoot around shite or rule people out, it’s why I’m so good.”
“I get that but Ethan is clean.” There was no part of it that fit him.
Wes brushed my elbow. “Xander there’s no harm checking. Then we can rule him out.”
“Sure, of course.” It was true we could rule him out, even though I already had. Ethan had wanted to catch Balthazar as badly as me. In the past his orders were always to kill him on sight. No questions asked, just kill him if you got a clear shot.
Dorian scanned over the five members of the senior team. He brought up their files and the numbers associated with them that were listed. Each number was color coded.
“Right… so the red numbers are what we have on file for their business phones and personal phones. The yellow ones and blue are where my equipment goes a little further. Right now its tracked a cellphone number that has been used by each person over the last eight weeks,” Dorian explained.
I looked at each person. Of the five people there. Ethan and Gina Hawkes had the most yellow codes, but they were the only ones with blue codes.
“What does yellow and blue specifically mean?” Wes asked. He took the words out of my mouth. I really hoped Dorian wasn’t one of those people who just color coded all manner of unnecessary shit.
“Yellow is another personal number. I don’t usually flicker an eyelid at that because of privacy. We may have their listed personal phone numbers but they may give their spouse, partners, kids, or other family members another number. It’s common. I personally don’t see the fun in having so many numbers but each to their own. The blue numbers a
re my pool of curiosity.”
Okay, so it seemed like he wasn’t one of those people who color coded for nothing.
He pulled in a breath and continued.
“This is where it gets highly illegal boys. Do I care? I think not. It’s the reason why you’re here.” He laughed. Wes cast a curious glance at me. “Blue usually means the phone was only used a couple of times and disposed of.”
“I used a phone the other day that I had to get rid of,” I surmised.
“Why’d you do that?” He raised a finger.
“So I couldn’t be tracked.”
He grinned. “Yes Xander, get with the program.” He pointed back to the screen. “Let’s start with her, she just has one blue code.”
He tapped the number and it brought up a listing of all the text messages that had been sent to and received by the number. It also brought up a list of numbers which was a total number. Dorian tapped into the messages so we could look at each one. The first one was a dead giveaway that Mrs. Gina Hawkes was having an affair with the guy with the number ending 5567.
It said:
Don’t worry my husband won’t find out.
Come over in ten minutes and bring a pack of condoms.
We used the last one yesterday.
Dorian laughed and flicked through the rest of the messages which went from mild to super raunchy until the last message, when she told Mr. 5567 she couldn’t see him anymore but it was fun.
“So, I’m gonna rule her out.” Dorian bit the inside of his lip.
I agreed. Wes started laughing.
“I’d have a field day with a set up like this,” Wes stated.
I shook my head at him, but the seriousness returned to me when Dorian switched the screen back to Ethan.
Ethan’s picture came up first, then the number listing. I recognized one of the numbers in yellow. That was the number I corresponded with him on. Up to the other day that was the number I’d sent the code red to.
Dorian went to the first blue number.
“This one is the oldest. I’ll start with that, it’s dated back eight weeks,” Dorian said, tapping into the number. Like on Gina’s profile, the number came up with messages.
I’d already decided in my mind that the only thing these messages would contain in relation to Ethan was mission guidelines.
Until I saw the first message from Ethan.
Giovanni Marchesi has the blueprints. If we get our hands on those it’s world domination. We can sell it to the highest bidder.
Ethan
That was what the message said… and as I read it shock slammed into my soul and froze my heart in my chest.
When Dorian flicked to the response from the sender I was ready to breathe fire:
I have a guy from North Korea. I’ll get the prints from the mobster.
Leave it with me,
Balthazar
Dorian looked to me, the humor gone from his face.
“Is it something like this you’re looking for? It tends to tick all the boxes,” he remarked.
I couldn’t even answer. I was just staring at the computer screen trying to process what I was reading.
Balthazar?
Ethan?
No…
It couldn’t be true.
It couldn’t.
Ethan wanted to take down Balthazar way back when, when I was part of the team. This didn’t make any form of sense. But there was no mistake here.
Dorian switched the screen to another message from Ethan. This one had my name.
Ethan:
We need to move fast before The Chameleon takes the prints. Xander Cage is the only one I know who can get in and out of anywhere without being seen.
Balthazar:
Thought we killed that fucktard.
Ethan:
No he’s still alive. He’s in Brazil. I’ll get him on board. He’ll get the job done if I make the right promises.
I balled my fist and roared. I’d been fucking played. I’d been played.
Played by someone I fucking trusted.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!
Ethan… why?
This was on me for putting my trust in him. Me who made it my duty to trust no one.
Wes touched my elbow. His face a mixture of fury. He’d been played too.
But… wait…
This was…
I ran a hand through my hair and looked back to the message on the screen from Balthazar.
I thought we killed him.
He said we…
Oh God…
I backed away and stumbled against the chair behind me. This wasn’t just a now thing, this game started years ago.
Ethan was responsible for everything. It was him… all of it.
The trap. The fucking trap in Nepal.
Claire… her death... it was him.
God… why didn’t I see this? When Paul got captured protocol was to leave him. But it was a trap from then. We were a team, Ethan was our leader. He gave us the mission to go after Balthazar. Then it changed?
It was him. All along it was him.
He made the right promises for sure. My reward for getting the prints was five hundred grand and more importantly, a team assembled to help me find Balthazar.
But Ethan knew where to find him all along. As Giovanni said the person who’d contacted Balthazar would have just called him up for a chat.
This… This shit was exactly that.
Ethan and Balthazar…
Ethan and Balthazar working together…
“You okay pal?” Dorian asked, Wes knew not to ask me that.
I wanted to kill something, or someone, but on account of the help Dorian gave I thought I’d remember my manners and answer.
“No I’m not.”
Wes suddenly tensed and snapped a worried gaze to me. “Xander, I just had a really bad thought. You know we were talking about how people would do things if they got desperate?”
“Yes.” What the fuck now?
“Ethan knows I came to Idaho. I told him. He only left to meet up with his people this morning. Same time I left. Xander I told him where I was going. I’m sorry. I didn’t know man.” Panic filled his face. “He’d know about Jack right? We’d both assumed Jia was with you. Giovanni might still have the prints Xander, and if he doesn’t he knows where they went. What if Ethan comes here and takes Jia? What if –”
Before he could even get the next words out his mouth I was on the move.
Him in tow behind me.
What if Ethan came here and took Jia?
Yes… that was the last thing left to do. The desperate thing, the last resort.
Wes was right.
If Giovanni didn’t have the prints he would know where they went. The only way he’d cough up information like that would be to take the thing that was most important to him.
His prize.
His most prized possession.
Giovanni’s most prized possession just happened to be the same as mine.
Her.
Jia.
Chapter Fifty-Four
Jia
“I love any kind of fruit in cake,” I told Jack.
He smiled and shook his head. “Not me. I just like blueberries. I loathe raspberries, because of the seeds. I don’t like anything that gets stuck in my teeth.” Jack replied.
“I like to eat.” Frankie intoned with a smirk and rubbed his belly.
I rolled my eyes at him. He was acting like he had an actual belly, like a pot belly. But he rubbed his hand over a six pack.
Jack just laughed when he saw my face.
“Well if you can look like that and eat cake then there’s no complaint. I’m an old man, I have to watch myself.”
“You don’t look that old to me.” I smiled.
“You’re very sweet. I’ll write that in my memoirs.”
I giggled. “You have memoirs?”
“Yes, when you live as many lives as mine you have to document something. It would b
e a crime not to.”
“Xander talks about his missions. It sounds really dangerous.”
“Yes, well mine were roughly the same. No walk in the park, and no tea party. You live to tell the tale and you know you’ve lived.”
“Sounds like my every day,” Frankie scuffed as if it was nothing.
Jack paused and cut him a crude glance. “I’m sorry, have you been captured by Vietnamese resistants and held captive in a coffin filled with shards of broken glass while they throw fire ants all over you to try and get you to talk?”
My lips parted, Frankie just stared.
“No, fuck no, bro. Shit, that happened to you?” Frankie looked him over.
Jack nodded. “Yeah, but that wasn’t the worst thing. I don’t talk about the worst things.”
And I took that to mean we shouldn’t ask.
“That’s horrible. I can’t believe people would be so cruel. Evil.” Why was I even saying that? Pa would do that. It was just the sort of thing Pa would do. He’d love the fire ants idea to no end.
“It happens Princess.”
He passed me the cupcake holders to choose which I wanted.
I took the pink ones and gave my mixture another good mix.
“So, this is what you do now?” Frankie asked. “Stay home and bake cookies? Doesn’t seem to suit you.”
“No, I work as a consultant for national security. I don’t get a lot of work but when I do it’s sufficient.”
“Sufficient? I hope you mean that in a monetary way.”
“I do. It pays well.”
“Six figures?”
I glared at Frankie. “Frankie that’s so rude. You can’t ask him that.”
“It’s okay,” Jack cut in. “The money varies depending on the job, but I aim for as close as possible to seven figures as I can. I know my worth.”
Frankie looked impressed. “Fuck yeah. Say, do you think the US government could use a guy like me? Maybe I could be your assistant and assist you.”
“Frankie, what the hell?” I placed my hands on my hips.
“Look girly, in case you didn’t notice, I’m out of a job and I can’t exactly go back to Vegas.” He raised his brows.
I would have continued my stance but he was right and it brought the guilt back.
Game of Love : A Mafia Romance Page 44