“Your way may not be enough to catch an operative like Hart.”
He smiled; it was amused and wicked this time.
“Caught you, didn’t it?” And I couldn’t tell if he was meaning his botched attempt to enter my apartment or the way I’d just bared my soul to him while we fucked.
“OK,” I granted, keen to move on. “How do you suggest we do this?”
“The old fashioned way. Knowledge and leg work.”
“Sounds technical,” I said deadpan.
“It might be straight forward, but it requires you to open up. How much more technical can we get?”
Damn. He wanted to fleece me of everything I had on Caleb. It made sense, but in doing so, I’d be divulging a hell of a lot about myself. I could hope he didn’t put it all together, but Adam Savill was too clever for that.
“There’s certain things I can’t tell you,” I hedged.
“Charlie, they’re setting you up,” he pointed out. “They’re hunting you too. Wake up! It’s time to change the rules.”
I took a staggered step back; his words hitting too close to their target. He was right; I was trying to fight this with skills learnt whilst in the Department’s employ. They knew every move I’d take before I even took it. They knew me.
I lifted my eyes to his face and looked at him, really looked at him. This man who stalked his prey for a living and had successfully stalked me. He might not have intended to, he might not even realise the extent to which he’d caught me, but he’d achieved something no one in ten years had managed to do.
Jacques Thibault was the closest I’d come to being cut down in the field. The closest anyone had come to ruining my life. Not taking it; many had come close to doing that. But truly destroying it; like Caleb could do. Like the Director was doing.
And here Adam was, a civilian working for a private investigations and security firm.
And he’d slayed me.
I couldn’t let him know.
“You’re right,” I said, shaking my head, realising my hand was gripping the back of a chair for support. I released each finger carefully and straightened up. “It’s time to change the rules.”
He smiled. Not wicked. Not amused. But understanding.
I wanted to hate him for it.
I knew I never would.
Adam Savill was one of the nice guys, one of the good guys. And I’d fallen for him.
“Let’s go see Nick,” he said softly, reaching up and grabbing his t-shirt. He offered a one fingered salute to the dome camera, which made me smile before I could stop it, and then he threw the top on and walked towards the door.
I glanced around the room where my life had jumped tracks and changed forever, but I couldn’t put into words what it was I was feeling. Fear, certainly. Surprise, definitely. Anger, assuredly.
But was that hope in amongst it all?
I shook my head.
Adam reached the door and turned the handle, opening it up and standing to the side to let me pass. I could smell his cologne. I could smell him and me. It called to me. It confused me. It made me work to not react.
“Charlie,” Adam whispered, when I came abreast. “I would have caught you,” he added under his breath and then walked through the door.
I’m not sure what hurt the most. The fact that he meant it. Or the fact that he thought I hadn’t let go.
Chapter 20
Really, I Had No Fucking Idea At All
Charlie
Nick was in his office, which made sense. He’d steer clear of control, knowing we’d come looking for him. And determined to keep me out of the brains of the organisation for as long as he could.
A strange sensation washed over me on that realisation; it took a second or two to identify it.
Regret.
I’d never regretted a thing in my life; another useful coping mechanism the Department had trained into us. We did what we did to protect our country. So our fellow countrymen didn’t have to go off to war. We weren’t just soldiers, we were specialists, designed to prevent the battle before it even began.
But the thought that Nick Anscombe would never fully trust me had me momentarily feeling regret.
Why? I wasn’t sure. The emotion was new to me, so how could I possibly figure out more?
“Interesting interrogation practice,” Nick commented mildly, as we entered his room through the purposely wide open door.
He’d been waiting, of course. Probably aware we’d left the interview room. Already ahead of our next step. I should have been annoyed. All I felt was respect. He leaned back in his chair, ankle crossed over opposite knee, effecting an appropriate king-of-his-castle pose.
I almost wanted to laugh. But humour had fled me.
“Ah, but was it successful?” he added. No smirk, all business.
“The mics not working?” I asked, before Adam could voice what was on his mind. And if the fisted hands at his sides were anything to go by, it wouldn’t have started this conversation off well.
“Eric got the message when the t-shirt covered the dome,” Nick drawled.
I wasn’t sure whether to believe him, but I also wasn’t going to have a debate over the pros and cons of voyeurism whilst on the job. It was irrelevant, had nothing to do with the outcome of the mission. So I brushed it aside like flicking lint off a shirt.
Taking a seat, I made myself comfortable. Adam walked across the room and leaned against a wall, watching silently, exactly how I pictured he watched the entire world.
“Caleb Hart is a problem that needs to be rectified,” I announced.
“And how do you rectify things, Charlie?” Nick asked. “Fatally?”
I held his chilling gaze with one equally as frosty in return. Nick and I may never get along.
And why I thought that was relevant right now was a puzzle all on its own. After this assignment was done and the Director was exposed and the Department reorganised, I’d go back to what I do best, where I do it best. Away from home.
Away from ASI and its over confident commander-in-chief.
Away from Adam Savill and the turbulent emotions he elicited.
Any thoughts of a different end-result was unacceptable.
“I confront my problems, Nick,” I said, pulling myself back on track. “Caleb needs to be found and challenged. He’s in town outside of normal operational parameters. If the Department sent him for a different assignment, I should have been informed to avoid conflict. If he’s here on a break between jobs, his movements should have been tracked by the Department, and, again, I should have been notified. That leaves only two possible alternatives. He’s here on his own, off grid. Or he’s here on the Director’s instructions and there’s no way they’d tell me about it. We need to know which.”
“And the answer to that will determine how you deal with it,” Nick said quietly. Not a question and not a signal of his agreement to help out. I was still on my own. Not trusted. Considered hostile.
I looked across the room to Adam, whose face didn’t give anything away. He’d been watching Nick, but when he felt my gaze on him, his eyes shifted to me. Still nothing. Just a blank mask that hid his true feelings.
What was my next move? I hadn’t thought beyond confronting Caleb and forcing the Director’s hand. Caleb was the key. But to what? Wayne Pascoe’s new role as Auckland’s drug kingpin?
“So,” Nick said, when it was obvious Adam and I were going to remain silent. “You were sent to infiltrate us to determine if we were involved in organised crime. Is that correct?”
I nodded my head, forcing myself to look at Nick and only watch Adam from the corner of my eye.
“And the reason for ASI being suspected is the number of times we’ve been involved in bringing down big players in the narcotics arena throughout the country.”
Not posed as a question, but I nodded my head again all the same. It had felt like a challenge.
“You’ve decided we’re clean,” he went on in that carefully contro
lled voice. No emotion, just a statement of facts. “Wrong place, wrong time. Just coincidence. And it took you all of forty-eight hours to do it.”
Where was he going with this? I didn’t bother nodding my head this time; he knew he was correct.
“You’re a specialist, aren’t you?”
He didn’t wait for me to reply; verbally or non-verbally. Nick was on a roll.
“A highly trained operative capable of speaking several languages, an expert at blending into practically any environment at will. Proficient in multiple forms of firearms or weaponry, handling them all with exacting precision unmatched by my team. You know how to throw a fight, which leads me to believe you definitely have mastered hand to hand combat. You’re clearly abreast of modern electronic surveillance equipment; your base of operations here in Auckland is secured with the absolute best.” He lowered his foot to the ground and leaned forward over the desk. “In essence, you’re an expensive government asset. Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of training has gone into making you the very best of the best.
“Now, there might be better operatives in the Department, but you’ve pissed your employers off enough to warrant a red flag. Which leads me to believe you’re good. Very good at what you do. So good the Director, that’s what you call him? Yeah, the Director has put a target on your back. Now why? I have to ask. Is it because he’s scared?”
I wasn’t sure if I was meant to be agreeing, disagreeing, or just witnessing this impressive display of deductive skills. Not that it was anything anyone else couldn’t have surmised from my short time here with them. But Nick had obviously had me profiled. Garnered enough information to break me down into bite sized chunks.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t him choking on them. It was me.
Everything he’d said was one hundred percent correct.
The Director was scared. A thought I hadn’t dared to consider. The ramifications of a man like him, a man in charge of the premier security division in New Zealand, with untold resources at his beck and call, being scared of one of his operatives was frightening. And he was scared. If he wasn’t, he’d have just had me killed by Ava.
Eight-hundred meters away and I wouldn’t have seen her coming.
Instead he sends Caleb? Who stumbles in, most unlike him, announcing his arrival before I even knew I was on a hit-list.
The Director was scared. But why?
“You’re all of this,” Nick said waving his hand around in a vague all encompassing motion in front of me. “And they send you to infiltrate us?”
“You’re better than you give yourself credit,” I whispered.
“Anyone could have deduced what I’ve just done with less,” Nick argued.
“You made me in under twenty-four hours.”
“Adam did.”
I turned my head and looked at the man in question. He offered me a shoulder shrug, which was more expression than I’d anticipated.
“Charlie,” Nick said, bringing my attention back to him. “An undercover cop could have come in here and found out what you know for far less cost to the country. Why did they send you? Why didn’t they just kill you? Why have we been put together?”
It was a question I’d asked myself since this all began to unravel. I still didn’t have an answer.
“Whatever you do now, you’ve got to know your time at the Department is over,” he went on, but I was shaking my head. “Don’t be naïve,” Nick said gently, almost as though he was trying to soften the blow. “They’re setting you up. Even if you catch the Director, clean house, put things back to rights, can you honestly say you’d be welcome back there? You’d want to go back there? You don’t even trust this Caleb. You can’t even tell if he’s friend or foe. Colleague or assassin.”
He paused. Waiting for all that to sink in.
And then he said, “You need us more than we need you.”
Touché.
ASI was a family. They trusted each other implicitly. They had each others’ backs. An overwhelming sense of jealousy stole through me, before I managed to thrust it aside and stretch my neck. I lifted my chin and stared Nick Anscombe in the eyes. Any other time, any other specialist being set-up, I might have admired this man.
Nick raised an eyebrow at me and then turned his attention to Adam. It should have been a dismissal, but somehow it didn’t feel like one.
“How do you want to proceed?” he asked him. Another indication of how much Anscombe trusted his man. An employee who had just covered a camera lens and blatantly had a “moment” with a suspect.
“What’s Amber uncovered on Hart?” Adam asked, making me turn in my chair to face him.
“Please tell me Amber’s not still hacking the Department’s servers,” I demanded.
Nick laughed. Actually laughed! Then said, “She’s moved on from that and is hacking your social media profiles. She’s been in conversation with your colleague for the past half hour.”
What?
“We didn’t want to disturb you,” he added.
You have got to be kidding me.
“Well, you did hang up a fucking big Do Not Disturb sign.”
I closed my eyes and concentrated on breathing. Adam had hung it, not me.
“He’ll be onto her,” I said, lids still shut.
“Have a little faith,” Nick offered jovially. He really was enjoying my discomfort. “Amber’s the bomb.”
“So, what’s she uncovered?” Adam asked again, interrupting Nick’s playtime.
“Caleb wants to meet,” Nick said. “Something about your back-up site. Amber’s trying to lock down where that could be, but because you’re persona non grata with the Department these days, and neck deep in a pile of shit, I thought you might like to save our IT guru the effort, and just tell us where that back-up happens to be.”
There was just so much wrong with that entire statement, I didn’t know where to begin. But I’d start with Amber “conversing” with Caleb. And the fact that my highly trained colleague knew where my storage unit was.
Had Ava sold me out? Would going there, and taking ASI, be yet another trap?
And where did Wayne Pascoe fit into all of this?
Motherfucker! I was not in control of my assignment. It was in control of me.
I needed more information. I needed to figure this out.
“The back-up site could be a trap,” I advised. Nick just arched his brow; a clear indication that he wasn’t buying it.
“If it is, we could use it,” Adam offered.
“But first we need to know where it is,” Nick countered, then purposely looked toward me before adding, “So Amber and Eric can put some eyes on it, and Ben and Abi can check out possible locations nearby for shadowing.” The fact that he’d bothered to soften the incursion into my life surprised me. But then, I’d been constantly surprised since I’d walked through ASI’s door.
“Once they’re in place, we can lure Caleb there,” Adam continued. “Make the hunted think he’s the hunter.”
And all the while, Adam would be hunting him.
“I’m the bait?” I clarified.
Adam smiled at me, making it impossible to look at Nick right then.
He cleared his throat and then said, “Either Amber or Eric would spot him approaching. Ben and Abi will shadow him in. Meanwhile, you sit your pretty arse down on site and I’ll hunt him. He’s gotta have a base somewhere. And he’ll have to drive to wherever this back-up site is. Between his wheels and his bolt hole I’ll find out exactly what he’s up to.”
“Meanwhile,” Nick took over, “you do your spy voodoo on him and figure things out your end.”
“It’s not enough,” I advised.
“What do you mean, not enough?” Nick demanded. “Eric and Amber are more than capable of accessing CCTV footage and locating your man on camera practically anywhere in the city. And with Abi and Ben as back-up, you’re doubly covered.”
“I don’t doubt any of their skills,” I hedged. “But it’s sti
ll not enough.”
“Why?”
I smiled; it was probably condescending.
“Because I could take out that number of targets in my sleep.”
Adam whistled. Nick just shook his head, eyes widened slightly, face a shade lighter than normal.
“Then what do you suggest?” he asked in a strained voice.
“Cain on the rooftop as sniper. Koki and Brook as decoys. You with me as a message.”
“Holy fucking shit,” Adam said on an expelled breath of air.
“The entire team?” Nick queried, as though he couldn’t believe it.
“I left out Carmel,” I offered with a shrug.
“She’d probably be the most frightening,” Adam said on a growl.
“The whole team?” Nick repeated, ignoring Adam’s attempt at humour.
“I called in back-up of my own, but she bailed,” I admitted, feeling all kinds of unusual opening up. “If she was still here, then I’d agree with your plan. Now she’s not, so we’ll need everyone.”
“You guys are that good?” Nick asked, still sounding disbelieving and in awe all at once.
I nodded my head.
“He knows where my back-up unit is,” I explained. “So he’s cased it already. He knows what I’m capable of, so he will have put measures in place to counteract it. I’ll be too busy dealing with those, to be able to confront him. And if he is part of the Director’s plans, then I’ll be dead before you even lift a finger.”
“And if he’s not?” Adam asked quietly.
“Then we’ve overreacted, but I’m not dead.”
Silence while both men digested that, then Nick looked at his watch; it was well past six o’clock.
“OK,” he announced, running a hand through his hair. “I need to know our exposure here. How far reaching is the Department?”
He was thinking of their families. The hangers-on who’d been here this morning cheering on the new girl, welcoming her into the fold. He was thinking beyond the walls of this building, farther out than those lives that walked its halls. He was thinking like a true leader, a man who didn’t overlook the little people, but placed them on a pedestal instead.
Sweet Seduction Secrets (Sweet Seduction, Book 8): A Love At First Sight Romantic Suspense Series Page 18