Circle of Deception

by Carla Swafford

  “Nic.” Without looking, he knew she was nearby. When was she not? “Go get Jack. And fast,” he said in a low, even tone. No need to frighten her.

  “What’s that?”

  “Remember me telling you about the ammo the Inferno claimed they would use to take over the world?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is Hell’s Purifier.”

  “Holy moly!”

  Normally he would laugh at her old-fashioned expletive, but he couldn’t find it in him as he stared at the shiny cartridge.

  Her hasty footsteps diminished as she raced toward the van and Jack. In no time, Jack stood next to him, and Rex wasn’t surprised when Abby showed up a second later. Wherever one went, the other followed.

  And he didn’t like it one damn bit.

  Chapter Two

  * * *

  ABBY’S HEARTBEAT SPED up when she spotted the cartridge between Rex’s forefinger and thumb. Instead of holding the full length, casing to tip, he held only the casing end. They’d seen drawings and pictures but never thought they would actually find the shipment so quickly. Or maybe she’d hoped they’d discover it to be a big joke. The ammunition was the equivalent of napalm in a bullet.

  “Fuck!” Jack reached down and picked up another green box. When he lifted the lid, silver glinted beneath the warehouse lighting.

  “Yep, we will be if we don’t get them loaded into the van, quick.” Rex slipped the cartridge back into its pocket and eased the box into the crate.

  “True that.” Jack nodded. “Let’s get to work and get out of here. Savalas won’t be happy when he finds out his people let us walk out with them. A mil and a half for”—he counted—“three crates. Bloody hell, he’s going to be pissed.”

  “His dead people aren’t quite letting us do anything, but I know what you mean. What did he say when he strung you up?” Abby nodded toward Rex.

  “He wasn’t here. I recognized a few of his men, but the bastard wasn’t with them, at least not where I could see him.” He stood and rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t think we need to worry about Savalas. He knew when he screwed me over that he forfeited anything I found. He’ll blame his own people and hope I don’t sic The Circle on him later.”

  Abby pulled out her satellite phone and called the backup that waited down the street. Ten minutes later, with the crates loaded in the van, they were traveling up Fulton Industrial Boulevard toward the OS Sector.

  Nic sat in the front passenger seat, one leg bent to the side so she could watch Rex drive the van. The woman acted like a teenager with a big crush. Some people never grew up.

  Abby shook her head and then leaned across the cargo bay, elbows on knees, and softly said to Jack, “You know that with us stealing the crates, it won’t slow Savalas or the Inferno for long. They’re getting them from somewhere and someone, and all they have to do is produce more. We need to find the source.”

  Hairs standing straight up on the back of her neck brought her head around, and her gaze met light gray eyes in the rearview mirror. She imagined that with her and Jack leaning toward each other and whispering, it looked as if they were planning a rendezvous later.

  Nic poked Rex’s shoulder with a finger. “Watch the road.” She glared at Abby as if it was her fault.

  What was the woman’s deal? Unable to resist taunting her, Abby lifted her eyebrows and pursed her lips as if in a kiss. The look she received warned her she better not ask Nic for a new weapon anytime soon, as firearm acquisitions fell under her jurisdiction. The small woman could easily turn the gun on her.

  “Quit irritating Nic.” Jack shook his head.

  Abby chuckled. “Okay, bossman.” She probably should be more respectful, but Jack never relied on a strict code of conduct. Even after Ryker appointed him as the OS Sector commander, Jack treated his operatives almost like partners. But everyone knew if they failed at their assignments, he wouldn’t have a problem kicking their asses. In the back of everyone’s mind was the memory that, only a year ago, to disobey orders within The Circle would’ve meant death. How the new and improved Circle would react was still up for debate, and no one wanted to be first to find out.

  “Are you having a problem separating your feelings for Rex from your job?” Jack’s steady gaze said more. That he wouldn’t put up with her bullshit. “I can find someone else to take your place.”

  Abby’s throat closed up for a split second. Why was she getting all choked up? He probably knew her better than anyone, including Rex. They’d gone through a lot, and although he had a right to be concerned, she didn’t really like his question or her reaction. What was in the past was past.

  Who was she fooling? Every time Nic whispered to, touched, or looked at Rex, Abby wanted to point her Sig at the woman and pull the trigger. Abby cringed. Jack had a point. Time to let it go.

  She looked him in the eye and said, “I’ll do whatever we need to do to stop these guys.”

  He nodded. That was one of the many things she liked about him. He never treated her like she needed a caretaker, and when she said she’d do something, in no way did he doubt it.

  She couldn’t resist another glance at Rex. The big guy stared straight ahead, but his rigid shoulders alerted her to the fact that he listened to every word.

  Jack leaned toward her, placing his hands on her knees. “When we return to the OS Sector, I’ll have the tech guys look over the crates. Chances are good they’ll find some clue as to where they came from and who sold them. If we do that, then finding out the inventor and stopping him should be a piece of cake.”

  She scooted back a little, breaking contact. Crazy as it seemed, Jack acted as if he was coming on to her again. Why, after so much time had passed? Or was he only trying to push his brother? Those two had issues, and she wanted to be nowhere around when it heated up.

  “Are there really that many arms dealers who would handle such a volatile weapon?”

  “They don’t care. They want the money. What’s it to them if innocent people get hurt in the end?” Jack slid back, resting his shoulders against the van’s wall.

  “When are you going to let us lower beings know what you have planned?”

  He chuckled. “One step at a time. We’ll examine the crates, try to find who invented it, and then we’ll see if we can stop the manufacturer and distributor.”

  The van turned into an alleyway that appeared to be a dead end. Before they could go any farther, the wall slid into itself and the road shifted down as they drove into an underground garage. One of the OS’s sentries had spotted the van through the camera and pressed a switch to open the secret door. Abby loved that about the new OS Sector. She always looked around for James Bond or guys in tights and capes.

  The other OS Sector vehicle pulled in behind them. Then with metal doors slamming and everyone talking at once, they headed into the lower levels of the building while personnel unloaded the ammo with extreme caution to take to the labs.

  If not for being stopped in the hallway by Charlie, the new mechanic for the OS—she could fix anything with just a hairpin and duct tape—Abby could’ve avoided being alone with Nic. The small woman had the female version of the Napoleon complex.

  “I’m glad we have a few minutes to ourselves. A little girl-to-girl conversation, A. J.” Nic gave her a tiny grin.

  Sure the woman was petite, possibly five-two, and Abby felt like a giant next to her—being five-six wasn’t really that tall, just barely above average height for a woman in the United States—but Nic gave her the creeps.

  “Call me Abby. What can I do for you?” She handed over her backpack filled with extra ammo, the OS-owned satellite phone, and laptop. Her time as A. J. had been spent as another person in another life best forgotten.

  “We’re grown women, Abby.”

  “Some more than others,” she muttered.

  “What?” Nic placed her hands on her hips.

  She waved her hand. “Nothing. Just thinking of other grown women.”

>   Eyeing her with suspicion, the smaller woman said, “I know you and Rex have a past, but you really need to let it go. He’s with me now. You’re Jack’s little friend—”

  “Little friend?” Abby shook her head to check for anything loose that could have caused her to hear it all wrong.

  “His favorite—”

  “Favorite?” Amazed by the idiocy coming out of the woman’s mouth, she could only stand there with her mouth hanging open. What did she think she was to Jack, his favorite slave? And to call her little was like calling a wolf a lamb. Since the age of thirteen, and being five-six at that point, she’d never been called little.

  “Quit being so sensitive.” Nic’s dark, round eyes widened. “I’m only offering you some advice so you don’t embarrass yourself and Rex. And, for that matter, me and Jack. It would be best for everyone if you left Rex alone.”

  Abby took one step toward Nic before she even realized it. The woman’s face washed of all color, and she turned her head away, raising a hand as if in protection from a blow.

  What the hell? Abby’s fists still hung by her hips.

  “Abby, dammit!” Rex moved between her and Nic. “What do you think you’re doing? If you hit her, Jack will string you up. You know how he feels about fighting among operatives.” He shook his finger as if he were a parent berating a wayward teenager. “You’re bigger than her. I never thought you were a bully. I knew you’d changed, but not that much.”

  “What’s going on?” Jack walked in, his forehead creased and eyes narrowed. “Dammit, Abby! What have you done now?”

  Her chest ached as if they had stabbed her in the heart. That was it. The final straw.

  “You got that backward,” she said through gritted teeth.

  “You’re saying Nic started something?” The questioning look on Jack’s face said he didn’t believe her.

  The air in the room disappeared. Her heart pumped hard, trying to take care of oxygen-starved lungs. She inhaled deeply, trying to recover from the one-two blows delivered by the men she cared for and had always thought of as being fair and good, no matter their pasts.

  She finally regained her voice. “I was talking about Abby Dammit. Remember?” Everyone stared at her with different degrees of confusion. She could almost hear a trombone go wa-wa-wa-waaa. “Well, you all can go fuck yourselves.” Then she headed toward the door and her apartment.

  “I didn’t know she was so touchy.” Nic’s sugary-sweet voice followed her down the hallway. “Maybe she’s having her period.”

  Abby hesitated in her march down the hallway. Did that little twit actually say that? She shook her head. Christ! The ignoramus set women’s rights back thirty years with that statement.

  Taking solid, long strides, she continued walking, turning at the entrance to the appropriate hallways without thought.

  That woman wrote the book on passive aggression. No. She was only a follower of the big kahuna, though most likely she had never met Abby’s mother. The one person who lived and breathed passive aggression. No other person in the world had it down to such an art. Yeah, Mrs. Leigh Ann Rodriguez was a typical Southern belle through and through and the original author of How Can I Be Nice and Make You Feel Horrible?. But Nic didn’t have a blood relationship to protect her, and she had no idea how close she came to turning up black and blue.

  Of course, with Rex and Jack fooled by her act, that left Abby on her own in dealing with her. Not that she could really do anything. No matter how catty the woman acted, she was protected by the fact that if Abby responded with open hostility, she would appear to be a spurned lover. Or like what Nic had said: “So sensitive.”

  After years of her mom’s jabs, Abby was savvy enough to catch the underlying meanings, and her sensitivity had saved her life more than once against all of the bad men and women out there. Of course, men referred to their sensitivity as a gut feeling and were admired for it.

  “How did it go?” Liam Kelly stood next to the elevator, leaning his shoulders against the wall, long legs crossed at the ankles. A fine-looking Irishman with ebony hair and a brush of gray at the temples that looked sexy only on men, and he was off-limits. Everyone knew that Charlie, the new mechanic, was in love with him—that was, everyone but Liam.

  Why they didn’t get together was beyond her and wasn’t a problem she had time to worry about. Did everyone know how she felt about Rex? She hoped to hell not. And if they did, everyone should forget about them getting together. Not going to happen.

  Liam shoved off the wall and pressed the UP button. Unlike the old OS building, where all the operatives lived underground, the new site was set up for all the floors to be used. Part of the more open and, should she believe, legal Circle organization.

  “We got the shipment but we need to cut off the source before they release more.” She eyed Liam from half-closed lids as they stepped into the elevator and he punched in the floor number beneath the penthouse. Every floor but the top one was broken into four apartments. Barracks for the single operatives were in the building next door. The OS’s penthouse belonged to the commander of The Circle, Arthur Ryker, for whenever he visited.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  Since being suspended and demoted last year, Liam normally stayed out of mission business. She guessed that was better than being eliminated. From what she’d heard, he’d come close.

  “I may have you a lead on the inventor.”

  “Then tell Jack.”

  “I thought it best that the info came from you.”

  Stepping off the elevator into an oval-shaped foyer with four doors, Abby stopped outside the far right one.

  She turned. Liam remained in the elevator, his hands braced on each side, holding the door open. She’d forgotten that he wasn’t authorized to enter the executive area of the OS. It had to be hard on him. For a short time, he’d been the head of security for The Circle, taking over after she’d returned to the OS.

  “Why do I have a feeling I don’t want to know where you got the info?” She walked back to the foyer. His stare was intense, never wavering to check her out like most men. Maybe she should be insulted by the lack of attraction, as he was known to be a player, but she’d always felt comfortable around the smooth-talking Irishman.

  “I got it from Ice. He knows a lot of people who Jack wouldn’t approve of. Word got to him about the new ammo, but before he had a chance to track it down, Rex was investigating. So we thought that was the end of it. Then it all went bugger.”

  “Got it from Ice Takahashi, huh?”

  A few months ago when Collin Ryker turned over the OS to his brother, rejoining it to The Circle, one of their more deadly operatives, Ice, went AWOL. And only last week had he shown up again. From what she’d heard, Arthur Ryker hadn’t disciplined him and had ordered Jack to back off. So she suspected the leader of The Circle knew all the facts about his disappearance. No one had ever heard of an operative leaving without permission and doing whatever he wanted without disciplinary action. Maybe that was why everything concerning Ice caused Jack to hit the roof. How could Ryker expect Jack to control the OS Sector if he couldn’t reprimand his people?

  “Yeah.”

  “Then why doesn’t he tell Jack?”

  “Sure. Two operatives he’d love to see take a nosedive off the Bank of America Plaza tell him that the arms dealer he’s looking for is in his backyard?” Liam shook his head.

  “Ouch.” The Plaza was known as the tallest building in the Southeast, so that would be one heck of a long dive. “Is he here in Georgia?”

  “No. In Alabama. Ice learned Brody Walker sold the goods to Inferno for a large chunk of change.”

  “If you call a million and a half dollars a chunk,” she said. Brody Walker? Damn. That was a name from her past she never expected to hear again. But why was she surprised? Considering how self-involved he’d been in high school, she imagined he decided to deal in weapons instead of drugs because it sounded classier and still kept him in th
e lifestyle his family provided him while he was growing up. He wasn’t much of a straight arrow back in the day. From what she remembered, when he got caught selling stolen goods in high school, he’d used his all-American title to his advantage. Why would a rich boy from a good neighborhood do such a thing? Someone set him up. Yeah, right.

  “You heard of Brody?”

  “Yeah.” She blinked several times to clear her mind. Had her expression given something away? She watched as he shifted to another foot. “Do you think Ice is right?”

  “He’s certain. Though Jack might doubt it.”

  She promised Liam to tell Jack immediately, and in the little time it took her to walk into her apartment and punch in the number on her cell phone, she reported to Jack what she’d been told.

  “I’d hoped it wasn’t him. His security is set up so that he’ll see us coming from a mile away. We’ll have a hard time reaching him before he escapes.” By the tone of Jack’s voice, she knew his blue eyes sparkled with excitement.

  “He’s that big?”

  “Yeah. You probably know him. He came from your hometown.”

  “I do. Though I haven’t heard from or seen him since he graduated from high school.”

  “That will be helpful in our plans. He’ll make no connection between you and The Circle.”

  “I had no idea he’d become involved in such a dangerous line of work.” When he didn’t say anything more, she asked, “So can you tell me your plans now?”

  “Tomorrow. Be in my office at seven hundred hours and be sure to read the file I just e-mailed you.”

  Whatever he had planned, she could tell she wouldn’t like it. He was too happy.

  Chapter Three

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