Edge of Grey

by Phelps, J. C.

  “No,” I said with disinterest. “I’m only talking logic. A ship without an anchor tends to go where the wind and the waves will take it. There’s no control and there’s no stopping it. I’ve decided to plot my own course this time with Will as my anchor. When we find him or are certain we’ve exhausted all avenues, I will reconsider your job offer. Until then you’ll stay put.”

  “It never occurred to me you’d pull something like this, Alex. And definitely surprised this is coming from you, Green.”

  “That’s what happens when people lose their anchor,” I said. “If we still had White maybe you could control us a little better.”

  Green looked at me with slightly widened eyes, implying I shouldn’t let on that we suspected the Admiral in White’s death.

  “Ah. So that’s it? I had no control of the company with White at the helm and I didn't want any. Yes. You both know I’m the main financial backer of White and Associates, but I’m not the decision maker. I’ve never wanted to fill that seat. I have enough to do already.”

  “You better hope Ruiz has the information we need because I don’t dare let you go until I’m prepared to complete the job you’re so bent on me doing. And I won’t be ready to do that job until Will is sitting in front of me. Besides if we let you go before I complete my current contract, I run the risk of being targeted myself. Truthfully, we both know it’s not a risk, it’s a certainty. Unless you’d be willing to let us do the trade,” I said.

  “No. Green, explain to her why there’s no way that’s an option.”

  “My apologies, Admiral Stanton,” he said. “But I do believe we could make the trade and recover Alan after we’ve acquired Lt. Malone.”

  The Admiral scoffed.

  “And when you fail? Who’s going to tell Slade I let his son’s murderer go free?”

  “That won’t happen. We can have a minute tracking device implanted under Alan’s skin,” Green said.

  “There are very few things I won’t do for my country, but putting tracking devices into people, for any reason, is one of those things. And, even if I wasn’t against it; could you imagine the backlash if it got out?”

  “It would never get out. We could implant it and he’d never be the wiser,” Green said.

  “Something I thought I taught you, Alex, is that the ends do not justify the means. I would have Alan dead, or Lt. Malone, before I compromise my beliefs. It’s simply wrong to do that kind of thing and I won’t allow it. I still think our Social Security numbers the government assigns at birth are intrusive. The day I compromise my beliefs to get something I want is the day my beliefs no longer mean anything. If I didn’t think—”

  “I know,” I cut him off. “If you didn't think you were right you wouldn’t be arguing.”

  “So you were listening,” he said. “Nevertheless, I will not give that order and DeLange has been informed of as much. He knows the situation and knows he’s not to compromise with you.”

  “Why are you so adamant on having Posner taken out?” I asked.

  “Because, he’s an evil son of a bitch,” my father said. “Did you not do your research?”

  “Are you sure you don’t want to take control of Mesa?”

  My father’s eyebrows raised for a second and then furrowed deeply as he frowned.

  “You have done your research,” he said. “That is merely a bonus, not a reason.”

  I don’t know how I managed it, but I kept my poker face on, tight. I couldn't believe I’d gotten the best of my father and I hadn't even been trying. If this part of what Posner told me was true then maybe the reason my father was under suspicion of White’s death had some merit as well.

  “It sounds like a reason to me,” I pressed.

  “Again, it comes back to your research. If you don’t believe Posner is deserving of a visit from Penumbra then why did you accept the contract? Or do you have intentions of never fulfilling it? Did Mark get under your skin?” He was trying to turn things back around.

  “He hired me to kill you and I did,” I said. “As far as he knows, he did get under my skin. But, he's not the reason I accepted the contract on you. Will is. And, if I’ll kill my own father to save Will then imagine what I might do to find out the details behind White’s death. You have been withholding information from us in that regard. That leads me to believe your information is vital in some way. I think Red is going to give Ruiz one more chance to talk with us later this morning and if he doesn’t comply he’ll be given Sodium Pentothal. I see no reason him and Blue couldn’t make a special trip up here since they’ll already have their syringes out.”

  “Alexis Stanton, I’ve had about enough of your insubordination. You go right ahead and send them up here. It won’t get you Will back. I wish you luck with cracking Ruiz,” he said.

  I’d been unofficially dismissed and didn’t even try to argue it. I stood from my chair and walked toward the door.

  “Admiral,” I heard Green try to smooth things over.

  “Green. I didn’t realize you’d be such a pushover where my daughter is concerned. If I had, I would never have offered you the handler job,” my father cut him off.

  Green stood from his chair and hovered over my father.

  “Is that so? You and I are definitely at odds, then Admiral. I don’t see it as me being a pushover. It’s more like we are a team. And a damn good one. We have the same goals, even if we have different ideas on how that goal should be achieved. The difference between our relationship,” he waved a finger between him and me, “and your relationship with your daughter is that I see her assets and build on them instead of holding her back and expecting her to comply simply because I have more life experience. She’s a capable woman and you’d be well served to remember that. Good day, sir.”

  When we got onto the elevator I broke out in a fit of laughter.

  “What’s so funny?” Green was still fuming.

  “You actually said, ‘Good day, sir,’ and meant it.”

  Green smiled and gave into my laughter. We stepped off the elevator into the office still laughing.

  “What’s so funny,” Brown met us at White’s office door with a big smile.

  All of my partners were waiting for our report on our meeting with the Admiral.

  “We completely screwed ourselves,” Green said.

  “Why is that funny?” Brown asked.

  “What’s going on?” Blue asked.

  “It was a little too eventful,” I said and started laughing again.

  “What?” Brown demanded.

  “Green actually told the Admiral, ‘Good day, sir.’” I said.

  Green wasn’t laughing any more, but he was wearing a sheepish grin.

  The rest of our partners didn’t find it as funny as we had. Maybe my laughing was just a tension reliever.

  “Tell us what happened,” Red said. “How did you screw yourselves?”

  “Well screwed us all, I think,” Green said. “I’m fairly certain Admiral Stanton is done talking to us about anything.”

  “What the hell did you do, Alex?” Brown asked.

  “Why do you think it was me?”

  “You’re the one with the mouth,” he said.

  “Okay. It was me, but Green contributed.”

  I was not taking the blame for this all by myself.

  “She threatened to have you and Blue give him Sodium Pentothal if he didn’t give us the information he has about White’s death,” Green told Red.

  “We can’t do that,” Red was shocked.

  “Why not?” I asked. “You gave it to me.”

  “We thought you might have been a threat,” Red said.

  “And if the Admiral had anything to do with White’s death he’s a threat,” I said.

  “Damn. The woman’s got a point,” Black said.

  “But the Admiral has secrets we would all die for if he suspects we might know them,” Red said. “We could never let him go if we did that to him if we planned on keeping what we
have. Everything would change.”

  I sighed.

  “I guess I can follow that logic,” I said. “The only way we give it to him is if I plan on fulfilling the contract I’ve already been paid for.”

  Red raised his eyebrows at me.

  “Okay,” I admitted. “I probably couldn’t do it, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be done.”

  Green filled them in on the Admiral’s admission of wanting to gain control of Mesa. None of them seemed surprised but none of them knew he already had a good foothold inside their own company.

  “Put yourself in the Admiral's shoes,” Blue said. “I don't know why he won’t give us any information about White, but I do understand him hiring Penumbra for Posner. The guy always has an alibi and is always involved in something he should be shot for. But, why would he want her to move on that job when he knows it’ll jeopardize Will?”

  “Owning Mesa sooner rather than later might be his motivation,” I said.

  “Could be,” Red said. “But, we’ve been dealing with the Admiral our entire careers and this is very uncharacteristic. There has to be another reason and we just can't see it.”

  We brainstormed for another thirty minutes before Red said he wanted to take another crack at Ruiz. We weren’t getting anywhere with our guessing the Admiral’s motivations anyway.

  Blue and Red left the rest of us to wait it out in White's office.

  I took a moment and went to Gabriella’s office and started a pot of coffee brewing.

  “Does Gabriella come in today?” I asked Green while I watched the coffee drip into the carafe.

  “She should be here any time now,” he said.

  I was looking forward to seeing her, but I was still apprehensive. I don’t know what my partners had told her. Our last conversation was very cold and abrupt, and that all came from her end of the phone.

  She walked in as I was pouring myself a cup.

  “Alex?”

  “Hi,” I said.

  “Is this okay?” She raised her voice a little so the men in the office could hear her.

  “She’s back,” Brown said.

  Gabriella let out a scream that made me jump. I spilled my coffee all over myself and was trying to shake the hot liquid off when she grabbed me in an embrace. She was actually crying.

  “They told me you were being watched and I couldn't talk to you. They made me act like I didn’t care. It was so hard. I don’t know how many times I had to stop myself from dialing your number. They said your phone was bugged and if we talked to you on it someone would kill you. Are you okay?” She pulled away and looked me up and down.

  “You’ve got coffee all over yourself.” She grabbed some paper towels and started blotting at my shirt.

  I stopped her and hugged her.

  “I missed you,” I said.

  She sniffled on my shoulder.

  “Now I have more than coffee on me,” I said.

  We giggled and she wiped her face with the back of her hand.

  “I was so afraid you'd hate me,” she said.

  “Never.”

  I refilled my cup and poured one for her. We moved to her desk and I started the conversation by asking how Martin was.

  “You missed everything,” she said. “The wedding, the reception. Everything.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “No. It’s okay.”

  My shirt and pants felt cold as the coffee soaking them cooled, but I couldn’t tear myself away to change my clothes. We talked until Red and Blue returned about an hour later.

  “Grey,” Blue hiked his head toward the office.

  I smiled at Gabriella and stood up with a shrug.

  She shrugged back and said, “Back to work.”

  I followed the men into White’s office and shut the door behind me.

  “What did you get?” Green asked.

  “We gave him the injection and he doesn’t know where Will is. He admitted to holding Will at his refinery for several months. Probably when Alex was in that cell. Jake might have been trying to let you know Will was there,” Red said.

  “Ruiz said there was an attack on the refinery and Posner moved Will right after that. Said he had Jake move him,” Blue added.

  Maybe Jake had been trying to help me figure it out. But he was the one who moved him out of the refinery and he didn’t bring him here?

  The men had told me Jake wasn’t who I thought he was, but I’d been having trouble accepting that fully. I’d been suspicious of him for a long time before my partners upped the doubt but I still fought with the concept. I had some kind of connection to Jake. It felt like Jake was on my side.

  I knew he was mostly out for himself but I never suspected he’d know where Will was. How could he know and not tell me? He knew I would have done anything to get him back.

  “I’ve got to go see him,” I said.

  “Jake?” Black asked.

  “Yes.”

  “The last time you went there you ended up at Mesa’s lodge against your will,” Green said.

  “That doesn’t matter. Has anyone even checked in with Joe lately? Jake could be awake and if he is, he knows where Will is,” I said.

  “Mr. Green?” Gabriella’s voice came through the intercom speaker.

  “Yes?”

  “DeLange is on line one,” she said.

  “Thank you.”

  Green put the call on speaker.

  “Yes?”

  “Green. I need to talk with the Admiral right now.”

  This was the first time I’d heard Colin’s voice in a long time and a longing, I didn’t know was there, surfaced.

  “Sorry. That’s not possible,” Green said.

  “This is important,” he sounded tired and worried.

  “I can give him a message.”

  “I can't accept that. I need to talk to him. Now.” I’d never heard Colin use this tone of voice. It was compelling in its insistence.

  “What’s going on, DeLange?”

  Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who caught the weight of his demand.

  “We lost Posner as well as a dozen good men,” Colin said.

  “What?”

  “The compound was attacked half an hour ago and they got Alan.”

  The tension in the room from Colin’s declaration only added to the jarring sensation of my Mesa phone vibrating in my pocket.

  I pulled it out and looked at the number.

  “Posner,” I announced.

  “Alex? Is that you?” Colin asked.

  “No noise, DeLange. You understand?” Green asked him.

  “Yes,” Colin answered.

  Green nodded at me to answer the call.

  “Hello?” I said. I didn't put my phone on speaker.

  “Grey. Good. I have a job for you. I need you in my office immediately.”

  “I’m still working the last job,” I said.

  “That job’s off the table, sorry.”

  “Okay. See you soon,” I said and hung up.

  “Who was that?” Colin’s voice came through the speaker.

  “Posner,” I said. “He says the last job is off the table and he has a new one for me.”

  “That confirms it,” Black said.

  “If he only got him out half an hour ago we might still have a chance,” I said. “I’m going to get over to Mesa and see what he wants. Someone needs to get in touch with Joe and find out if Jake’s awake. He should be able to tell us where Will is.”

  “I don’t like that idea,” Red said.

  “We need to do something. Maybe this new job offer has something to do with Alan. If nothing else, maybe we can retrieve him before Posner has a chance to get rid of Will.”

  “He probably would hold onto Will for a while yet, just in case,” Blue said.

  “You can’t go over there alone,” Brown said.

  “He’s right, Alex,” Colin’s voice came from the air.

  “I’ll call you back, DeLange,” Green said and dis
connected.

  “You still can’t go alone,” Brown said.

  “Who’s going to go with me?”

  I rolled my eyes.

  “Joe,” Black said and pulled out his phone.

  We waited, but he hung up without any conversation.

  “No answer,” he said.

  “I’m wearing my watch.”

  I held my arm up for everyone to see.

  “I’ll push the button if I run into any trouble and if I don’t get in touch by tomorrow morning you can do your thing and find me anyway,” I said to Green.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  I WALKED INTO THE LODGE and was met by two men I’d never seen before.

  “Your weapons, Ms. Grey,” one of them said while holding out his hand.

  “They stay with me,” I said.

  “One moment,” the other said and left us standing in the lobby.

  He returned less than a minute later.

  “Posner’s okayed it,” he told the other man.

  They led me toward Posner’s office. Security was thick and we walked past men posted at every access point.

  One of the men escorting me knocked lightly on Posner’s door.

  “Come in,” Posner’s voice came to us.

  The three of us walked in, one man in front of me and one behind me.

  “You can leave us,” Posner told them.

  I stood with my arms clasped behind my back and my finger near the button on my watch. As soon as the men left the office Posner nodded toward the mirror on the wall behind me.

  I turned my head in time to watch Alan Posner walk out of his father’s quarters. I pushed the button on my watch. I wasn’t in immediate danger, but I thought the men might like to retrieve Alan.

  “This is Ms. Grey?” He asked his father without any acknowledgement to me.

  “Ms. Grey, this is my son, Alan,” Posner said.

  I inclined my chin in greeting and Alan raised an eyebrow.

  “I can see why White was drawn to you. I can also see us getting along in the same manner,” he said.

  The room was quiet and I rolled my shoulder slightly to remind myself exactly where my pistols were.

  “I want you working with Alan from now on.”

  Posner indicated Alan with a sweeping hand.

  “You’re going to love this assignment,” Alan said.