by L. T. Ryan
Takedown
Riley “Bear” Logan Book Three
L.T. Ryan
Liquid Mind Media, LLC
Copyright © 2019 by L.T. Ryan & Liquid Mind Media, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced in any format, by any means, electronic or otherwise, without prior consent from the copyright owner and publisher of this book. This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places and events are the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. For information contact:
[email protected]
http://LTRyan.com
https://www.facebook.com/JackNobleBooks
Contents
The Jack Noble Series
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Epilogue
Also by L.T. Ryan
About the Author
The Jack Noble Series
The Recruit (free)
The First Deception (Prequel 1)
Noble Beginnings
A Deadly Distance
Ripple Effect (Bear Logan)
Blowback (Bear Logan)
Takedown (Bear Logan)
Thin Line
Noble Intentions
When Dead in Greece
Noble Retribution
Noble Betrayal
Never Go Home
Beyond Betrayal (Clarissa Abbot)
Noble Judgment
Never Cry Mercy
Deadline
End Game
Receive a free copy of The Recruit by visiting http://ltryan.com/newsletter.
1
Bear let the crowd push him out of Penn Station and dump him on the sidewalk. He immediately had to sidestep a man with a briefcase who was trying to get around an old woman without knocking her over. After a few attempts to get out of everyone’s way, Bear backed up against a wall and took a second to breathe the city in.
Bear didn’t make a habit of looking at Manhattan’s buildings in wonder. That was saved for the tourists. New York City was a beautiful place if you liked steel and glass, but even natives got tired of the bustle after a while. The city had a way of sapping your energy, of making you see the worst of humanity.
He held back a laugh. Bear had seen plenty of the worst of humanity over the last several weeks, and New York felt shiny and new in comparison. He’d been away from home for too long, and he was ready to lay low for a while. Maybe pick up a couple jobs here and there doing something menial while he kept his ear to the ground. He knew some people who’d do him a favor, who’d be willing to look the other way for a short time.
And it would be a short time. Bear was not naïve enough to think all his troubles were over. Not while Jack was still missing, at least.
Bear sucked in another deep breath of city air, a confusing mixture of putrid garbage and mouthwatering food stands. His stomach growled, but he ignored it. There’d be time to eat later. For now, he had to go knock on a couple doors.
He hefted his backpack over his shoulder and started walking down 8th Ave. He didn’t have much on him, but he had a place nearby with the basics. Unfortunately, he knew that if he went back there now, he’d sleep for three days. And as good as that sounded, he needed to get some things done first.
He didn’t even make it to the corner before some guy in a suit knocked into him. Bear opened his mouth to say something when he felt a piece of paper being slipped into his hand. His first instinct was to reach out and grab the guy before he could take off, but it was already too late. The man had been a head or two shorter than him, disappearing easily into the crowd. Bear debated going after him, but by the time he caught up, the other guy would be waving to him from the other side of a subway car door. Not worth the effort.
He pressed himself against the façade of a building and let the stream of people adjust to passing around him. He watched them for a moment, looking left and right, looking across the street. No one paid him any attention. No one stuck out. Looked like the guy in the suit had been alone.
The paper had only two words written on it: Bryant Park.
Bear popped his neck and looked around him again. He didn’t recognize the handwriting. Didn’t know who could want a meeting with him so soon after landing. That meant they’d been watching him this whole time. There were too many options to choose from. Did it have anything to do with Korea? With Jack? With something else?
All of the unknown factors made the back of Bear’s head itch, but he ignored it. Instead, he turned around and started heading back up 8th, toward Bryant Park. It was probably reckless, but he was getting tired of being tugged back and forth like someone’s plaything. Maybe he could put an end to this now.
He sighed, some of his anger dissipating. He didn’t blame Sadie for playing him like she did in Korea. He knew she meant well, and if he were honest with himself, he felt much better knowing Thorne wasn’t in the wind anymore. Sadie’s plan to bring Thorne out of hiding had been a solid one, even if it did end up getting them both in more trouble than they were comfortable with.
Then again, he’d pretty much been neck-deep in trouble since the day he met Jack Noble. And for some reason he wasn’t exactly ready to change that just yet. Maybe he had a death wish. Maybe he just knew he’d never actually be satisfied working a boring job for the rest of his life.
But if someone wanted to meet him in Bryant Park, they weren’t looking to blow his brains out. There’d be plenty of people there, plenty of witnesses. The park would be a mixture of traffic noises and the sound of people talking and laughing and going about their day. Perhaps a show going on in the center lawn. There were several exits, and a subway entrance Bear could slip into if he found himself needing an escape.
So why was the back of his head still itching?
Bear pushed his way toward 40th Street and crossed over, making his way toward 6th Ave. He kept his eyes sharp, but there were too many people to do a proper assessment. Whoever this was could have a dozen men or women on his tail, switching out every couple blocks, and Bear would be none the wiser. Or maybe he was utterly alone in the crowd. He wouldn’t know until he met the person behind the note.
Bear jogged up the steps to Bryant Park and stuck to the outer rim. There was a huge inner field roped off with a sign that read special event, but he already felt exposed as it was. He wasn’t about to make it easier for them.
Instead, Bear made a single loop around the park, scattering gravel and pretending to scroll through his phone while clocking as many people as he could out of the corner of his eye. He didn’t recognize anyone, not from the walk over and not from the vast catalog of faces in his memory bank.
But whoever this was knew him. It wasn’t hard to pick his thick six-six frame out of the crowd, and walking around in circles wasn’t doing him any favors. So Bear found an
empty chair right off the path and sat down. There was no way he could watch the street behind him and the entrances to his right and left at the same time. That was probably the point.
Instead, he settled in and did the best he could to look unimposing. That was never an easy task for him, but with his phone in his hand and his elbow perched on the bistro table, most people just figured he was another regular guy waiting to meet up with an old friend and trade stories.
Five minutes passed. Then ten. Then fifteen. His stomach knotted. His knee bounced. Whoever this was seemed to be as paranoid as him. That didn’t bode well for either of them.
When a full twenty minutes had transpired, Bear stood up. He was tired of wasting his time, and maybe it would force them to show. Either way, he was done waiting. The itch had spread from the back of his head down to his shoulders. He needed a shower.
He made it three steps when a young woman’s voice sounded behind him.
“I’m sorry I kept you waiting, Bear.” She paused while he turned around. “I had to make sure you were alone.”
Bear blinked several times. Out of everyone he could’ve expected, Thorne’s little protégé Maria hadn’t even cracked the top fifty.
2
The last time Bear had seen Maria, she’d been blonde. Now her hair was red and fell in soft curls around her shoulders. This was quite a difference from the dirty, beaten, drugged-up girl he’d rescued just a few weeks ago.
She’d also had a gun held to her head on his orders. He’d had no intention of killing her, not then, and not now, despite her ties to Thorne. The look of betrayal in her eyes when Thorne had said he was willing to sacrifice her made Bear think he could trust her.
Then again, she could also be a wild card. Her mentor threw her to the dogs and didn’t even bother cleaning up the mess. And now he was behind bars. She was either back in the game or working on her own for motives only known to her. Neither would bode well for Bear.
“You’re just about the last person I expected to see.” Bear eased back down in his chair and motioned to the one next to him, keeping a guy in a suit in his periphery.
Maria did a quick scan of the area and then sat down, crossing her legs and facing him. She offered a meek smile. “I bet that doesn’t happen often. Being surprised like that, I mean.”
“It doesn’t.” Bear didn’t give up any other information. She wanted to meet him, after all.
“No hard feelings about last time we saw each other.” She tossed her hair over her shoulder. “I’m glad Thorne got what he deserved.”
“You and me both.”
“You’re probably wondering why I asked you here.”
“I am.”
Maria looked around once more and scooted her chair a little closer. “I need help, Bear. And you’re one of the few people I trust these days.”
“Me? What kind of help?” He couldn’t stop himself from scanning the area around them as well. He’d assumed he was being watched by whoever had asked him to come to Bryant Park, but what if they were being watched as well? That was trouble he didn’t need.
“I’m trying to wrap up loose ends. With Thorne out of the picture, I’m not really sure what’s left for me.”
Bear crossed his arms and stayed silent.
Maria continued. “Sadie’s been helping the best she can. The CIA can’t exactly take me in as one of their own, but they’ve been treating me like a trusted asset. They want to know everything they can about Thorne. I told them as much as I could, but he wasn’t exactly the sharing type. And the drugs I was forced to take, the effect they had on me, I’m still not back to being clearheaded.”
Again, Bear decided silence was his best course of action.
“I tried putting out feelers, to find anyone who may have talked to Thorne. That’s when I came across something strange.” Maria took a deep breath before continuing. “Three agents have gone missing in London. I was their liaison while I was working for Thorne. It was pretty easy work. Good practice. Slipping in and out of crowds, passing along information. No one suspected me. I could disappear easier than someone like—”
“Me?”
Maria cracked a smile, but it looked sad. “Yeah, someone like you.”
“Why’d they go missing?”
She shrugged. “Don’t know. I thought I passed credible intel on to them. I’m beginning to think that was a setup, too.” Maria looked directly at Bear now, her eyes glistening. “I don’t know what to believe anymore, Bear. This whole life was fine when I thought I was on the right side of things, but now that I know what Thorne was mixed up in, I’m second-guessing everything.”
“What does this have to do with me?” he asked.
Maria tilted her head back and stared up at the sky for a few seconds. Bear could see when her face hardened into a mask of determination. She looked back at him and her eyes were dry again. “I need your help.”
“Yeah. Why me? Why not go to Sadie?”
“I don’t know who to trust,” Maria said. “Thorne told me horror stories about the CIA. I trust Sadie, I do, but she runs things by the book. She might want to do the right thing, but not everyone she works with feels the same way. Believe it or not, you’re pretty transparent, Bear. I can trust you’ll make the right call.”
Bear laughed and ran a hand over his head. “Look, kid, I just got home. I’ve got enough on my plate. I have a bad habit of taking on other people’s problems. I’m starting to think I need to break that habit.”
Maria looked torn between frustration and desperation. “I thought you were supposed to be one of the good guys.”
“You don’t know me.”
Now Maria looked angry. “Out of the two of us, I know I owe you a hell of a lot more than you owe me. It wasn’t easy coming to you. I know what you’ve just been through. I know you probably just want some peace and quiet. But I—”
Maria’s words choked off as her voice broke. She cleared her throat and took a second to regain her composure. “I’ve killed a lot of people for Thorne. Or at least been responsible for their deaths. There’s more than that. I was following orders, but, that’s just an excuse. I know I’m not a good person. I’m selfish. For so long, all I cared about was surviving. Then Thorne showed me how strong I could be. How much good I could do. I started to care. It’ll probably be my downfall.”
Bear chuckled. “You and me both, kid.”
“These were good agents, good people. One of them had just gotten married. Had a kid on the way. He was only a few years older than me. If I did something wrong here, I owe it to them to fix it. I owe it to myself. Because if I don’t, I’m afraid that’s gonna be it for me. Then I won’t be any better than Thorne.”
Bear ran his hand through his beard. Maybe he would’ve said yes on a different day. But he was exhausted to his core. His feet had barely hit the ground before something else had fallen into his lap. He needed to stay focused. He needed to find Jack.
“I’m sorry.” Bear stood up. “I want to help you, I do, but I have my own shit going on. I need to take care of some things first. I don’t know how long it’ll take. Maybe after that. I don’t know.”
Maria stood up with him. “Bear, please. Even if you just ask around. Anything will help. I don’t know who else to go to.”
Bear opened his mouth to tell her he’d consider it after his business was done, but four figures closing in around them made him stop short.
3
The four men came at them in pairs from either side of the path. The only exits were through the hedges or through the lawn. Neither way could outrun a 9mm. The men separated to form a wall around Bear and Maria. They were wearing street clothes, but Bear knew they were agents the second he spotted them. To anyone else it would just look like a group of friends standing around having a chat. That meant they wanted to keep things quiet. It was the only good thing about this situation.
Bear kept his stance neutral. “Can I help you, boys?”
The guy with a b
ruised eye spoke first. He was beefier than the others, like he’d been a linebacker his whole life until Langley showed up at his door with an incredible offer. “I believe you can, Mr. Logan. Will you please follow us?”
He and the man to his left parted and motioned for them to walk. Bear didn’t budge.
“Who’s asking?”
“A friend,” the linebacker said. “Look, we don’t want any trouble. You could walk away now, but my boss will just keep asking. Maybe you can save us all a little time?”
Bear’s hackles were still raised, but there was less alarm to it now. He was used to subtle threats. This was more like a cordial invite. Still, it was better to play along. If he got a chance to slip away, he’d take it.
Maria looked up at Bear and he met her eyes. “Go home, kid. I’ll be in touch.”
“Her too,” the linebacker said. “My employer would like to speak with you both, please.”
Bear looked at the four men in front of him. They all looked tuned into their surroundings but stood calm. Bear wasn’t looking for a fight. Neither were they. He just hoped Maria wasn’t going to end up in the middle of something she was going to regret.
Bear looked over at the linebacker. “Where?”
“There’s a nice café just down at the corner. Pretty popular place. You should find something you like there.”