He had to be quick.
Thomas focused his attention on the dining table, which had likely never seen a meal. He picked up papers, scanned lines, but nothing caught his eye. Half of it was in Kurdish or Arabic. Maps obscured the wooden surface.
He pushed what he didn’t need onto the floor.
Minutes were precious.
Still, nothing that looked like a DVD, thumb drive or anything.
“Fuck!” He swept a whole pile onto the floor, sheets of paper falling like snowflakes.
There was no laptop or anything electronic.
It wasn’t here, which meant this was a waste of his time.
He pulled out his phone, jabbing Mark’s contact.
The phone went to voicemail.
“Yeah, it’s me. She’s not here. They’re onto us.” He ended the call and yanked the back door open.
A gun pointed at him.
Thomas stared at Grant, whose gaze was trained on his chest.
“Drop the knife,” he said.
Thomas couldn’t draw his handgun fast enough and he wasn’t wearing a vest. He let go of the knife and held his hands out.
They had nothing on him.
SUNDAY. ERBIL, KURDISTAN.
Mark jabbed the voicemail and prayed Thomas was held up in traffic.
“Yeah, it’s me. She’s not here, and neither is the disc. They’re onto us.”
“Fuck.” Mark tossed the phone into the passenger seat.
His team sitting on the Erbil Rotana had seen Erin leave with her escort, driving the same SUV as yesterday. Thomas was most certainly walking into a trap and on his own now.
Mark pulled off the street and snatched the phone, breaking it down into pieces.
They’d never used names. Mark didn’t leave voicemails. No one could trace the call to him and Thomas knew what would happen if he talked.
Mark pulled another phone from the cup holder and unlocked the screen.
There was no more time to wait. They had to end this today.
The call rang twice.
“Yeah?” the man on the other end said.
“You’re following them still?”
“I am.”
“I need you to let them go into NexGen. We’ll get them when they come out.”
He ended the call.
A sniper on the building across the street and a couple people poised to snatch whatever she dropped in the confusion should do the job. His men would scatter after and they’d lie low for a while until this blew over. Worst case, they lost Thomas. It was an acceptable cost of doing business in their world.
10.
SUNDAY. ERBIL ROTANA, Erbil, Kurdistan.
Erin twisted the long sleeves around and around until the fabric created a vice on her forearm.
“Anything yet?” she asked.
“Nope, and they aren’t going to contact us until we tell them it’s time for the pickup.” Riley was cool as could be. Not even the least bit phased with the knowledge that they’d been carting the enemy around with them.
“I don’t understand how you’re so calm.” She turned around as though she could discern if any of the vehicles were following them. That wasn’t her skill set. It wasn’t like a vehicle would have a sign on it that said I’m following you.
“Off the record?” He glanced at her. “We did a job a couple months back where we had the guy who’d kidnapped our asset with us the whole time. We didn’t suspect it. This time? I think we all had reservations about Thomas.”
“What happened? On that op?”
“That’s a long story.” He shook his head and chuckled. She guessed that it worked out okay, but the between bits must have been harrowing. “What matters is, everyone went home in the end, and the bad guys are in custody.”
“You love the danger of this job, don’t you?” She flopped in the seat and turned to appreciate his profile. She was so worked up she hadn’t let the butterflies bother her much.
“I have been accused of being an adrenaline junky from time to time.” He shrugged.
Erin chuckled. She knew his type because she was guilty of it herself. She hadn’t just taken this job because she thought she could do some good. It’d also been exciting, different. She got to see her mother’s country without the dangers of it. Or so she’d thought. How different reality was.
“We’re almost there,” Riley said, as though that would comfort her.
Those three words killed any joy or fuzzy feelings. Cold dread gnawed at her instead.
Going through the things at NexGen was just another step. With any luck, they’d discover the next piece in the puzzle. That was good, but it wasn’t enough. Whatever Thomas and Allied Security had done, she needed proof. She’d had a bad feeling about their people the day she’d met them, and if she’d trusted her gut a little sooner would people have died?
She couldn’t follow that line of thought. She’d spent hours laboring over what she could have done differently, and the truth was, she’d said something at the soonest possible moment. But even that was too late.
“Anything good to eat at the airport? We’re going to be there a while,” Riley said.
He was trying to distract her, but she wasn’t taking the bait.
Best case scenario, she found whatever damning evidence Thomas and the others thought she had. She’d turn it over to the police. At this rate, taking it up the ladder for NexGen to handle was out of the question. Then, she didn’t know what her place in all this would be.
Half an hour and two security check points later, Riley pulled into the parking lot at NexGen. There was a token security presence outside while most of it was focused indoors.
They parked in spots designated for visitors. Before Riley turned the vehicle off, he turned and grabbed her hand.
“I’m going to come around and get you, okay? Hang tight.” He kept his tone light, but the seriousness behind his eyes gave it away. He was great at playing the role of casual hero.
He was worried about her safety. That much was obvious. It was in the corners of his mouth, the not-quite smile, the stress around his eyes. He, too, thought they were still at
