Chapter Fifty-Seven

Ghost

I grabbed a beer out of the cooler without glancing behind me. "Chaos."

"What'd he want?"

I handed him the bottle as he came up next to me. "Who?"

Inked, suspicious, and lethal, Chaos leaned on the railing and eyed me. "We playing this game?"

"No game." I didn't have a boss, and he wasn't here for one of his infamous interrogations.

Chaos smirked. "Right." Taking a swig of his beer, the former Delta Force operative glanced across the lake. "Saw Christensen leaving. Who bought the other property?"

A rising Phoenix, if I had to guess. "Saw or heard?"

"Both." Abruptly palming his piece, Chaos pivoted. "What the fuck did I tell you about coming up on my six, Cypher?"

Staring at his phone as he walked up the steps to the deck, the hacker who'd helped me steal my fifth satellite shrugged. "Don't know, don't care." He glanced at me. "Your sats are temporarily disabled. Rhys has us covered for the next twenty minutes, but that was as large of a window as he could swing, so don't fucking keep us here past that."

Christ. "Since when are you tight with November?"

Before Cypher could answer, Chaos cut in as he scanned my property. "Who the fuck else did you invite to this bullshit party?"

Saint came from the opposite side of the deck. "Me. And I'm with Chaos on that last sentiment. We didn't need to meet in person for a debrief."

"What fucking debrief?" Chaos glanced behind us. "And where's Judas? If you're dishing out shit, he had a hand in this."

"Judas isn't coming." He was harder to pin down than I was. Glancing at Saint, I nodded toward the cooler. "Beer?"

"No, thanks." He looked pointedly at his watch.

I didn't offer Cypher alcohol. He didn't drink. "Cypher, waters are in the cooler."

Already back to fucking with his phone, he didn't look up. "Don't need one."

"Why are we all here?" Chaos demanded. "Job's done."

"Is it?" It wasn't a question. It was a test.

Three of the most lethal operatives on the planet all looked at me.

Chaos spoke up first. "I handled my shit." He glanced at Cypher, then Saint. "You two?"

Cypher said, "Mission complete" the same time Saint said, "Handled."

Chaos looked back at me. "Shit's dismantled. I spoke with Helios, that fucker Hashimi is dead, and we all saw the media piss themselves over a leveled compound outside Caracas. What else is there?"

"Making sure the generator explosion story for Venezuela holds up in the press," Cypher answered. "There're already threads about it being a drone strike. I'll shut down any that I find, but the rumors aren't only coming from the dark web." He looked at Saint.

Saint nodded. "I'll handle anything internally that's coming out of the Agency."

Former CIA but recruited from the Marines before that, Saint still had one foot in Langley. But that wasn't what I gave a shit about right now or why we were here. I'd rely on these guys for my life in a firefight, but I'd learned a long time ago not to trust anyone. I needed to look each of them in the eye, know that the job had been handled, and make sure no one was going to leak any more intel to my fucking nemesis.

I glanced between them. "We had a lot of head count."

Cypher nodded first. "Two hundred and eighty-seven direct action targets, forty-three scouts, and thirty-nine auxiliary."

"You mean thirty-nine extra hired guns," Chaos corrected. "And we can all fucking count."

Cypher tipped his chin at Chaos before addressing me. "Three hundred and sixty-nine eliminated."

I held his gaze a beat, then I nodded and looked at Saint. "What's the blowback?"

Saint inhaled and glanced out at the lake. "Besides every branch wondering who the fuck did what? POTUS is pissed about the optics on Venezuela, and top Brass is trying to decide if heads are going to roll or if medals are going to be handed out." He looked back at me. "I think we're good."

I needed better than that. "Good isn't acceptable."

Saint, ever reserved, lifted an eyebrow. "You're a ghost. What blowback?"

"Not what I'm after." And he knew it.

"We all covered our tracks. Cypher cleaned up the digital trails. Sounds like you have Nathan Rhys on this, and November's the best there is." Saint shrugged. "Good is good. Venezuela wasn't great. You want a better answer, don't fuck up next time."

"Standing right here," Cypher clipped. "I take offense to that Rhys statement."

Saint didn't apologize. "Noted." He looked at me. "Why are we really here?"

I glanced at the three of them. "I'm retiring."

Chaos half snorted, Cypher looked surprised, and Saint didn't react.

Chaos figured it out first. "Which one are you fucking?"

Refraining from drawing on Chaos only because it didn't serve my end goal, I leveled him with a look as Cypher answered.

"The Turkish woman."

Chaos glanced at Cypher. "No shit?" He looked at me. "I was only half joking. Helios said you brought in AES to get rid of all the evidence."

I should've fucking drawn on Chaos. "One, they're women, not evidence. Two, when did you start believing everything Helios says?"

"Hey, that crazy fuck saved my life twice, and so have you." Chaos held up his hands. "Church of fucking Grayson Brothers convert here. Don't hate the sinner. Hate the religion." He dropped his hands. "Besides, when has Helios ever lied?"

Every goddamn day. "Three," I continued, making damn sure Chaos was paying attention. "Refer to any of those women again as you just did, and it'll be the last thing you say."

Immune to the threat, the Tier One eyed me. "Seriously, you retiring for real?"

"Yes."

"Time," Cypher stated. "Eighteen minutes."

Saint glanced at his watch. "You holding on to your satellites?"

I knew he'd been itching to get his hands on them. Cypher, too, but Cypher had unlimited access already, and I didn't question his motives like I did Saint's. "Yes."

Chaos crossed his arms. "So you summoned us to the middle of fucking nowhere for a twenty-minute retirement party?"

"No." I leveled Chaos with a warning stare. "Intel on the op and strike teams was leaked."

Chaos opened his mouth.

I didn't give him a chance to feed me a line of bullshit. "No excuses. It happens again, I'll eliminate the problem."

Saint spoke up. "Chaos isn't the one who's been playing chicken with his operative doppelg?nger for eight years."

Certain it'd been Chaos, I now glanced at Saint. Then I repeated my warning. "I'll eliminate any problem."

Saint threw it back on me. "You sure you weren't your own problem?"

I wasn't the one who'd converted a stolen triple-digit million-dollar superyacht into a practical destroyer to conduct questionable Black Ops missions. I wasn't the problem. "Yes."

Saint held my stare for a second before he relented. "Okay."

I glanced back at Chaos.

He tipped his chin. "Message received, but like Saint said, you and boss man have had a lot of interaction over the years. He's bound to know some things."

"I don't have a boss, and neither do you," I reminded him.

Chaos smirked. "Tell that to Phoe—"

"Conversation's over." My hand in my pocket, my burner cued up with the transfer, I glanced at all of them, then pressed my thumb to the screen. "Thanks for the assist."

Chaos shook his head in disgust, and Saint said nothing.

Cypher glanced at his cell. "That's ten times the fee." He looked up. "You already paid us."

"Call it a bonus. Watch your backs and look out for those women." All except one. I'd watch her on my own.

"Fucking Christ, you're going soft," Chaos muttered.

"Nineteen minutes," Cypher warned.

"I'm out of here." Chaos looked at me. "You're still a fucking asshole. I told you I didn't want any goddamn money for this."

"But you're taking it." Chaos was unhinged most of the time, but he wasn't ignorant.

"Didn't say I was stupid." Chaos glanced at Cypher and Saint. "Later, you fucks." He turned to leave. "And for the record, I'm calling bullshit on your retirement. Million bucks says you're not only full of shit, but you won't last a month playing house."

"I don't gamble." Not with money.

Chaos glanced back. "Then what the fuck do you call taking out the Baccalaureate?"

Revenge. Justice. Peace of mind.

I didn't answer.

Chaos stared a beat, then disappeared the way he'd come.

"Thirty seconds. I'm out." Cypher glanced up from his cell. "Thanks for the bonus. I'll put the satellites back online once I'm clear of the property."

"Copy."

Cypher nodded at Saint, then left.

Saint looked back at the lake. "I hate to admit it, but I agree with Chaos on something."

Taking a swallow of my beer, I scanned my acreage and waited because there was a reason Saint hadn't left yet.

"I don't think you're going to retire either."

My occupational status wasn't why he was still here. I took another swallow.

"No comment?"

"No."

Leaning on the deck's railing, he got to the point. "The profiler. What are you going to do about her?"

"What profiler?"

Saint continued to watch the lake for another ten seconds. Then he pushed off the railing, and his unreadable, hazel-eyed stare met mine. "Less than a handful of people will ever know about it, but you made history, my friend." He switched to Turkish. " Bir kahvenin k?rk y?l hat?r? vard?r ."

I knew both the direct translation— a cup of coffee will be remembered for forty years —and the proverb's meaning about the significance of friendship.

But Saint wasn't my friend, and I didn't give a shit about history.

Nothing to say to him, I didn't comment.

The fucker left, and I drained my beer as I thought about the woman who'd waited for me for eight years but couldn't wait one more day.

One fucking day.