“If not…” He drags his hand down to my knee, then digs his fingers into my flesh until I hiss with pain. “Your lessons will begin.”
I grasp his fingers as he digs in, hurting me. The first thing taken from the girls who pass through here is their resistance. I forgot that lesson amidst the pain.
Benefield tested me, and I failed. No doubt, I will pay for that later.
Four
Max
Present Day
As promised, a helicopter arrives in twenty minutes. I brief the rest of the team who will stay behind to extract the information we need from Julian Townsend.
Knox and I board the helicopter and rise above the trawler as we head back toward land. With exceptionally favorable weather, it’s a pleasant flight; no chop and beautiful views of the ocean as we approach the California coastline. I’d call it idyllic if not for the reason behind our flight.
We land at Guardian HQ and take a moment for a meeting of the minds. That means bringing the incorrigible Mitzy into the mix. She is the brains behind our impeccable intelligence network and incredible technical team. We sit with her and Sam going over what we know about our new case and new client.
“Can you cut to the chase and tell us what’s important?” I’m tired and strung out, which makes focusing difficult.
Mitzy’s been talking nonstop for the past five minutes, inundating me and Knox with information overload, but I can’t make head nor tails out of her techno-speak.
Sam and CJ mentioned she would be using the proof of life photos to narrow down where Eve’s being held. Mitzy’s giving a dissertation on the topic and the tech behind such a task.
“Actually, I need help from you.” Mitzy pauses. Her gaze flicks upward as if she just had a new, and interesting, thought.
“Me?” I point to my chest. “How the hell am I going to help you? I’ve understood one word in twenty of whatever you said, and most of those words were when you were hemming and hawing.”
Mitzy gives me a look, like I’m an idiot. “I do not hem and haw.”
“Ummm… Okay… Ah…” I toss back her words and love the way her expression heats.
“Whatever.” Dramatic eye roll engaged, Mitzy blows out a puff of air. “I need you to get them to take a picture outside.”
“Outside?” My lips twist. “You want me to ask the kidnappers to take Eve outside for a photo op? I’m sure they’ll be pleased as punch to do that.” I inject as much sarcasm as I can, responding to such a ridiculous request.
“Yes, that’s exactly what I want, a picture outside.”
“And how does that help?”
There’s absolutely no way that’s happening, but I’m curious about Mitzy’s thought process.
Mitzy blinks at me, like she’s dealing with a child and must explain the most basic things. She’s trying to maintain her cool, and I’m trying not to bust a smile.
Knox sits silently beside me, absorbing every detail. Sam sits across the table with a smirk plastered on his face. I don’t know if that’s for me getting Mitzy riled up or for her getting me all twisted. Honestly, it could go either way.
Annoying Mitzy is a fine art, one I excel at. Knox fights the grin tugging at the corner of his lips. He’s stony-faced on the best days and is enjoying this far too much.
I try to reel it in, but I can’t help it. Mitzy simply draws out the argumentative side of my character. It’s probably because I hate it when people talk down to me, and Mitzy is exceptional at talking down to people.
It’s something I should’ve gotten over years ago, but that kind of shit stays with a person for life. Growing up, I was never the smart guy. I was always the dumb jock busting my butt to barely pass my classes.
Physically, I excelled. Academically, I failed. I hated the smart kids back then, and I suppose I still hate them now. Only after high school, when I enlisted in the Navy, did I receive a diagnosis that explained my failures.
Dyslexia validated my academic difficulty, but the sting of all those comments about being a dumb jock sticks to this day.
I stay in my lane, and I expect Mitzy to stay in hers. Except it doesn’t work. She doesn’t understand why the rest of us can’t keep up with her incredible brain.
“Asking kidnappers to parade their hostage outside for a photo op? You’re crazy if you think something like that is going to happen.”
“It helps,” she says, “because we can confirm their location.” Her lips press into a hard line. I’m not the only one holding back my frustration with this whole exchange. “That’s what you want, right? Find the girl? Or did you forget what it is you do for a living?” Her growing frustration is fun to watch.
“We all want to bring Eve home.” My tone takes on a sharp edge and a growl vibrates in the back of my throat. I will bring Eve home.
Want someone taken down? A facility breached? Need hostages rescued? I’m king of the hill in those scenarios.
Ask me about the intel and tech behind all of that, and I happily hand the reins over to her. She can be the queen all she wants when it comes to that. But when she openly questions my goals? All our goals? I won’t let that slide.
We don’t have time for this back and forth kind of crap. “Why would we consider something like that?” I inject enough impatience into my tone to get my point across without being rude about it.
Okay, I’m semi-rude bordering on rude-as-fuck, but what do I care?
“Evelyn is being held in Colombia,” Mitzy states that as fact.
“Then why do you need me if you already know where she is?” I’m sure there’s some kind of science behind it. Something to do with the position of the sun, or shadows, or some such shit like that. Or it could be as easy as reading the newspapers in the photographs. I don’t understand Spanish, but someone here must.
While I’m happy we’ve narrowed down Evelyn’s location, it’s still not good enough. Colombia is known for its varied climate. Most of its population lives in the mountainous west or along the coastline to the north. Bogotá is their largest city, but Mitzy’s given me no indication Eve is near the mountains or the coast.
“So, do you know anything? Just Columbia? Nothing more specific? Like a city?”
Without better intel, Eve’s as good as lost.
“Of course, there’s more to it.” Mitzy props her hand on her hip and gives me one of her I-can’t-believe-I-have-to-explain-this-kind-of-shit looks.
“Such as?”
“You’re aware of geolocation?”
“Yes.”
Geolocation is the nuts and bolts behind how my men get around. That, at least, is hard-wired into my brain. First in the military, where I trained to be a SEAL, and then with the Guardians as I learned how to use all their high-tech gear.
“Every picture taken from a cell phone is tagged with geolocation,” she says.
“Right, and we all turn that shit off.”
Everyone with an ounce of military training, or baseline paranoia about Big Brother, knows to turn off that particular feature on their cell phones.
Embedded in every picture is a set of GPS tags, which locate precisely where the photo was taken.