Page 87 of Acting on Instinct
Did it have something to do with the war, or was it despite the war?
“Boats coming up,” White said. “I’ve got someone in my ear with the right open sesame. They’re ours.” She lifted a flashlight and sent a set of flashes.
There was a shift as the team assessed the boat, then ranged out, eyes in every direction.
“Hey, Ty,” Nitro’s voice was only loud enough to carry as far as his team and no farther, a particular trick when they were so close to water. “You think the timing’s suspicious that Iniquus kept you on ice since December, then Kira gets in, and there’s suddenly a contract in the mail, and you’re one of the family?” Nitro asked.
“Lynx is in the mix.” White’s voice held a smile. “Sounded like she got called into Command a few days ago.”
“That doesn’t explain the timing,” Nitro said.
“No?” T-Rex asked. “It makes perfect sense to me.”
“Did you know General Elliot used to be in charge of the U.S. Galaxy Project?” White asked.
Jeopardy flicked a glance over his shoulder. “What’s that?”
“You’re just a young pup. This was before your time,” T-Rex said. “The military did a foray into psychic spying decades ago when it was a hot topic with the Russians.”
“You believe in that shit?” Nitro asked, stepping closer to the van when one of the targets moaned.
“Me?” White asked. “I don’t know enough about it to have an opinion. I’m just saying that sometimes Iniquus Command does things the split second before they’re needed. And when they do, Lynx is often involved in that conversation. This might be one of those times. It amuses me as a thought experiment.”
“That makes the hair stand up on my arm,” Nitro whispered.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Ty
Echo stood in place, each wearing a borrowed uniform.
Like T-Rex and Havoc, Ty was dressed in an orange maintenance jumpsuit with broad reflective tape stripes. He sat in the driver’s seat of the fuel truck with Rory curled onto the floorboard beside him.
T-Rex held the directional wands that would lead the Davidson jet to their chosen X, and Havoc stood there with tire chocks in hand, looking helpful.
Inside the hangar, Jeopardy and Nitro waited. They wore the clothes handed off by two of the customs officers. In this case, they donned suit jackets with embroidered emblems. Jeopardy and Nitro were chosen for their fluent Spanish, should someone decide to speak with them in the native language rather than English. And practically, they were picked for those roles because they were the only ones on the team that were short enough and wiry enough to get their bodies into the available uniform, and even then, the tight fit wasn’t ideal if things turned kinetic, which Echo promised to contain.
When they’d arrived, Echo had already mapped out a plan, and they’d come up with a sales strategy. Even on missions within Delta Force, sometimes there was a competition for who was the big dog.
This was Spanish soil; they had trained professionals skilled in their work.
T-Rex was ready to convince them to stand down and leave it to Echo, but when White’s jet landed, she moved behind closeddoors for a private discussion with her counterpart at the Centro Nacional de Inteligencia, CNI. France’s DGSE had already filled them in on the Paris mission Echo had performed. And the CNI “did not wish to interfere in this important work.”
White didn’t clue CNI in to the fact that this was an entirely separate mission. She simply thanked them graciously, accepted their ground rules, and called T-Rex in so he, too, could sign on with the plan.
The Ground Rules:
The pilot and co-pilot could be removed from the plane, but nothing should seem interesting to anyone who might oversee. Like in Paris, they wished Echo to function on the same cats’ paws. These were dangerous times to seem like they were bending over backward for Uncle Sam. It could well put a bullseye on their citizens.
The four passengers listed on the passenger manifest for their international flight plan were to remain on the plane throughout the intervention.
Everyone on the plane was to be treated with respect until a crime was discovered, to avoid blowback on the Spanish government if innocent people were being harassed.
If Echo discovered a crime and wished the perpetrators to move through legal channels, the criminals were to be removed from the plane and handed over to the CNI, who would, in turn, expedite extradition to the United States. Should this be an issue handled through CIA channels that did not require legal paperwork, the CNI would be otherwise engaged and unaware.
White promised to let them know which route was required once Echo got on the plane and gave it a thorough search.
Gunfire was a last resort. Violence was to follow the United States’ Graham Factors, which allowed Echo to determine, based on expertise, the level of force required to manage the situation. It made no mention of minimum; it was about“reasonable,” especially in a dynamic encounter in a confined space.
