Almost as soon as he replied affirmatively, the printer came to life and started printing.
"Your hall pass," Keneke said.
Scott stepped away from the door. "I want your friends at Tailored Access on this. The attacks were coordinated, well-planned. There's a trail of messages out there across the Internet, probably all over the dark net."
"I'm running Techniques Discovery over here now, Scott. Give me an hour or two."
"Calls, emails, everything. Hell, get Treasure Map on all of this. Every device tracked to owner. Every recorded call analyzed. Every recorded email analyzed."
"Scott, you'll know everything even if I have to dig into Dishfire and ferret out text messages myself."
"And no issues with F.I.S.C. or Senate Intelligence Oversight?"
"Everything must be triple authorized now, especially if any military-grade encryption breaks are required. Nothing I can't handle," Keneke replied.
"Wait, a minute," Scott said aloud, even though he meant only to think it. He tried to think, to work through everything that had happened and was happening. He thought about the briefings and what he'd heard the Operations Commander say. What had he said exactly? Did he say they were going to kick these jihadist bastards back to their caves? "Keneke, you still there?"
"Scott, I'm here."
Scott looked into the briefing room. "I think I need you to do something else for me too."
Keneke said clearly, "Anything, just ask."
Chapter 16
She walked down the hall, surprised no one said anything to her about being in the wrong place or on the wrong deck. She didn't know exactly where she was headed, but she knew the general location of the operations rooms from the ship's diagram she'd seen.
Her head throbbed, her body ached. She'd been in the water so long she never thought she'd be warm again. But she was warm now, though she felt disoriented, like she wasn't herself anymore.
As she trudged onward down the narrow corridor, she began looking for a workspace. Surely, there were workspaces onboard the ship or just some place to access a computer.
She needed information. She needed to know what others knew about what was happening.
At the end of the hall, she paused, unsure which way to turn. The hallways in the Kearsarge were like labyrinths and she hadn't spent enough time memorizing the path to where she thought she needed to go next.
She stood a moment and closed her eyes, exhaling as she tried to collect herself. Then she turned right without thinking anymore about it.
She passed a porthole, saw that the sun had yet to set. Both were good signs. "I'm going to find Scott," she told herself.
In her years working in security and as an operative, she'd performed all kinds of strange assignments. None though that she'd loved or dreaded as much as this one. Working in a moral gray area was commonplace for someone in her line of work, but she never thought the work would lead to this.
The prospect of what was ahead, what would happen tomorrow, she dreaded in a way. She didn't want to know any more than she already knew and yet she wanted to know everything, even as she tried to remember everything that had happened so should could understand how things had gone so terribly wrong.
In the new clothes, she felt transformed, never expecting them to be so formfitting or to complement her lithe figure so well.
Suddenly realizing the absurdity of such thoughts at such a time, she almost laughed at herself.
More irrational thoughts from an overexerted mind.
What I need is rest, to sleep for a day or two.
But she didn't have a day or two to sleep and she knew it. She tried to focus on the events of the day, to sort what was relevant from what wasn't.
Coming to a t-intersection, she stopped.
"Sit 1?" she asked a passing ensign.
The ensign pointed.
"Thanks," she replied, turning to follow the path he indicated.
She recognized him immediately, but didn't say anything until he hung up the satellite phone. "Scott?" she said softly, her hand going to her pocket.
His eyes lit up when he saw her. "You?" he said, waving an accusatory finger.
She took her hand out of her pocket and rushed at him, running as fast as her legs would carry her. As she got closer, she reached out to grab him.
When she grabbed onto him, she turned and twisted, almost as if they were a couple of bears going at it. He pressed his lips firmly against hers. "My God," he said, "I thought you were gone. I thought I'd never see you again."
She returned the passion of his kisses, the fervor of his caresses. She put her hands to his cheeks, looked deep into his eyes. "I thought I'd lost you too. No one would tell me anything."
"No one knows anything. They told me you were dead."
Her eyes filled with dread. "Dead? You thought I was dead?"
"It's what they told me. I didn't know. I was just trying to get back to you, to see for myself."
She hadn't died, but she almost had. When she'd awoken and he wasn't there, she had been sure he was gone. Dead gone.
Too afraid to even think about it, she'd pushed those thoughts out of her mind. She left the infirmary in search of answers. As the medical staff kept running between the infirmary and Sit 1, Sit 1 was where she tried to go.
She kissed him again. Her lips, her tongue, her body, wanted him. Oh God, she told herself as she sighed. She wanted to feel. She wanted him to do her right now, right here up against the wall. She didn't care who saw, what anyone said or whether it was right or wrong. She wanted to feel everything about him, to know him as she had been so deathly afraid she never would get the chance to.
She spun around, pulled him to her as she backed up against the wall. "Ohhh… Ohhh… Ohhh," she cried out, but this time it wasn't a pleasure-filled moan. It was pain-the pain of her wound as she backed up against the wall.
The shooting pain in her shoulder brought her back to reality, almost as if a hypnotist had snapped his fingers and told her to wake up. She pushed him back, her hand on his chest. The feel of his beating heart beneath her fingers sent a shiver down her spine and all the way to her toes. "Oh, Scott, what am I doing? What have I done?"
"Edie, you didn't do anything I didn't want," he said with a broad grin. "I was scared to death that I'd never be able to do that. Mad as hell at myself for not doing it the hundred times I could have. I love you."
Three simple words she'd waited so long to hear. I could die now, she told herself before realizing how wrong such thoughts were and how even more wrong her actions were with all that was going on.
Her thoughts swam, but a sudden sadness in his eyes brought her thoughts back to him. He looked absolutely crestfallen. What was wrong? Then she realized she hadn't said those three simple words back.
"I love you," she said, wrapping her arms around him, even though it hurt like hell to do so.
Stepping back from him, she nodded to the shoulder wound. "7.62mm through and through. Go me one better?"
Chapter 17
Scott's heart was racing. It had taken everything he had to keep from giving Edie everything she wanted right there for all to see. But his devil-may-care attitude was fleeting.
He knew better, every part of him knew better-even if every part of him wanted her as much as she wanted him. "You mean 5.56mm?"
"No, 7.62mm. It's what the combat medic who stitched me up wrote in my charts."
That didn't make sense. He closed his eyes, tried to bring back the images of the attack.