“Well,” he said, “if this was your plan all along, I say mission successful. What was your mistake?”
“I should have swept from the side of the ankle instead,” she replied.
Exactly.
There was a moment of awkwardness. Jill’s heart rate quickened and she felt a sudden urge to lean forward and see what came next. Paula was right. He did have nice eyes, a combination of blue and turquoise that could keep a girl mesmerized for hours.
Instead, Jill tore her gaze away and pretended to act annoyed. “Okay, you can get off me now.”
His face was very close to hers. “The view’s pretty good from here.”
She slapped him playfully on the shoulder. “Get off me. I’m not one of those peasants your lordship can just have your way with.”
He grinned, rolled off and pulled her up to her feet. “Next time, coming from the angle you did, kick higher at the knees or sweep the ankles.”
“Yes, sir,” she replied, brushing the chunks of mud off her pants. She was doing laundry almost every day now.
He looked up at the sky and checked his watch. “Let’s call it. We’ll move training to the city from now on. You’ll have more encounters in the urban jungles than the wilderness anyway.” That was music to Jill’s ears. She couldn’t wait to stop rolling around in the dirt.
“First thing tomorrow night?” she asked as they walked back to the car.
“Double sessions,” he said. “One at dawn and at night.”
She sighed. Sleep was becoming a rare commodity.
Baji initially wanted to call Roen at four in the morning over there just to give him a taste of his own medicine. It was tempting but Jill decided to be the bigger person. She waited and called at what should be lunch local time. Instead, she was surprised to catch him just waking up.
“Starting the day a little late?” she joked. “Wuehler have you on permanent guard duty?”
She knew she had hit a nerve when he mumbled something too low to make out. At first, he pretended things were fine, but like all good wives, she knew how to dig the truth out. Eventually, he caught her up on the events of the past few days.
Killed by the Genjix? What about Ramez?
“What about Wuehler’s Quasing?” Jill asked. This tale was becoming all too familiar these days. It seemed far too often these days, another of Baji’s friends was sent to the Eternal Sea.
“I got him out,” Roen sighed. “I had to do it. Shoot Wuehler. It was the only way.”
Jill felt his grief right there. It was the one tragedy that he could never get over, and now it had happened again. Granted Wuehler didn’t own Roen’s heart like Sonya had, but it still must have hurt. A little itch of jealousy bubbled up in her as she thought of Sonya, but Jill pushed it out of her mind. This wasn’t the time.
You honestly need to get over it.
“I’ll get over it when you do.”
“Any hits on Dylan?” Jill asked.
“The fat bastard’s fallen off the face of the Earth.”
“Have you considered heading south to that Genjix operation?”
“I thought about it, but I don’t know. It’s a large port and we’re undermanned. Might be more than we can chew. We lost most of our supplies and are in pretty bad shape. There’s a lot of heat on us too.”
Jill picked up the piece of paper. “I got a name for you: Punai Corporation. Found some docs through the Department of Commerce. Much of it was redacted but that only shines a bigger spotlight on it. That means someone from up on high in this administration is covering for them. And of course, their primary refinery and export hub is in southern Taiwan. I don’t think it’s a coincidence. It should help narrow your search.”
“I’ll give it a shot.” Roen sounded so deflated. Jill couldn’t remember the last time he had sounded this insecure. Ever since she found out about Tao, Roen had tended to exhibit an overabundance of confidence.
“Listen, Roen, you take care of yourself,” she said softly. “You have a son. Remember that.”
There was a long pause.
“Jill, when this is all over, I want to talk. About us being us again.”
Something got caught in Jill’s throat. No words came out, and she suddenly felt the need to turn away and face the window. The last thing Wilks and Tammy needed to see was her crying at her desk. Wilks would fly into a rage and Tammy would gossip. Politics was a rough sport, and there was no place for crying in it.
“I have to go,” she said quickly, hanging up. She kept her face turned for several seconds.
Maybe we should talk about this. Marco is confusing you.
Jill wiped the tears falling down her face and breathed in sharply. “No he’s not, Baji. There’s nothing to talk about. Let’s get back to work.”
TWENTY-THREE
NEW MANAGEMENT
The war between the Cro-Magnons and the Neanderthals was wider in scale than any humans have seen since. There was little strategy and coordination, save for what the Quasing could coax out. It was genocide by any definition. By the end, only one species remained.
After the Cro-Magnon established their dominance, the next several thousand years became a time of great innovation. We harnessed our new tools and showed them how to bend fire to their bidding. We taught them how to follow the stars when they traveled and showed them how to cultivate the land for sustenance. Then in Mesopotamia, the Keeper, in all her wisdom, offered the humans a new gift: the written word.
Tao
Roen and the team stayed at the safe house for three more days. The men needed to recuperate from their dozens of minor and not-so-minor injuries. Jim complained of dizziness from his concussion, Hutch had cracked a tooth and needed dental work, Stan’s bullet wound festered, and Grant somehow came down with an intense itch that required a doctor. It ended up being gonorrhea. Ashish never returned and they were forced to presume him dead.
Roen had hoped to speak with Lin the next morning, but his hopes were dashed when he saw the empty couch. That was too bad; the team could have used his help. Not only was he familiar with Taiwan, he was easily one of the deadliest fighters in the world.
Roen knew better than to beg Lin to join the team, though. First of all, he’d be a terrible teammate. There was no way his master would follow Roen’s orders. Even when Lin was active, there was a reason he was a solo operative. Second of all, Lin was a man of his word. He took that whole retirement thing seriously and meant what he said about not being involved with the Prophus anymore. If his master felt his service to the world was done, it was.
The team had to be more careful now with a strong Genjix presence close by. This was the last safe house in Taipei and discovery would be catastrophic. Operations in Asia were inherently risky these days. Gone were the days when Prophus Command could ship support within twenty-four hours. Once a team was isolated, especially in the enemy zone of control, they were on their own.
For Roen, taking charge was a learning experience. In all his years as an operative, he had never owned a team. Sure, he had led tactical operations before, but this was a beast of a different nature. At first, he thought Faust would help run the day-to-day operations, but he was having a tough transition with Ramez. The two did not seem to get along and were waging a war of wills in Faust’s head. Roen pitied them both.
You should be glad you got lucky with such an agreeable Quasing.
“Pfft. I bet Ramez doesn’t put Faust on a diet right away and torture him with hot ass-kicking women.”
Admit it. You liked being beaten up by Sonya.