Disavowed(51)

“You just got your third degree black belt, right?”

“Fourth.”

Rob smiled. “Admit it, you’ve still got the itch to be out there, rather than working behind that desk.”

“Never denied that,” he said with a grin, leaning back in his chair. He and Rob had worked together for almost eleven years total, a span of time that included some of the most important ops in the agency’s history. They worked well together, trusted each other.

And yet, however closely they worked together, Rob had no idea about Will’s side ops, but they were few and far between anyway, and something told Will that Rob would understand the necessity of them should he ever find out.

“You heard the news yet?” Rob asked.

“Just got back from a meeting. What’s up?”

“One of our Clandestine Services Operation officers is dead. Janaia Miller. She was a handler. FBI team in Denver says she was killed in a professional hit. Cyanide.”

Will kept his expression blank. “When was this?”

“Yesterday morning. And the operative she handled is missing now too. The one who did the Ramadi hit. She’s been AWOL ever since. She was in the area, and might have killed her.”

This was working to his benefit far more than he’d anticipated. Will took that moment to pull up the message he’d seen in his e-mail folder. “You mean Briar Jones?” He turned the screen so Rob could see the picture of her.

“Yeah.” He frowned as he peered at the screen, reading the notes there.

“I just got off the phone with our forensics people twenty minutes ago. Jones is dead, as of last evening. Sniper got her.”

Rob glanced at him in surprise. “Was it one of ours?”

He was asking because those agency-sanctioned ops almost always required at least one of their signatures on the orders. “No.” One of mine. “Any leads yet on Miller’s case?”

Rob’s mouth tightened. “Zero. Security footage from the airport apparently isn’t that helpful. But if Jones and Miller are both dead, there may be others involved.” He shook his head. “Bet you’re glad you’re leaving, huh?”

He was mostly glad he’d hired the right man for the Miller job. The Feds would never find the guy now, not with him having this much lead-time. In addition to making things untraceable, another benefit of hiring outside people was that they tended not to ask questions. As long as the money was good and showed up in their bank accounts on time, they did the job and disappeared into whatever new life the payout afforded them. “Moving on to bigger and better things.”

Rob smiled. “Yeah. Got the paperwork on that other op we were working on last night?”

“Already sent it to you and the Director.”

“Great.” Rob stood, put his hands in his pockets. “Let me know if you hear anything more about Jones or Miller.”

“Will do. Hey, you coming to the fundraiser tomorrow night?”

“Wouldn’t miss it,” he said, eyes twinkling at the lie. Everyone knew how much Rob hated social functions and avoided them whenever he could. “See you then.”

“You bet.”

As Rob closed the door behind him, Will mentally let out a sigh of relief. He’d always been careful whenever he’d sanctioned private ops, making sure there were no paper trails and using his offshore accounts to fund them.

Four people who might have exposed his extracurricular activities were now dead. Three for sure. He wanted to see Jones’s body though. George had once worked for The Company, before she’d gone off the grid and become a mercenary.

She’d be hard to track now that she’d done the hit, but Will was very familiar with her file and knew how close she was to her former handler. He could use that to his advantage, kill the two of them and seal this entire thing up tight.

His position and the powers that came with it gave him many advantages, including access to a long list of people who could help him out of this current predicament.

He pulled up his contact list, searching for the name of someone he’d used once before. The man was a stone cold merc, quiet and absolutely lethal. A former Mob hit man. He didn’t care who the target was as long as he was paid well. Expensive, but worth it because of his reliability and speed. Will would call him on his way home tonight, have the standard fifty-percent deposit ready to wire by this evening. The remainder was always due after proof of the target’s death was established.

That was one more thing he needed to button up.

So close now, he thought as he reviewed more e-mails concerning his current load of on-the-books ops he was involved with. If all went well, he’d work his last day Friday and move on without the worry of past threads tripping him up.