“Well, I’m glad you asked,” Rawlins cut in. “I’ve asked Sally Higgins to fly back from Seattle. She’s going to rehearse with the three of you on a new version of the show in case we can’t find Ethan.”
“What?” Zach blurted. “Shouldn’t we at least wait a few days?”
“I know he’s your best friend, Zach,” Hightower interrupted, “but, we have obligations and millions of dollars on the line already. If we delay any longer, we’ll all be out a ton of money. So as much as I wish we had time to wait for Ethan to come back to us, we have to move forward and prepare for a worst-case scenario.”
Zach wanted to say something to counteract Hightower and Rawlins, but they were right. Ethan had royally screwed over everyone.
What the hell is Ethan thinking?
* * * *
Dr. Hennigan
Dr. Hennigan knocked on her mother’s office door for the second time that day. She waited for the buzz before entering.
Her mom stood in front of a bank of display monitors, watching an operation going down in the Middle East in real time. The Foundation had an asset captured and tortured, so a small strike force was sent in on a retrieval mission. If rescuing was impossible, the asset would be liquidated.
Everyone, even the chairwoman and vice-chair, knew liquidation was a possibility. It was part of their line of work. The Foundation tried to stress that liquidation was always the last thing they wanted to do after investing so much time and energy into their training. Still, The Foundation was always greater than the individual members.
Dr. Hennigan stood beside her mother, knowing better than to interrupt her viewing of the mission in progress. The helmet cameras captured death-shot after death-shot as the team made their way through what looked like an abandoned warehouse.
The operation was borderline picture-perfect regarding its infiltration and sweep of the warehouse. The team finally came upon a clearly booby-trapped room. One specialist quickly worked the trap and hesitantly opened the door to ensure there wasn’t a secondary one.
A gunman entered the hallway on one of the camera feeds, and one of their operatives put a bullet between his eyes before he raised his weapon.Good shot!
The strike force entered the room and found their asset. Unfortunately, she was already dead.
“Alpha to Mission Control,” one agent said. “The target is down. How should we proceed?”
A voice chirped over the intercom, “Alpha, this is Mission Control. You are clear for disposition.”
“Copy, Alpha out.”
Dr. Hennigan watched as one operative set an explosive device under the seat where the asset had been bound.
“I trained that asset,” Deborah said, a somber look on her face. “She was an excellent acquisition for almost two decades. I hate this is how her legacy ended. Fucking Aegis Concordat! How did they even know she was one of ours?”
The two watched as the strike force exited the building before it exploded behind them. A Blackhawk was waiting to exfiltrate the team back to a Foundation staging area. Once the helicopter left the ground, Deborah clicked on the monitors and turned to her daughter. “How can I help you?”
“I wanted to give you a quick status update on Target E. We’ve traced his email use to a coffee shop in Houston. We also found a picture of him at the same location, so we’re sending Denzili and Richardson to finish the job.”
Deborah made her way back to her desk without saying a word. Once seated, she gestured for her daughter to sit in the chair in front of her desk.
“Your grandmother is not happy,” Deborah said with no emotion. “She recommended I reassign this case—”
“Mother—”
“I told her,” Deborah said, raising her voice to cut off her daughter’s objection, “that I fully believe you and your team will finish the job. Of course, it would be helpful if Ms. Brighton was here completing her audit. Too bad she was delayed.”
Dr. Hennigan thought about saying she had nothing to do with the delay, but she knew her mother wouldn’t believe her, so she sat still and quiet.
“For their sake, I hope Denzili and Richardson get it right this time. Let’s say your grandmother is looking for heads to roll after the explosion missed Target E.”
“If there are any more problems, I’ll take care of Denzili and Richardson myself.”
“I’m going to hold you to that.”
* * * *
