On the train here from Maiori, I’d had nothing but time. Time to think, and rethink, and overthink.
Time to look over that warning text I’d received from an unknown number the day of the bombing and remember that Rocky didn’t know I was staying at Locke’s house. Time to remember Liyana saying,Thank you, Jett. I hope someday to repay your kindness.Time to realize that good and bad, truth and lies, loyalty and honor, weren’t the black-and-white concepts I’d thought they were when I’d first become an agent.
I’d had time to regret, too.
I’d foolishly gotten way too involved with a supposedly heterosexual billionaire. A man who literally controlled the world like pawns in a game. A man whose determination and responsibility were melded into his very soul. A man who’d stood alone, acted alone, for so long, that when I’d begged him to leave, he’d stubbornly insisted on staying behind—alone.
No loyal ESP agent would risk his career over Locke Maris by being less than a hundred percent honest with his boss…
Unless that agent had a damn good reason, like being head over heels in love with the man and determined to protect him at all costs.
“I’m visiting my cousins,” I lied with no compunction whatsoever. “They invited me, and I figured, ‘Hey, I’m on vacation, and Rocky specifically told me to stay out of trouble, so why not?’ But don’t worry, I’m heading back to Italy first thing tomorrow. I’ll collect the package you sent to the post office and set up surveillance?—”
“No!” she almost shouted. “Jesus, no. Under no circumstances should you go back to Maiori, Jett. I mean it.”
I sat on the bed, stacked the pillows behind my head, and tried to think what the Agent Jett Marian that she knew might say. “What? Why not? Come on, Rocky! It’s been almost a week. I’m so relaxed by now my muscles are starting to atrophy!”
“Have you not checked the news in the last forty-eight hours?” she demanded. “There’s been a blockade in theKiel Canal.”
“No way.” I sank further into the pillows. “You mean… you think the convo I overheard was actually them… what? Plotting something? Shit.”
“We don’t know,” she admitted. “It’s not related to the explosion near the canal. That’s confirmed by CJ and the others. The official cause is a software glitch. If there was an unofficialcause, we haven’t figured it out yet. But listen, Jett, Trevi said you contacted him for information about a company…” Papers rustled in the background.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Malik Makida. I remembered someone mentioning that at lunch, too. Trevi said it’s owned by Saleem al-Qadiri, so it makes sense that’s why they mentioned it, right? Did that have something to do with the canal thing?”
“No. But…” Rocky hesitated. “Saleem al-Qadiri was killed by a car bomb at a villa just outside Maiori yesterday.”
“What the fuck? I was just there! I left first thing yesterday morning. Damn it. I knew I shouldn’t have left?—”
“No, it’s probably better that way. But that’s why you can’t go back. The investigator showed your picture around to the owner and staff at the villa?—”
“Why?” I didn’t have to feign shock now. I sat up on the bed and glared at my phone. “Why the fuck would he do that and blow whatever cover I would have had?”
“Because I couldn’t get in touch with you! Because we were concerned that you might have tried to get close to the players. And that you might have been hurt in the process.”
“Jesus Christ,” I groaned.
I wanted to say that she should know me better than that… but based on recent events, she obviously knew me exactly the right amount.
“Anyway, if you go back to Maiori, you’ll raise a whole lot of suspicion. And anyway, the investigation’s not centered there anymore. Chatter says al-Qadiri upset the wrong people in the process of a power grab from his father-in-law. They’ve got a couple leads they’re following up in Qadara.”
I closed my eyes. I was sure that story was a plant, and I raised a mental toast to the Paxis Council.
“One thing that’s bothering me, though,” Rocky mused. “Two of the ships involved in the blockade were Maris ships. And al-Qadiri was assassinated at Locke Maris’s house.”
Interrogation 101: don’t answer questions that weren’t asked.
I waited her out until she finally said, “But then again, there were other ships involved. So there’s no clear evidence pointing to Maris.” She sighed.
“Do we have a mandate here?” I wondered. Because we could be curious cats all we wanted, but if there was no indication of danger or illegal activity that could lead to global instability, then what was our interest in al-Qadiri’s death? “I can look into it?” I tried to sound eager. “Ask around?—”
“No. God no. Go back to your vacation. Keep staying out of trouble. We’ll see you in a week and not before.”
I hung up the phone and squeezed my eyes shut.
I should have felt like I’d crossed a Rubicon, I was pretty sure. Yes, I was not Rocky’s most rule-following agent. Yes, there were times I’d taken risks—like staying under way too long in Germany—that she didn’t agree with. But I had never overtly disobeyed an order. I’d never questioned or tested my loyalty to ESP.
But if I were being brutally honest, my frustration with the job had been a constant drip, drip, drip that had, over the years, built into a tidal wave. So many times, I’d seen higher-ups—people who’d never had their boots on the ground in the agency—make decisions that enabled small-time criminals like Ronald Gillen to keep living their best criminal lives, with no thought to the people they hurt. So many times, I’d been pulled from casesrightbefore they broke because diplomatic channels broke down and our authorization to operate was yanked.
