“You think they’ll be okay?” Trent asked, his casual tone not matching the tension in his jaw.
There was no doubt who they were.
“Olivia can handle herself,” Jake said. “And Marielle’s proved she’s no slouch in the field.”
“I’m not worried about their skills,” Trent said. “I’m worried about what Cal knows, and how many steps ahead of us he is.”
The temperature in the cabin seemed to drop ten degrees.
Omar leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Exactly how much access did McCloud have?”
McCloud was Potomac’s Operations Director. But Omar wasn’t entirely sure what the job entailed. Probably by design.
Jake closed his laptop. “He had access to everything related to field operations, across all departments—tech, equipment, logistics, all of it. He knows the covcom frequencies, the safe house locations, our extraction protocols. He built the deployment architecture. If McCloud turned, he could hand over our entire playbook.”
“So every agent in the field right now is operating naked,” Omar said, his stomach sour.
“That’s the crux of it.” Jake dragged his hands through his hair. “Anyone, anywhere, could be exposed at any time.”
Trent’s expression was unreadable, but a vein in his neck pulsed ominously. He stood and paced the aisle between the seats like a trapped cat.
Omar cracked his knuckles, thinking.
“Ryan’s on it,” Jake reminded them. “He’s combing through Cal’s communications, his financials, everything. We’ll find him.”
“And then?” Omar asked.
“And then we’ll lean on him until he gives up everything he knows,” Jake vowed.
Jake’s phone buzzed against the table. He glanced at the screen.
“Speak of the lawyer.”
He put the call on speaker.
“Tell us something good,” Jake said.
“I wish I could.” Ryan’s voice was tight. “Did you know Cal has a son?”
“He never mentioned a family to me,” Jake said. He looked at Omar and Trent, who shook their heads. “The consensus is no.”
“That’s not shocking,” Ryan said. “They’re estranged. Cal and the mom divorced when Jackson was two; the ex-wife lives in Colorado.”
“Where’s this going, Ry?” Omar and Ryan had been friends since elementary school, and Omar knew how to rein in his thoroughness when it veered toward verbosity.
“Jackson McCloud is doing thirty years federal time for securities fraud and money laundering related to some cryptocurrency exchange he launched.”
“Thirty years for white collar crime?” Omar was surprised. He was no lawyer, but even he knew white collar criminals usually did months, not years, in minimum security camps.
“When you defraud customers to the tune of three hundred and fifty million dollars, you don’t tend to get a light sentence.”
“How’s this relate to Cal? You said they’re estranged.” Trent shook his head.
“They are, but guess who got a Presidential pardon just two weeks ago?”
“Jackson McCloud,” Jake said grimly.
“Right, and this is a fine distinction, but it was a blanket pardon, not a commutation of the sentence and not a pardon after Jackson served his time.”
