Hell or High Water (Deep Six #1)(43)
Banu waited a beat for the signal to bounce around the globe and back. Finally, “Yes, Banu. I understand.”
“Good.” He breathed a sigh of relief. “That’s good. Now, hold steady until we get there. Can you do that for me?”
“Yes. Good,” Nassar said, and before Banu could add anything more, the signal went dead. Ah, well. He blew out a breath, soothing himself with the knowledge that Nassar had sounded far less hysterical there at the end.
“All is as it should be?” Ahmed asked.
“I think so.” He silently added, I hope so.
“Nassar is a passionate man. And sometimes he is too quick to act. But he knows how important this is. He will not disappoint you, brother.”
This time Banu spoke the words aloud. “I hope so.” Then he waved a hand at the man behind the wheel. “Okay, let’s go.”
The command didn’t need a translation. As the motorboat’s engines came to life with a coughing sputter, Banu turned his mind away from the disturbing thoughts of Nassar and the possibility the man might indeed f*ck everything up to more pleasant things. Things like the blow he’d deliver to the U.S. and its overfed, overconfident, overly entitled populace. Things like the scores of people who, after exposure to the cyclosarin, would foam at the mouth and scratch at their throats and eyes until they drew blood. Things like the news stories that would echo around the world.
He smiled with the knowledge that, as the mastermind of the whole thing, his name would go down in the annals of time, remembered by most, discussed by many, and revered by some. He would be like Timothy McVeigh or Osama bin Laden! The man to strike at the heart of an empire!
His dick twitched to life, swelling at the thought of what was to come. He had to covertly hook his heel over his knee and drop his hands into his lap. He sure as shit didn’t want to give these guys the wrong idea…
Chapter Nine
1:58 p.m.…
Olivia thumbed off the secure satellite phone and turned toward the group still gathered in the pilothouse.
“Well?” Leo asked, unhooking the sunglasses from the collar of his T-shirt and sliding them onto his face when a beam of sunlight caught the crest of a wave and glinted in through the window. She couldn’t help but recall how he’d casually tossed them onto the table in the galley right before he— “What did Morales have to say?”
“Morales? Oh yeah. Right.” She shook her head. What is your problem? But she knew. It was Leo Anderson. Leo Anderson and his too-handsome face. Leo Anderson and his mind-numbing kisses. Leo Anderson and his—
“Y’okay there, Agent Mortier?” Bran asked. When she glanced over at him, there was a smug, knowing grin tilting his lips. Like Leo, Bran was nothing if not perceptive.
“I’m fine,” she assured him, skewering him with her iciest expression? hoping to freeze that smile right off his face. To her utter annoyance, it didn’t work. Bran’s grin only became sunnier.
Jerk.
“Director Morales said the Black Gold is registered to some sort of Texas oil tycoon out of Houston.” She turned her attention from Bran to Leo. Nope. That was no good. Not if she wanted to remember whatever the hell she was talking about. Because those lips…those fabulous male lips made her forget her own name, much less anything else. His ear, then. She would focus her gaze on his very innocuous earlobe…that she wanted to suck straight into her mouth. Friggin’-A! Okay, so that left…Wolf. There. Good. She would keep her gaze squarely on Wolf’s fierce, uncompromising face.
“Its captain is listed as one Harold Tripplehorn, and its marine logs show it has docked in ports all over the Caribbean and some in Central and South America. Pretty standard for the yacht of a rich Texas businessman.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Morales seems to think it’s legit.”
“And he doesn’t think it’s awfully coincidental that this yacht is anchored less than two hundred yards from the GPS coordinates those signals are sendin’ us?” Leo asked.
Damnit. She was left with no recourse but to turn to him. To address Wolf when answering Leo’s question would be…well…weird. Girding herself against that bearded jaw and that flyaway thatch of golden hair, she shook her head. “He checked the port registries. According to the marina in Nassau, the Black Gold checked out of customs and weighed anchor yesterday evening for a return trip to Houston. A slow sail would pretty much put her right about here.”
“And a fast sail might have had her somewhere around Gitmo last night and out here this morning,” Wolf said.
“That’s a negative.” She shook her head, thankful for a reason to turn her attention back to him. “According to Morales’s calculations, even if the Black Gold was steaming at full speed, she couldn’t have left Bermuda and made it to Gitmo in time to pick up the terrorists last night. Not by a long shot.”
“And you trust Morales and his calculations?” Bran asked, his expression suddenly serious. It was beyond bizarre how the guy could do that. Go from frivolous to fierce in two seconds flat.
“He didn’t get to his position by being an idiot,” she assured him. Then she glanced around at the faces of the three remaining SEALs. Despite their retirement, they were still SEALs. She’d worked with the spec-ops community long enough to know there was no such thing as a “former” SEAL. Once a SEAL, always a SEAL.