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Susan sat next to me. “That’s something.”
I searched through the footage, identifying ten different masked tangos armed to the teeth inside, then paused the moment Diana was on screen.
“Is she . . .?” Susan left off the word dead as she cupped her mouth.
I returned my focus to the laptop as one of the men lifted Diana from the ground and began carrying her to an exit. She was limp and lifeless in his arms.
My stomach turned, but I kept my shit together and rewound the footage farther back to see what happened to her before then.
I shouldn’t have been surprised she’d put up a fight. She’d always come across as a strong woman to me. Her ex, on the other hand, had done nothing to help her, and it made me want to kill the asshole.
Rage burned through my veins as I took in the scene inside Diana’s office. She’d resisted the bastards and fought while her ex hid behind her, then fled. I nearly lost my shit witnessing the masked man strike her in the face when she’d been distracted by something—effectively knocking her out. Another man I planned to identify, then murder with my bare hands.
“What do you see?” Secretary Chandler asked, and I skipped back to the scene and turned the computer to show him and POTUS. I used that time to get a grip so I could think through the problem of how to locate her.
“You have sound, too?” POTUS asked.
“Yeah, give me a second.” I turned the screen and made a few adjustments to the program, bringing up the volume.
“What language are they speaking? Anyone recognize it? Eastern European, maybe?” Susan asked as we rewatched the footage unfold, this time starting from Diana being rendered unconscious and removed from the building up until the blast that destroyed the site. “We need a translator.”
I listened closely, recognizing the language. “Serbian.” The first woman I’d slept with after Rebecca had been Serbian. Alyona Jovanovich.
After I’d had the angel wings tattooed on my back, I’d gone back to Alyona’s place. Ultimately, she’d helped me connect the dots to the smuggler that brought me to Rory McAdams—Red Robin Hood. I’d been indebted to Alyona for that, so I didn’t take her down with the others. I supposed it was my luck I hadn’t, because I’d be needing her again.
“We weren’t working with Serbia on that project,” Secretary Chandler echoed what I’d already assumed. “Must be hired mercenaries for whoever was behind this.”
“I think I know how we can find whoever has Diana and the others.” I set the laptop aside and stood. “Behind every powerful man is an?—”
“An even stronger woman.” Susan’s words weren’t lost on me.
Rebecca. Yeah, yeah, I fucking know. I suppressed my emotions so they didn’t bleed into the room. “Are you familiar with Alyona Jovanovich?”
“Of course. She’s on the same lists you once were.” Secretary Chandler’s eyes widened in a light-bulb moment. “You think she’s behind this?”
“Not behind the attack, no, but she may know who is. And I can get her to tell me.” I checked my watch, needing to be on a plane already. “Last I heard she was in Germany. My guess is Germany’s one of the eleven countries you were working with? I’m betting you trust them as much as they trust you right now. So, you can’t send a team in to take Alyona in for questioning.” Which is why I’m here. “But there’s only one way I can make this work.” I hated what I was about to ask, but I had no choice. “Put me back on the wanted list and give Alyona a justifiable reason as to why I’d come back to her for help after all these years.”
“What kind of reason?” Susan asked, fidgeting with her suit jacket.
“Leak a story to the press that there’s new evidence I murdered my wife for eleven billion dollars.” I waited for the news to sink in before continuing, “Gray and the rest of Falcon can’t be on the ground with me for this. I need my old crew.”
“And what will you do?” Susan asked, managing to reclaim the same sharpness from minutes ago that her nerves had seemingly whittled away.
“What you all want me to do.” Be the man I once was and take down every son of a bitch responsible for setting a hand on Diana. I took a pen and notepad from the desk and jotted down names that’d hopefully be the least offensive to Secretary Chandler. “Here.” I dropped the pen and handed the list—which didn’t include Griffin’s name—to Chandler. No one needed to know he’d been part of those dark years with me unless he wanted it to be known. “See who you can pull in from this list while I get word out to Alyona I need to meet.”
Chandler smoothed his thumb over the shiny stars on his collar. “Why do I feel like you’re Bruce Willis giving us a list of his motley crew, and I have to go round them up like we’re in some Armageddon movie?”
That gave me pause. The fact he’d make a parallel like that at a time like this. “Is this an Armageddon situation, sir?” When everyone remained quiet, my blood pressure spiked. “Does Diana know she wasn’t really working on cold fusion?”
20
CARTER
“She was working on cold fusion.” The President was possibly the only man in the White House and all of D.C. who could stare a man like me dead in the eyes and say those words with a straight face.
Secretary Chandler lifted my list of names, waving the folded piece of paper in the air. He wanted out of this conversation and now.
What had they gotten themselves into? Really fucking into?
