Page 4 of Nightstalker

“I gave Garrett the go ahead to start analyzing the machines you brought back. This is top priority. I have fuckers from every three letter agency in Washington breathing down my neck about this asshole. I’d love nothing more than to put another bullet in this fuck chop’s head for stirring up a shit storm.” Z looked like he was ready to blow a gasket. “There is a metric shit ton of information for Garrett to go through. I think that boy nearly creamed in his perfectly pressed pants when he saw the boards from some hot shit new computer hardware company. Fuck if I know that geek shit. I just want to know who in the mother fuck hired Deepweb336.” Z sneered, his normally handsome face turned up like someone had taken a shit on his shoe. He raked his hand through his jet black hair, a sure sign of his building frustration.

Shit was about to get hot real quick, Z was nearing DEFCON one. The last time I saw Z this mad, some idiot had tried to take out a senator while we were in Kandahar almost causing an international incident.

Z tossed file folders into the middle of the table indicating we should all take one. He pointed the remote towards the LCD screen and pulled up a group of images with his tablet.

“There is no good time to do this, so I am going to get it out of the way now. I am not happy about losing one of my best operatives. Drew, you have been an invaluable part of this company as well as to the Red Team. You will be greatly missed, brother.” Z cleared his throat and continued, “Drew has agreed to stay on as a part time consultant, strictly behind the scenes. Mission support and logistics. As you all know I have struggled with whether to promote someone up to Red team from one of the other teams or hire from outside the company. With that being said, I have decided to hire from the outside. I simply cannot afford to disrupt one of the other teams. I hired Lincoln Parker. He just got back stateside after being dark on an op for two years. I would be surprised if most of you don’t at least know his name.” Z stopped to look around the table.

I did the same and wondered who the hell this Lincoln Parker guy was. And why that name had my team’s eyes lighting up like the holy grail of operatives was about to grace us with his presence. All of them except Eric, that is; his look was one of disgust rather than awe.

I heard the door to the back office click for the second time in the last thirty minutes and wondered if one of the other teams was going to be briefed on the Deepweb336 case. It didn’t happen frequently, but it was neither unheard of for a second team to be brought in on a Red Team operation. The conference door pushed open and in walked the hottest man…no scratch that…Fuck. My. Life. I had no words for the man standing in the doorway. Where in the hell was my handy dandy pocket thesaurus when I needed it? I looked at him from top to toe and back up again. Who in the ever loving hell was this? I felt a blush creep up my cheeks and moisture pool between my thighs. Oh, Fuck no, not now. If one of the guys spotted my reaction to this fine ass man in the doorway, I would never live it down. This would be “bust Jasmin’s balls” fodder for years to come.

I tried to school my features as I looked at the sexy man I dubbed Mr. Drop Dead Gorgeous. BUSTED! Fuck my life again. He caught me as I was checking him out, which meant the eagle eye assholes on my team had too. I tried to sneak one more look, maybe I was wrong. Nope, there was a super fucking hot smirk, on Mr. DDG’s face. FML! Yup, I was now speaking in acronyms in my head.

Chapter Three

Jasmin

“Linc, welcome. Glad you could make it in. You all settled?” Z turned and shook Mr. DDG’s hand.

“Yeah all set. Thanks, Zane,” Linc said as he leaned in to give Z one of those manly slap on the back embraces.

Holy mother God, this cannot be my new teammate. Shit and damn.

“Team, this is Lincoln Parker. Linc this is your new team Eric, Leo, Jaxon, Colin, and of course, Jasmin. Drew will brief you on his case load and show you around tomorrow.” Z pointed to each of us as he made his introductions.

Linc nodded his head in turn and added, “Great to be here. Zane has told me a lot about all of you.”

“Take a seat,” Z said as he motioned to one of the remaining empty chairs, “You’re just in time for the brief and after action reports. Did you look over the Deepweb336 files I sent you?” Z asked as he slid a file folder across the table towards Mr. DDG.

“Yes LT, and I added some notes of my own about the Russians involved.” Linc’s answer made Eric’s eyes light up.

“Fucking Russians, it’s always the God damn fucking Russians!” Eric could not miss an opportunity to add “fucking” to the word “Russian”.

“Christ, settle the hell down, Eric.” Z shook his head as he picked up his tablet once again. “Jake’s preliminary reports show we have three major players on the board. All of which piss me right the fuck off. This is beginning to play out like a who’s who in a fucked up game of P’yanitsa.” Z slid his finger across the smooth screen of the tablet and changed the picture on the LCD wall monitor to mug shots of three Russians.

“Boris, Viktor, and Andrei Orlov. Three brothers, each more fucked up than the last.” Z pointed his tablet in the direction of the screen.

Just to note, I was having a hard time paying attention to the information on the monitor. Three of the ugliest Russians I have ever seen were no competition for possibly the sexiest man alive sitting approximately fifty six inches away from me. A little over four feet. One hundred forty two and some change in centimeters. Sweet baby Jesus, I could smell him from across the table. Sex. He smelled like sex! More to the point, the way he smelled made me want to rip his clothes off. Thankfully, the sound of someone speaking stopped my wandering thoughts.

“Last I heard they were serving life sentences in The Black Dolphin,” Jax informed the room.

Holy shit, if the Orlov brothers were doing time in Russia’s highest security prison, then they had to be the worst kind of criminals. The only sentence you could get when entering The Black Dolphin was life. It housed everything from child molesters to members of the Bratva.

Unfortunately, being incarcerated would not be much of an impediment to the Orlov brothers. Bratva members in prison were every bit as active as the brothers who were free. No one fucked with those assholes; they had been considered the criminal elite in Russia since the early 1900’s.

“The Orlov brothers are out. Three weeks ago Viktor gave the Russian government information on a Chechen separatist attack in Saint Petersburg. The minister of Justice’s son was killed in the attack. Needless to say the Russian’s were feeling generous when Viktor demanded release for himself and his brothers in exchange for the information,” Linc informed the room.

“Fuck it all to hell, they’re out? How in the hell was this shit missed?” Z’s face was growing redder by the moment.

“It was kept under wraps. The Russians don’t want word to get out that they negotiated a deal with these three animals. The FBI and DEA will want answers as to why three major players in the drug trade have been released, not to mention the girls,” Linc explained.

“How is it that you know about their release before our contacts in the district and at the White House?” I asked. Something was not adding up. Who the fuck was this guy and how did he have information before Z?

Z shot me a warning glare, which I returned with one of my own. This was my fucking team; it would be our asses on the line when we get sent on an op based on this new asshole’s information. Trust but verify. Fuck yeah, I was going to question him. If he didn’t like it, then screw him.

“I was there.” That was all the explanation I got from Linc as he glared at me.

“That’s it? You were there. Care to elaborate on how it is that you were at The Black Dolphin, while a deal was being negotiated after a Chechen attack?” I continued my questioning. Judging by the look on his face, he did not like being questioned, and certainly did not like that it was being done by a woman.