Page 48 of Her Wild Warrior

Kostya paused. Ryker could see his wheels turning. “I can see why. Now that we have a game plan, wake his ass up and invite him over so we can introduce him to Leila. I want him to call the CEO this morning.”

“Are all of you fresh for your assignments?”

Everybody nodded.

Ryker felt the adrenaline pumping through his veins. He knew that Jase was going to end up with stellar information from Damla Akbas, and he couldn’t wait to go after it. He glanced over at Linc, and he could see he was vibrating with energy too.

“Gideon, give Landon and Nolan the address to Ayaz Polat’s house so they can get started. Ryker and Linc, I want the two of you familiarizing yourself with Mirzabey. My gut is telling me that we’re going to find the Princeton boys near there.”

“Got it.”

Ryker and Linc headed out of the suite just as Dermott was coming in.

“What’s going on?” he asked them.

“Talk to the lieutenant,” Linc said.

“Ryker?” Dermott persisted. “What’s up?”

“Dude, talk to Kostya.”

As soon as Linc and Ryker were out in the hall, they looked at one another. “Dumber than a box of rocks,” Ryker said.

Linc nodded.

12

“You owe me twenty bucks,” Ryker said.

“How in the fuck did you know that was a pistachio tree?” Linc bitched as he squinted at the satellite image again.

“Because I went out and picked pistachios with three of my brothers for a week at a cousin’s farm.”

“I thought all you did was surf.”

“California supplies most of the fruit and nuts for all of America, you dufus. By the way, it wasn’t fun, and my cousin didn’t pay us, which really sucked. She needed help, so we just pitched in. I was an asshole at fifteen, at this age I’d do it again in a heartbeat.”

Linc was looking down at his phone. “Batman has a huge pistachio market. Aw hell, if they’re trying to figure out what farm by the top of crop they’re growing over in Mirzabey, we might be shit out of luck. Here in Batman it looks like wheat, barley, and pistachios.”

“Well, at least we will know if we’re looking for farms with or without trees,” Ryker said.

“There is that.”

Ryker checked his watch for the eighteenth time since everybody had left the hotel. “The Polats should have landed forty-five minutes ago.”

“You gave me an update fifteen minutes ago,” Linc said disgustedly.

“And the meeting is due to start in thirty-five minutes.”

“Yeah, you let me know about that fifteen minutes ago too. Should I call you cuckoo, as in you’re a cuckoo clock?”

“I’m antsy,” Ryker admitted.

“No shit. I want to do something too, but you don’t see me irritating the fuck out of you, do you?”

“Hey, I know. I’m going to go irritate Gideon.”

“That sounds like a fine idea. Go for it.”