Backblast by Candace Irving (miss read books TXT) 📕

She managed to round the latter up. Trap it there. But it was still roiling, threatening to spew forth. Jeffers could impugn her father all he wanted. The bastard deserved it. And at least she now understood why this had felt personal.

As for her? Jeffers could slime her to her face in front of the entire, snickering embassy for all she cared. She'd endured worse from at least three of her so-called loving foster "mothers" while growing up, especially her final one.

But she'd be damned if she'd let this man kick John to the dirt. Not after what John had given—and given up—for their country.

She stepped well into the DCM's personal space. The man had two inches on her five-eight, maybe three. It didn't matter. Her rage carried her right up to his level and a bit beyond. "It's a shame you've been channeling my NCIS counterpart, Mr. Jeffers. You should've picked someone more in tune with reality. Agent Riyad couldn't grasp the concept of motive if Ted Bundy himself had brought him along and offered up a blow-by-blow while good ol' Ted was selecting his victims and murdering them. And Riyad sure as hell doesn't understand what makes Garrison tick."

The surfeit of garlic Jeffers had consumed for lunch blasted right back into her, fueling his hot breath that much more. "Coming from you, that's amusing as hell. Because, unlike you, Riyad is more than some cut-rate Army dick. That man is a former Navy SEAL who's done more to track down terrorists and put them out of commission since 9-11 than you can hope to finger in a hundred careers. And if Garrison thinks he can slide into that slot alongside Riyad at Homeland Security, he's got another think coming. Especially after I finish sending my two cents up the chain."

Riyad was a former SEAL?

What the—

"Cat got your tongue there, Agent?"

Try every single lion on the Serengeti. But her instincts were roaring louder than all of them combined. And shredding though her suspicions with a lot more force.

If Sam Riyad was a former SEAL, why had he hidden it?

Because he had. With her, and with John.

Only, she was now almost certain the spook hadn't been as successful in deceiving John as he'd hoped.

She also knew why John had needed to get to a phone, and what he'd wanted to confirm. Part of it, at least. According to a number she'd come across while working a joint case shortly after she'd been tapped for CID, there were roughly twenty-five hundred SEALs on active duty. Special Forces had close to three times that.

Yes, there were joint training schools and missions. But as a rule, SEALs and SF tended to play in separate sandboxes when the day-to-day shit went down. Hence, while as a whole both communities were tight knit, they didn't know everyone.

A fact Riyad had depended on.

Something must've given the spook away. An unguarded comment, a suspiciously defining behavior. Possibly several. Whatever it was, it had caused John to suspect the man's professional lineage…and something else. Something so serious John had been loath to discuss it with her—and General Palisade—until he was certain.

But what?

And why did she have the feeling that whatever it was, it was also tied up with Riyad's irrational suspicions about John? Why else had the spook worked so hard to hide his former status from a current special operator?

"Agent?"

The sneer that blew in on that fresh wave of garlic hauled her back to the present. To her temporary office. She needed to get Jeffers out of there, so she could think. Make her own covert call—to Mira. Find out what the hell was going on.

As for the other revelation Jeffers had made, the one regarding John and a pending slot at Homeland, she'd take that up with the only man who mattered.

And he wasn't standing in front her.

Despite the garlic, she stepped that much closer to the one who was—and smiled, albeit grimly. "If Agent Riyad is so brilliant, how did he manage to miss the fact that Tamir Hachemi was poisoned by Staff Sergeant Brandt?"

"What?"

She nodded crisply, even as her eyes began to water from that odor. "Getting his face bashed into the bulkhead didn't kill the translator, strychnine did. That and your Marine."

Why not? The moment she and the others had reached Al Dhafra, Palisade had drawn her, John and Riyad aside before he'd departed to deal with whatever had been in that message traffic that his aide had brought into the Griffith's wardroom that morning. Once again, the general had made it clear that she had absolute control and discretion over the release of information regarding her case. That hadn't pleased the spook, and would probably please Riyad's current cheerleader even less.

She didn't care what Riyad or Jeffers thought. It was what the ambassador did with the information that mattered. Linnet possessed loose lips, at least over this.

Why not use that to their advantage? What better way to let the Pakistanis know John hadn't been responsible for Hachemi's death?

They were going to need the Pakistani president's support, not rancor, if they hoped to identify the final victim from that cave and catch the traitor before he managed to infect someone else—and prevent whatever else Durrani's cohort had planned.

For once, Jeffers' fleshy lips appeared stuck in neutral. "I don't understand. Hachemi was poisoned? By Brandt?"

This second nod was even crisper, and more than a bit clipped. "Yes. Do try and keep up, sir. Brandt brought strychnine onto the Griffith. But he obtained it when you and the others returned via Al Dhafra. I need to know how, and from whom."

Jeffers swallowed hard as the implications ricocheted in. "We—my staff—we were the only ones who knew those two Marines were heading back to the Griffith after they picked up the prisoners."

"Exactly. But there's more. Brandt's seizure was caused by the chimera. He was infected at Al Dhafra too."

Either that tidbit hadn't been shared with Linnet or the woman had managed