Page 7 of Her Devoted HERO

“I thought all of the Syrian artifacts were going to be captured by ISIS,” Griffin said.

“They were,” Adams explained. “We’ve finally decrypted the e-mails between Anders and El Mahdy’s cousin. It was El Mahdy’s men who stole the Syrian artifacts. Anders is the seller.”

“I don’t get it, why would they kidnap the family? Don’t they need Anders kept in place?” Hunter asked.

“Langley said that they knew there was an antiquities operation going on close to the embassy,” Dex said. “They were closing in.” Dex turned to Adams. “I’ve been crunching through the e-mails too. Have you noticed some of the overlap going from Bill Anders account and the Protocol Officer’s account?”

“So?” Adams said. “He’s just using his other named account and his titled account.”

“Noreen Anders, the Ambassador’s daughter, is the protocol officer,” Dex explained slowly.

Adams looked at him incredulously. “You can’t mean she’s involved. This is him. He’s the bad guy in all of this. El-Mahdy made a deal with Anders to get him off that boat and out of harm’s way before the CIA closed in on him.”

“Can Anders keep doing what he’s doing from someplace else?” Dalton asked.

“He’s got four years of contacts, he should,” Dex answered.

“So, he hasn’t been kidnapped, he’s basically run off with his fucking business partner,” Aiden said with loathing.

“But he’s still in the hands of El Mahdy, and his father-in-law has the international community raising hell about their disappearance,” Adams said.

“Aiden. Dex. We have a mission to plan,” Gray clipped out as he headed towards them.

Dex looked up and saw that Gray was already in mission-mode.

“What are you talking about?” Adams demanded. “We’re still investigating things. There is no mission.”

“Captain Adams, I have to ask you to leave, this is classified.”

Dex watched as Adams clenched and unclenched his fists, it was clear he was not happy about this turn of events.

“Lieutenant,” he said using Gray’s lower rank, “I am in charge of this investigation.”

“You are still in charge of the investigation. And I am in charge of my men. I appreciate your valuable input. It will be noted in my report to command. As of right now, we have different orders that require me to brief them privately. I’m sure you understand.”

Adams took a deep breath and nodded. He picked up his hat and motioned for his men to follow him as he strode out of the barracks.

“Shit, Gray, what was that all about?” Aiden asked.

“I couldn’t risk this getting back to the Marines. They are chomping at the bit to get in on any kind of retaliatory mission. But command wants us to go. Satellite photos show a terrorist camp in the middle of the Tibetsi mountain range. It was blind luck that they found them. It showed three figures with blonde hair, one adult, and two children. We have to go in mean and fast before we lose our advantage.”

“Holy hell, that’s the wife and daughters,” Wyatt breathed out.

“That’s command’s assessment,” Gray agreed.

“Was it on the Chad or Libyan side of the border?” Hunter asked.

“How in the hell have you even heard of some mountain range called the Betsey mountains, let alone know they are in Chad?” Wyatt asked Hunter.

“I read books from time to time, you should try it,” Hunter said dryly.

“It’s on the Libyan side. Barely,” Gray answered.

Dex logged into the secure server and found photos had been downloaded to him. He twirled his laptop around so his team could see them.

Dex clicked through the eighteen photos, pausing as his teammates assessed and made comments, or asked him to zoom in. After forty-five minutes, they were done.

“Okay, so we have a landing point fifteen clicks away without being seen or heard,” Gray surmised. “Based on the number of tents and activity, we have at minimum, thirteen targets. All the Anders are blonde, and so far, we’ve only had eyes on the girls and mother. Our plan will be to take out all of the targets, acquire the Anders family and call in the helicopters for a pick-up to take us back to Egypt.”