At Any Cost Read Free

this looked more like a surveillance photo. Digital. Black and white. And a perfect picture of the woman's ear. "What is this? You can't even see her face." He studied her ear. Not even an indent indicating pierced ears. A grown woman without pierced ears was different, but not completely unheard of. It gave Dan a starting point, at least.
    "It's the best we could do. Only a few knew of that lab. Although we never told Turner about it, she knew how to tap into the database. It wouldn't take much for her to find it. Besides, she's the only agent who fits the description of the woman in that photo. Add that to the fact she went missing right after
LEON
disappeared, and is still missing, and you have a pretty good idea why we think it's her."
    "That's what you're basing this whole thing on? Her ear? Who best fits? A missing agent? We go under all the time, Donovan." Dan shoved the photos back in the envelope.
    "Hey! Don't we get a peek?" Stevens protested.
    "No."
    "But—"
    "I said no."
    Opie wouldn't let it go. "Who the hell died and made you King Shit of the Outhouse?"
    Slowly, calmly, Dan met his eyes. Without a word, he conveyed how close this kid was to another ass kicking. Dan didn't blink, didn't falter, until Stevens finally looked away.
    Too bad. The mood Dan suddenly found himself in made him itch to punch something. Hard. Grinding his teeth, he spat out, "So why bring me in on this? You know what a liability I am, right, Donovan? Isn't that what you said to me when you told me to take a hike?"
    "You were told to take a break , Weber. No one expected you to stay away. That was your decision and yours alone."
    Dan felt a growl creeping into the base of his throat. That's exactly what they expected him to do. He'd become unpredictable, and that equaled unreliable. He was useless to NASSD. Why wait around for the agency to put him out to pasture? Besides, still being on NASSD's payroll meant he still had to follow their rules. As a freelancer, he could do what he wanted, when he wanted. He had all the freedom in the world.
    For the past two years he thought of little else but hunting down the man responsible for the scar on his chest and returning the favor. He'd tried to find him, but always picked up the trail too little, too late. As a NASSD agent he had unlimited resources at his disposal. When he left, he lost that freedom.
    How ironic.
    "Sounds like you got all the pieces together. By the looks of this hot beauty queen, she hasn't been a NASSD agent for long." He dropped the envelope onto the desk. His hard on finally picking up the fact it wasn't the real thing, he leaned back in the chair.
    "How do you figure?" Donovan asked.
    "She's young, maybe late twenties. She didn't pose like that as an agent, which means either the swimsuit photo is old, or she's new. I've never heard of her and I've only been out for two years. If she's supposed to be NASSD's secret weapon, I would have known about her. There aren't too many female agents, and none of them are that screaming hot. She's new."
    "You got all that off a swimsuit photo?" Stevens asked, his lip curled. Although he tried to sound unimpressed, Dan could see in the kid's eyes that he was, indeed, impressed.
    "You're right, as usual." Donovan leaned forward in his chair. "We had her back in training for almost a full year before she disappeared. After proving she can shoot the gnat off a wall at three hundred yards in a high wind, we decided to make use of her skills. She looks better than any pinup centerfold, which we knew would work to our advantage."
    "How so?" Stevens asked.
    "Any male would turn to putty in her hands," Dan stated and smiled at the thought. He'd give his left nut to have her hands all over him, to have her rub that gorgeous body up against his just so he could melt on the spot.
    The thought of
LEON
out there made him pull his attention back in check. "What about Professor Keithan? His assistant? How do we know it wasn't one of them?"
    "Always