Guardian Read Free

He hummed.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œWell, it’s an unknown subject. Never seen an asset come up as unknown.”
    â€œThat’s for me to worry about. Copy?”
    â€œYes, Deputy.”
    Good, Glenn thought, thankful Mike was smart and knew to leave his phone on. “How long before we’ve got video?”
    â€œSeven minutes, give or take.”
    â€œI want it on the big screen.”
    While Glenn waited, he pondered what might have happened. The code 9-­9-­9 was for an agent in duress. Mike had gone to site R91 on his orders. The military handed the site back over to the construction company. Work had resumed. The area should have been safe.
    Should have been.
    â€œGlobal Hawk on station, Deputy,” Terry said.
    Glenn fished a pack of cherry antacids from his pocket, popped one in his mouth and ground it between his back molars while watching the live feed from the UAV. The real-­time color imagery from the drone was displayed on the giant digital screen at the front of the Operations Center. It circled a ­couple of hundred feet above a black Lincoln Town Car and a blue Renault, both shot-­up and beat to shit.
    Fuck .
    â€œGeez,” Terry said. His pale face had turned a slight pink. “Hope no one was hurt.”
    You and me both, Glenn thought. He stared at the footage for a few more seconds. No bodies. No cars other than Mike’s and the pursuit vehicle. Whoever had him now had left in a different car for sure. And he had to assume they had Mike, because his agent would never have left his phone behind.
    You went to R91 like I told you to. Someone saw you there, remembered you from the attack last month. Wanted some payback or to finish the job.
    It was the only thing that made sense. Glenn doubted it was a foreign agency or a terrorist group. No, it had to be someone familiar with R91. The only group outside coalition forces and Iraqi regulars to visit the site in the last few weeks was the little band that had attacked it.
    What had Mike called them? Guardians of the Prison, or some shit like that?
    He still couldn’t fully swallow the whole tale. Mike had been serious when recanting the events at R91, and Glenn admitted something strange had happened, including the prison disappearing. But he had a hard time accepting that whatever was in the prison was supernatural in origin or worth protecting by a bunch of desert dwellers for thousands of years. More likely the prison had been temporal, excavated by looters and sold on the black market. Nothing supernatural about that.
    Of course, he didn’t know what Mike meant by supernatural. Mike had only told him that it wasn’t a weaponized hallucinogen or any other chemical agent. Even getting that much out of him had taken a direct order. The rest, Mike said, would have to be told in person, once he got back to Langley, where he’d have a better chance of convincing him it was all true. Mike had thought that if he tried to convince him over the phone, he would have had him committed or killed for being insane.
    I still might, Glenn thought . First I need to get you back to Langley alive to hear it.
    He ran through possible plans. He had zero CIA assets available in the immediate area. The closest ones, he wasn’t willing to divert from current operations. Not to mention that he’d have to admit he had a rogue agent working in-­country. If he did that, the chain of command would go ape shit, arrest him for conducting illegal operations, he’d end up in jail and Mike would end up dead.
    He could call in the Iraqi military. But then he’d still have to explain to his boss what was going on without giving away Mike’s identity and their relationship. Not an option.
    Shit. No, he needed to handle this on his own if he or Mike stood a chance of coming out of it unharmed and free of prosecution. Free of the pokey.
    So how do I save our asses?
    â€œThanks, Terry. Break off the bird and