For the first time since she realized Jesse was gone, she took a deep breath and tried to banish her fear. Erin was getting to her, reminding her that there really was a job to do and that job wasn’t to worry. It was time to take action. “I would take stock of my resources.”
“Okay. What are our resources?”
“A couple of guns no one will resupply, four Agency trained operatives, two otherwise trained operatives. A little cash.”
“Don’t forget the nerd squad. I assume they can wire us cash if we need it. And Hutch has like fifteen pounds of candy, so we won’t starve. That dude is like made of sugar. And I’ve got enough bullets for Bertha to take out a good portion of this country. I also brought a sniper rifle, some C-4, and a dozen flashbangs.” Erin shrugged. “A girl likes to be prepared. So we can totally start a war if we want to.”
If Phoebe was running an Agency team, she would hire Erin in a heartbeat. “We have to figure out where to look. We can’t just start blind. What do we know about al Fareed?”
“One brother is still here. He’s at the conference according to Kamdar’s guys. It’s the older brother, Ibrahim. No sign of Hani.”
“That tells us nothing except they’re trying to keep up appearances.” Phoebe started to pace, her mind revving up. “Although if they’re smart, Hani will make an appearance, too.”
“He’s set to give a speech this evening. It would be news if he missed it.”
This was good. “He won’t. He’s too smart to skip that meeting. It gives him an alibi. So they’re potentially holding Jesse somewhere in Dubai. They’re set to go back to Saudi tomorrow afternoon. They need everything to go according to plan. They won’t take Jesse on that plane. They have to expect we’ll look for him.”
“I think they expect we’re all going home. At least the Agency types are going home. Do you think the Agency knows about me and Si?”
“Probably. I don’t know. Ten wouldn’t have told them. So how did they know?”
“Unless they have an operative here themselves.”
“Ten would have known.”
Erin stared at her, disbelief plain in her eyes. “I don’t think Tennessee is in the Agency loop anymore. You ask me, they’re going to take him down.”
“He still has friends there. He would have known if there was another team working this conference.” But there were other options. “He might not know if someone inside the Agency is feeding a civilian party information.”
“Another mole?”
Phoebe didn’t think so. “Al Fareed had to have had a contact. If he wasn’t Agency, then he’s likely someone connected politically.”
“I hate the spy shit. Give me someone to shoot any day of the week.” Erin sighed as she looked around the bedroom. “You and Murdoch do it on the couch?”
“No. Why is that any of your business?”
She sank down and spread out. “Because I do my best thinking sitting down, but I don’t want to get gross stuff all over me.”
Finally she could get the tiniest bit of revenge. “Oh, in that case, I totally lied to spare myself the embarrassment of admitting we did it everywhere. Bed, bathroom, shower, against the window that now has a gaping hole in it. And definitely on that couch.”
Erin popped back up and flipped her the finger. “You suck, Grant.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “I did that, too.” There wouldn’t be an inch of that hotel she wouldn’t associate with Jesse.
Not an inch. Or a room. She would remember the ballroom where she’d had to save him. It was the first time she’d really realized that she had something to give him past a few nights in bed. He’d needed her. If only she’d been a little quicker in getting rid of that douchebag…
The douchebag who claimed he was a spy. The best lies always had a grain of truth.
“Where’s the senator? More importantly, where’s his aide?”
“You talking about the asshat we tagged the other night?”
She’d forgotten about him in her haste to find al Fareed. “There’s a connection I’m not making here and it runs back further than we thought. We’ve always known The Collective had politicians in their pockets.”
Erin strode to the bathroom, turning on the water and scrubbing her hands. “I think I need to change clothes.”
“Are you OCD?”
She shrugged. “A little. I don’t like germs. They’re like predators waiting to take us down. The flu is like a battle in your own body and god, I hate mucus.”
“Pay attention, soldier. Eli Nelson worked for The Collective, more specifically, he worked against anything that might have disrupted big oil interests.” The pattern was suddenly right there. Oh, it was circumstantial, but she’d learned that the rules tended to apply to most mysteries, no matter what Hollywood’s twisty-turny movies would say. The easiest path between two points was a direct line.
She could draw that line. She just needed one little piece of information to make it all click.