It was a plan, elegant in its simplicity. Straightforward. Diaz would flesh out and handle the details on the ground. If she needed audibles, he’d make sure to call them out when the time came. “Copy.”
“Huh?” Kyle asked.
“We have a plan.” She smiled at him. “You’ll be in good hands.”
The best, as far as she was concerned. And she’d worked with a lot of professionals over the past several years. This, the confidence she experienced with the barest of discussion required, was what she wanted as she continued to work. Puzzle pieces came together and fit when she coordinated with Diaz and their fire team.
“Where do you want Victoria and Marc to meet you?” Diaz paused as a few couples walked by. “Or do you want to just check in here?”
“Might be best.” Now that they were planning, she figured it would be perfect.
“Victoria will meet you.”
“Okay. Once Kyle is secure here, I’ll need to head back to get my gear.”
Diaz raised an eyebrow when she referred to Kyle by name but didn’t comment. Instead, he turned to Kyle. “Once your family is out of harm’s way, we’ll arrange for a safe house for them until the trial is over. It will have to be separate from you.”
Kyle raised an eyebrow and glanced at Lizzy. She shrugged. It’d ripped Diaz to shreds a few months ago when they’d wanted to take action to rescue Maylin’s younger sister and had to stand by. The two full squadrons of resources, weapons and ammunition plus communications and technical support it required was more than any single person could fund. When it came to a temporary sanctuary, they could provide that and work out the budget later.
There would always be tough decisions to make, when doing the right thing wouldn’t be this doable. Diaz, and all of them, tended to help where they could and when they could.
“All right.” She slipped her hand into the bend of Kyle’s arm. “Let’s get through this.”
Tonight’s outcome was going determine whether or not he’d have the chance to build the life he’d been planning for his family, and for himself. He’d made the past couple of days...fun, more than fun. He’d become someone important to her.
She wanted him to have his future.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“That’s it?” Kyle was almost making her drag him across the ballroom. At least he was keeping his voice down.
“That’s what we needed.” Lizzy exchanged smiles and nods with a few of the people they’d chatted with earlier.
Nothing to see here, moving along. Yeah, hello. Smile and nod.
She waited until she could speak to him again without anyone overhearing. “Diaz will set up the key details with the rest of the fire team. I’ll go ahead to scout. We’ll make necessary adjustments at go time.”
“I thought there would be a lot more planning.” Kyle sounded unsure.
She didn’t blame him. “Regardless of whether our former colleague is directly involved, Edict as an organization knows the Centurion Corporation and Safeguard in particular. They’ve had time to research personnel profiles and get to know strategy and tactics used in the past. Now that they know we’re at least tangentially involved, they’ll be looking to encounter us again even if they don’t exactly know when. One of the most effective ways to remain unpredictable is if we ourselves don’t all know the entire plan.”
It required relying heavily on each team member as an individual with a key task. Not all fire teams could manage it. But theirs could.
“You’ve done this before, then, so it’s not necessarily unpredictable.” He was reaching for arguments now.
She wanted to reassure him but this entire job had all the aspects of having gone down the rabbit hole. “We’ve never done it to this extreme, no. But we can still make it work.”
Kyle choked back a panicked laugh and picked up his pace until they were comfortably walking together, rather than her pulling him by the arm. “And we’re headed where now?”
“A leisurely walk.” She fluttered her eyelashes at him. “Ending at the front desk to reserve a room.”
He gave her a long look. “This is a fairly large charity event.”
“Yes.”
He cleared his throat. “You’re trying for a last-minute reservation.”
“If I have to coax somebody into checking out, I will.” Not the nicest thing she’d ever done, but hell, it’d happened in the past.
He rolled his eyes. “You could always offer to share a room with someone. I think we encountered at least two different couples who’d be interested.”
“Unnecessary exposure for innocent bystanders.” He was teasing, she knew. Though, looking at the smile playing around his lips, he might not be joking about the interested couples.
Hey, to each their own.
“Are you the type to...have fun in groups?” Fine. She was distracted. Momentarily. But she did want to know the answer.
He leaned over her. “Are you?”