Page 8 of Tempting Alec

Grier was already typing furiously on her laptop, her fingers moving across the keys with amazing speed and a precision that surprised Alec. She was clearly in her element now, the fear and uncertainty she had shown earlier replaced by a laser focus on the task at hand. Alec watched her, his initial frustration beginning to soften. She might not be an operative, but she was sharp, and she clearly knew her stuff.

“What are you working on?” Alec asked, his voice low.

“I’m pulling up the files I decrypted right before the attack,” Grier replied, not looking up from the screen. “The information in here—it’s about a mole in the CIA. Someone high up. This isn’t just about the weapons shipments to Yemen, which is what I was working on before they sent me here. It’s bigger than that.”

Alec felt a chill run down his spine. A high-level mole within the CIA was bad news—worse than he’d imagined. And if the mole was involved in arms deals with Iranian-made weapons, it meant the situation was far more dangerous than he’d thought. He leaned closer, his eyes narrowing as he watched the lines of code and data scroll across the screen.

“Whoever this mole is, they’ve covered their tracks well,” Grier continued, her voice tense with concentration. “But there are patterns, connections that don’t add up. If I can just—there!” She paused, her eyes widening as she pointed at the screen. “Here it is. This is the link I’ve been looking for.”

Alec looked at the data, trying to make sense of it. He wasn’t an analyst, but he had seen enough classified intel in his time to recognize the significance of what Grier had found. “What does it mean?”

Grier’s voice was grim. “It means the mole has been working with someone inside Cerberus. There are encrypted communications here, sent directly to one of your operatives. Whoever it is, they’ve been feeding the mole information for months—maybe longer.”

Alec’s blood ran cold. The implications were staggering. Cerberus was more than just an organization to him—it was family. The men and women he worked with were the best of the best, people he trusted with his life. The idea that one of them could be a traitor, working with a mole in the CIA, was almost too much to bear.

“Are you sure?” Alec asked, his voice barely more than a whisper.

Grier met his gaze, her green eyes filled with a mixture of determination and sorrow. “Yes. I’m sure.”

Alec sat back on his heels, his mind reeling. He had seen betrayal before, had dealt with traitors in the field, but this was different. This was personal. The thought that someone he considered family could be responsible for the mess they were in now, for the attack on the safe house, for the lives lost—even if they were the enemy—it was almost more than he could process.

“Who is it?” Alec asked, his voice tight with tension. “Who’s the operative?”

Grier hesitated, her fingers hovering over the keyboard as if she were reluctant to type out the name. Alec could see the conflict in her eyes, the way she wrestled with the knowledge she had uncovered. Finally, she typed a few more commands, and a name appeared on the screen.

Alec’s heart sank as he read it. “No,” he breathed, shaking his head in disbelief. “It can’t be.”

“Do you know who it is?”

“Not really. It’s a code name, but it’s one I recognize as a Cerberus operative.”

“How can you work with people you only know by their code name?” she asked.

He quirked his eyebrow at her. “Pot? Meet kettle,” he said sardonically.

She grinned at him sheepishly. “Right. Sorry.”

It didn’t matter that he didn’t know the identity behind the code name, the evidence was there, clear as day. Alec’s mind raced, trying to reconcile the name on the screen with the person he knew. It didn’t make sense, and yet… it explained so much. The inconsistencies, the strange behavior, the way certain operations had gone sideways for no apparent reason. It all pointed to this.

Grier’s voice broke through his thoughts, soft but insistent. “Alec, I know this is hard to believe, but we have to face the facts. Cerberus has been compromised. And if we don’t act now, if we don’t stop this, more lives will be at risk. We have to expose the mole, no matter what.”

Alec clenched his fists, his nails digging into his palms as he fought to keep his emotions in check. He wanted to deny it, to argue that there had to be some mistake, but deep down, he knew she was right. The evidence was undeniable, and if they didn’t do something, the consequences could be catastrophic.

But even as he accepted the truth, a new fear crept into his mind. If Cerberus had been compromised, it meant that the circle of those he trusted had just shrunk to only those people closest to him. And that realization shook him to his core.

“How do we do this?” Alec asked, his voice rough with emotion. “How do we take down the mole without bringing Cerberus down with it?”

Grier sighed, her shoulders slumping with the weight of the task ahead. “We need proof—concrete evidence that ties the mole to the traitor inside Cerberus. Once we have that, we can go to someone we trust, someone who can help us expose the truth without causing too much collateral damage.”

Alec nodded, his mind already working through the logistics. It wouldn’t be easy. They would have to move carefully, avoid drawing attention to themselves while they gathered the evidence they needed. And they would have to do it quickly, before the mole realized they were onto them.

“I know someone,” Alec said finally, his voice steadier now. “Someone we can trust. But we’ll need to be careful. If the mole gets wind of what we’re doing, we’re as good as dead.”

Grier looked at him, her eyes searching his face for any sign of doubt. “Who?”

Alec hesitated, the name on the tip of his tongue. But before he could speak, the sound of approaching footsteps echoed through the warehouse, shattering the fragile silence. Alec’s heart jumped into his throat as he sprang to his feet, pulling Grier up with him.

“Someone’s coming,” he whispered, his eyes scanning the darkness.

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