Page 5 of Undercover Savior

“Where is Periscope?”

“On her way to headquarters.”

I’d worked with her for just over a year and had a hard time believing she would issue an erroneous order. “Who is she saying it came from?”

“That’s presently unclear, but I anticipate it won’t be much longer. Where are you now?” he asked.

“Still in Edinburgh, not far from the castle.”

“I’m going to request something of you that I know is out of the ordinary. Can you protect the asset until I know exactly what happened tonight and what the fallout might be?”

“Yes, sir.” I’d already made the decision to—one way or another—so I had no reason to argue.

“Good and thank you. I’ll get to the bottom of this as quickly as I can. In the meantime, do not act on any order that doesn’t come directly from me.”

“Yes, sir,” I repeated.

“And, while I anticipate you’ll be getting help from the rest of your crew, no one outside of them and me is to be read in on your plan.”

“Yes, sir,” I responded for the third time.

“In the meantime, stay alive. You’re needed here, Savior.” Typhon ended with his customary sendoff to all the agents who worked for him in Unit 23.

The next call I made was to Conrad Carnegie, aka the Earl of Blackmoor, one of my most trusted friends and the man who owned the building where I’d brought Sullivan tonight.

“What in the bloody hell is going on, Ash?” He was chuckling when he answered.

“I’m not sure you’ll believe me when I tell you.”

“You’re on speaker, by the way. Tag and Gus are both here.”

While Con, Tag, Gus, and I had been friends since we were children, it wasn’t until secondary school that we began using our nicknames. Con was short for Conrad, his first name. Same with Gus, for Angus. Tag was for MacTaggert, his last name. And even though my father was alive at the time I was given the moniker, they still called me Ash, as I was thefutureDuke of Ashcroft.

We all worked for Unit 23 in some capacity and made up the crew Typhon had referred to.

Tag, aka Niall MacTaggert, the Earl of Glenshadow, code name Obsidian, was an assassin, like I was.

Con was one of the preeminent cyber- and artificial-intelligence experts in all of SIS—maybe even the world.

The way Gus fit into our group was entirely different, but he was no less important. In fact, some might say he was the glue that held us all together.

Like me, he grew up on Ashcroft, but rather than an heir, he was the son of Mairi—pronounced Mary—Drummond, who’d been our housekeeper for as long as I could remember.

Gus and I were inseparable as children, apart from the one year my parents and I spent in Ballater. The year I met Sullivan. When I returned, nothing had changed other than me losing my heart to a blue-eyed girl whose pigtails I’d loved to pull.

More than Con or Tag, Gus was forced to listen as I told stories of how amazing she was. It was hard to imagine now how such a young lad, as I was at the time, could be so enraptured. Perhaps, somewhere deep inside, I’d sensed the story wasn’t over for Sullivan and me. Not by a long shot.

My father had arranged for Gus to attend university with me, and after graduation, we were recruited by SIS. He went to work for MI5, the domestic equivalent of MI6, where I’d landed.

Eventually, we both ended up at Unit 23. At first, he was a handler, but as his real skill set became more apparent to Typhon, he transitioned to being the team’s eyes and ears in the west of Scotland, where Con and Tag also grew up.

His cover as butler at my family’s estate, where he still resided, served him well in intelligence gathering. No one on the staff, with the exception of his mum, knew the vital role he played in carrying out his oath to the Crown. Even she had no idea the full extent of what he did.

“As you’re all aware, I set out from London earlier in the day on my way to Ashcroft for the holidays. I’d just arrived withinEdinburgh city limits when I received a call from Periscope, saying MI6 was asking for my support at the castle. Upon my arrival there, I was informed there were two targets. The first was a gunman who held the second with his gun to her head.”

Now that I thought about it, it made no sense to call me in fortwohit orders. Why wouldn’t MI6 allow the gunman to kill the woman, then have me take him out? I shook my head, thankful that wasn’t how it had gone down.

“The woman—and this is the part you won’t believe—was Sullivan Rivers.”

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