Page 36 of Damaged

It had been after that job that the three of them had parted ways and Rogue had heard through the grapevine that Jagger and Quick actually worked in a covert ops unit.

When Quick had called him a year later, Rogue had gone to the Nevada ranch to visit, unbeknownst to Solomon. It was there that Rogue found out more about Phoenix, a group of operatives who were based out of California but worked all over the world. Quick had done his best to recruit him, and Rogue would have loved to say yes, but he had chosen a different path. Hindsight really was twenty-twenty.

“Are you there?” Jagger broke into his trip down memory lane.

Clearing his throat, Rogue scooted out of bed and walked out onto the balcony. He slid the door closed behind him.

“What do you mean you have one of my boys?”

“I have one of your fucking boys.” Jagger sounded out of sorts and Rogue’s senses went on high alert.

By saying one of his boys, did Jagger mean the previous boys of Solomon? And if so, how did Jagger even know about any of them or his connection to them?

Yet, Quick knew about Erebus, so maybe Jagger did too?

Rogue said nothing about Erebus for the moment.

“How do you know he’s my boy?” he hedged.

“Quick said he might have seen him with Crow,” Jagger said.

“What does he look like?”

“Brown hair, skinny.”

“Who’s Crow?”

“You’ve met him, right? He’s in the military but working on a joint op with Genesis?”

“Genesis…” Rogue murmured. Well, shit. He knew all about that group of military assassins. They, along with some activemilitary, had helped take down Tanis and rescue boys being held.

“I can’t remember all the players, but I think I remember someone named Crow.” Rogue wracked his brain but couldn’t put a face to the name.

“He’s in the military,” Jagger repeated as if his mind was on a hundred different things.

“You already said that.” Rogue snorted. “So why don’t you call Crow to handle the kid?” he suggested, staring over the balcony at the twinkling city lights in the night skyline.

“I did, he’s not answering, so Quick said to call you.”

The buzzing on Rogue’s phone signaled a call coming through from Echo.

“Hang on, Jagger.” He placed Jagger on hold and answered Echo’s call.

“What’s up?”

“I can’t find Azrael and he’s not answering his phone,” Echo said. “Have you seen him?”

“It wasn’t my turn to watch him,” Rogue growled, clenching the railing with his free hand.

“You were training him,” Echo hissed and Rogue’s stomach suddenly dropped when he thought of something.

“Shit, hold on, Echo,” Rogue muttered and then flipped the phone line back to Jagger.

“What’s the boy’s name?”

“I don’t fucking know, man, he got caught in one of my stings,” Jagger said impatiently.

“A sting? Where are you?” Rogue ran a hand through his hair.

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