Page 86 of Operation Heartbeat

“Who is this?” Con’s sharp voice flooded her ear—and her heart.

“It’s Sophie.” Her gaze darted to the script in front of her.

“Sophie!Jesus Christ, where are you?”

“Con.” She kept herself from blurting all the things she hadn’t said to him. Now she might never get a chance.

The man in front of her thrust the script closer to her face.

She gulped in a breath. “I have to follow a script. I can’t deviate from the script.”

She placed emphasis on every word.

A beat of silence sounded on the line. Either he was flabbergasted by the situation or he knew to pay attention to what she was saying.

Taking a deep breath, she began to read. “You’ve cost us enough. Consider this your only warning: Stay away from the shipment. If you attempt to detain it or intercept it, you’ll never see your woman alive again.”

“Fuck!”

Her heart broke at that single word, uttered in such a broken way.

Too many seconds passed, and the man in front of her lifted a fist, threatening to make her continue if she didn’t do so on her own steam.

“This isn’t an idle threat. You might think your team is untouchable, but we will pick you off one by one. Don’t let her blood be on your hands. It’s your move.”

Her head whirled. She couldn’t let it end here. She couldn’t let Con go without giving himsomeclue.Anyclue.

Back in the hotel, she’d acted silly, bantering with Con about code words and bouncing around the room striking spy poses.

If he was going to find her, she needed to give him a landmark to go by. When they brought her here, she’d taken in every single detail so she could recall it all later.

“I’d love to talk longer, but I have to go. It’s nom-nom time. I hope these guys can understand me—I’m pretty sure they only speak Lebanese.”

“Sophie—”

“Wave bye!”

As she sputtered the final words to the man she loved—maybe the last words she’d ever say to him—her captor snatched the phone away. She could only pray that Con heard her crazy code and understood it.

With his gaze trained on her, the man brought the phone to his ear for a moment, listening to whatever Cipher said on the other end of the line.

A gleam came into his eyes, dark and evil. “I have orders to strike you.”

She didn’t have time to brace herself. The blowrockedher. The wooden chair creaked under the hit. Pain threw her head back and snapped it forward again. Blood dripped in fat splats onto her lap.

She stared at the spots in a daze.

Sophie didn’t care if she’d incited Cipher’s wrath because she deviated from the script. It was well worth it if what she told Con gave him enough information to find her, or prevented that bomb from reaching the US and killing innocent people.

She looked at her captor…and smiled.

TWENTY

Con’s face felt numb as the line went dead in his ear. Sophie. They had her. They had his woman.

He whirled to face his team. The minute he walked through the door of the safe house, the phone rang with an unfamiliar number and he answered it only to hear Sophie’s voice. Too bright and too brittle.

“Mason, you drive. Denver, I need a map app. Now!” He barked orders as he strode out the door.

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