Page 31 of Storm Surge

Hearing the truth about her brother would be hard for Betty. She’d need Lizzy. But Will would never let anyone take her from him again. Not the past. Not her aunt. Not a man like Collins who was bent on twisting the truth to fit his own depraved needs.

Chapter Nine

The moment Will stepped into the space the team had designated as the war room, he knew something had broken on the case. There was so much he had to tell his people, but for now, he needed to know what had happened.

Victor glanced up and smiled, waving him over. “Glad you’re back. We’ve found something interesting.”

Will moved over to where they gathered around a laptop. “What’d you find out?” He felt drained from the emotional encounter with Betty. The woman had no idea the lies her brother had told her. For Lizzy’s sake, he was happy Betty hadn’t known because she loved her aunt so much, and that would have destroyed their relationship.

“Once we found out Jamie’s mother was CIA,” Garrett said. “I’ve been trying to locate an agent named Sofia Collins or any derivative of the name. There wasn’t any.”

Will narrowed his gaze, and Garrett grinned, the familiar smile from many times in the past. It meant something big was coming.

“While I didn’t find a Sofia Collins, I did find a Sofia Vermillion.”

The name Lizzy had given him as her surname when they met. For some reason she had chosen to use her mother’s name back then. Was it because she had begun to see the monster that existed inside her father?

“She and Collins worked together. Sofia Vermillion took a leave of absence around twenty-seven years ago. She was still a young agent herself. Around twenty-eight at the time. She was gone for around ten months, and then she came back.”

“She had a baby.” Will guessed the truth and blew out a breath. He told them about the memories Lizzy had recovered.

“Wait, Jamie is your wife? Lizzy is alive?” Kinsley’s shock was clear as she crossed the room and hugged him tight. “This is a true miracle. You have your wife back.” She pulled away, her eyes sparkling.

Will still couldn’t believe it. “I do.” He looked past her to the laptop and Kinsley turned as well.

“Unfortunately, there’s no information in Sofia’s file about a baby. So, fast forward several years and Sofia Vermillion was a senior agent. . . and then around fourteen years ago she vanished. The only notation in her file was that she’d decided to leave the CIA for civilian life.”

“That’s around the same time the ME estimates the woman in the grave died. Any next of kin—other than the woman we believe is her daughter?”

“None noted, but get this, Sofia was married once before her presumed marriage to Collins. She had been quite young at the time. The boy she married died in a car accident.”

“You’re kidding?” Will couldn’t believe what he had heard. “What about Sofia’s commander? Who was in charge at the time?” They’d need to speak to that person right away.

Kinsley flipped through the online file. “An Ezekiel Hardeman. He’s a senior agent. And he’s worked with Collins in the past.”

“Get him here right away,” Victor said. “I want to know what isn’t in that file.”

“You got it.” Kinsley grabbed Victor’s phone to see that the order was followed.

Will stared out at another day fading. The answers were coming quickly, but still the main question remained unanswered. Where was Collins hiding? Though they might be able to provide Lizzy the peace of knowing what happened to her mother, until Collins was found, the world would never be safe.

???

Lizzy squeezed his hand and Will faced her. “How’s your aunt?”

She smiled sadly and ran the back of her hand across his cheek. “Exhausted. It’s been an emotional day for her as well. I still can’t believe she had no idea about my mother. She assumed she ran off and left us like my father told her.”

Will shook his head. “I can’t believe Collins would kill his own wife. The mother of his child. What else had he been up to before he formed Legion?”

Lizzy shivered but had no answer. “I never really understood the battle taking place between God and the forces of darkness until Legion. My father. It’s led by a truly evil man.”

“Yes. That’s why we have to find your father and bring him in. I don’t want to have someone like that free and roaming the earth, plotting his next attack.”

“He’s on the run, but he’ll eventually make a mistake.” Lizzy shifted to face him. “And at some point, he’ll try and reach out to me.” According to what Will said, her father had proven himself good at disappearing. Will told her that the man who held the office of president briefly at her father’s doing was cooperating along with a man named Howard Duncan, the former Director of the NSA. Both were members of Legion, but so far, neither man had a location to track her father.

How many other members of Legion were out there that they didn’t know about? Her father had made many contacts over his ten years in hiding. He could be anywhere by now.

“I’ve spoken with Zeke Hardeman. He was your mother’s and your father’s commander at one time. Lincoln is flying him in now.”

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