Page 21 of The Savior

CHAPTER EIGHT

Every muscle in Liam stilled. His thoughts stalled, leaving him to contend with the thudding pound of his pulse until he spat, “What?”

Her bracelets jangled again. “You were part of Operation Red Gold.”

Several years had passed since Red Gold, but Liam didn’t confirm her statement. As far as he knew, Red Gold was classified as top secret. He didn’t plan to take a single fucking breath until someone volunteered what the hell was going on.

“For God’s sake.” Sorenson huffed. “I chair the Senate Intel Committee. Even the goddamn president has to update me.”

Liam’s eyebrows arched. The two men who sat on either side of her didn’t react, and he decided to take his cue from them and ignore the bravado. He’d keep his answer concise and pray this conversation was sanctioned. “Yes. I was a part of Red Gold.”

“Were you aware of casualties?” she asked.

“There were no friendlies on the casualty list.” Of that, he was certain. As for the details, specifics were fuzzy. He hadn’t thought about that in years.

“That’s not what I asked.”

“Ma’am, with all due respect…” Liam glanced at the other men. Their faces held no information. For all he knew, this could be some convoluted masquerade to extract intel, and suddenly, he couldn’t be sure of the men who’d transported him or who controlled the location they were in. He wondered if the salacious documents about Julia were a lure that had trounced his better judgement. “We debriefed years ago. There’s likely a report better suited to provide you an update than I could.”

“I providedyouan update on your girlfriend,” she said pointedly then moderated her tone. “This is related.”

Liam couldn’t make any connection between Red Gold, Julia, and Sorenson. His temples ached. “There were casualties of enemy combatants, but I don’t recall the exact count.”

“What did you do with the bodies?” she asked.

The question unnerved him. “What does that—”

“The bodies?” she said again.

His jaw twitched. “Our instructions were specific. Bag and tag ’em.”

“Then?”

Then? What does she think we did?“I don’t know their final destination. My job was done.”

Sorenson’s sharp chin jutted toward the man at her right. “Mr. Westin, care to elaborate?”

“The dead count included,” he said, not missing a beat, “a young woman named Quy Long.”

Shaking his head, Liam said, “We had confirmed intelligence. No women. No children. None were within a desert mile of that place.”

“That was the best intel available at the time,” Mr. Westin added vaguely.

Liam’s nerves danced, and he doubled down on his words. “And we didn’t see any.”

“You wouldn’t have,” Mr. Westin said.

Tension built in Liam’s shoulders. “We only interacted with tangos who engaged us with weapons first.”

“Quy Long engaged with you first.”

“A woman was fighting?” Liam reassessed what he could remember about the mission. “Their patriarchy wouldn’t allow it.”

“There’s always an exception to the rule,” Westin continued. “Her father, Tran Pham, has had his fingers in every domestic and international terrorist attack in the last two decades. He’s the exception to almost every rule you can think of.”

“I haven’t heard of him before.” Though Liam wasn’t sure he was the best candidate to make a list of terrorist protocol. His job had never been to dabble in the intelligence community’s tedious work, only to follow orders based on their findings.

“Most people haven’t,” Sorenson said. “Pham stays in the shadows.”

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