Page 124 of A Touch of Treachery
“So what went wrong?”
My father’s eyes narrowed in suspicion.“This is starting to sound like an interrogation.”
I barked out a bitter laugh.“What?Do you think I’m wearing a wire?”
I yanked my shirt up so he could see my bare stomach and chest.I also pulled my phone out of my pocket and tossed it onto his desk, right next to the photo of my mother.A message on the screen warned that the device had malfunctioned and couldn’t be used.
“Satisfied?”I demanded.
Some of the suspicion leaked out of my father’s face, and he gestured for me to take a seat in front of the desk.This time, he poured us both a glass of whiskey, then dropped into his own chair.The General sipped his drink, but I didn’t touch mine.
“Henrika produced several weapons for me.Pink sulfur smoke bombs, some poisons, a few truth serums.”Anger crept into his face.“But she got greedy.Henrika wanted more money, more control over what she developed and when and how it was deployed.She actually had a sliver of a conscience, if you can believe that.”
He shook his head, as though being worried about how her weapons were being used was a great failing on Henrika’s part.
“She also wanted to branch out into other areas, like cosmetics and skin care, which would have invited much more attention and unwanted scrutiny.When I said no, she threatened to expose our arrangement.”
“So you sent Jack Locke to Mexico to kill her.”
The General scoffed.“Of course not.Jack Lockeneverwould have taken such an assignment.”
My heart lifted with a bit of unexpected hope.“So Charlotte is wrong, and you didn’t try to kill Henrika.”
My father barked out a laugh.“Don’t be a fool.Of course I tried to kill her.I just sent someone else to do the job.Thomas, another cleaner on the Mexico mission.Thomas had orders to kill Henrika, while Jack Locke was supposed to eliminate Feliciano Salvador.”
His mouth twisted.“But something went wrong.If I had to guess, I would say that Locke’s conscience got the better of him the way it always did.”
His nostrils flared, and his icy aura pulsed with anger and disgust.That tiny bit of hope crumbled to dust in my chest.
I’d been on similar missions where different cleaners had different targets and objectives, so I could guess what had happened.Jack Locke had been ready to do his job and eliminate Feliciano Salvador, but he had balked when the other cleaner had wanted to kill Henrika as well.
I would have balked at that too.Ihadbalked at that, when Bryce Finkley had killed an innocent hostage to complete our mission.
“Whatever went wrong, Thomas was killed, along with all the other cleaners, except for Jack Locke.That stubborn bastard couldn’t even do me the courtesy of dying.”
My father glared into his whiskey glass for a moment before looking at me again.“Eventually, Section received a ransom demand for Locke.His mother, Jane, was still working here.Somehow she found out about the ransom demand, went behind my back, got the money, and sent it to Mexico.”
Jane Locke, Charlotte’s grandmother, had borrowed the money from Leon Chase, Gabriel’s father and another Section cleaner.Leon had been the one to actually deliver the ransom, although the General didn’t seem to know that, and I certainly wasn’t going to tell him.
“Then what happened?”I asked.
My father shrugged again.“I sent another team of cleaners to eliminate Salvador once and for all, and I went with them to personally oversee the mission.”
“And make sure Henrika was killed too.”
My father arched an eyebrow at my snide tone, but I wasn’t about to pull any punches now.
He harrumphed and continued his story.“Someone must have tipped off Salvador, because he knew we were coming.There was a massive firefight at his villa.When the dust settled, Henrika and Salvador were gone, and Jack Locke was dead.A few weeks later, another team of cleaners tracked down and eliminated Salvador, but I never did figure out who shot Locke.”
I snorted in disbelief.
“It’s the truth,” the General snapped.“No matter what Charlotte thinks, I didn’t kill her father.Someone else did.Probably Henrika, if I had to guess.”
“And the ransom money?”I asked.“How did you wind up with it?”
“So many people were dead and injured.It was chaos.I picked up the briefcase with the ransom money and set it aside with the other evidence from the mission to turn in when I got back to headquarters.”He sighed.“But then I got a message from Henrika.She wanted the money in exchange for her silence.”
“So you gave it to her.”Once again, I couldn’t keep the snide note out of my voice.“Charlotte was right.Youdidpay off Henrika to keep quiet.”
