Page 56 of Exhale
“I promise, Elliott, I will be back,” he said.
“With mommy?”
Owen tried to smile, but he knew it was a failed attempt and pulled Elliott in another tight hug.
“Let me get Weston first, and then we’ll talk about mommy,” he promised.
“Okay,” Elliott said and held out his arms to Kellum.
When the SUV door shut after Kellum and his son, Owen rubbed both hands on his face tiredly.
“Don’t think you’re going to cut me out, bro,” Link admonished him.
“Sorry about that, I wasn’t thinking.”
“Apparently,” Link snorted.
Owen agreed. He hadn’t been thinking when he’d suggested Link be a babysitter. Sitting Link on the sidelines would have made things much more difficult, even with Seven and Hunter out there, along with Parker and Oliver.
Link was one of the best, if notthebest, in their unit.
Knuckles wrapped on the side of the SUV and Owen jumped out with Link following closely.
“You two ready?” Ace said.
Along with Ace stood Creed and Jacob, fully geared. Eagle waited patiently in the background.
“I will be,” Owen said, walking over to the open end of the Pegasus suburban where they kept gear and ammo. He pulled back on everything that he’d taken off to greet his son. Pulling on his vest, he tucked extra ammo and flash grenades into pockets and strapped the sheath of his knife to his thigh before tucking his blade away. Picking up his nine-millimeter Luger, he double checked the clip.
“We got a lead on Danner’s location. He carjacked a vehicle on 7th, two blocks from here. The car has a vehicle recovery system,” Ace said. “Kellum pulled it up.” Ace showed Owen the blinking dot on the phone.
“Send that to my phone,” Owen said.
Ace grimaced. “Jordan’s the expert in that shit.”
“He’s busy,” Owen said.
“Here.” Jacob took Ace’s phone and tapped on it before handing it back to Ace and then holding his hand out for Owen’s phone.
“Thanks,” Owen said, handing Jacob his cell. It took the techie a few moments, but he had the ping up on his phone working along with a new app for it.
Ace slid into the Suburban, and Owen followed, and with Jacob riding passenger and Link driving, he, Ace, and Eagle took up the back.
“Eagle told me that Jordan knows Black,” Ace said.
“Yeah, it’s two people from his past that showed up,” Owen murmured.
“Small world,” Ace said.
Yeah, Owen agreed, but he wasn’t buying it. Those two, along with that Lucas guy at the Pegasus gate, seemed a bit much. It was odd that all of them showed up almost at the same time.
All men in the vehicle were quiet.
They had all heard the story, or rather a version of Jordan’s history, before he was saved by Seth, Frost, and Storm from the streets of Oakland. It made Owen sick to his stomach thinking of the circumstances that had caused Jordan to live that life, and he hoped that the three men from Jordan’s past were not here to cause any shit.
If they were, then he’d deal with them one at a time.
Assassin or no assassin.
