Page 66 of The Only Reason (The Trident Trilogy 2)

She smiles. “I would do anything to see you. I’m sure your agency knows that. It was a good plan to get me out of hiding.”

“Thank you,” Alex says from the corner of the room. I whip my head around to see him walking toward us with his Glock pointed at Aza.

“Alex. Put the gun down,” I say slowly as I try to discreetly reach under my skirt for my gun. His eyes are focused on her. “Alex. Put it down. She’s not armed.”

“You think I’m going to trust you? Who’s your allegiance to, Millie? It’s definitely not to me,” Alex says.

His eyes dart briefly to me. They’re wild and unfocused. “Alex, I’m completely on your side. We have a job to do here. Let’s just take her back into protective custody. Our mission is successful.”

“I heard everything she said to you,” he says, his eyes still fixed on Aza. “She told you I turned her in. That’s true. Part of my job is to redevelop a relationship with the Pakistan government. All they want is her, and we’ll be in good standing with them again. That’s when my mission will be successful.”

“Alex. Put the gun down. I’m not going to ask again.” He looks over to me and sees my gun pointed at him.

“Are you going to shoot me, Millie? Really? You’ve never shot anything in your life except a paper target. It’s different when the target is breathing. You don’t have what it takes. I knew it the minute I met you. That’s why you’ve never gotten in the field. You shouldn’t be here now, but you did manage to get your aunt to come out of hiding, so I guess you did one thing right.”

Aza is curled up on the floor with her hands over her head. She looks up at him as he stands above her and says, “They wanted to kill you, but I don’t think they’ll mind too much if I do it.”

As his finger begins to slide to the trigger, I fire a shot—hitting him purposely in the leg. I want to give him another chance to put his gun down. The force spins him around to face me. He lifts his arms to fire at me. I fire another round—hitting him in his forehead. He falls to the ground, blood shooting out of his head. I walk slowly toward him with my gun still drawn. I kick his gun out of his hand and lean down to check his pulse. I already know he’s dead. I take a long, shaky breath as I lean over to close his eyes. I let my hand linger on his chest for a second before I force myself to look away.

Aza is covered in his blood—her eyes wide with shock. I kneel down to look in her face.

“Do you know if my dad is alive?” I say, touching her shoulder to try to get her to focus.

She’s shaking. I can tell she’s finding it hard to speak. She shakes her head slightly. “No,” she whispers.

“If he’s alive, do you know where he might be?”

“Yes,” she says more loudly. “I arranged for my cousin to take him to my grandparents’ house in the Kalasha Valley. I don’t know if they made it there. I don’t know if he’s alive. But, if he’s alive, he might be there or have been there at one time.”

“Can you take me there?”

She nods as I help her up. Her eyes go over my shoulder to look at something. I turn around to see Mr. Bukhari looking at Alex’s body. He turns to me, his eyes wide as he looks at the gun in my hand.

“He’s on my side,” Aza says quietly from behind me.

I reach into my pocket and turn off the recorder on my cell phone. I type a text message to Mason, but don’t hit send. I hand the phone to Mr. Bukhari.

“A very large, angry man with a beard is going to come through your doors within the hour. Give him this phone. Don’t call the authorities until he gets here. Do you understand?”

He nods and reaches out to take Aza’s hand. “Good luck, my friend,” he says in Pashto. She nods and smiles.

“Let’s go, Millie,” she says. “We have a long drive ahead of us.”

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