Page 20 of Wild Card (The Trident Trilogy 3)

Mason, Virginia Beach, Virginia, 2020

Paul Ward is staring at Millie gravely—like he’s about to reveal the deepest secrets of the universe.

“Do you want me to go?” I say to Millie as I pull her a little closer.

“No. Stay.” Her face is void of all expression, but I can tell she’s a little apprehensive by the way she’s squeezing my hand. “Paul, enough drama. Just say what you’re going to say.”

“You said you’d do anything to protect your dad. I’m just wondering which one. We have reason to believe Amar Petrovic is your biological father.”

“Man, shut the fuck up,” I say, shaking my head. “You people will say anything to get what you want.”

Millie starts rubbing her temples. “You’re the worst,” she says, looking up at him. “Seriously, you’re worse than George. Amar Petrovic is not my father.”

“I’m just saying there’s a possibility—a good possibility.”

She leans further into me as she sighs and looks up at Ward. “There’s not a good possibility; not a bad possibility. There’s no possibility.”

I’m glaring at Ward. He looks at me quickly and then back to Millie. “According to Sayid’s journal, your mother married Amar just before she died.”

“Well, then he was going to raise another man’s baby because Mack Marsh is my dad. I mean, you saw him?” she says, pulling her strawberry-blonde ponytail to the front. “Where do you think I got this hair?”

“And your ears are identical,” I say, tilting her head so I can look at one.

“Seriously?” she says, laughing as I examine her ear. “How did you even notice that?”

“I don’t know. I was talking to Mack one day and noticed. He has small ears for a guy his size,” I say, quickly adding, “Please don’t tell him I said that or that I even looked at his ears.”

She shakes her head and laughs. “Okay, this conversation is getting ridiculous. It’s over.”

“Millie,” Ward reaches his hand out and then pulls it back quickly when he sees my face. I think it would be a good idea for him to learn how to talk without using his hands. He looks back at Millie slowly. “I’ll fly you over on one of my private jets. I’ll put you up in a luxury villa. You’ll be in and out in a day—two days tops. It’s Rome for fuck’s sake. You just have to talk to Amar’s wife for a few minutes. You can spend the rest of the time eating pasta and drinking wine.”

“I’m not on your payroll anymore,” Millie says slowly. I can tell she’s considering going.

“Then I will pay you a consultant’s fee.”

She stares at him for a few seconds. “I want the highest fee you pay anyone, and Mason comes with me.”

“Agreed,” he says quickly. “I’m going to send Raine Laghari with you, too. And I’d like to send a few more SEALs just in case we have to grab Amar.”

“My team can come with us,” I say, looking down at Millie. “If you want to do this, Mills. Do you trust him?”

“Sitting right here,” he says. I ignore him.

“Yeah, he’s fine. I know he’s lying about Amar being my father, but Amar’s the one who got me to Dad, so let’s go over there and see if we can find him. And Rome’s a romantic city—”

“Again, I’m right here,” Ward says, shaking his head.

Millie looks back at him. “Yeah, we’ll go.”

He sits back, looking satisfied. “Good. Master Chief, I don’t need your entire team. Pick two guys. We have to run low on this. I need you to blend in as much as possible.”

“Butch Harrison and Hawk Fuller.”

Millie looks up at me, smiling. “Those are the two guys you choose to blend in?”

“JJ’s trying to take the reigns of the team. Hawk and Butch are retiring at the end of this year. He’s going to have to replace them eventually. It might as well be now.”

Ward nods. “We’ll start working on that today. Millie, my office will call you with details, but it’s probably going to take them a day to get the Navy to pull these guys off their team.”

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