“Copy,”Henry said.
Deacon honked the horn and swerved around a car.
“Masks on, weapons ready,” James said quickly, a rush of adrenaline spiking through his veins.
James looked to Deacon. “Wait at Union Square Park, we’ll direct her that way.”
Deacon nodded and James grabbed the door handle. He looked to his team, directing them to their locations, watching as they sprinted away. Every second mattered now.
James waited a few minutes, giving everyone time to get in place. “Henry, check in.”
“Target is browsing medical supplies. I think she knows I followed her in,”Henry confirmed.
James nodded. They didn’t have another moment to waste.
He stepped forward.
JENNA
Jenna picked up another box, using the mirror on the wall in front of her to check her back.
She felt eyes on her, but she couldn’t see them. She’d felt that way since she’d left Grand Central.
Maybe it was nerves, but maybe it wasn’t.
The fact that Lisa hadn’t called wasn’t helping to calm the unease that made her stomach churn. Jenna had tried to call her twice, but each time her phone rang out.
Her stomach curdled. The plan had gone so wrong. She had done her part—secured James Thomas’s man to the track. Lisa’s job was to lure James onto the train and get off at the next stop, making sure he followed her—luring him away from his men because he was easier to kill alone. James should’ve been on the train, and his man should be chopped up in pieces by the train. But instead, there was no sign of a bloody scene on the tracks and Lisa couldn’t be contacted.
Jenna fought to keep her breath steady, pushing down the unease that crept up her throat.
She’d wanted to kill the man on the tracks immediately, not risk one of James Thomas’s men being able to find him and cut his leg loose. But Lisa had forbidden it. She said James Thomas prided himself on his loyalty to his men—for never leaving one behind—and she wanted him to die knowing his friend, his comrade, was chained to the tracks and James had left him there to die. She wanted to punish him for what he’d done to her—what he’d taken from her.
But now it seems James had bested them at their own game.
Jenna shook her head. She should’ve killed the man. She should’ve killed James when she’d had the chance. Then they could collect their fee—because Lisa wasn’t the only one who wanted James dead—but Lisa’s reasons were personal.
Jenna thought back to the man on the train track. James must’ve gotten on the train, otherwise Lisa would’ve called. And if he did, there was no way the man on the tracks could’ve gotten out of there alive, yet when she’d walked back along the track, there was no sign of a bloody scene and the trains continued to run.
Another thought occurred to her and it made her stomach churn.
Did Lisa blame her for their failure?
Jenna couldn’t see how this was her fault, though. It had been Lisa’s plan, despite Jenna’s objections. Jenna didn’t care about revenge, she just wanted them all dead—as soon as possible.
Jenna chewed on her cheek.
Lisa had warned Jenna before they came to New York that this would be difficult. That they were going up against the best—the only one Lisa had never been able to get to.
James Thomas.
Lisa had been hired many years ago by the CIA to kill him. They’d justified he was an agent who had become too dangerous, and had therefore become a liability. They hired someone from the outside so it couldn’t be traced back to them. But apparently the raid went bad and somehow James Thomas, who was then Liam Smith, and one Ranger had escaped. Everyone else had been killed but those two men.
Then Lisa lost him. He went underground and she didn’t see him nor hear of him for years.
When he resurfaced, his face was all over the news for a murder, and Lisa wasn’t the only one pleased about it.
But like the slippery snake he was, he managed to turn that situation around and he’d eventually become the head of the CIA. That’s when the call had come in from the deputy director, the man below James. A man who had secrets he’d been killing to keep—secrets James had found out about and was trying to prove. But this man, Anderson Florrick, was fighting hard and dirty to keep his skeletons in the closet and wanted James dead—at any cost. He could hardly issue an open contract for James’s death, so he called Jenna. They had, many years ago, had an affair and had kept in touch since. He was a good contact to keep, Jenna rationalized.