––––––––
Jason sat in his seatat the long, oval table. His eyes remained glued on the images displayed on the large, retractable screen on the wall he was facing.
His stomach turned, but he refused to look away. His team had failed.He’dfailed.
And that failure was going to break Sophie’s heart.
“We’re sure it’s him?” He glanced at Admiral Newton, the high-ranking military official standing near the screen.
“DNA confirms the remains belong to Colton Moore.”
Damn.
Jason rubbed his hand across his beard. The phone call he’d received while he and Sophie had been in his car was from Dax Tanner, the lead man on his covert team.
Dax had told him Moore’s body had been discovered in a trench outside Chabelley, a small village a few miles southwest of Djibouti. With news like that, Jason knew this meeting was vital to shore up any unknowns before the intel was leaked to the press.
Shit like this always found its way to the press.
“Anyone claim responsibility?” He asked no one in particular.
“Not yet,” Newton answered. “We’re still looking into it, but it’s only been twelve hours since the body was discovered. In fact, the only reason we were able to get the DNA results back as fast as we did was because of Homeland’s involvement in the case. Sure wish the Navy’s labs worked as quickly as yours do.”
A few chuckles filled the room, but Jason was no longer in the mood to laugh.
He’d laughed with Sophie earlier. While they were lying in bed after making love. In the shower, and then again while they ate their re-heated crepes.
He’d laughed more today—with her—than he probably had in over a year. The feeling had been foreign at first, but then it was like welcoming an old friend back home after a long journey.
Right now, however, the only thing Jason felt like doing was finding the sons of bitches responsible for killing an American journalist in cold blood.
“You got any guesses as to who’s behind this, Admiral?” Dax asked from his seat across the table.
The man at the front of the room hesitated to answer, and Jason understood why. In their business, assumptions or guesses could ultimately cost someone their life.
However men like him...and the one they were all waiting on to speak...also knew that, more often than not, their gut instincts were spot on.
“Naturally, our first look was at the Yemeni extremists who attacked the city of Djibouti,” Newton commented.
“But you don’t think it was them.” Jason’s words were a statement, rather than a question.
The older man shook his head. “It doesn’t sit right for several reasons. The biggest one being the dismemberment and subsequent burning of Moore’s body.”
“Why does that strike you as odd?” Becca Scott, another one of Jason’s invaluable operatives spoke up.
“Because it doesn’t fit that organization’s M.O.,” Newton explained. “That particular group is all about doing things for show. They want the attention. They want public acknowledgement. Dumping a body in the middle of the desert, and then purposely destroying that body to avoid the possibility of it being identified is something entirely different.”
Asher Bannon, the brainchild of Jason’s team asked, “So howdidMoore’s body get identified?” He jutted his chin toward the large screen. “Looks like there was nothing left but charred bones and ash.”
“We got lucky. One of Moore’s fingers was found in the dirt, away from the rest of the body. Our guess is, it fell when the pieces were being carried to the ditch. Which is good news for us, because it managed to avoid being burned completely, so your labs were able to access enough tissue to obtain the DNA. Their hit came from a national data base. Apparently, Mr. Moore sent in one of those ancestry kits a few years ago, back when they first became popular.”
That answered the how. Now they just had to figure out the who and the why.
“I’m assuming we’ve also looked into the usual groups,” Jason sat back in his chair. “IS, Al Qaeda, Taliban?”
“Affirmative, Agent Ryker,” Admiral Newton nodded. “As of right now, nothing with any of those have hit.”
“But I’m guessing you have a theory.” Jason shot the man a pointed look.