Inch by agonizing inch.
But Jagger was right. Until Liam figured out a way to trace the call—if he could even do it in the first place—the only thing he could do was wait. And since knowing your enemy was the number one rule in warfare…
He walked over to the table and sat his ass down. Head pounding and body aching, he drew strength from the physical pain and emotional pain to do what was needed to help the woman he loved.
“Like I said, Ainsworth used to be SEAL Team 1’s leader. About six months before he left the team, I noticed Mike acting…different.”
“Different how?” Christian joined him and Jagger.
“He started getting these headaches. Then his personality began to change. He became more aggressive. Reckless.” Brody ran a hand over his jaw. “I confronted him about it before one of our last missions together. Told him I was concerned, and I thought he should get checked for Breacher’s Syndrome.”
The unofficial term used for those suffering from repetitive TBIs—traumatic brain injuries. Pro football players, military… Anyone at risk for experiencing multiple blows to the head, or in Ainsworth’s case, being flash banged, come close to a few RPGs, and constantly breaching doors with explosives…
That shit took a toll on the body and the mind. And in Ainsworth’s case, it had apparently changed a once-great man into a deranged lunatic. One who’d resulted in terrorizing and kidnapping an innocent woman simply as a pawn in his sick game of revenge.
“Let me guess.” Jagger stared back at him from across the table. “Ainsworth screw something up on an op?”
Brody looked at his teammate and nodded. “He used to be the best, you know? From day one with the Teams, the guy took me under his wing.” A humorless huff. “Asshole taught me everything I know about being a SEAL.”
“So what happened?” Rocky asked quietly.
“He started taking risks. High risks, too. Gambling. Sleeping around on his wife. And then his shit spread over into the team. The guy started changing the game mid-op. Put himself at unnecessary risks.”
“You talk to him?” Christian asked.
Brody forgot he’d never really gotten into any of this stuff with his best friend.
“I tried. Like I said, I went to him with my concerns. Mike blew them all off, of course.” Guy always had an answer for everything. “He fucked up on that op, and I…I covered for him. Made excuses to the higher-ups. Blamed bad intel and poor communications. But it was all Ainsworth.”
“That what ended his career?”
“No.” Brody shook his head. “That was the last op he served as Team Lead. We were in Afghanistan, taking heavy fire. Orders were to hold in place until air support could arrive. Ainsworth goes off half-cocked…runs into a building we hadn’t secured.” His jaw clenched tight. “We were a team, so we went against orders and followed him inside. He’d gone up to the roof for a better vantage point, so that’s where we went, too.”
“You had his back,” Christian rumbled.
A curt nod. “And it almost got me and another man on our team killed.”
Sometimes in the dead of night, Brody could still hear that bullet whizzing by his head. “On the chopper ride there, I’d already made the decision to tell Command what I’d witnessed. As soon as we got back, I was going to go in there and lay it all out.”
“Weren’t you worried about being labeled a rat?” Cade asked with genuine curiosity.
“Sure I was.” Brody looked at the younger man. “But I was more worried about me and my teammates getting killed. Anyway…” A deep breath and harsh exhale. “I submitted my A.A.R. the same day we returned. So did the other guys.”
“You let the report do the tattling for you.” Jagger surmised. “And Ainsworth has been stewing about it ever since.”
“That’s what I don’t get. This was what, three years ago?” Christian frowned. “Why now? Why, after all this time, has he decided to get his revenge on you now?”
“Who the hell knows what triggered the asshole?” Brody pushed himself to his feet and began to pace. “None of that shit even matters. We need to focus our attention on finding Ro. She’s what’s important here.”
He’d barely finished his rant when a low dinging came from the other side of the room. Liam, who’d been using the laptop he’d brought with him to try to locate Ainsworth, stared at the phone before turning a paled gaze Brody’s way.
“You just got sent two pictures.”
Brody rushed to the other man’s side. “Let me see.”
“Okay, but first, I need you to promise not to lose your shit. We’re going to find her. I just need a little more time to—”
He snatched the phone from the other man’s hand and opened the new text feed…and the images he’d just received. A rush of bile hit the base of his throat, and it was all he could do not to puke all over his kitchen floor.