Page 165 of The Fourth Option
“I left honor behind a long time ago, friend.”
“You…”
“I what?”
“You have no idea what you’re up against.”
Kimbel’s head slumped forward.
Walker felt for a pulse and looked for signs of breathing.
He let Kimbel hang from the rack for a few minutes as he went over all of what he had just learned.
Then he cut the Genyra executive from the rack and let him fall to the ground.
“One step closer.”
Walker shut the rear passenger door and got back behind the wheel, leaving Walt Kimbel to rot on the forest floor.
I left honor behind a long time ago.
CHAPTER SIXTY
AUGIE LLOYD HADclaimed one of the corner offices on the third floor of the FBI’s New Orleans Field Office, overlooking Lake Pontchartrain. The building’s upper floors were secured by keycard access and biometric scanners, but Lloyd’s office felt more like a private club than a federal workspace.
He sat behind a polished mahogany desk, eyes sharp behind rimless glasses that caught the morning light. Floor-to-ceiling windows framed a sweeping view of the lake, shimmering in the afternoon heat. Lloyd’s walls were curated with precision: framed commendations, photos of him shaking hands with senators and cabinet secretaries, and a shadow box displaying his Bureau badge alongside a pair of brass handcuffs engraved with the FBI seal.
Stanton stood with arms folded, his posture rigid. J.J. stood just behind him, silent.
Lloyd didn’t bother to rise. He had summoned them to his desk like a principal calling in a pair of underperforming students. He tapped the printed police report on the Dorado Freight attack, the bolded line referencing the suspected death of a law enforcement officer.
“The DA sent this over,” Lloyd began. “Wanted to make sure I saw it personally.”
Stanton gave a curt nod.
“Thissicario, this mercenary, the man you identified as Chris Walker, is starting to look more like a domestic terrorist,” Lloyd said, voice low and deliberate. “At minimum, he’s a serial killer. And that’s not a good look for the Bureau.”
You mean for Icy, Stanton thought, noting his boss’s tired eyes.
“Please give me some good news.”
“We just came from Dorado,” Stanton said. “Scene’s a bombed-out mess. No video. No prints. But the blast was surgical. It only took out twovehicles of foreign nationals of unknown origin. Whoever did it knew exactly what they were doing.”
Lloyd didn’t blink. “Where are we with it?”
“We are following the evidence,” Stanton said evenly. “Not the optics.”
“Your job is to produce results.”
“And to get it right,” Stanton retorted. “The facts point to Dorado’s involvement in something bigger. The absence of evidence is just as telling as the blast itself.”
“What do you mean?”
“Dorado looks less like a warehouse and more like a pipeline. Sugar for sure. But something else as well. I’d like to loop in the Coast Guard to help locate the company owner, Charlie Babineaux. With your approval.”
Lloyd leaned back, his chair creaking beneath him. “Your job, Agent Stanton, is to find thesicario, or contract killer, mercenary, or whatever the hell he is.”
Stanton’s jaw tightened. “We’re trying to understand the whole picture. Casting the net as wide as we need to.”
