Page 65 of Knox
One minute I am wrapped around him, his body pressed against mine, and the next, I am with Leif and Tae on a flight to Venezuela.
Talk about whiplash.
A few days before Cillian’s trainwreck of a party, Alexios found a trail leading to Clark Brown, a corrupt FBI analyst who’d been paid to find everything out about Cillian’s life and routines.
The good news…
You could say he is our perfect ticket to finding out who wants Cillian dead.
The bad news…
Well, the fucking idiot got himself locked up in a Venezuelan prison for smoking weed in a restaurant.
A freaking restaurant!
To make things worse, we thought the extraction would be smooth since Venezuela has an extradition treaty with the US, but even after asking nicely, Washington got handed some bureaucratic bullshit about “domestic constitutional limits.”
Ha!
What a nice way to say, “Thanks for sending your spy; we’re keeping him.”
Luckily, because Mr. Brown was working as an agent and the secrets he carries are a national security nightmare, the government wants him back just as badly as we do.
Which is exactly how I ended up here…
Two days after the best kiss of my life, crouching behind a shitty concrete barrier with the green light to infiltrate the Venezuelan prison and drag his ass home.
“Status?” Alexios asks over the comms, all the way back in NY at the Harknett’s HQ.
“In position at the eastern blind spot,” I whisper, checking my watch. 0200 hours. “Tae, Leif, ready the line.”
To my left, Leif adjusts his vest and stuffs his long hair beneath a black balaclava. Beside him, Tae checks his magazine to ensure it’s fully loaded with rubber bullets.
We don’t want to kill any of the guards, just knock the hell out of them… If needed, of course.
“Hey, Knox…?” Alexios says. “You being all the way in Venezuela means you quit babysitting Cillian?”
“No. I am still his bodyguard.”
“…Are you sure about that?”
“Positive.”
“And you don’t feel like quitting? I don’t know… say, before Friday?”
“Alexios… How much did you bet on me quitting before Friday?”
“Me? Nothing! Why would I even—two hundred.”
I groan, rubbing a hand over my forehead through the balaclava. “Sorry to ruin your luck, but I’m still working for him. And when I get back, I’m taking your two hundred bucks, asshole.”
“Yeah, Alexios,” Leif interjects, adjusting the line launcher between his hands. “How dare you pressure Knox? He clearly needs more time. Say… I don’t know… two weeks and three days before he finally decides to quit.”
Oh, no… he didn’t.
I glare over at Leif, and the Swedish hippie grins unapologetically.
Bastard.
