Page 107 of Her Unflinching Warrior (Omega Sky)
“Holy hell.”
“Exactly,” Kostya agreed. Then he gave Gideon a patient smile. “Have we taken your mind off things enough, yet?”
“It worked for ten minutes, so that was nice,” Gideon chuckled.
“Glad to be of service.”
* * *
It turnedout to be Tanner Robb, their sniper and backup medic, who was their go-to when it came to having an in with the United States Army Corps of Engineers. His aunt retired from the USACE as one of the staff principals for civil works.
“Aunt Alice knows where all of the bodies are buried.” Tanner laughed when Gideon got ahold of him after they landed.
“This is important. We’re twenty minutes away from the Kinzua Dam here in Pennsylvania, and we need full access to their systems. This is going to take total trust, and what’s more, we can’t tell them why. We haven’t figured out a cover story yet that will work with these people.”
“Let me have Aunt Alice call you. I’ll give her the details of who you are, first. Will that work?” Tanner asked.
“Absolutely.”
“I’ll make it fast, Chief.”
“I appreciate it.”
Gideon hung up and looked at Jada who was sitting with him in the backseat of the SUV. Kostya and Ryker were up front. Kane, Nolan, and Commander Clark were driving in another SUV ahead of them.
“Needed a break from Kane, huh?” Gideon teased.
“More like, I needed a little bit of time with you,” Jada whispered back as she held out her hand to him. Gideon grabbed it and held it tight to his thigh. “You know this is going to work out, don’t you?”
Gideon looked out the window. “I can’t help but see this entire valley flooded, and it kills me, Jada. The man doesn’t have a soul. Not only will people lose their livelihoods and homes, but some of them will also lose their lives.”
“We’re going to stop him.”
He let go of her hand and put his arm around her shoulders. Even with the seatbelts, they found a way for her to rest her head on his chest for a long moment before his phone rang. Jada pulled away so that he could put it up to his ear. He didn’t want the car noise to disturb this conversation and it would if he were to put it on speaker.
“Hello, this is Chief Petty Officer Gideon Smith, United States Navy.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Gideon, I’m retired Lt. Colonel Alice Tanner, United States Army Corp of Engineers. My nephew vouched for you but didn’t have details for me, just that I could trust you implicitly. On a personal level that gets you one hundred percent of my trust, but my nephew is saying that this has to do with one of our dams, and I’m going to have to have a hell of a lot more information to get up to a hundred percent trust on that. What’s going on in Pennsylvania, Chief?”
He liked her, he liked her a lot.
“Colonel, as you know a SEAL team does not work operations here in the United States.”
“I’m aware,” she agreed crisply.
“My girlfriend was kidnapped almost four weeks ago. I was able to find and rescue her with some help, but I knew she was still in danger. I am my team’s communications and computer expert, and I pulled in some other experts to assist me in uncovering who was behind her abduction, and subsequently found out she was kidnapped by a man that I had sent to prison over twenty years ago.” Gideon took a deep breath.
“Go on.”
“When I worked for him, it was in Silicon Valley. He’s a technical genius, but he’s also a madman. He’s held a grudge against me for years, and while I’ve been tracking him to make sure my girlfriend stayed safe, myself and the other experts found out about another plot that he has planned that involves over four-hundred dams across the nation.”
“Are you saying that someone plans to sabotage four hundred of our nation’s dams?” For the first time, Gideon heard a hint of panic in her voice.
“That’s what I’m saying. What’s more, this man intends to cause nationwide hysteria in about five and a half hours if we don’t stop him. We must keep this between the fewest number of people possible, otherwise, we will not be able to stop it.”
“I understand your reasoning at this point, but I need to hear more.”
“Instead of trying to explain further, can I text you a web address, and you just watch the video and call me back?”
