Page 81 of Code Name: Atticus
God, whynow?
The casual normalcy of it made me more desperate to find an innocent explanation. While I’d been sitting through dinner with Morrison and his associates, listening to their veiled recruitment pitches about “alternative revenue streams” and “international partnerships,” Luke was twenty yards away, meeting with Liu in private. The same Luke who’d hugged me three nights ago at our dinner, who’d been so genuinely happy about Atticus and me finally being together, who’d teased me about Mom already planning the wedding.
“We need to set up a briefing with the team,” said Atticus, walking over to me.
Emma was already opening her laptop on the cottage’s dining table. Kodiak was establishing the encrypted connection. The resort’s expensive furniture and artwork blurred into the background as they transformed the space into an impromptu command center. Within moments, the screen split into familiar faces—Admiral’s stern expression already showing concern, Alice with her characteristic intensity, Tank and Dragon at theirstations looking grim, Tex joining from his home office, his usually calm demeanor replaced with sharp attention.
“What’s the emergency?” Admiral asked, leaning forward in his chair. The late hour and the urgent summons had clearly caught everyone’s attention.
“We saw Luke at the resort. There’s probably an explanation, but—” I started.
Atticus interrupted, more clinical. “We observed Luke Austen at Valley Ridge Resort tonight. He was leaving Liu’s cottage at approximately twenty-one thirty hours. We overheard their conversation.”
The silence that followed stretched across the connection like a held breath. I watched their faces change—surprise, concern, then the grim acceptance of professionals who’d seen too much to be truly shocked anymore.
“Are you both certain of what you heard?” Admiral asked.
“Yes, but the context—” I started to say more, but stopped myself. Who was I trying to convince?
“We heard what we heard,” Atticus said, though he added, “But Luke’s too smart to be that careless if he was really…”
“I’m sorry, Brenna, but we need to investigate regardless. This is too serious to ignore,” said Admiral in a tempered voice.
“I’ll start pulling data immediately,” Alice said, her voice carefully neutral but urgent. “Phone records, financials, system access logs—everything that leaves a digital footprint.”
“Please look for explanations that aren’t…that don’t mean…”
“Understood, Brenna,” she said in a tone as gentle as Admiral’s had been.
“We’ll coordinate from here, starting with deep searches in DoD contractor databases,” Dragon added, already pulling up screens I couldn’t see.
“Look, this is your call, Brenna,” Admiral began. “But this feels serious enough that I should be there. K19’s plane can haveme in San Francisco by zero three hundred. It’s your decision whether I come now or wait.”
“Now,” I managed to eke out.
“Roger that,” he said, then added. “Tank, you’re with me.”
“We’ll compile everything while you’re in transit,” Alice promised, her expression focused and determined. “If there’s something to find, we’ll find it.”
I looked toward the window, and when I turned back, I saw the screen had gone dark.
“We should go,” Kodiak said. “The sooner we get back to the safe house, the sooner we can figure out what’s really happening here.”
My eyes met Atticus’, and he nodded. “We should.”
“You don’t really think Luke would do this,” I said as we packed.
“I don’t know what to think,” Atticus replied. “That conversation…”
“Could be innocent. We both said so.”
“Could be.” But his tone suggested growing doubt.
I moved mechanically, grabbing my overnight bag and shoving my essentials in—laptop, chargers, the encrypted drives I’d brought, the files we’d been reviewing just hours ago when our biggest concern was getting Morrison to trust us. My hands moved without conscious thought while my mind reeled. The beautiful midnight-blue dress I’d worn to dinner lay forgotten on the bed, a relic from a different lifetime when I cared about impressing intelligence brokers instead of worrying that my brother might be one of their assets.
Within five minutes, we were loading the BMW and Emma’s rental. The resort’s security guard at the gate noted our departure with polite disinterest, probably assuming we were just another couple leaving early from a weekend that hadn’t met our expectations.
If only he knew how catastrophically our expectations had been shattered.
