Edge of Honor: An EDGE Security Novel Read online

  Edge of Honor

  An EDGE Security Novel

  Trish Loye

  Tough Girl Press

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Also by Trish Loye

  Acknowledgments

  Note From the Author

  Copyright © 2016 by Trish Loye

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, incidents, and places is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

  ISBN: 978-0-9940084-9-7

  Created with Vellum

  For Krista

  Tough, smart, fun and an amazing sister.

  We are so going to London.

  Prologue

  Two Years Ago

  Somewhere in Iraq…

  Trooper Jack ‘Blackjack’ Sinclair slithered forward in the dry dirt and gravel. A hot dry wind blew in, but didn’t refresh his sweat-soaked body under the load of body armor and gear. Not that it mattered. He’d been in-country for months now with his unit, and was almost used to the heat and sandy grit on his skin. Almost. No one from Glasgow ever really got used to it.

  Still, he didn’t think to complain. As a member of the Special Air Service, the British Army’s elite special forces unit, he’d been trained to be one of the toughest sons of bitches alive.

  “Who Dares Wins.” He whispered their motto, and ignored the itch of the sand.

  A bunker lay ahead, only barely visible with his NVGs. The night-vision goggles gave the world a green tinge. The brighter or more thermal an object, the lighter the green color. Each of his men wore a tiny infrared light on the back of their helmets to mark them as a ‘friendly’ in case things got heated.

  Right now, Jack stared at the bunker, which looked almost black in the moonless night. It had been dug into the side of a hill with only a door visible. Behind the hill was a steep bluff rising black against the lighter green-gray of the night sky.

  He keyed his throat mic. “Any movement?”

  Three negatives from the other men in his patrol sounded in his ear. He stared at the location. They were following up on a lead. Someone had hijacked an American transport truck two days ago containing a shipment of weapons and some kind of tech that the higher-ups didn’t want to speak about. Whatever it was, it had them freaked. His patrol had been tasked with confirming the target and retrieving the truck and contents, or calling in a drone strike if necessary.

  He frowned and waited a few minutes. They’d positioned themselves around the bunker. Tire tracks on the road indicated truck movement, but only a single white pickup—the kind so many Iraqi families owned—sat near the bunker.

  Somebody was home, but Jack suspected it wasn’t anyone they needed to worry about.

  “Fletcher,” he said over the comm, addressing his best friend, Aiden Fletcher, a man who’d gone through selection with him. “Recce the back.”

  The patrol had come up along the road, Parker and Barrett on one side while Jack and Aiden took the other. Jack knew the terrain from studying the satellite images before the mission, but perhaps they’d see something from ground level that the satellites couldn’t.

  While Aiden scouted the backside of the hill and the bluff, Jack crawled back a distance so he could have a chat with the powers that be.

  He changed his comm line and spoke into his mic. “Alpha actual, this is Alpha four one, over.”

  “Alpha four one this is actual, over.”

  Jack frowned. He didn’t recognize the voice. It wasn’t the signaler he’d had since the beginning of the mission.

  “Actual, I authenticate echo bravo one niner five.”

  A sigh came over the line. “You’re checking my veracity, alpha four one? You think we have time for that?”

  Jack scowled. Who the fuck was this? “I say again, I authenticate echo bravo one niner five.” If this wanker didn’t give him the proper code back, he’d pull his boys out of here pronto.

  Another sigh and Jack wanted to go through the comms and rip this guy a new arsehole.

  “Very well. I authenticate niner delta foxtrot tango four. Did you have a question, alpha four one or did you just call to chat?”

  When Jack got back, he was going to find this guy and wipe the ground with him. Who the fuck had let him man the radio?

  “We’re at the location,” he said. “No movement so far. Request authorization for infil.”

  “Request denied. Observe location and report back in fifteen minutes. Do not engage. I repeat: Do not engage.”

  What the actual fuck? Jack looked back at the bunker barely visible from where he crouched, even with NVGs. Something wasn’t right—both with the bunker and with the prick on the other end of the comms. He wanted to know the man’s name, but he wouldn’t be able to find that out until they got back to base. For now, he and his men would be sitting tight for fifteen minutes and then they’d have to hump themselves home.

  Maybe he’d get one of his guys to hotwire the truck. He switched his comm channel back.

  “Blackjack, I got something,” Aiden said.

  “Go ahead.”

  “There’s another door back here. And a garage door. I’m heading in for a closer look.”

  “Take Parker.”

  A click came over the line. The arsehole was back. “Stand down, alpha four one.”

  “Our mission is to gather information. A reconnaissance does that,” Jack said slowly and distinctly. He’d never dealt with anyone so unprofessional in all his time as a soldier.

  That must be it. He wasn’t dealing with the army anymore. This had to be someone from British Intelligence.

  “Fletcher, carry on with the recce,” Jack said. He didn’t tell his friend to watch his six. They were all highly trained. Telling him to be careful would be an insult.

  The line clicked. Maybe the arsehole had decided not to listen in anymore.

  A few moments passed before Aiden’s voice came back over the line, low and hushed. “There was a window in the door. Truck was there, along with four or five others. There are crates of rifles. This is more than the one heist. It looks like these guys are being supplied.”

  Fuck, no wonder the powers that be wanted this place checked out.

  “Any way to salvage the truck or weapons?”

  “Wait out.”

  Jack held tight for Aiden to come back on line. It was only a few seconds.

  “Blackjack, negative on the retrieval. There’re about twenty armed tangos in the back of the garage. Not sure why they’re all inside. It looks like they’re waiting for something.”

  “Pull back. I’m calling it in.” Jack pulled out his map to double check his coordinates in case c
ommand wanted to call in a drone strike. “Alpha actual this is alpha four one, over.”

  There was no response. Where was the arsehole?

  “Alpha actual this is alpha four one, over.”

  Jack switched channels. “Barrett, check your comms,” he instructed. “Can you signal alpha actual?”

  He waited. Though his instinct told him to start moving, that something was going to happen, he remained still, watching the bunker.

  “Blackjack, no signal from actual,” Barrett said.

  “Copy that. I’m heading to higher ground looking for signal.” Jack crouched and ran further from the bunker to a smaller tree-shrouded rise about a hundred meters away.

  He signaled again for the arsehole, but no one answered. The window for calling in a strike was rapidly shrinking. He thought there might be ten minutes before the drone left their area and moved onto another mission. Fuck. He wasn’t going to make contact before they lost the drone. He shoved his map into his pocket.

  “Pull back to the RV,” he ordered.

  “What about the mission?” Aiden asked.

  “We’ve done the recce. We’ll seek higher ground and try to reestablish signal to figure out what the fuck command wants.” He stood to join his men. The rendezvous point was roughly a klick back.

  “Blackjack, we got movement,” Parker said over the line.

  “Sitrep.”

  “Two men have carried out some kind of device.”

  “Device?” Bollocks. What now? He started to run back toward his men. “A weapon?”

  “Unknown. Looks like a metal box.”

  Fuck, that couldn’t be good. He started to sprint. “A bomb?”

  “The most cack-handed bomb I’ve ever seen,” Aiden said. “Shite. The two guys just ran back inside and shut the door.”

  “Get the fuck out,” Jack barked. “Everyone out. Now.”

  He saw his men as green blurs, all hauling ass from the bunker. A high-pitched whine sounded, and then a pop.

  He was blind.

  Bollocks. It was completely dark. His NVGs had stopped working. He tore them off and blinked, trying to accustom his eyes to the shadows around him. He keyed his radio. “Fletcher, sitrep.”

  Nothing. He keyed his radio again. It was dead.

  He saw the first flashes of muzzle blast while bullets ripped through the night. A man screamed, the sound shrill before it cut off abruptly. He sprinted, barely able to see in the dark until his eyes started to adjust. Almost constant muzzle flashes gave the surreal impression of strobe lights going off, fucking with his night vision. Black silhouettes moved against the darkness of the hill behind. His guys racing for the RV. More gunfire thundered. Shouting.

  An ambush. They were being picked off. The enemy had somehow destroyed their comms and NVGs.

  Someone standing by the bunker raised a rifle. Jack raised his, sighted, and shot, barely pausing in his stride. The man fell. Jack felt the sting of a bullet graze his arm. Fuck! Where had that shot come from?

  The enemy had the high ground, and they could see while he and his team couldn’t. Nor could they signal each other.

  “Get to the RV,” he screamed over the noise.

  Bullets struck the ground near him. He had to move. He sprinted to his men.

  The roar of an engine came from the road. A truck of some sort. Then the heavy thwap thwap thwap of a .50 caliber machine gun.

  Enemy backup.

  This had been a trap from the get go. Who the fuck had told the insurgents they were coming?

  He raced down the near side of the road, hoping to take out the gunner and driver. They needed to get by this damn truck.

  He razed the top of the truck’s silhouette until the machine gun went silent. Then thundered rounds into the windshield, aiming for a driver he couldn’t see. He heard Aiden call to Barrett and Parker. They were regrouping and attacking.

  Of course they were. They were fucking SAS, and the enemy had better kill them on their first shot because they wouldn’t get another chance.

  The vehicle passed him by, slowing as it went. The driver must be dead. Jack ran to catch up. He’d get one of his men to take control of the machine gun while he drove. They’d—

  A loud high-pitched whine made him look up.

  No.

  The world went brilliant white. A massive concussive force threw him backwards into darkness.

  1

  Dr. Charlotte Singh glanced at the clock as she waited for the kettle to boil. 6:55 a.m. Her heart beat faster. Five minutes until her aunt’s alarm went off. She shouldn’t have hit snooze that last time.

  She already had her leather jacket and boots on. Her laptop and purse lay on the counter beside the metal to-go cup with the teabag waiting inside.

  “Come on,” she muttered to the kettle.

  Another minute ticked off the clock.

  Screw it. She could get a tea from Tim Horton’s on the way to work. She shut off the kettle and grabbed her purse and computer bag. She strode across the creaky wood floors of the brownstone to the front door.

  “Charlotte?”

  Besides her father, Aunt Gajala was the only one who called her Charlotte. She much preferred Charlie, which was what everyone at EDGE Security called her.

  Her diminutive aunt appeared on the stairs, her dark hair cut in a short bob and her housecoat wrapped securely around her. Even in her nightclothes, her aunt carried herself with an air of regal grace that Charlie had yet to master. They both had the same light brown skin, and were often mistaken for mother and daughter—though Charlie’s hair would never be the dark silk of her aunt’s. She self-consciously touched the few curls that had escaped her braid.

  “Did I hear the kettle, Charlotte?” her aunt said, taking the last step down and moving past her and into the galley kitchen. “Would you mind being a good girl and making me a cup of tea?” She picked up a cloth from the sink and began wiping down the already clean counter.

  “Morning, Bua,” Charlie said, using the Hindi word for aunt. “I’m on my way to work.”

  Aunt G sighed through her nose. “I don’t understand why you’re always so anxious to get to work. It’s just a security company. Your father didn’t send you to MIT just so you could hide yourself away.”

  Charlie closed her eyes and swore never to hit snooze again. She strode to the stove and turned on the gas burner beneath the kettle.

  “I told you before, Bua. I’m the head of their research department. It’s an exciting job, and I love it.”

  “Well, at least they’re going to send you to that conference in London. You might have your eyes opened to what’s out there.” She turned to Charlie and smiled, the expression changing her entire demeanor. “I can’t wait until we go. I’m so glad we can do this trip together.” Her smile was so broad and so genuine that Charlie couldn’t do anything but smile back at her. She hadn’t been able to deny her aunt’s request to accompany her to the International Engineering and Technology conference.

  But Charlie had insisted on one thing. She was presenting this year, and had asked Aunt G to get her own room because she needed time alone to work. And also because, while she loved her aunt, she couldn’t handle a week in a hotel room together.

  “Remember,” Charlie said. “I’ll be working. So I won’t—”

  “Won’t be able to see the city with me.” Aunt G waved her hand, dismissing Charlie’s words. “And you remember, I’m a full-grown woman. I don’t need a babysitter. Now, weren’t you going to put fresh water in the kettle?”

  “Bua, I’m going to be late for work.”

  “Nonsense, child. It’s barely seven. I swear you leave early just to avoid me.”

  Charlie forced her eyes to widen. “What? You’re being paranoid, Bua.” She leaned down to peck her aunt on the cheek. “Besides, why would I need to get away from the sweet woman who raised me?”

  Aunt G frowned at her while Charlie smiled. “Gotta run.” She gave a wave and left. When the front door swu
ng shut behind her, she breathed a sigh of relief and hurried to her gray Honda Civic parked on the tree-lined street.

  She’d bought the brownstone on Rue Chambord shortly after joining EDGE. She loved the street with Parc La Fontaine at one end and Avenue du Mont-Royal-with its boutiques, restaurants, and bookstores-at the other.

  She drove toward downtown Montréal, where EDGE had its hidden-in-plain-sight HQ. She tapped her finger on the steering wheel. The drive-through at Tim Horton’s was eight cars long. She really shouldn’t have hit snooze. She kept driving. Maybe once she got to the lab she’d make a tea.

  And maybe she’d have time to finish all the urgent projects that kept piling up in her lab. She snorted. Both unlikely.

  EDGE Security kept her extremely busy but she didn’t mind. It wasn’t just a security company, but a covert international organization whose missions were black ops. Charlie was head of EDGE research and development. It was a prestigious job, but unfortunately a very secretive one. She wasn’t allowed to tell anyone what she really did for a living, even her aunt. But she didn’t mind.

  Much.

  And even though it was nice to get away from her aunt, she wasn’t going in early just to avoid her. Charlie had piles of projects that needed to be finished. Especially since she was heading to London the next day.

  “Dammit, Gears. This is your fault.” Ever since her lab partner, Dante–codename Gears—had started doing field missions, her workload had doubled. It wasn’t Dante’s fault. She’d have jumped at the chance to work in the field, too. It seemed so exciting, almost fun.

  But more, the operators made a difference in the world. In people’s lives. They didn’t just live in their heads and their sterile labs. She shook her head at herself. What she did was important too, it just wasn’t as…as real.

  Or dangerous.

  She secretly read all the mission reports for EDGE. Secretly, because while she had the security clearance, she didn’t want anyone to know that she read the reports at night like other women read romance novels. She longed for the excitement of doing field work. And she learned things from the reports. She wanted to be prepared in case someone needed her help on a mission someday. Something only she could do.