Power Play (Titus Black Thriller series Book 7)
Page 21
“I blew it,” Black said.
Then he heard a shriek from Shields, followed by the hum of machines.
When he looked up, he saw light emanating from the overhead bulb as well as from the computer monitors.
“What’s happening?” Black asked.
“It’s a restart,” Shields said. “The kill code deleted the virus, but the program had to restart. Now it’s back online.”
“So, we did it?” Black asked.
“Yes,” Shields said, raising her hand triumphantly. “We did it.”
Black’s phone buzzed with a call from Blunt.
“Do you have power in Washington, sir?” Black asked as he put the phone on speaker.
“We lost it for a minute, but it’s back now,” Blunt said. “Does this mean the virus is eradicated?”
“Yes, sir,” Shields said. “You might want to get Besserman to have his team run a diagnostic, but I think the virus has been eradicated.”
“I’ll handle that right now,” Blunt said. “Meanwhile, you two get back to Washington. We need to celebrate and drink some bourbon together.”
Black reached out and grabbed Shields’ hand. Maybe it was the emotion of the moment. Maybe it was all they’d been through together trying to figure out who was behind the sabotage. Maybe it was the fact that he almost lost Shields. But he couldn’t restrain himself.
Black leaped to his feet and gave Shields a big hug.
She winced with pain.
“Oh, sorry,” Black said.
“Did you forget about my wound?”
Black inspected it again. “I can’t believe you did this with your arm like this.”
“Adrenaline,” she said, waving her hand dismissively. “But that doesn’t mean I want you to squeeze it.”
Black smiled before his gaze met hers. “I hope this doesn’t hurt too much.”
Then he kissed her.
CHAPTER 41
Washington, D.C.
TITUS BLACK ENTERED the Firestorm headquarters two days later for a meeting Blunt had called to discuss the near-disastrous fallout. He smiled at Shields, who gave him a coy wink before following him into the conference room. Jana Shadid was already seated with a stack of documents in front of her, while Blunt’s chair at the end of the table was still empty.
Black took a seat next to Jana, while Shields sat across from him fiddling with her sling.
Jana glanced at her two colleagues, her eyes bouncing back and forth. “Are heroes always this casual when they walk into a room after saving the world?”
Black and Shields laughed.
“The real hero is you,” Shields said, looking at Jana. “If you hadn’t given us that decryption device to bypass the password, we’d all be sitting in the dark somewhere right now.”
“But here we are,” Black said. “And it’s all thanks to you.”
Jana deflected the praise. “That was just a small part. You two are the ones who made it happen.”
“It was a team effort,” Blunt said in his gravelly voice as he walked into the room. He gnawed on a cigar as he lumbered to his seat at the head of the table.
“So where is the cake to celebrate?” Jana asked.
Blunt grunted. “If we were celebrating, I’d have a bottle of bourbon open. But it’s too early for that right now. First things first. Shields, how is your shoulder?”
“I was very lucky,” she said. “The bullet went clean through, so I just have to tend this wound for the next few weeks and I should be fine.”
“That’s good to hear,” Blunt said. “We’re all glad that you’re still with us and won’t have any major complications. Now, before we discuss future missions, we have a few loose ends to tie up, starting with Adrianna Dixon.”
“Is she still in trouble?” Shields asked.
Blunt shook his head. “Ironically, thanks to Katarina Kozlov, Congresswoman Dixon had her seat restored after all charges were dropped. Katarina proved that the financial records were altered by hackers. Currently, we’re still trying to determine who was behind it, but digital forensics suggest that the meddling originated in Saudi Arabia.”
“Why would any Saudi actors be trying to sabotage Dixon?” Black asked.
“That’s a good question, but I’m certain there’s a connection to someone in the U.S. government, perhaps some remnant of the Fullgood Initiative,” Blunt said. “We haven’t been able to determine that yet, but I’m working on that with Hawk and Alex, who are out on assignment right now. There’s still more we need to know there.”
“What about our friend Marty Kellerman?” Black asked. “How is he doing?”
“I spoke with the FBI director this morning, and Kellerman is going to prison for a long time,” Blunt said. “The silver lining to this saga is that some of his developers have been hired as part of President Young’s new task force to address the country’s power grid and create more stopgaps within the computing software. Kellerman confessed that he acted alone in hiring DarkNite’s company even though that was strictly against the terms of Kellerman’s contract with the power companies.”
“So, what’s on the horizon?” Black asked.
“Something that’s been lingering around for a while,” Blunt said. “Bahiri Zahid, the Alsheri agent who escaped from Gitmo, is a priority again. We have intel reports that he’s operational again and planning to strike against the U.S.”
Black smiled. “I’m going to enjoy this assignment. I owe Zahid.”
“I’ll give you all the details in a report tomorrow,” Blunt said. “In the meantime, finish up your reports on Kozlov and take the rest of the day off.”
Black didn’t move as Blunt dismissed the team and ambled out of the room. Jana followed him, but Shields lingered.
“Are you going to sit here all day?” she asked.
Black shook his head. “I was thinking about my report and what I need to include in it.”
“You don’t need to include everything,” she said with a wink.
“Well, the truth is I’m not sure I remember everything correctly, and I was thinking that maybe we should debrief tonight over dinner at my place,” Black said. “I make a mean fillet mignon.”
“Sounds like a plan,” she said before exiting the room. “I’ll be there at seven.”
Blunt remained in his chair, the smile on his face growing as was the angst in his gut. For the first time in his life, he might have a reason not to be so reckless. And he wasn’t sure how he felt about it.
But he was certain he needed to figure it out sooner rather than later.
THE END
To continue reading in the Titus Black series, order STATE OF CONSPIRACY now. Or to read more novels from the Firestorm world, check out the Brady Hawk series also available on Kindle Unlimited.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am grateful to so many people who have helped with the creation of this project and the entire Titus Black series.
Brooke Turbyfill was a big help in editing this book.
I would also like to thank my advance reader team for all their input in improving this book along with all the other readers who have enthusiastically embraced the story of Titus Black. Stay tuned ... there's more Titus Black coming soon.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
R.J. PATTERSON is an award-winning writer living in southeastern Idaho. He first began his illustrious writing career as a sports journalist, recording his exploits on the soccer fields in England as a young boy. Then when his father told him that people would pay him to watch sports if he would write about what he saw, he went all in. He landed his first writing job at age 15 as a sports writer for a daily newspaper in Orangeburg, S.C. He later attended earned a degree in newspaper journalism from the University of Georgia, where he took a job covering high school sports for the award-winning Athens Banner-Herald
and Daily News.
He later became the sports editor of The Valdosta Daily Times before working in the magazine world as an editor and freelance journalist. He has won numerous writing awards, including a national award for his investigative reporting on a sordid tale surrounding an NCAA investigation over the University of Georgia football program.
R.J. enjoys the great outdoors of the Northwest while living there with his wife and four children. He still follows sports closely.
He also loves connecting with readers and would love to hear from you. To stay updated about future projects, connect with him over Facebook or on the interwebs at www.RJPbooks.com and sign up here for his newsletter to get deals and updates.
Power Play
© Copyright 2021 R.J. Patterson
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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