by J. M. Madden
Flat Line
J.M. Madden
Copyright © 2018 by J.M. Madden
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.
Cover by Becky McGraw
Editing by Meg at Megedits.com
Created with Vellum
For my Family, as always. You know I love you.
This is one of the funnest sets I’ve ever worked on. The other authors have been fantastic and Becky McGraw has been especially remarkable.
While these books can all be read as standalones, we hope that you will read them all. Every author in this set I have read before, and I will again because I love their styles.
If you think you’ve missed one of the twelve, you can follow this Link to my website for a complete list.
www.jmmadden.com/sleeper-seals/
And of course if you have any questions you can email me any time at [email protected]
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
Epilogue
Afterword
About the Author
Also by J.M. Madden
Prologue
Retired Navy Commander Greg Lambert leaned forward to rake in the pile of chips his full house had netted him. Tonight he would leave the weekly gathering not only with his pockets full, but his pride intact.
The scowls he earned from his poker buddies at his unusual good luck were an added bonus.
They'd become too accustomed to him coming up on the losing side of five card stud. It was about time he taught them to never underestimate him.
Vice President Warren Angelo downed the rest of his bourbon and stubbed out his Cuban cigar. "Looks like Lady Luck is on your side tonight, Commander."
After he stacked his chips neatly in a row at the rail in front of him, Greg glanced around at his friends. It occurred to him right then, this weekly meeting wasn't so different from the joint sessions they used to have at the Pentagon during his last five years of service.
The location was the Secretary of State's basement now, but the gathering still included top ranking military brass, politicians, and the director of the CIA, who had been staring at him strangely all night long.
"It's about time the bitch smiled my way, don't you think? She usually just cleans out my pockets and gives you my money," Greg replied with a sharp laugh as his eyes roved over the spacious man-cave with envy, before they snagged on the wall clock.
It was well past midnight, their normal break-up time. He needed to get home, but what did he have to go home to? Four walls, and Karen's mean as hell Chihuahua who hated him. Greg stood, scooted back his chair, and stretched his shoulders. The rest of his poker buddies left quickly, except for Vice President Angelo, Benedict Hughes of the CIA, and their host, Percy Long, Secretary of State.
Greg took the last swig of his bourbon, then set the glass on the table. When he took a step to leave, they moved to block his way to the door. "Something on your minds, gentleman?" he asked, their cold, sober stares making the hair on the back of his neck stand up.
It wasn't a comfortable feeling, but one he was familiar with from his days as a Navy SEAL. That feeling usually didn't portend anything good was about to go down. But neither did the looks on these men's faces.
Warren cleared his throat and leaned against the mahogany bar with its leather trimmings. "There's been a significant amount of chatter lately." He glanced at Ben. "We're concerned."
Greg backed up a few steps, putting some distance between himself and the men. "Why are you telling me this? I've been out of the loop for a while now." Greg was retired, and bored stiff, but not stiff enough to tackle all that was wrong in the United States at the moment or fight the politics involved in fixing things.
Ben let out a harsh breath then gulped down his glass of water. He set the empty glass down on the bar with a sigh and met Greg's eyes. "We need your help, and we're not going to beat around the bush," he said, making the hair on Greg's neck stand taller.
Greg put his hands in his pockets, rattling the change in his right pocket and his car keys in the left while he waited for the hammer. Nothing in Washington, D.C., was plain and simple anymore. Not that it ever had been.
"Spit it out, Ben," he said, eyeballing the younger man. "I'm all ears."
"Things have changed in the US. Terrorists are everywhere now," he started, and Greg bit back a laugh at the understatement of the century.
He'd gotten out before the recent INCONUS attacks started, but he was in service on 9/11 for the ultimate attack. The day that replaced Pearl Harbor for him as the day that would go down in infamy.
"That's not news, Ben," Greg said, his frustration mounting in his tone. "What does that have to do with me, other than being a concerned citizen?"
"More cells are being identified every day," Ben replied, his five o'clock shadow standing in stark contrast to his now paler face. "The chatter about imminent threats, big jihad events that are in the works, is getting louder every day."
"You do understand that I'm no longer active duty, right?" Greg shrugged. "I don't see how I can be of much help there."
"We want you to head a new division at the CIA," Warren interjected. "Ghost Ops, our own sleeper cell of SEALs to help us combat the terrorist sleeper cells in the US...and whatever the hell else might pop up later."
Greg laughed. "And where do you think I'll find these SEALs to sign up? Most are deployed over--"
"We want retired SEALs like yourself. We've spent millions training these men, and letting them sit idle stateside while we fight this losing battle alone is just a waste." Ben huffed a breath. "I know they'd respect you when you ask them to join the contract team you'd be heading up. You'd have a much better chance of convincing them to help."
"Most of those guys are like me, worn out to the bone or injured when they finally give up the teams. Otherwise, they'd still be active. SEALs don't just quit." Unless their wives were taken by cancer and their kids were off at college, leaving them alone in a rambling house when they were supposed to be traveling together and enjoying life.
"What kind of threats are you talking about?" Greg asked, wondering why he was even entertaining such a stupid idea.
"There are many. More every day. Too many for us to fight alone," Ben started, but Warren held up his palm.
"The president is taking a lot of heat. He has three and a half years left in his term, and taking out these threats was a campaign promise. He wants the cells identified and the terror threats eradicated quickly."
These two, and the president, sat behind desks all day. They'd never been on a field op before, so they had no idea the planning and training that took place before a team ever made it to the field. Training a team of broken-down SEALs to work together would take double that time because each knew better than the rest how things should be done, so there was no "quick" about it.
"That's a tall order. I can't possibly get a team of twelve men on the same page in under a year. Even if I can find them." Why in the hell was he getting excited,
then? "Most are probably out enjoying life on a beach somewhere." Exactly where he would be with Karen if she hadn't fucking died on him as soon as he retired four years ago.
"We don't want a team, Greg," Percy Long corrected, unfolding his arms as he stepped toward him. "This has to be done stealthily because we don't want to panic the public. If word got out about the severity of the threats, people wouldn't leave their homes. The press would pump it up until they created a frenzy. You know how that works."
"So let me get this straight. You want individual SEALs, sleeper guys who agree to be called up for special ops to perform solo missions?" Greg asked, his eyebrows lifting. "That's not usually how they work."
"Unusual times call for unusual methods, Greg. They have the skills to get it done quickly and quietly," Warren replied, and Greg couldn't argue. That's exactly the way SEALs were trained to operate--they did whatever it took to get the job done.
Ben approached him, placed his hand on his shoulder as if this was a tag-team effort, and Greg had no doubt that it was just that. "Every terrorist or wannabe terror organization has roots here now. Al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, Isis, or the Taliban, white supremacists and other armed hate groups--you name it. They're not here looking for asylum. They're actively recruiting followers and planning events to create a caliphate on our home turf. We can't let that happen, Greg, or the United States will never be the same."
"You'll be a CIA contractor, and can name your price," Warren inserted, and Greg's eyes swung to him. "You'll be on your own in the decision making. We need to have plausible deniability if anything goes wrong."
"Of course," Greg replied, shaking his head. If anything went south, they needed a fall guy, and that would be him in this scenario. Not much different from the dark ops his teams performed under his command when he was active duty.
God, why did this stupid idea suddenly sound so intriguing? Why did he think he might be able to make it work? And why in the hell did he suddenly think it was just what he needed to break out of the funk he'd been living in for four years?
"I can get you a list of potential hires, newly retired SEALs, and the president says anything else you need," Warren continued quickly. "All we need is your commitment."
The room went silent, and Greg looked deeply into each man's eyes as he pondered a decision. What the hell did he have to lose? If he didn't agree, he'd just die a slow, agonizing death in his recliner at home. At only forty-seven and still fit, that could be a lot of years spent in that chair.
"Get me the intel, the list, and the contract," he said, and a surge of adrenaline made his knees weak.
He was back in the game.
Chapter 1
Parker Quinn didn't recognize the number, but he did recognize the area code and a bolt of something exciting jerked through him. Who in that exclusive Virginia area code would be calling him? It had been a long time since he'd seen a number like that.
Curiosity won out and he swiped his thumb across the screen and brought it to his ear. "Hello?"
"Quinn! How the hell are you, buddy?"
Parker scowled and looked at the phone, wondering if he'd fallen into some type of time warp. It had been a couple of years since he'd spoken with his former boss, Navy SEAL Commander Greg Lambert, but he remembered his voice like it had been yesterday. "Hello, sir."
Parker had no idea why the man was calling him now. After he'd been injured, Lambert had been in to see him once, then never again.
Probably couldn't stand to be reminded what could happen when he looked at me.
That wasn't a very charitable thought, but it was how he'd felt at the time. Hurt and left behind. He'd given a huge amount of his life and sanity for his country, and his team, but as soon as he was damaged and no longer usable they were done with him. Yeah, they paid him his hazard bonus but, whatever.
He waited for Lambert to speak, because he wasn't sure how he felt about even talking to the man.
After a couple of long seconds, Lambert cleared his throat. "Well, I wanted to check up on you, see how you'd recovered."
Scowling, Parker looked out over the parking lot. He heard papers rustle in the background and had a feeling Lambert was looking at his medical record—if he wasn't actually watching him. The man had friends in high places with expensive toys. And Lambert never asked rhetorical questions. "I'm fine, thank you. As you can see."
His former boss chuckled. "You always did like to call me on my shit, Quinn. I appreciated that about you. Tell me what I can't read in the medical file. There's not much here."
Parker shook his head and looked around, suddenly overwhelmed with anger. They'd wiped their hands of him, now they wanted him to bleed for them again. "What's not in the file? It's not in the file that I can't take too deep of a breath because one of my ribs pops, and doctors can't tell me why. It's not in the file that it takes me twenty minutes to clear my eye socket of goop every morning. It's not in the file that my dick bends to the right when I get hard because of all the scar tissue on my lower belly. Is that what you're looking for Lambert? Some other reason to feel like you have it good in life? Why the fuck are you calling me?"
Silence stretched on the other end of the line and Parker realized he might have gone overboard. That banked anger that he'd learned to control had flared to life. He was almost yelling, and that wouldn't get either one of them anywhere.
"I'm sorry, Parker," Lambert said eventually. "No, I'm not calling you to make myself feel better. Since my wife died those moments are few and far between, so I'll have to think about our conversation later and see if it perks me up and makes me feel all sparkly inside."
Parker snorted in spite of himself. Lambert was as much of an asshole as he'd always been.
"How's your mobility?"
Again, Parker scowled. His mobility was a touchy subject. "Fine," he lied. "Why?"
Lambert sighed on the other end of the line. "I know you've gotten a job in Denver with Duncan Wilde, but I don't know what you're doing."
"Why don't you call him and snoop, like you used to? Use your influence to strong arm him into telling you?"
"I thought about it but I'm giving you the option of telling me. You were a good SEAL Quinn, and I'm sorry you got rolled out the way you did. I didn't follow up with you the way I should have, but if you're like me, you're chafing in the civilian world, looking for something more. I've got something for you but you have to be physically able to do it."
He wasn't even sure he wanted whatever it was. Probably some do or die mission that had to be acted upon immediately. That was usually the way Greg Lambert worked. And if Parker didn't do the job, Lambert would call some other dumb schmuck who would.
He had a good life here in Denver. After he'd been released from the SEALs, medically retired from the Navy, he'd moped for a long time, and wallowed in his recovery. Physically, he'd been mobile, but just barely. The insurgents had done a real number on him. When word had gotten around to him that there was a former Marine in Denver that only hired other disabled veterans, he'd been intrigued, but not much more than that. It wasn't until months later that he actually looked the place up online. There was one tab on the website to 'apply to join our team!' Parker hadn't even had a resume at the time. How do you encapsulate thirteen years in the Navy and all his SEAL experience into a few paragraphs? You didn't, you couldn’t; most of his missions had been classified and he couldn’t discuss them with anyone, ever. Instead he'd left his former commander's name and number, as well as a copy of his medical record. Apparently that had worked because a woman from Lost and Found called him two weeks later to arrange an interview, if he was still interested in the job.
Was he? He'd looked around his neglected apartment and knew he needed something to get him out of the slump he was in, so he'd agreed.
It was the best thing he'd ever done. The Lost and Found Investigative Service was comprised of veterans just like him-- men that had seen the bad side of war and returned from it changed. There were
also a few women vets working there, just as blunt and capable as the men. Duncan Wilde had proven to be a savvy boss, pushing him to the limits of what he could do but not taxing him too much. Generally, he did surveillance or he drove clients that were under their protection. Denver wasn't a metropolis like New York or LA, but they had their fair share of affluent people needing coverage. He'd gotten his private investigator's license and realized that the more he got into the job, the more he had to learn. It was giving him something to work toward.
Parker didn't mind the challenge. It gave him something to focus on. Yes, it could have been more stimulating, but he understood that he needed to start on the bottom, too, and work his way up to the meatier jobs.
"The pay is substantial."
When Lambert spewed out the number, Parker couldn't keep the surprise from his face. "That's a heck of a teaser. What's the job?"
"Surveillance, for the most part, and possibly more. You'll be sitting on a prosecuting attorney for the next week. She's the primary in a criminal case against an actor from a small terror cell in Columbus, Ohio. He had visions of being a lone wolf but botched the job. Now he's in lockup awaiting trial. Actually, we think Mozi Al Fareq is the fourth or fifth son of the man that runs the terrorist cell responsible for the truck attack on the Columbus Christmas Parade several months ago. Do you remember that?"
"Of course," Parker said softly. "It killed a lot of people, mostly kids."
"Yes," Lambert said, his voice muted. "Fuckers. There's a special place in hell for people who kill little kids like that."
