need to talk to him tomorrow. And Anthony has to have answers, and I believe he’ll talk to me. He was always kind. Brought me a trinket every time he visited.” She smiled as if a happy memory had come to mind. “But, um, we’ll know a lot more after the meeting.” She slowly turned around, her eyes moving to everyone in the room before landing on A.J. last. “Either way, I’m certain the labyrinth will be where Grigory proposes we meet. Sort of brings us full circle. And then we can try and find out if Adrik is still alive.”
“And if he is alive, the man would be as important, if not more valuable, to the FBI than the ledger,” Roman commented. “It’s possible the Russians would want him just as much as they’d want the book.”
“If he’s still alive,” Harper reminded him, eyes on Roman, and the way she peered at him made A.J. feel like the two of them were having a telepathic conversation, reading each other’s thoughts.
Chris lifted a hand in the air. “And meeting with a Russian mobster in a series of foreign tunnels sounds about as smart as the hot woman going down into the basement when she hears a creepy noise at night.” He made a stabbing motion in the air. “No bueno.”
“I know it sounds crazy, but I think we can make it work if you’re up to it. I promise.” Ana’s confidence she’d lost last night after the encounter with his brother had apparently returned. A determined woman on a mission. “You all have a lot of aces up your sleeve, is getting us on a plane to Budapest while I’m a fugitive one of them?”
“I know a guy who knows a guy,” Chris teased.
“And if Porter doesn’t show with Anthony tomorrow?” There’s still that giant question mark to consider.
“We fly to Budapest either way and bait Grigory into believing we have the key,” Harper answered before Ana could respond. “One way or another, we’re taking down the Volkovs.”
“And clearing Ana’s name,” A.J. added in case his team needed a reminder.
“Right,” Harper said softly. “We’ll go make some calls. See about that plane.” Harper was already on the move.
“Maybe study the location of the safe house again,” Chris added, following Harper. “There’s way too much ground to cover and—”
“Wait.” The blood practically drained from A.J.’s face. “I want the plan to use this meeting tomorrow as bait for The Huntsman off the table.” He glared at his team now crowded by the doorframe leading to the hall. “It’s the only way I go tomorrow. We can’t risk something going wrong. We locate the sources another way.”
“Maybe he’s right,” Ana said, and his shoulders dropped in relief. “One issue at a time.”
“You’re sure?” Harper raised a brow, and Ana nodded. “Okay, I’ll loop Jessica in on the change of plans.”
When his teammates were gone, he snatched Ana in his arms and pulled her tight to his chest, unable to stop himself. “How would you feel about being Echo One tomorrow?” he whispered into her ear.
She pulled back to find his face. “Isn’t that team leader?”
He smiled, doing his best to lock up his nerves. “This is your mission, isn’t it?”
“True.” Her hardened expression loosened a touch. “You sure your people are up for tomorrow?”
He stroked her back to calm her. Hell, to calm him, too. “We do this all of the time. You wouldn’t sleep at night if you knew the messes we wind up in. This is honestly a piece of cake. I mean, not that I don’t want you sleeping at night from worry. But you know what I’m saying.”
She pushed up on her toes and tipped her lips like an offer to kiss her, and that’s exactly what he did, to hell if anyone walked in.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Echo One, that’s a good copy.”
Echo One. Ana’s lips would’ve twitched into a smile at A.J.’s use of her call sign if she weren’t so nervous as to whether Porter would show with the forger, her father’s old friend. When she’d worked with A.J.’s team last year, she’d been on the outside looking in, wondering what his team knew and how they knew it. It was an entirely different feeling to truly be part of his unit.
A.J.’s team was down a man, the real Echo One, and there was way too much ground to cover. They were surrounded by miles of woods in the middle of nowhere. A.J., Ana, Harper, and Roman had