Luke Taylor...
A/N...
I've put out two posts today, so if you haven't read it yet, go back and read the first post, Unlikely Partners, first... 💋
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Sang and Axel called a family meeting as soon as they returned from the February BoD meeting with the Academy on the 28th February,
'Aside from Volto, which we will continue to work with the MC, we have been given our first assignment as the Ghost team,' the team focused their attention on Sang as she explained the intel and purpose of the assignment,
'Our role is to ensure the uncovered assassination threat against the governor does not happen. However, we are not to be seen and will have no direct contact with the governor or his family as obvious protection detail. The family will, however, be aware of our aliases - a family who run a charitable foundation offering recovery and respite to disabled children and their families via the horse ranch here on the vinery, which we will open for business in a month's time. The reason they will be aware of us, is one of their children is disabled and will attend our ranch as a therapy treatment,' Axel began allocating responsibilities to the Ghost team,
'Iris, you and Corey will take the governor's family and immediate contacts details given by the BoD to monitor all comms to and from the family. You will also be given access to the evidence of the threats to assassinate in case you can decipher something more than the government agencies could from the physical and digital evidence. Skug will be joining us today as a liaison...'
The Toma men gave Sang and Iris furtive glances, noticing that they'd stiffened at the mention of their MC 'brother'. Neither responded so Axel pushed the matter,
'Will that be a problem, ladies?' Sang and Iris had a silent conversation before answering,
'We will let you know after we've spoken to him today,' Axel rubbed the back of his neck to hide his anxiety. He hoped Skug was planning on making some kind of amends to the twins regarding his role in tampering with the Blackbourne video when he arrived or he was likely to find his only positive link to the project would be Corey. He hoped that didn't happen as he'd have to step in as team lead to ensure best results occurred.
He really did not want to find himself on the twins' shit list. He and the boys had started discussing and planning a surprise for the twins on their 20th birthday in October that could be ruined if this assignment created a rift amongst them...
Axel ran through the rest of the team's roles noticing that Sang and Iris, while engaged in the external conversation, had also continued their private discussion. Thinking about it, Sang had been unusually quiet on the plane journey from South Carolina to Sacramento.
Perhaps there was something more than Skugga causing the intense conversation between the twins... He could think of nothing else that happened in the board meeting... It must be the meeting she had afterward with Jessica Lee.
Hmmm... what were his birds up to now...
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Splitting himself between South Carolina and California had proven far more difficult than Phil had imagined. He'd needed someone to intern with his secretary so that she could be freed up to run his South Carolina patients and manage his Academy commitments.
His secretary had handled the recruitment process and had offered the role to a recently early graduated senior from high school who was able to commit until September when she would be headed to university. He would be meeting her this morning when he wrapped things up before returning to the Sacramento office.
Phil was tired. He'd had a complex surgery scheduled the day before the Academy board meeting, which had been held yesterday, for one of his personal patients. He was just returning from checking on the patient's after care and had been pleased that she was recuperated enough to be released later this morning.
Phil opened the door to his office to find his secretary, Eve Mallory, and the new intern going over office protocols. The new intern was a 17 year old with light brown hair, green eyes framed by a pair of dark purple glasses and a bright, friendly smile. His secretary lifted her head from the monitor on her desk and gave him a professional smile,
'Good morning, Dr. Roberts. Did all go well with signing off Ms Danvers?'
'Yes, she is recovering well and may continue her ongoing treatment from home now,'
'Wonderful,' Eve responded in her efficient manner,
'I'd like to introduce the new intern, Jessica Lee,'
Phil raised an eyebrow,
'You wouldn't be related to Dakota Lee, would you?' Jessica grinned broadly,
'Guilty. He's my brother, although he's presently on assignment with the Academy. Though, I suppose you already now that...' Jess blushed in embarrassment, remembering that Phil was the President of the Academy board.
Phil just grinned back at her to put her at ease,
'Don't worry about it, Jessica. It's not your fault I wear more than one hat,' He winked at her and she smiled back gratefully, Eve asked to speak with him privately and confirmed that she'd had Jessica sign an NDA (Non Disclosure Agreement) as part of her induction paperwork.
Phil wasn't very concerned - Jessica may speak with Kota once every three months but Eve would make sure she didn't see anything strictly confidential and with Sang and Axel on the BoD now, they were a more worrying potential source of information to the Blackbourne team than Jessica Lee could ever be.
Still, best to make sure Mak knows about the possible link back to the Blackbournes...
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All nine members of the Blackbourne team were in Victor's office reviewing the information gathered carefully since the fake bust nearly four weeks ago.
The surveillance of the two girls who'd been wearing the bugged necklaces showed clearly that they had definitely been sent in as potential spies. There were a couple of reasons this was indisputable. The first being their physical condition in comparison to the other four girls. While the initial medical exam had shown that the two girls in question had been forced into some form of very rough intercourse prior to being rescued, they were lacking the extensive scaring and tearing from repeated sexual abuse over an extended period of time that the other four girls' exams had disclosed.
In fact the evidence from those medical exams had been horrific even for Kota and Nathan who'd experienced abuse themselves. Those four girls had been tortured - ribs, arms, legs, fingers and toes showing multiple breaks over a likely period of 6-18 months. Two of the girls had required surgery to repair their perineums - the barrier between the vagina and the anus - due to severe sexual abuse. None of them were older than 18.
All six girls had been separated and taken to homes for abused women. Beforehand, during the two days the girls were debriefed and examined, both mentally and physically, both necklaces had been, at different times, replaced with the spare from the Andrews birds gifts and taken for analysis of the bugging devices within.
The second reason they were certain the two girls were spies was the direct communication with someone in the Viper organisation. The complication in dealing with the two girls was that while they were spying for the Viper, it was clear from the audio evidence gathered that neither was doing so willingly. They were both being blackmailed in some way - the team suspected the Viper was holding their families' safety over their heads. The longer the two girls went without giving good intel to the Viper team, the more pressure they were being placed under and the more desperate and stressed they were becoming.
Soon the Blackbourne men had decided they would approach the girls directly to give them an opportunity to become double agents with the opportunity to go into witness protection afterward. Once they decided on a way to have the conversation privately away from the bugged devices.
The Blackbournes and the Bratva had gone through the exercise of looking at 'leads' from the fake bust as well as what misinformation the two spies had provided to cover both the two unwitting spies as well as Amanda Andrews' tip off with the chrysanthemum necklaces.
The team was beginning to give up hope that Amanda would contact them directly though.
Victor and Skug had been able to localise the location of the signal from the bugging devise but not pin point the exact position and building. The Ravensthal Bratva was systematically going through the area to identify that source. They should have that location within the next week or so.
Things were progressing well. At least with regard to closing in on Kayli and Blake. Vasily and Owen, however, were both of the opinion that, capturing the Coaltar leg of the operation did not necessarily equate to closing down the Viper them self.
This was why both the team and Vasily were hanging onto hope that Amanda would find a way to contact them. She was the inside person they needed to answer questions that had been unanswerable for the last two years on the Viper,
'Vic what do you think Amanda would do to contact us if she was able to? We never trusted her team with our secured comms but we did communicate with the Andrews team during their time with us on this case under a secured system... Do you think she'd try to access that system?' Owen wondered out loud. Victor clicked away from the audio from the two spies to open a window into his archived files. He clicked onto the Andrews' file and pulled up the secured comms folder,
'No, there's nothing new in that file,' Victor started to close the file when he noticed a new entry, dated 1st February in a different folder under the Andrews team,
'However, I should have considered that she might use an even more direct approach...' Vic clicked onto the folder which kept the audio and visual feed from Amanda's chrysanthemum necklace. The team crowded around behind the desk to see the monitor.
When the media played, the sound of a shower running was the only noise. A mirror view showed a standard white tiled bathroom, Amanda was standing in front of the reflective surface wearing a towelling robe, holding the shower curtain open just far enough so that she could use her hands to break the flow of the running water to make it seem as though there was someone cleaning themselves in the shower stall. For ten minutes that was all that occurred. Then as the mirror fogged over with steam, she used her finger to write on the surface of the glass:
3 March 10am St. Nicholas Church and Museum. Only one or two of you. In disguise.
She stared into the mirror intently before wiping the words away and removing the necklace. The frame went black and shortly after the video finished.
'Fuck yeah!' Gabe swore happily as all nine smirked at this unexpected step toward unmasking the Viper,
'Call Vasily.'
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Volto had been watching Amanda closely since she'd taken the opportunity to visit the Eppingi Tower tour four weeks earlier. Aside from monitoring Amanda's movements minutely, Volto had also had the Eppingi Tower tour watched for a week afterward. The same tour guide had worked on two other days and the tour she'd given was exactly the same as the one Amanda had seen and all the other tour guides gave the same tour as well. There was no deception that could be detected.
It mystified Volto that Amanda had chosen to risk their displeasure for a tour of the landmark but eventually, without any incriminating evidence to the contrary, they'd come to the conclusion Amanda simply had a thing for taking in historic sights in Tallinn. She had not stepped a toe out of line since then and had been extremely cooperative whenever asked to undertake tasks. Perhaps visiting historical places relaxed her? Odd behaviour but there was no harm in it, could even be useful information... She was a very pretty girl after all.
The Blackbourne team seemed to have taken the bait from the staged bust on the 2nd February as they'd absorbed up the two girls they'd rescued into their organisation along with the other four genuine rescued females, although neither had provided any useful intel as yet on the Blackbourne team or Turgenev Bratva.
Volto didn't expect any mind blowing intel to come from the two plants for quite awhile, despite the pressure they'd enjoyed putting on the two terrified girls. Volto's associates were, in fact, holding their younger siblings as collateral against their continued good behaviour so they were satisfied both would do exactly as they were told. Volto snorted, loving people just provided your enemies with a target. Attachments made you weak. Volto had no attachments. Not even to their partners.
At any rate, those two teenagers would be very useful once they coaxed their way into the Turgenev organisation and the Blackbourne team as decoys - like they previously used the Andrews team. They could sell themselves as too 'damaged' for anything else. Volto grinned. The only concern was whether Vasily Turgenev would go for the bleeding heart approach as that definitely was not his usual m.o. If the girls succeeded in getting into the two teams, they'd be in positions to open both the Blackbourne and the Bratva entirely to Volto by planting audio and visual devices in key locations.
But the real prize was hopefully getting the Ghost team location.
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Sang and Iris were keeping an eye on the septs. The babies had reached the stage where they were rocking on their hands and knees and crawling about bashing into one another like bumper cars.
They loved playing peek a boo and were all smiling, laughing and giggling despite having painful, red gums that signalled their teeth coming through. Their puzzle solving abilities were beyond what the development books indicated should be expected now, giving all eight of the Ghost family parents nervous days and nights trying to stay ahead of the precocious infants.
Noah and Loki were the best crawlers but Rin and Viola were pulling themselves up to stand of their chubby little legs. Sang felt sure one of the girls would walk first or perhaps just break out into a shocking run. Or maybe she was just a proud, biased mother...
'Did we make the right choice drafting Jess in to run checks on the strength and robustness of the security systems the other directors and trustees have for their comms, sis?' Iris sighed,
'I know you're worried about Jess being exposed but the risk is very minimal and she wanted to help her brother and his friends, not to mention keeping her nephews and nieces safe. She'll be 18 in April so I say she's old enough to decide for herself... and let's face it, we'll both protect her should we need to,' Sang's shoulders rotated as she tried to work the stress out of her neck,
'If we didn't need to plug the hole that is feeding Volto2 with information, I'd never have agreed to let her help but I do think she should have the right to choose her own path forward, if she has all the information required to make an informed choice... it's what I wanted at her age.' Iris gave her sister a sharp look,
'You're thinking of taking at least Kaiden if not Loki and Noah too to the next BoD meeting end of May, aren't you?' Sang shrugged,
'I am, but if I take all three, at least Raven, if not more of the fellas, will insist on coming with Axel and me. I'm not sure that six or more of us travelling together is smart. We will draw too much attention...' Iris nodded and then cocked her head at Sang,
'But if we travelled separately but together on the same flight as three different families with 2 babies each except one family with 3 babies, that could work as a distraction. To be safe, we'd have to travel under different aliases and perhaps fly into Georgetown instead of Charleston,' Sang smiled as she considered her twin's suggestion,
'That's a great idea! I was just thinking last week that it might be good for us to have a short vacation together as a family... if we flew into Georgetown, it's only an hour's drive south to Charleston and an hour's drive north to Myrtle Beach. Axel and I could go to the BoD meeting and arrange for Jess, Erica and Uncle to meet us in Georgetown the next day. Although they would only be invited for the day. Then we could travel north to Myrtle Beach for a three-five day mini break, just the 15 of us...'
Iris began to get excited about the idea,
'Call the fellas! If there's nothing on the vinery or disabled children business schedules to stop us going, I think they'd really be up for some quality time away as a family...'
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A/N...
So who thinks Jess would make a good Academy team member with a spin off story all of her own...?
The connections are starting to happen with the folks who could expose Volto's 1&2 as well as the shrouded group behind Volto2...
How long do you think it will take before the guys wise up and share with the people who can join the dots...?
What do you guys want to see during the Ghost family's va-ca to Myrtle Beach - septs time, sexy time or cuddle time with all 15?
What do you think the Tomas surprise is for Sang and Iris' birthday?
Hope you enjoyed the double post!
Next update Friday! 💋