Page 29 of Delta (Alpha #12)

S he dials an extraordinarily long series of numbers. Puts the phone on speaker, holds it near her face, parallel to the floor. It rings three times.

"Acme Concierge Service, how may I help you?" The voice that answers is a smooth, accent-less female voice, a professional phone operator.

I stifle an involuntary snicker at the name Acme, though. What is this, Bugs fucking Bunny?

"Hi, my name is Jane Smith,” Bryn says. “I need to get in touch with a travel agent." Bryn's voice is even, expressionless.

"I see. Do you have a particular agent in mind?"

"Yes, actually. I was hoping you could connect me to Doc Smith."

There's a pause. "I see. And this is Jane Smith, you said?"

"Yes."

"Do you have an ACS identification number?"

"I do. It's one-six-five-bravo-echo-hotel."

Another of those pauses. "Very good, Miss Smith. Category?"

"Um. Just…code red."

"I'm sorry, Miss Smith, but that's not a recognized category."

"Goddammit," she whispers, her voice losing the even, measured quality for a moment, going shaky. "I need a return ticket."

"Thank you, miss. Shall I have your agent return your call to this number?"

“Yes, please."

"Very good, miss." A pause. "I have contacted your agent. Doc Smith will be contacting you very shortly. Will that be all?" The emphasis on ‘very’ seems intentional and important in this coded conversation.

"Yes, ma'am. Thank you."

"It's my pleasure, Miss Smith. Take care and thank you for contacting Acme Concierge Service. Goodbye."

Bryn ends the call and sets the phone on her thigh, staring at it expectantly.

"Sorry, but Acme—?" I start.

She holds up a finger, indicating I should shut up and wait, so I do. At literally the very moment she lifts that finger, the phone rings. She answers on the first ring, putting it on speaker.

"Hi, Daddy," she whispers, her voice shaky. "You're on speaker and I'm not alone, but I…well, it's complicated, but I'm mostly safe and able to speak freely."

There's a significant pause, and then a low, silky-smooth, hard-as-nails voice slides across the line. "When you, your mother, your brother, and I spent a week at Disney World when you were nine, I purchased a souvenir for you. What was it, and what did you call it?"

She licks her lips, exhaling slowly. "A stuffed llama. I called her Yammie, because I'd just started taking Spanish lessons and figured they should be called yammas rather than llamas."

"If you are able to speak freely, tell me five significant details of the person you are with."

"His name is Rush. He's former SAS. He works, or worked, for Roberto Pugli, who is responsible for this whole…

situation I'm in. He needs, for a reason I have not yet discovered, a quarter million dollars.

Two hundred and seventy-six thousand and change—it's a very specific number.

Um. He…Oh, he's fluent in French and German. "

There's another heavy pause. The voice returns—Nicholas Harris, I assume. The legend is real. "Bryn. Sweetheart. I love the shit out of you, girl, but what the actual fuck ?" The last word is furious, snarled.

"I'm sorry, Daddy.”

"You give your bodyguards the slip by picking a fight—" I hear Mom's voice in the background, muffled and unclear.

"Do not encourage her, Layla. And then you fucking vanish off the face of the earth. In the wake of your little Houdini act, at least six men have turned up dead. Two of whom were brutally murdered in what I can only describe as clever ways that tell me you’ve taken a few situational survival lessons from your mother. "

"That's…accurate."

"Elaborate, Bryn. Now .”

Oooh boy, Daddy is peeved .

Bryn launches into a facts-only retelling of the events, and it doesn't seem like she leaves anything out except for our little sexual side quest.

And my betrayal.

Once she's done—having made it seem like Pugli captured us rather than the truth, her father is silent again. "You're lying about something." His voice is cold. "Don't."

"Daddy, I—"

"I have four fucking fireteams scouring Europe for you.

I pulled your Uncle Lear away from a very important case to track your movements.

Your mother is frantic. Your brother and Cal are beside themselves.

Law enforcement from three different countries have your fucking face on their wanted lists.

" His voice rises in volume—just a hair above the quiet, conversational tone he's used so far. It seems significant, though I don’t know the man from Adam.

"So, I will say this only once, Bryn Eloise Harris. Do— not —fucking— LIE —to—me.” He bites out each word, snapping the world "lie" with vicious intensity.

"Tell him the truth, Bryn," I murmur. "I'll accept the consequences."

"Consequences?" Nicholas says, the question ominous.

"I told you he works for Pugli." She swallows hard. "I didn't know that at first. He…he was, um…"

"Pugli has leverage over me, sir," I say.

"Significant leverage. Enough to force me to do things that go against everything I am.

I was tasked with bringing Bryn to Pugli.

And I did. But I couldn't go through with it.

I don't say that to justify anything, though. I did what I did, and I ain’t gonna deny it. "

Harris is silent. "I assume your relationship has crossed into…personal territory."

Bryn snorts. "That's none of your business."

"He betrayed you. Tricked you. Lied to you. Sold you to one of the most notoriously vile human beings on the planet. Yet you're still with him."

"I told you, it's complicated."

"I suppose that's your choice, and I'll have to let you make it.

God knows we've all made weird choices in this fucked up family.

" He sighs. "What do you need? Why call now?

I assume because you thought you could handle it on your own and have come up against something you can't handle by yourself. "

"Rush thinks they're tracking me, somehow. Like a chip or something. They keep showing up everywhere I go, when there's no way they should be able to."

"You're using the evasion strategies we've taught you?"

“And then some. Rush knows what he's doing, Dad."

"Ah, here we go." A lengthy pause. "I just received Rush's dossier from Lear."

"Shit," I mutter.

Bryn glances at me. "Something to hide? Something else, I mean?"

I snort bitterly. “You might say that, yeah.”

"You're a complicated man, Rush Bellamy."

"Bellamy ain't my real last name,” I answer. “I just picked it for the military forms coz it sounded good."

"Then what is your last name?”

"Ain't got one, sir,” I answer. “I was left on the steps of a vicarage in central London when I was not even a week old. No clue who either parent was. Raised in an orphanage till I was eight and then put in various foster homes till I ran away and lived on the streets. I was given the name Rush by a nun at the orphanage because I had too much energy and was always rushing around causin’ a ruckus. Before that, I was just 'you, boy.'"

"I see.” A long pause. “Recruited into the military at seventeen, SAS by nineteen. Top marks across the board in all disciplines. Multiple honors, decorations, and medals, including the Victoria Cross.” Another pause; the man uses pauses like weapons.

"But…you've also been demoted several times for a variety of offenses, mostly to do with insubordination, assault, and…

oh." He actually laughs. "You were discharged rather abruptly two and a half years ago, but the details are heavily redacted. "

"Yes, sir."

"I'm curious about that."

"Um." I really, really don't want to get into that.

"Dad," Bryn says, admonishing. "I'm not sure this is the right time for an interrogation."

Harris sighs. "I guess not. But son, we're gonna have that conversation."

"Ain’t your son, sir. Respectfully."

"Understood." Another of those damned dreadful pauses—I see where Bryn gets her penchant for using silences as interrogatory weapons. What's he going to say next? "What's he have on you?"

I clear my throat, reaching deep for a calm I do not feel. "So you can have it on me, too?"

Bryn takes the phone off speaker and puts it to her ear.

"Dad. I'll handle Rush and his secrets—yes, I'm aware.

No, I don't want you to intervene, I can handle it.

I just need this tracker deactivated. I didn't want to drag you all into this—yes, Dad, I know, god .

I've already apologized for—right, I forgot I have to use Dad's Official Apology Script or the apology doesn’t count.

" She speaks in a mocking, annoyed, monotone.

"I accept responsibility for my decision.

Regardless of extenuating circumstances which may or may not apply, I made choices and they are mine alone.

I'm sorry, Dad. I should not have ditched my guards, snuck out to a club for some unmonitored alone time, and gotten kidnapped by sex traffickers while trying to stop a kidnapping.

" A pause. "There—happy? Yeah, well, me neither. This hasn’t exactly been fun, Dad.

Jesus! Can you just fucking stop parenting me for six goddamn seconds and help me with my actual problem?

Or is this phone call just a waste of time?

Maybe I should have asked for Uncle Lear instead.

I mean, silly me, I thought you'd want to help .”

She listens for a while after that outburst, interjecting the occasional "right" and "yeah" and "got it."

After a few minutes of this, she says goodbye and ends the call, tossing the phone at me. “Good lord. He can be such an uptight jackass, sometimes."

"He cares." I give her a long, hard look. "Be grateful you have that, Bryn. No one on the planet has ever given a single solitary flying fuck what I do or what happens to me except as it affects them."

She scrubs her face. "You're right, I know you are. He just can't help himself."

"So. Is there a plan?"

She nods. "There is. We have to get to Lisbon—there's a contact there who can get this thing out of me."

“And then?"