Page 82 of Enigma

She looked at Mitzi, who was officially the senior agent on the team.

“Fast and aggressive. They’re counting on us being cornered.” Mitzi moved to the main entrance. “On my count.”

Silence stretched for several heartbeats. Then Mitzi kicked open the door and rolled out into the darkness, immediately drawing fire from two positions.

Jason and Olive emerged from the door simultaneously, catching their attackers in a crossfire.

Their attackers had positioned themselves for a siege, not expecting their targets to come out shooting.

Within minutes, two of the ambushers were down, and the other two had retreated.

No one was dead—but no one would be coming after them any time soon either.

Mitzi sprinted toward the nearest fallen attacker and grabbed a tactical radio from the man’s belt. She ran back to the rest of the team.

The radio crackled to life with an urgent voice. “Team Two, report. What’s your status?”

Mitzi looked at Olive and held out the radio, letting her call the shots.

After a moment’s hesitation, she took it and pressed the transmit button. “Team Two is compromised.”

A pause sounded on the other end, then a woman’s voice came through the static—calm, controlled, and achingly familiar. “I’m disappointed, sweetheart. I really hoped you would have taken my advice and walked away.”

Olive’s blood turned to ice in her veins.

Was she imagining things? Hearing what she wanted or giving in to the power of suggestion?

“Hello, Olive,” the woman continued. “I think it’s time we had that talk.”

Olive stared at the radio in her hands, her heart pounding. “You’re right. We should talk.”

“Face-to-face,” the woman said.

Jason immediately shook his head, his expression grim. “That’s a terrible idea.”

“You should have taken the money and forgotten about this,” the woman continued.

“You know I won’t do that,” Olive said into the radio.

A soft laugh came through the speaker. “No, I suppose you won’t. You were always too stubborn for your own good.”

The familiar criticism hit Olive like a physical blow. It was something her mother had said to her countless times during her childhood.

“I gave you a way out, sweetheart,” the voice continued, something that almost sounded like sadness to her tone. “But now that you’ve come this far, now that you know this much . . . I can’t protect you anymore.”

Olive’s hands trembled as she held the radio. Part of her wanted to believe this was really her mother, that somehow Margot Sterling had survived and been trying to keep her daughter safe all these years.

But another part of her remembered the violence that had been following her lately.

Could her mom really be responsible for those things?

“Mom?” she whispered into the radio. “Is it really you?”

The radio crackled with static, but no voice came through.

“Mom?” Olive tried again, pressing the transmit button repeatedly.

Nothing.