Page 126 of Lucky Charm

Hunt pulled out several sheets of paper covered with neat print. “You better get some coffee.”

He waited until Quaid had filled a cup, then he started reading.

Dear Quaid:

I don’t know if this letter will find you, but I sent it to Germany because we had some good times there, and I knew they’d forward it to you.

Things are ten ways to fucked up, and I have no one to blame but myself.

Me, Baltimore Douglas Reid III, curse the generational lineage that put my family into government service. I accepted this assignment to piss on the life plan that had been decided before I was even out of diapers. But you know this.

My father’s support for my role with the CIA is at an end. He’s utterly, bitterly disappointed in the son who won’t follow the ambassador footsteps of great-grandfather to grandfather to father. My ex-wife has me by the balls, and my bank account more than proves that sex and love are not the same thing. The CIA trained me to be an uncompromising son of a bitch, then launched me into a relentless string of missions. My last one came to close to killing me.Wait, you were there for that, too. Ironically, it was the scars from that mission that sold my cover for this one. But I’m afraid this time, I’ve made a misstep and may get my head cut off by a nasty, soulless terrorist.

You know the mission as well as I do. Guns, Drugs, IQS. Impossible success ratio. These people don’t give a shit about Afghanistan as a nation. They care about their tribe. I am an outsider, always will be, and I don’t have free reign to search and explore with impunity. Here twelve fucking months, and everyone is tight-lipped. I’ve done what I can with my camera.

“With his camera?” Hunt looked at Quaid.

Quaid had a memory card pinched between his fingers. “It was enclosed.”

Hunt frowned. “Well, fuck. Did you look at it?”

“Not yet. Knew it wasn’t wise to do it alone. I’ve taken too much flak from Stocker for how that all went down.”

“Good point.” Hunt went back to reading.

To confess, my lack of success could also possibly be because my give-a-fuck is busted.

Might be the sex slavery traffic or being asked by the CIA to turn my back on shit like that. Or that the boy’s mother was sold by her family at fucking twelve.

Might be the lack of a cheeseburger.

Might be my occasional recreational drug use to still the PTSD.

But most definitely it’s sweet Kaamisha.

Hunt swore quietly. “He fell for the woman. I knew it was about the woman and the boy.”

Quaid sank into a chair. “The boy?”

“This Kaamisha was with Reid. She’s dead, too. Didn’t Stocker tell you?”

Quaid rose and paced, his face twisted with emotion. “No, he only told me Reid was dead. Bullet to the head.”

Hunt set the letter on the coffee table in front of him and steepled his fingers. He hadn’t been given any direct orders about excluding Quaid from the knowledge so what was Stocker up to?

Hunt told the story. “We went back to the mountains a few days after our escapade. We found Haquiri dead with a bullet to the head.”

Quaid stopped and stared at him. “He didn’t tell me that either,” he growled in a low tone.

“We started tracking the boy, and finally found him in Jalalabad. By the time we identified the house and took a team in, Reid and the woman were dead. Each had a bullet to the head. Boy was gone.”

“Where to?” Quaid’s face screwed into a puzzled, hurt expression.

“I don’t know the how of where to, but I do know where.”

“That made no sense at all.”

Hunt looked at the bedroom door, then got up and checked on Cait. Still sleeping soundly. He carefully shut the door again. Back in his seat, hedrilled Quaid with a stare. “I haven’t told Cait this, yet. Haven’t decided if I’m going to tell her.”