Backblast by Candace Irving (brene brown rising strong .TXT) 📗

Riyad reached down to retrieve the microTLC. "If the diplomats or crew of that Super Stallion could engineer the delivery of the poison to the terminal in Al Dhafra, why not Garrison? I've read the man's record. Garrison is resourceful and smart—and he's Special Forces. As such, he's proven himself more than adept at functioning under extreme conditions."

Riyad was right. John was an exceptionally proficient, quick thinker whose efforts produced results above and beyond his peers.

As for the man standing in front of her? The one gripping the handle of that case as though he was ready to fight her for it?

Sam Riyad was a bona fide idiot if he'd managed to miss the rest of what was in John's record.

She'd read John's file too after she'd been tasked with investigating his houseguest in Germany—all of it. John's enlisted and officer evaluations, the writeup for his Silver Star, as well as the Bronze Star with V device for valor, that he'd been awarded, not to mention the other countless medals and commendations that proved his character was above reproach.

But there was no point in wasting her time trying to convince the spook.

She'd simply run the test on residue from the cup of coffee Hachemi had partially consumed that morning, and then tossed at John in anger shortly before his death. The tox results would support her view of John's character, not Riyad's.

She held out her hand and waited for the spook to hand over the microTLC.

He simply stared. Make that, glared.

"Oh, for Christ's sake. I'm not planning on 'accidentally' tossing it out the back of the chopper while we're skimming the ocean." Though the verdict was still out on whether or not she intended to do the same with the spook.

And, Lord, was she tempted.

He finally extended his hand, relinquishing the case with a shrug. "I know you don't see it, but you will. There's no one else. The timing might be tight, but Garrison is the only one who knew Hachemi was on the ship before he ever came aboard."

The spook was wrong about that, too.

"Sorry, Agent Riyad, but there is someone else."

Someone her so-called partner had chosen to leave off his suspect list. Someone even she'd left out of her tally, at least her verbal one. Someone who was bound to have had at least as much warning regarding his own shipboard destination as John had been given before he'd left Fort Campbell. Someone who'd also known Hachemi was aboard that vessel, zealously guarding a traitor's name on the tip of his tongue. Someone who'd spent even longer aboard the Griffith than John, trying to get that name out of the recalcitrant translator.

Someone who, by the spook's own admission, had also had even more downtime in that terminal in Al Dhafra before he'd boarded the Super Stallion.

She doubted Riyad had even realized it.

She shook her head in disgust and turned, only to stop short as the spook grabbed her upper arm.

She jerked her arm from his grip as she spun around. "Touch me again and I will knock your ass out the back of that bird on our way to the Griffith."

And it wouldn't be an accident.

He stared down at her. "Who?"

"Just to be clear, Agent Riyad. Are you asking me—the 'nauseatingly feted' CID agent assigned to this case—if I have any inkling as to who else had the requisite means and opportunity to kill Tamir Hachemi?"

The glare turned Arctic. "Yes."

"You."

12

The return flight to the Griffith was taking twice as long as the initial leg to the carrier, and it had nothing to do with the readout on Regan's watch.

It had to do with that glare. Riyad's glare.

The Arctic frost that he'd blown her way inside the USS Ronald Reagan's patient ward had long since seared off. Fury simmered in its place, somehow spiking along with each rattle and rumble of the haze-gray helicopter that surrounded them.

It was ironic. She'd be the first to admit that she'd had issues with John when they'd met, due to the man's innate arrogance. But John had nothing on the overinflated ego squatting across the belly of this bird. The ego who'd spent the better part of their current chopper hop openly watching. Assessing.

Her…and the rugged plastic case tucked up against her boots.

She swore the spook actually believed her capable of plotting to render the microTLC inside useless. But that was crazy.

Wasn't it?

She caught the crew chief's wave. The Marine acknowledged her nod with one of his own before crossing his forearms to signal the chopper's imminent landing.

Three raised fingers followed.

Three minutes to the Griffith's flight deck.

Three minutes to waving goodbye to the asshole who was still scowling at her. Screw the man's co-investigator status. Chief Yrle could witness the tests on the rat bait that the woman had been ordered to collect up via the ship-to-ship call Riyad had instigated. And then, she and Yrle would move on to the dregs of that coffee.

She hadn't been exaggerating in the aircraft carrier's patient ward. If she hoped to pull off her coming showdown with Durrani, she needed the distraction John's added presence would provide. Especially since John would be conscious during this meeting. Something neither John nor Staff Sergeant Tulle had been back in Charikar.

The change in status just might prick the Afghan doc's own colossal ego deeply enough for her to get a name out of the bastard.

She was willing to start with any one of the three they were now after.

Unfortunately, it was nearing midnight. She suspected that Durrani had turned in hours ago, along with the bulk of the crew, after the ship had passed the word for taps. Even if Durrani was a night owl, there was no way she'd risk starting up an interrogation session at this hour. Doing so would send a dangerous message.

One of desperation.

The fact that she was desperate was immaterial. Until morning, patience reigned…however grudgingly executed, especially in her.

Oddly enough, her patience had been shored up by the owner of that perpetual