65

Pensacola, Florida

Present day

It had been raining for three days. Some of the streets were flooded, and many basements were wet. Jack Winthrop missed the dry heat of Kuwait. He folded his shirts and placed them neatly in his suitcase, checking the two encrypted devices he used to send and receive e-mails. He felt a headache coming on, probably because of jet lag. He hadn’t had enough time to spend with his wife and two daughters.

He had been watching the sheets of rain beat down on the sand in front of his villa when he received the request from Aurora Source. He didn’t want to leave so soon. He missed his girls when he was away, and the distance between him and his wife seemed to grow with each trip. Then there was the memory of that one-eyed man in the hangar in Kuwait. He was feeling remorse, and that didn’t help him do his job.

He checked his ticket. Destination Paris. There were worse places to be sent.

He opened the door to his girls’ room and looked at the walls filled with Disney posters. They were sleeping. He kissed them on the forehead. He knew his wife was pretending to sleep.

The rain slapped his face as he ran to the taxi waiting in front of the house. When he got to the airport, he learned that his flight to Miami had been cancelled because of the weather. He scanned the waiting area filled with anonymous passengers, all of whom were focused on their cell phones.

Jack Winthrop made a decision. This would be his last assignment for Aurora.