Chapter 23

"What the fuck Jase?" Rays was the first voice Jason heard as he walked through the doors of the main safe house room, dropping his phone and gun on the table. Heard it was a strong description, more he was aware of it on the outskirts of his own thoughts.

Then there was Sonny "What's that spook got herself into this time?"

There were other raised voices and conversations but they were all floating around somewhere. Jason's head was thumping, he felt dizzy… he took himself back out of the main room and up a flight of stairs leading to the roof.

Back in the main room Davis held out her arm to stop Ray from following him, shaking her head "Ray, give him a moment"

Ray didn't look happy but he nodded in acknowledgement and sat himself at the table. "What do we know? How'd she seem?"

"In control" Davis said with confidence. "She didn't seem surprised to see us so she has either been briefed or her intel is better than ours"

"You make contact?" Clay also sat himself down at the table

"No. A subtle head shake from her to signal it was not the time or place. She had two guys following her every move" Davis continued

"Guards? bodyguards?" Asked Sonny

"Looked to us like she was comfortable enough in their presence, not afraid of them and they seem to treat her with respect and keep their distance. My guess is they aren't part of her team, but someone is protecting her. She's dressed the part, not dressed to blend, so they're protecting whoever she's pretending to be, not who she really is" Davis sat down and plugged her phone into the laptop, downloading the most recent images. She brought up the images from today.

"Mrs Spook looking hot" said Sonny whistling, Davis gave him a pointed look and he shut up.

"New do, new get-up, definitely under-cover" Clay commented raising an eyebrow. "Was Boss man OK?"

"He did what he always does, kept mission-focused, kept his distance, trusts her to do the same" Davis said simply shrugging her shoulders.

"So do we know why she's here? Whether this overlaps with us? Are we on the same team here or what?" Clay asks

"I don't know. I'm going to use the surveillance from today and compare it to what we've been watching over the last few weeks see if any of the people around Mandy overlap with people on our radar. We followed Mandy and her goons to a hotel in the city, the bodyguards aren't holding her hostage, it's a really nice hotel, The Grand, and they wait around a little while after she goes inside then they leave…" said Davis "I asked Brock and Trent to take over from us, to follow the bodyguards at a distance so hopefully we'll get an idea of where they go and maybe who they're working for"

"So we know where Mandy is staying, do we make contact or wait for her to find a way?" Sonny asks

"Sounds like a question for Jason" Davis says looking at Ray "Maybe take the man a beer?"

Ray stood from the table, grabbing two beers from the fridge and headed towards the roof.

When Jason reached the roof he bent over with his hands on his thighs, taking in some lungs full of early evening air. He stood himself with his back to the brick wall steadying himself and closed his eyes, focusing on his breathing, one useful thing he'd actually taken away from all those imposed therapy sessions over the years, in through the nose, out through the mouth he repeated in his head over and over as the thoughts began to slow and the world stopped spinning.

Once he was steady on his feet he sat himself in an old deckchair looking out over the Mexico City skyline, somewhere out there was Mandy, not at home safe like he'd hoped, instead she was right in the middle of all this same as them, except she wasn't with them and he was out of the loop. She looked amazing, when she smiled he swore his heart had stopped beating a few moments. It had taken very drop of willpower to keep him on the other side of the street.

He'd been glad it was Davis that was there, she didn't feel the need to question him every 5 seconds like some of the guys seemed to nowadays. If he said he was OK, she accepted it and moved on. But if she had something to say she just came out and said it without also expecting a conversation. She was a lot like Mandy that way, he could see now why the two of them got on so well. Being pretty much the only two women in Bravo teams professional orbit in a male-dominated line of work was always going to make them close but they weren't just colleagues they were friends and he could see why now. They were similar kinds of people.

She'd simply asked "You OK boss?" And when he'd nodded, she'd just nodded back.

Jason heard the roof door open, he knew it would be Ray, didn't need to turn round to know it.

"Beer man?" Ray says as he pulls up another deckchair next to Jason

Jason holds out his hand to accept a bottle "cheers"

Ray settles himself in the chair and they sit in silence for a while drinking their beers.

"Guys wondering if we make contact first or wait for Mandy?" Ray keeps it focused on the op for now

"I think we wait for her. We have no idea how sensitive this is or how easy it could be to blow her cover. This could impact our op too, I say we tread carefully." Jason says thoughtfully, he'd had some time up here on the roof to get his thoughts straight

Ray nods "Sounds sensible. Mandy has a lot of experience undercover, ten times more than we do in fact, if anyone can find a way to make contact without blowing up everyone's plans, she can. Just gotta trust her to do her thing"

Jason turned and held out his bottle to clink it against Rays "Exactly man. Exactly."

"So now we've done being all professional n shit you gonna tell me how you really feeling about this?" Ray says laughing a little

Jason actually laughs "I'm fine Ray."

Ray looks over at his friend raising his eyebrow "Reeeally? You are full of shit man" he laughs harder and sips his beer. "You know if it were any of us, and we saw our girl after 6 weeks in that situation we might be a bit less than fine"

"Good job I'm not any of you then" Jason says. "Honestly, I'm fine. Mandy's a big girl she knows what she's doing. Like you said, we just have to trust her"

Ray smiled one of his smiles that said he knew his friend was holding back but that he wasn't going to push. Instead they sat in silence enjoying the sounds of the city with their beer.