She tensed her bicep, just a little before opening her notebook. Two peaks defined and started climbing higher all while the muscle fibers bunched, defining the jagged cliff faces beneath those growing muscle peaks, making her arm thicker and harder. The pain hit her and made her want to stop, but Norma hadn't built her body without pain. She only flexed for a second or two because she didn't want to destroy her shirt. She idly traced the veins crisscrossing beneath her skin. Most of them were like tributaries, but then she got to the big river, the blood vessel riding across the top of her now relaxed bicep. It was just waiting, waiting for her to flex again, waiting for her mighty muscles to demand the gallons of rich oxygen rich blood, but that wasn't going to happen. Not this morning anyway. While Norma didn't mind pain, she wasn't a sadist either.

Norma's pecs felt like they'd been trampled on by herds of angry elephants and her nipples like they'd been polished with sandpaper. They ached constantly. In the shower that morning her chest felt like it had burst into flames from the inside out. Norma didn't get every joke the first time it was told, and sometimes she missed out on innuendo, but she was smart enough to know that when she flexed her pecs to more than three times their normal size a few hours ago there was a price that had to be paid. She'd flexed her entire body that's why it was sore, but she and Stan had paid extra attention to her chest. Last night she'd wanted to see just how hyper crazy her muscles could get, and before the end of it, her pectorals had been so huge that she couldn't see her feet without leaning forward a little. And they'd been so hard that she couldn't dent them even using the muscle power of her own biceps. Just that thought made Norma tingle a little.

While looking at herself in the mirror in Stan's bathroom she'd finally got the full picture of just ludicrously shredded her pecs had been and just how huge. That was one of the reasons she'd given Stan that extra milk. She'd flexed her pecs even harder when she'd been alone having those extra orgasms. Her mighty tits had produced more milk, lots more. She'd given Stan a bit over a gallon of it, but way more than that had gone down the shower drain. Norma knew her body was this amazing thing since she was a kid. She knew that she was a little stronger than the other kids, and then at age eleven she'd started lifting weights, building muscle so fast that the guidance counselor at school thought her mother was giving her steroids of some type.

The truth was that Norma had never even taken a supplement, a protein shake, or anything like that. She'd never had to. She just kept lifting heavier and heavier weight as time when on, getting stronger and bigger in the process. She had limits and she'd found them a few times, but she realized that she hadn't explored everything within those limits. She'd seen what her pecs could do now. She'd pushed them right up to the edge of possibility, but what about her biceps. Or… she got a little grin on her face as she thought about flexing her quads and glutes as hard as she'd flexed her chest. Sometimes when she really got pumped, her quads would get so big and hard that they'd press against her sex. She wondered how many orgasms she could give herself in a row if she got her legs crazy pumped. Of course she couldn't share that pleasure like she could the surprise gift of last night's efforts.

It might be painful now, but she'd learned how to make that muscle milk. She could share that with any muscle luster as crazy for muscle as she was. Right now that was Stan. The look on his face when he'd seen that first drop of pale sweetness gather on her nipple had only been the tip of the iceberg when it came to how he felt inside. She was pretty sure that there were some guys who thought they were muscle lovers who wouldn't have been able to hang in there like Stan. Some of them would have mentally checked out when her muscles had gone super nova and gotten super human, because that's what she was. They wouldn't have enjoyed the muscle milk, but Stan adored it, damn near worshipped it. She knew that eventually he'd come to her and beg for more milk because of her gift she remembered exactly what she was doing when she created it. Just as long as he didn't ask her this morning. She'd rather punch him in the face than flex her chest today.

She checked the clock on the wall then looked over her shoulder, wincing softly again. Even her neck was sore, but she wanted to catch a glimpse of Stan as he arrived. She felt like crap and wondered if he'd be able to make it up here at all. If he did show up, she hoped he wasn't a ragged mess. She didn't want anybody to know about their hook up the night before, but she was herself. Norma was this muscled dynamo with the strength to easily tip over cars and to rip safe rooms right out of the walls of a building. If she felt like this even with all of her strength and stamina, there was no telling what Stan looked like today.

"Gooood morning everyone!", a grinning Stan greeted his team as he briskly walked into their side of the partitioned conference room holding his briefcase in one hand a steaming mug of coffee in the other.

"Good morning, sir", came the replies.

"I think I made a small find this morning when I looked over my notes", he exclaimed as he sat down at the table. "I'd hit a brick wall but got a second wind. I think I might have figured out what some of this money was being used for. So let's get to it!" His enthusiasm appeared infectious, getting the rest of his team going at a faster clip too. Stan looked through the window to Norma and gave her a little tip of his mug before turning away and getting to work.

Norma was stunned. Bewildered. She felt like she'd been hit by a convoy of busses, and he looked like the most rested, chipper man in the world. "How in the hell?", she asked herself then dove into the intel sitting in front of her.

Alone in his little apartment after his shift, worries started seeping into Cornelius 'Boones' Lee's mind. Most of them were what-if's, and those were the worst. He worried about his family back home, but he and Jack had worked out a plan for that. No plan was perfect, but Boones trusted Jack, plus both of their families were linked now, in more ways than one. Boones grinned thinking back to the several minutes of magic he'd experienced during the Linking. There was no feeling like it, nothing approaching the pure emotion of it. It made a person feel truly alive, and apparently he didn't even get the full effect. For the gifted people, like his nephew Thomas, the Linking was ten times more intense.

Despite his best efforts and despite the job they seemed to be doing, there had been some disappointment when Thomas had chosen to live with Jack and the Caufields instead of moving back to Ohio to grow up with his own family. Boones was one of six kids, all with families of their own. Everybody would have doted on Thomas for the rest of his life, but none of them were gifted, as far as Boones and Thomas knew. So growing up in a family where he'd get a chance to explore that part of himself appealed to Thomas. Boones had come to understand his nephew's decision and was honest enough with himself to know that he would have encouraged Thomas to keep his powers under wraps. It had been his attempts at experimentation that had drawn Romano Scarlforo's attention in the first place. Boones was sure he'd have told Thomas to bury his ability to control electricity deep inside himself and never let it out. Only now, after experiencing the Linking, did Boones understand just how wrong that would have been.

Instead Thomas got to live with parents who'd already raised a gifted child and he got to have Jan as a sibling. She'd grown from the cute, adventurous little kid she'd been into a wonderful young woman, who loved Thomas deeply. Boones' own kids wouldn't have known how to handle a kid who could do what Thomas can. Jack's family had a whole support structure not just with Jan, Taylor, and Heather, but also with an extended group of extraordinarily powerful people. As many times as Thomas had linked with Jan's friends, they were approaching family status too. Boones was pretty sure that if there was a next time, somebody like Scarlforo would have to go through Sara, Alisha, Lisa, LaShaunta, Cassie, and the rest to get to Thomas. That would be no mean feat. So his nephew was in the perfect place to be safe and to explore himself. It was enough for Boones to know that Thomas loved him and that his choice to stay with the Caufields had nothing to do with how he felt about his blood relatives. Boones already knew that Thomas had spent six months alone on the streets of Washington DC to protect his family from Scarlforo, but after the Linking Boones knew what that emotion felt like. Boones now understood how a young kid could find the courage to suffer so that his loved ones didn't have to.

That thought made Boones angry as he sat forward in his seat. He wished he'd shared a few more of his old Army stories with his brother and with his nephew. Thomas knew Boones was a cop and that he'd been in the Army, but until recently he had no idea what Boones had done while in the Army. Jack's reputation for being a badass within the Intel and Special Forces community was well earned, but Boones' rep was a pretty lofty one too. He almost wished that Scarlforo had sent his goons to Columbus. Boones would have waged a personal war against that entire organization. That's not how things had played out though. Boones knew that he had to stop wishing things had happened differently because the past wasn't going to change. He needed to keep his mind on his current mission.

Boones' years of experience had prepared him to deal with the problems of an idle mind too. He'd already memorized all sorts of materials that he had access to as a CIA officer, and he'd read ever dossier on the people working with him and around him. So now he pulled out a little composition book from the safe and sat at the kitchen table coming up with If-Then scenarios. That should keep his mind occupied until he got sleepy.

Armen studied the board for a moment then decided to move his piece from the study towards the kitchen. Now it was Sara's turn. "Was I supposed to make a suggestion?", he asked the rest of the group after he'd moved his piece.

"Only if you wanted to", LaShaunta informed him while looking at the cards in front of her once again.

"This game is so confusing", he lamented and looked at the note sheet to see what clues had already been revealed. Of course he wasn't even sure he was keeping track correctly.

Sara let out a long sigh after rolling the dice and moving Colonel Mustard towards the billiards room but not quite making it. "You know, it feels so much better now that we've put our secrets on the table. It kind of felt like we'd been holding our breath all that time."

"Jan probably could have held her breath that entire time", Alisha quipped as she moved her piece along the board. Jan shook her head but didn't say anything.

"Secrets do suck", LaShaunta added. "Makes me think back to freshman year when you all were trying to keep your secrets from me. I'll just say that y'all didn't have to work so hard. All you had to do was start talking about tanning.  My ears would have turned right off." Everyone around the table laughed. "I admit I'm kinda nosey, but pretty much the last subject on earth I'm interested in is tanning."

Everybody was still chuckling as Brian reached for the dice. He finished moving his piece to the Library then looked up. "Oh Jan, you can tell Thomas I've got the footage of his epic battle with Armen edited."

"Yeah", Armen exclaimed, not believing that he could have forgotten. "I saw it this morning. It was almost as cool looking at it as doing it. It's better than the special effects in any movie I've ever seen. No offense, Alisha."

"None taken", she replied with a dismissive wave of her hand.

"Just tell Thomas I said he's awesome and his command of his gift is really really good!"

"He was already good at using his gift when I met him, and he's only gotten better. Mom and Dad encourage him to experiment… as long as he doesn't destroy anything. But yeah he's a really fast learner, unlike me. It took fifteen years to fully get a handle on my power."

"That's because you're corralling a fucking volcano!", Alisha exclaimed then blushed a little and looked at Sara. "Sorry. Look I've been doing better", she explained her swearing.

"I'm not going to say anything", Sara said with a shake of her head. "When I press, you just fall off the wagon and start cursing up a storm."

"Speaking of learning how to control yourself", Armen began as he reached for the dice, "I'm really impressed Alisha, with how good you've gotten with your gift. You've only known you weren't normal for what… less than two years?" LaShaunta let out a little laugh and Armen frowned. "What am I off?"

"Yeah", LaShaunta cut Alisha off before she could speak. "By like 20 years… well maybe fifteen or sixteen."

"Now you've lost me", Alisha spoke up, "and you're talking about me. I didn't have an inkling there was anything different about me before Miss Clara said that my aura was strange or something."

"Oh come on, Alisha", LaShaunta started then pointed at her. "You're talking to me. You know I know the truth. All of us do. We're just lulled into it being normal for you, just like with Jan."

"What you're bringing me into this now? Whatever this is", Jan spoke up.

"Yep", LaShaunta declared. "We see you every day, so we're all used to it, but y'all tell me if I'm wrong. You guys ever go somewhere with Jan and you're looking really cute. Got a nice little skirt on or some top that shows a little more than normal. You see guys turning their heads as you walk by and your ego gets a little inflated only to realize that they're really staring at Jan who's walking right next to you in a track suit!"

Sara nearly spit some water on the table as she laughed and nodded. Alisha laughed too as she looked over at Jan whose face was turning pink. "I don't even own a track suit", she declared.

"Don't get embarrassed", LaShaunta told Jan, who was still blushing as she reached for the dice. LaShaunta just smirked before turning back to Alisha. "So yeah, Alisha you're like that."

"I still have no idea what you're talking about."

"I'm bringing it back around", LaShaunta explained. "I got sidetracked. Anyway, so just like you, me, and Sara are hot… everyone at this table is smart too, right. I was valedictorian at my little prep school. Brian I think you were too." He nodded in confirmation.

LaShaunta pointed at Jan and Sara. "You two are in the International Honors Program, and Armen's going to be a doctor, but let's look at Alisha here. She's on the dean's list every semester at Tech, but doesn't talk about it. She's got four paintings hanging in the campus gallery, two of them on semi permanent display. Oh and let's not forget the one she's got hanging out at UCLA. And since tutoring people in comp sci isn't enough, she tutors students in three different foreign languages that she's not majoring in. Then there's math. She tutors people in it and decided to add math as a major for shits and giggles. I had a small role in that last part.

"My major sucks you guys know that, I mean I manage most of the time, but even I get stuck sometimes, although it pains me to admit it. Anyway, I'm walking down the hall one day freshman year about to pull my hair out. I've got my book in my hand and a completely lost look on my face, wondering out life if life has any meaning and if anybody can help me with nonlinear differential spatial equations. Most people who passed me had the same looks on their faces as you guys do now. Like… spatial what?", LaShaunta said and motioned towards everybody but Alisha.

"Anyway, Alisha leans out of the door to y'all's room." She'd already met Sara and Jan, but this was her first time actually talking to Alisha even if she'd seen her around a few times. "And motions me over. Then proceeds to spend the next twenty minutes explaining the concepts to me as good as any professor could have. After talking with her I was like BOOM, I've got it. I figured Alisha had to be a grad student or hell, a post grad student getting a PhD in math or something like that. I mean she'd just explained a 400 level math concept to me like she'd been teaching a little kid his times tables, but nope. She was a freshman just like me! And she wasn't even a math major yet! She told me that she just did math as a hobby when she was bored. ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME!!! A hobby!!!" Alisha cracked a smile as LaShaunta went on.

"You were my secret weapon. I stopped going to the professors and teacher's aids for help because I was like I can get help from this bored little math hobbyist and make my professors think I never needed help with anything. And she never said she didn't understand a problem I brought to her… not once. There was just one time I remember you asked to look at the text book. I was like oh no, I've finally stumped her. But of course not. She just wanted to see what terminology the book used so she could explain it to me in the same terms. Eventually though, I stopped thinking about how Alisha had always been able to help me and realized that you'd always been willing to help me. You never once said that you were too busy or something. And I thought to myself what a really nice person she is."

"Well thanks Shaunie."

"You're welcome. Now back then I'd never met Mr. and Mrs. von Edder but I figured they had to be saints to have raised such an amazing young woman. No really, I'm not even being funny. One missed dance recital as a kid, or a grounding at the wrong time and Alisha might have gone down the wrong path and become a criminal mastermind, like a Bond villain!" The table erupted in laughter.

"Oh come on Shaunie!", Alisha complained between chuckles.

"I speak the truth! Admit it Alisha! You were one disappointing Christmas gift away from becoming an evil world dominating underworld figure, like Blofeld or Moriarty from that Sherlock Holmes movie."

Alisha finally joined the laughter. "A female Moriarty? I'll have to remember that one and tell Dad." That might be a nice twist for a movie or tv show.

Armen turned to Alisha as the dice came to her. "Okay Alisha, if you're so smart, who's going to win this game of Clue?", he asked with an annoying smirk.

"I am", she stated flatly. "It's Mrs. White, in the study, with the rope." She reached for the cards in the center of the board and revealed them for everyone to see.

"Oooookay then", Armen backpedaled quickly then cleared his throat. "Let's shuffle for a new game."

Norma made sure she ran into Stan when they went downstairs for lunch. He'd been doing a great job acting normal, and she was the one about to act clingy. "You look great", she told him as she came up behind him. "Well rested."

He turned and smiled down at Norma, unable to keep from looking at her muscled cleavage before making himself lock his eyes on her face. "I feel terrific. I can't say when I've felt better. It's like I'm brand new."

"I'm just asking because I feel like I lost a fight with a steam roller."

Stan laughed. "Well you look as good as always, so I bet nobody notices."

"I've just got to ask how. After what we did last night you should be a zombie, like me."

Stan looked around then leaned down closer to Norma as he replied. "It's your milk. I felt like crap when I woke up, but umm, I've drank like three of those mason jars since yesterday. Hell I put some in my coffee this morning. It tastes great and it's like energy in a glass. I'm not kidding." He stopped and frowned. "Weird?"

"No. I did leave them there for you didn't I? I just didn't know my milk could do what you just said", Norma replied.

"I've still got some left", he said then smirked. "Although I'm not sure if I want to part with it."

Norma rolled her eyes. "I can make more if I want."

"You can!!!", Stan shouted then looked around to see if anybody was looking. "You can???", he implored in a somewhat softer voice.

Now it was Norma who grinned. "Of course I can", she said and began tensing her pectorals, slowly flexing them bigger and bigger, making the muscle fibers in upper chest undulate before setting like bedrock. Then she started pulsing her pecs in and out. Stan's mouth began to water at the sight. As quickly as her flex started, it ended. Norma looked up at him with that same grin, realizing that she and her muscles still had complete control over Stan. She ignored the pain in her protesting muscles to get a bit of satisfaction. Stan understood that Norma wasn't going to tolerate any sass from him. Only when she turned and walked away did she let the pain show on her face. She loved the feeling of strength though. She loved the knowing that her muscles could command Stan like he was hypnotized. She just didn't like the discomfort pushing herself so far had caused. "I wonder if they sell Epsom salt here?", she said to herself as she headed to stairs. "Or maybe I'll drink some of my own milk", she pondered with a grossed out grimace.

Jack's first couple of weeks at Integrity International had settled him into a routine. The job itself was pretty straight forward, not nearly as interesting as old job with the family business. He wondered several times a day exactly what Billy expected him to find here with this company. It seemed like all the other mercenary companies operating in the warzone, with smart business people looking to make a buck and a bunch of has-been and never-was ex-military types looking to either make a name for themselves to have once last chance at glory. At first glance, Jack didn't see anything here that was worth him staying away from home, but he'd keep digging.

One thing Billy had been exactly right about was Bruce, the company founder, owner, and CEO. He was an all right guy and Jack got along with him just fine, but he wished his back story had more accolades to it. He felt almost like he had to earn the respect of the tough talking ex-soldiers who made up the operations side of the company. It was as if he believed all of their stories, and feared that they didn't believe his. Jack for his part didn't believe any of them, and never told any of his own. The character he was playing was supposed to have been in Desert Storm as a Quartermaster, and was even supposed to have seen a bit of shooting up close. That part of John Miller's back story had been thrown in because some of these guys might have seen Jack operating during Desert Storm. The invasion of Iraq had been his last hurrah with the Army and the CIA… well until now.

There weren't many women in the office at Integrity International, but all of them had their eyes on Jack. They gossiped about how he was handsomest man in the office. One lady said she'd just love to get lost in those dreamy blue eyes, while another said she'd like get lost somewhere else lower down. Jack for his part didn't try to tamp down any of their enthusiasm for him. He'd lightly flirt and chat a few of them up. He wanted to let them know that he was a nice guy, but not too nice.

Jack gave one of the women a little wink as he made his way out of his office on the way to the copy machine. The rest of the females' eyes followed him too as he walked past many of them in his tailored pinstriped slacks, tailored shirt, with his silk tie with opal tie clip and cufflinks. The character Jack was playing had supposedly done pretty well for himself in the private sector so Jack felt comfortable using his own wardrobe which aside from the jeans, t-shirts, and khakis had plenty of custom fitted clothes. It wasn't that Jack was pretentious, it's just that not too many off the rack clothes fit right. The ladies seemed to like his wardrobe too. Of course the women in the officer weren't the only one's who'd been keeping an eye on Jack.

Luke had made it her personal job to keep tabs on their newest hire. Luke just couldn't shake the feeling that this new guy Miller had to be a plant of some kind. Not long after their secret operations were tossed into chaos, this guy comes from nowhere to help things settle out. George was working to rebuild their illegal operations while Miller was settling into George's old job like he'd been doing it for years. It took a few more days before Luke to stop the surveillance of the new guy. The people at Integrity were starting to trust him a little, and that made Jack feel pretty good. He'd completed step number 1 of his mission.

Stan had looked at the last two jars of milk in his fridge like they were heirloom bottles of Pappy van Winkle or Balvenie 40. Until this yesterday he would have thought that they were, but now he knew that Norma could make more milk if she wanted. At least she said that she could. Stan knew that didn't mean that she would though, so he left the milk in the back of his fridge and headed down to the gym. He'd neglected his own workouts since he'd been in Poland because he'd been swamped with work and because, he hated to admit it, but he'd been intimidated by some of the soldiers working out there.

This black site had some of the most experienced Special Forces guys in the world in one place at one time, and Stan certainly wasn't one of them. He just wanted to keep in shape as best he could since he spent most of his day hunched over at work. He'd suck it up today and get through a workout, or at least that's what he told himself. The room was no less intimidating than the first time he'd walked in. It wasn't that all the soldiers had super buff Adonis bodies, it's that Stan knew they could kill him without breaking a sweat, even if in reality they weren't paying him much attention.

After being in the weight room for about twenty minutes, Stan sat at the shoulder press bench facing the mirror when his imagination kicked in. He could see the reflection of the door from where he was sitting and his mind imagined seeing Norma walk through it, with her short confident muscle bursting strides.

Even after seeing Norma's muscles in their full glory, Stan was still amazed how much her muscles flexed and morphed with simple everyday tasks like walking. He could have sat and gotten hypnotized watching her quads, hamstrings, and glutes flex as she strolled. He imagined Norma walking to the end of the free weight rack, picking up the biggest, heaviest dumbbells in the place, and doing a set of warmup curls. Stan's mouth actually began to water as he imagined how Norma's biceps would swell under load, getting massively dense and shredded the more she pumped. She'd start to sweat a little, and her bare arms would start to glisten in the intense light like gems in the desert, with her mighty muscles creating facets that put the best jewel makers to shame. Her biceps put everybody in the gym to shame anyway. Her peaks were amazing as she brought the heavy dumbbells up, squeezing at the top a little before getting that good negative burn as gravity pulled the weight towards the floor.

Seeing Norma's biceps stretched out was nearly as awesome as seeing the peaks at full flex. Stan would try to count the extended muscle fibers in the instant before they started bunching and flexing to curl her arm again. It was impossible task, like counting the grains of sand on a beach one at a time. Norma's muscles were too shredded for that. And then he imagined her lifting those dumbbells over her head as she shifted her grip and warming up her triceps, pumping the weights as easily as she had with bi's.

Norma's triceps were impossibly even more massive than her biceps. Everyone knew that the triceps were the largest muscles in the upper arm, but Norma's biceps were so huge that it was hard to imagine any muscle bigger, but Stan had seen Norma's triceps with his own eyes. He'd seen them thicken as they'd flexed with the same maddening definition of the rest of her body, jutting out from the backs of her arms like she was trying to grow extra limbs.

When her arm pump was over, he imagined Norma going over to the cable machines and putting the pins in the bottom of the stack so she could do flies. The machine shook under the strain, hell the whole room shook as Norma's chest inflated like she was hooked to a muscle pumping machine. Her entire upper body swelled as she held the handles out in front of her for a split second before allowing the weight to slowly spread her arms apart, only to muscle the weights up again. Her underarms looked like caverns as they became bathed in shadow as her lats, delts, pecs, and arms flexed to keep the light out, but Norma's chest was the show. Three muscle heads split into dozens as she worked up a bit of a sweat, and then her pecs divided again and again until her skin seemed to disappear amidst the seething, flexing muscle fibers, and then it happened.

She grinned at Stan, like she had in the break room, and the front of her cutoff sweatshirt got twin wet spots, but not from sweat. She powered up rep after rep, not tiring with the effort of lifting hundreds of pounds each time. She actually started pumping faster, making the sides of the weight machine tilt towards her. And then her little smile got bigger. The first spray of milk shot through the fabric. Dozens of individual milk streams blasted from her tits flying halfway across the room, but that wasn't enough. She pumped the weights harder and the milk shot to the far wall.

Even in the midst of his daydream, Stan licked his lips like Norma's wonderful spray was actually touching him. She was looking right at him as she spun her grip and curled her biceps. Stan imagined hearing the bolts holding the machine together start to snap one after the other. With a final mighty flex Norma ripped the weight stacks from the overburdened machine. She stood there, her mighty muscles at full pump fully covered in jagged striated, vein chocked muscle from top to bottom with milk flowing out of her pure muscle tits like water out of the fucking Trevi Fountain. Her eyes gleamed with power, strength, and lust as she covered everything with her powerful spraying milk. Then she caught Stan in her gaze and motioned for him to come over.

Like a robot under her full control he rushed over to Norma. She looked at him for a moment before bending down and picking him up like he was weightless. She rocked him in her arms like a child a couple of times. He remembered the feeling of her biceps with their mighty peaks and her triceps which felt like weathered granite that had been left in the sun and was hot to the touch. Her entire body felt like that except he could feel the life in her, feel her throbbing heartbeat and watch her arteries pulse with each powerful beat.

Then his trembling fingers and more importantly his flicking tongue found her nipples. In his daydream her clothes had just disappeared and Norma was now naked. She could have just flexed them into oblivion because he'd seen her do it in real life. "Come on", she told him playfully as she looked down at Stan. "Drink all you want."

Stan didn't need more urging. He wrapped his mouth around her nipple and began to suckle. Only he wasn't actually strong enough to get Norma's body to do anything. She flexed her right pec. Stan felt the muscle inflate and almost lost it right there. He started sucking and he felt the warm milk flowing down his throat filling his stomach, but he never got full. He drank more and more and more while the other tit continued to cover the room until everything around Stan was white with it.

Suddenly a soldier across the room accidentally dropped a 25lb plate and reality rapidly returned to smack Stan in the face. He blinked rapidly as he looked around realizing the situation around him. Norma hadn't actually walked through that door, and worse yet, he had a full on erection. He took his hands off of the military press bar and put them over his crotch. He was lucky that for all of the intensity of his fantasy, it hadn't lasted long enough for anybody to notice his hard on. He quickly grabbed the towel he'd been using to wipe his face and put it somewhat naturally in front of his crotch as he hurried out of the workout area.

"She's got me so I can't even workout", Stan lamented as he left that building heading across the yard towards his living quarters.

He turned the corner from his office towards the copier when he slowed his pace. Luke and some of his guys were standing around the machine, which was more than odd. Jack had never seen any of Luke's operations guys on the building's top floor. Their offices and conference rooms were on the third and fourth floors, and they had their own copier. This was really odd, but he kept walking. Jack recognized a couple of the guys standing around the copier when they'd been tailing him for a week. Gerrit was a former soldier with the Dutch Army, Sid an ex-Australian soldier, and Cyril used to work for Belgian Intelligence until three years ago. The rest of them he knew by face only.

"Ok", Luke told his group. "The plane touches down in an hour. We have to be in place. Got it?" His people nodded just as Jack got close enough to hear. "Oh hey Jack", Luke said and deftly swiped a piece of paper from the copier plate before Jack could see it. "Let him through guys. Sorry about this. The copy machine downstairs is on the fritz. We're finished here anyway."

Jack smiled uneasily, pretending to be put off by having so many 'tough' guys around him. "This one isn't working much better. But hey, mi copier es su copier", he joked and got a couple of chuckles from the guys as they headed to the elevator.

Luke smiled again and gave a little wave as he stepped onto the elevator. Jack waved back and set up his report to copy. The already warmed up copy machine hummed to life and started spitting out pages. Jack took a moment to look around while he waited. He happened to look down to the waste bin and saw something out of place. It looked like a copy of a photo in can, mixed in with the failed copies of reports, proposals and the never ending lists this office created. Jack was about to shrug it off, but curiosity got the better of him. He wondered if somebody was making copies of their girlfriend's picture on the company dime. He straightened out the very distorted image from the copier and his brow gathered into a frown. He had to force his expression back to neutral.

The copy was smeared and streaked and out of focus, but Jack would have recognized Amber anywhere. He shoved the paper into his pocket then gathered up his copies. He looked completely normal as he headed back to his office, although the questions inside his mind were starting to swirl. His first thought was to sit on this and fish around for info later, but a group of operators didn't get together like that for an operation happening in a few days. Jack wondered why Amber would be in Pakistan, but somehow whatever Luke and his guys were up to involved her. Luke might be on a welcome detail. He was just the sort of guy Bruce would want to make a first impression, but there was no way Bruce would want the rest of those knuckle draggers anywhere near a VIP. Perhaps they were meant to be bodyguards, but if that were so then they'd have on the company uniform since Bruce also loved pushing the brand. Suddenly a thought ran across Jack's mind that made him gasp. What if Jack's cover was blown and Amber had somehow been lured to Pakistan as leverage against him.

Jack let out a long sigh before slipping the copies into a desk drawer. He grabbed his suit coat and headed down to the parking garage under the office building hoping he'd be able to ask some questions down there, but his luck was better than that. Jack got to the motor pool area, where the company vehicles were kept and saw that Sid hadn't left yet. He'd just finished closing the trunk on a champagne colored sedan when he turned and saw Jack jogging towards him.

"Can I help you with something, mate? John is it?", he asked as Jack got closer. "They didn't break the damned machine did they?"

"No", Jack said and slowed to a normal walking pace. "I just have a question."

"Sure mate", Sid replied, although it was easy to see that he was getting a bit impatient. Jack was about four feet away when he made his move. A lunging heel strike buried itself in the pit of Sid's stomach, doubling him over. The trained soldier tried to spin away, but Jack spun with him not letting him gain any distance. He grabbed Sid by the ear and forced his head up just high enough to slam an elbow into his temple. Sid dropped to his knees and slumped against the rear of the sedan. Jack took Sid's gun from its holster and the car keys from his pocket at the same time. He slipped the gun into his waistband then snatched off Sid's ID badge, and gripped the Australian by his crotch, giving his genitals a squeeze as he lifted Sid back to his feet. Jack snatched the bag out of the trunk before tossing Sid inside. He slammed the lid closed and hopped into the driver seat. He took a moment to look inside the bag and saw a better copy of Amber's picture lying on top of a length of rope, a set of cuffs, and duct tape. Jack bit down hard on his teeth as anger hit him, but at least he his instincts had been right in acting quickly.

Jack was leaning towards the passenger seat as he used Sid's ID badge so the cameras couldn't get a decent look at him. Once he was out of the gate and full block away, Jack sat up straight and merged into the traffic of the Pakistani capital. It wasn't long before Jack heard Sid start to stir back there. He hurried as best he could towards the one spot he'd scouted where he and Sid might be able to converse in private. A new development was on the way for that entire block, but for now the area was abandoned. Jack sped up and drove into the locked fence, easily breaking the chain holding it together and sped around the back of what had been an auto-body repair shop. Jack took a quick look around to see if anybody had followed him, and then shut off the engine. He had the pistol in his hand as he got to the back of the car. He pushed the button opening the trunk and then fired a shot right through the tail light.

"For fuck's sake!", Sid exclaimed as a bullet barely missed him, traveling through the tail light and into the backseat instead. The moment of confusion was all Jack needed though. He threw open the trunk lid while jumping backwards. Sid took a swipe with his knife but missed short and got clubbed in the side of his head with the butt of his own gun, opening a gash that sent blood running towards his right eye. Jack knocked the knife from the Australian's hand then yanked him out of the car, dragging him through the gravel only to slam Sid into a wall hard.

"The fucks gotten into you mate!", Sid exclaimed when Jack stuck Sid's own gun in his face.

"Why do you have this picture?", Jack demanded, shoving Amber's photo in Sid's face.

"I don't know what you're talking about!"

Jack's face hardened and he slapped Sid across the face with the gun. "Talk!!! Why do you have this picture!?!"

Now Sid's face turned as angry as Jack's. "I should have known you were goddamned plant, a fucking spy. No accounting asshole is in shape like you!!! I'm not telling you shit!", Sid screamed and spit in Jack's face. Jack lowered the pistol and put a round through Sid's calf. Ripping through the muscle and fracturing his fibula on impact. Jack let Sid fall to the ground now that he couldn't hope to get away.

"Ok", Jack said as calm as could be. The angry act hadn't worked anyway. "So left arm or right?"

"Fuck you and your moth—ahhhhahhhh!", Sid screamed as Jack put a bullet into his left arm.

"You're going to run out of meaty parts, Sid. Next bullet might go some place that really hurts. Now why do you have this picture and that stuff in the bag?"

Jack still saw hesitation on Sid's face. He wasn't a rat, but then Jack aimed the muzzle at his right ankle and he saw the resistance break. Everybody thinks they're really tough until faced with a slow, agonizing death. "Luke's running a snatch op, all right!!!! We have to snatch up that bitch from the picture."

"And?"

"And fuckin' nothing! We hold her until they tell us to let her go", Sid spilled.

"There's more, Sid", Jack warned and pressed the pistol against Sid's cheekbone.

"Who is she to you any fuckin way?", Sid asked as he moved his head back to relieve the pressure on his face.

"That doesn't matter. Tell me the rest of it. Your life's riding on it. I'll shoot you full of holes, put you back in that trunk, drive you to the desert and leave you there to die. Of heat stroke or blood loss, either way doesn't matter to me."

"You're a sick fuck", Sid yelled.

"And you're running out of time."

Sid laughed, which surprised Jack a bit. "Luke told us that if we don't get what we want after snatching her, then we get to do what the fuck we want before moving on to the next step. They're going to get her you know! They don't need me! And when they find out that you're a fucking spy, John, or whatever the hell your name is, they're going to do to you what you've done to me!"

Jack let out a long sigh then stood up. Sid had found his second bank of courage. Jack knew ways of knocking it down too, but he didn't have time for that. He got the bag from the front seat and used the gear inside to bound up Sid before tossing him in the trunk and closing him up inside. Jack wanted to keep the pistol but knew that he couldn't, not where he was going. He put the gun under the passenger seat and headed towards the busy main streets.

He stepped into one of the many markets, not looking at all out of place since he was in one of the sections of town that had lots of international businessmen. He purchased a double pack of cellphones with cash and left the store without anyone getting a long look at his face. Worry was starting to creep into the back of his mind as he activated the first phone. What if his cover was blown? What if that's why Luke had been smiling and waving at him like that? Jack worried that abducting Amber might be part of a larger attack against his family. His hands were actually shaking a bit as made a call.

"I don't know Mom", Thomas opined as Carol held up a blouse. "Look at those sleeves. They're all puffy. They'll make your arms look funny."

Carol laughed. "Maybe I'd wear sleeves like that to contain my muscles", she said with a smile and turned the blouse around again while holding it up. Thomas chuckled. "Oh so that's funny. Well, maybe I should work out and then I'd get muscles like Jan", she said and did a mock flex.

"Jan doesn't hide her muscles underneath frilly sleeves", Thomas countered and Carol shrugged.

"You got me there", she said and went towards more blouses deeper into the boutique. She finally saw another one and held it up for inspection. Thomas didn't have a strong opinion on this one, and neither did she, so Carol put that one back on the hook. She'd gone to a third blouse when Thomas' phone started ringing. Carol watched Thomas pull out the new cell phone Jan had bought for him a couple of weeks earlier. Carol had no idea what this phone had that his old one didn't, but he seemed to like it. He looked down at the screen with a puzzled look then answered.

"Hello", he said as he answered for a number he didn't recognize.

"Excuse me, kid", a familiar voice said with a cough. "Must have the wrong number." Thomas's already doe like eyes got larger in their sockets and his face showed deep dread as he took two long strides towards Carol.

"Mom, we've got to go", he declared. His tone made her frown as she turned away from a blouse she liked to see his face. "Just put it down, Mom. Come on, we've got to go", he urged and tugged on her arm. A moment later the lights in the boutique dimmed, along with the lights of the stores around it. Everyone thought it was just a power surge, but Carol knew better. Her fight or flight response kicked in when Thomas pulled more electricity into himself. She felt he hairs on her arms pulling towards him as his very presence charged the air. He looked all around as they headed towards the car. Carol hurried, but tried not to look as terrified as she was. She knew the call had to have been Jack. He'd worked out contingency plans with Thomas, Jan, Taylor, and Heather, probably LaShaunta, Sara, and Alisha too. He had code phrases and coded words that he'd made them memorize. He hadn't wanted to worry Carol with the details, but Jack had given instructions to all the gifted people closest to him.

Carol started up her Cadillac and pulled out of the parking garage with Thomas looking all around to make sure nobody looked suspicious. She hoped nobody came to try to mug them or anything because Thomas would have turned them to cinders. As soon as they were out on the road, Thomas pulled out his cellphone. "Heather! Dad called me and gave the phrase for the huddle plan." He heard Heather let out a sigh before she spoke.

"It's going to be all right. Just relax. I'm going to pick up my Mom, Dad, and Brice and I'll be at Grandma's as quick as I can. Okay?"

"Okay", Thomas replied trying to push the fear from his tone.

"It's going to be all right Thomas. And don't worry I'll call Taylor. You just get Aunt Carol to Grandma's."

"I will", Thomas promised and then Heather hung up.

Heather was very impressed with how Thomas was handling himself. She never let herself forget what he'd gone through. The thought that his new family might be under attack like his original one had to make him more nervous than she could imagine. Heather was actually angry that Thomas had to go through this. He was such a strong person inside, but he still had some time left to just be a kid and that shouldn't be taken from him. Heather stared down at her phone for a second before pushing the send button on her phone.

Taylor looked utterly fabulous on a perfect spring day, in a flowing off white blouse, a short khaki colored skirt and five inch stiletto heels that made the already 6'2" Taylor tower over all but the tallest of men. She had an iced frappuccino in one hand and her phone in the other as she strutted across an overpass towards the trendy restaurant where she planned on eating lunch with some college friends. Horns blew and tires screeched as people in cars craned their necks to eye Taylor for a little longer as she strolled without a care in the world. She was like a vision from the most ambitious dream. Lust kicked into overdrive when people saw that goddess smile as she looked down at her phone. "What's up?", she asked Heather after answering her call.

"Uncle Jack called for the huddle plan", Heather said and Taylor stopped walking. Her heart rate instantly doubled and her eyes narrowed beneath her shades.

"I'll head to CSB to get Uncle Drew and Aunt Amber", she declared as the details of the huddle plan jumped into her head.

"I'm going to get Mom and Dad and the kids. You hurry", Heather urged then hung up the phone. Taylor realized that she'd parked her car down on the lower level of streets and would have backtrack nearly half a mile to get to the stairs leading down there. There was a quicker way though. She glanced back at all the people looking at her and mentally said screw them and their stares. She took a short peek over the concrete railing of the overpass to make sure nobody was standing beneath her before swinging her long, beautifully shaped legs over the barrier and jumping off the edge.

There were gasps and traffic stopped as people got out of their cars, all looking to see if that gorgeous vision of a woman had really just committed suicide from the nearly 30 foot drop to the road below. The closest gawker made it the railing in time to look over and see Taylor as she landed. Her toes were pointed as she approached the sidewalk and they stayed pointed as she landed.

Even from the top of the overpass he could see her calves snap flex into diamond hardness, in an effort to spare one of her favorite pairs of shoes from destruction. Her knees bent just slightly, but just to keep her balance. Her quads rippled as they flexed with steel shaming hardness and inhuman definition. The force of landing from such a fall traveled up Taylor's long body but stopped at her quads which absorbed it all. She hadn't even spilt a drop of her coffee. She didn't take another drink of it though. She shoved it into the trashcan next to the bus stop as she took off running down the sidewalk faster than the cars were moving on the street next to her. It was a sight that guy would remember for the rest of his life.

A few miles away, Carol was shaking as she pulled into her mother-in-law's driveway and turned off her car. She wasn't scared for herself though. She already had Thomas looking out for her and pretty soon she'd be surrounded by some of the most powerful people on the planet. No sooner had that thought entered her mind than her brother Ted pulled in with Kat and Heather. Thomas looked like some weight lifted off of his shoulders when Heather hopped out of the car looking ready for anything. No Carol was worried about Jack. She had all this support around her, but who was going to help her husband?

Boones took a step back and admired his own work. The granite floor in the lobby shined like a mirror. There was no 'watch your step' sign out because the floor wasn't wet, but people stepped around it like it was. "When you're good, you're good", Boones said to himself when his phone rang.

"You're on the mic with the man himself", he answered with a grin.

"There's a man in a car trunk who needs medical attention. Two gunshot wounds", Jack said immediately. "I'll text you the address as soon as we hang up. The keys are under the driver side floor mat. There's a gun under the passenger seat, and the guy in the trunk's an operator for Integrity, so he's somewhat dangerous."

"Copy that", Boones replied. "Then what. There's more to it than this."

Jack wanted to explain everything to his handler and old friend, but that was going to have to wait. And then it hit him like a slap. "After you do that pick up, meet me at the airport."

"Ok. I've got it", Boones told Jack as he made it to the stairs. "Damn its nice working with you again. There's never a dull assignment when you're around." Despite his tension, Jack got a little smile on his face before ending the call then texting Boones the address to pick up Sid. His first thought was to destroy this phone like had the one he'd used to call Thomas, but Boones' phone was secure, so there was no way to trace the call. Jack decided to put this one in his pocket.

He stood still for a moment after that while people passed him on both sides, walking to and fro while he thought. He wished he'd gotten more information out of Sid, at least part of their plan. It would have helped if he'd known why Amber was in the country, but he'd have to wing it.

He hailed a cab and ran over before anybody else could take it. The driver had been in the business long enough to know a man in a hurry. "Where to sir?", he asked in British tinged English.

"Bhutto Airport", Jack told him as he settled into the back seat.

The driver pulled into the traffic, which was barely moving at all. "Do you have a flight soon sir?", the driver asked politely.

At first Jack had thought the guy was trying to make small talk, but then it hit him. "Yeah, flight leaves real soon. Get me to the airport as quick as you can."

The cabbie grinned. "Yes sir. I can get you there very quickly." With that the driver pulled out of the flow of traffic into oncoming traffic for nearly half a block in order to make a left turn, and then he pulled the same trick twice more before he got on the motorway. Jack buckled himself up in the backseat to keep from sliding around as the driver made his various moves. It didn't take long for Jack to realize that this driver had missed his calling. He should have been on the Formula 1 circuit.

"Has anybody been able to raise Sid?", Luke asked from his perch a mile from Integrity International's headquarters.

"Negative", Cyril replied. "And he's got the good detention kit. Mine's rather bare bones in comparison."

"Are you saying you can't restrain one woman?", Henri teased.

"I can restrain you, Frenchie!", Cyril shot back and got some laughs.

"Knock it off. Henri, do you have eyes on our guest?"

"Negative. She hasn't exited the airport. Do you want me to go in and search?"

"Not at this time", Luke decided. "The whole plan is that she comes to us. Just sit tight."

Jack reached into his pocket as the taxi driver pulled them towards departing flights. "I'll get out here", Jack said and handed a wad of rolled money towards the front. "Excellent driving by the way. What's your name?"

"Nisir and it was my pleasure sir."

Jack shook Nisir's hand then headed into towards the airport. He'd noticed when he arrived that the Pakistani's took airport security very seriously. Back then it had been a comfort, not now. He passed three armed military guards before he got to the door, and there were three more pairs roving the ticket area that he could see. There were so many eyes and so many cameras around that he was limited in what he could do. He just hoped he could catch Amber before Luke and his guys did.

"Do you think her flight was delayed?", Henri asked over the radio.

"The hotline says the plane landed on time", Luke reported. "Okay. We can't stay here forever. Henri, you and Gerrit, go in and see if you can find her. I want to make sure she's coming our way and there's no funny business."

"Fuck", Jack breathed as he worked his way towards baggage claim. He had to spin behind a pillar to cover himself. He saw Henri heading towards the escalators. He was about to go towards the elevator when he saw Gerrit coming from the other direction. Jack looked all around and finally found a group of international travelers coming from a flight and blended in with them to get out of Henri and Gerrit's line of sight. They had to spreading out looking for Amber. He had to find her first. He wanted to camp out near baggage claim but knew Gerrit and Henri would be doing the same thing. He had to come up with a plan quickly. He ducked behind a pillar and pulled out the cellphone to make a call.

Amber Caufield headed straight for the bathroom after clearing customs. She'd ponied up the money for a first class non-stop ticket to Islamabad from DC and yet half of the plane's bathrooms had been out of order. She'd look for a different carrier for the trip back home, even if it had a layover. There were worse things in life than being stuck in London or Berlin for a few hours, like having to hold it for the last six hours of a 19 hour flight. At least the airport's bathrooms were functional. Amber checked her reflection in the mirror, making sure she looked presentable after being on a plane for so long. She wanted to get this business with Bruce and his people over today. She was scheduled to meet him personally in about an hour. He'd offered to have a car pick her up, but Amber didn't want to be beholden to that man for anything. She didn't know him and she'd already started not liking him.

Satisfied that she didn't look like hell, Amber took a deep breath and left the bathroom, heading for baggage claim. She put her game face on as she walked with purpose, thinking about how this meeting with Bruce was going to unfold. She'd had a thought about bringing Bruce's refund with interest in cash to hand it to him, but that hadn't been practical. Instead she'd called ahead to a large bank that did lots of international business and requested they keep three quarters of a million dollars in cash on hand in case she needed it. Of course the bank charged a fee for that service whether she used the money or not. Amber was more than willing to cover that cost if it got Bruce out of their lives. But if he was a reasonable man, he'd accept a wire transfer refund.

"We don't see our package in the baggage claim", Henri reported to Luke. "I'm heading to the concourse. Gerrit stay here in case she gets past me." Gerrit nodded and Henri headed towards the stairs. Jack saw them split up and cursed under his breath. His job had just gotten that much harder. He glanced over the Gerrit and moved towards the stairs behind Henri, taking care to look natural and stay out of sight at the same time. Luckily for him he was directly behind a tall Sikh gentlemen who could mask Jack's face from Henri's casual glances.

Henri frowned as looked back over his shoulder like any traveler might who was trying to get his bearings in an unfamiliar place, but Henri wasn't lost. He'd studied the airport's layout the night before and knew all the public spaces by heart. He turned a bit further, attempting to see all the way behind him, like he'd been taught by his home country's DGSE. He turned back towards the front, but frowned when his mind told him that he'd seen something, someone familiar. Jack bit down hard as he followed Henri's eyes, knowing he'd already been glimpsed, but he was nearly to the second floor. There was nowhere to go. His mind raced to come up with a plausible excuse for him to be at the airport instead of in the office, but he already knew there wasn't one. As Henri's eyes started to sweep Jack's way, he did the only thing he could.

Jack reached towards the lady standing just to the left of the Sikh and pulled her purse off of her shoulder, instantly spilling out just about all of its contents onto the escalator. Jack instantly bent down. "So sorry", he apologized in a husky tone as everybody around him turned to see what was going on. When Henri looked all he saw was a collection of backs. A spilled bag was none of his concern, so he moved deeper into the terminal looking for his target.

Jack fumbled around for some items while the lady tried to recover her purse's contents. Jack kept his eyes on Henri the entire time. When the Frenchman stepped off the escalator, Jack forgot all about helping the lady repack her purse and stepped past them all onto the main floor, shadowing Henri as best he could.

The more Amber thought about the situation she was in, the angrier she became at Andrew. She couldn't believe the danger her husband had put their new adopted nephew in. Amber hadn't spent a lot of time around Thomas, but he seemed like the nicest kid, plus Jack, Carol, and Jan were crazy about him, so was Ted for that matter. Amber hadn't ripped into Drew too hard because she knew how sorry he felt already. Amber knew that the best thing she could do for her husband was to squash all of this and make sure Jack never found out.

As far as Amber could tell, Jack always treated Drew with respect. Jack was the older brother, and actually owned more shares of the company, but he was COO while Drew was his boss. Amber never saw Jack step on Drew's toes once, or contradict him in front of anybody. If they had differences of opinion, they were settled behind closed doors. It was too bad her husband didn't treat his older brother with the same respect.

Drew never seemed satisfied with being the very successful CEO of a very successful defense company, and having a wonderful family around him. He always talked about how Jack got to play with the cool tech and how he always wished that he was in those secret DARPA meetings and stuff. Amber always reminded her husband that Jack had twenty plus years of experience in that world while his strong suit was business. Plus, selfishly, she was glad she didn't have the worry like Carol used to worry about Jack. Amber and Drew had just started dating when Jack was getting out of the spy game, but she'd been around long enough to remember back when Carol used to have at least one extra glass of wine at night to calm her nerves when Jack was gone, or back when her face had been puffy from crying while he was away. Of course, Amber could have used Jack right at this moment, but he was back in government service, on assignment to God knows where.

"I'm getting close to the customs counter", Henri reported. He scanned the area and saw the top of a woman's head standing above many of the others. Her hair looked similar to the woman on the photo, but it was in black and white. "Ok, I might have something", Henri said and started towards the woman, who was walking along the other side of the large area with throngs of people in between him and her. Henri cut across the waves of people to get closer.

"Do you have a positive ID?", Luke asked, the anticipation heavy on his voice.

"Negative. Not yet. I'm getting closer. How tall is this woman supposed to be?", Henri asked, weaving his way around people and picking up speed. She was wearing a dark colored business suit he saw, blue or black, but he still couldn't see her face.

"About 1m 77 I believe", Cyril answered for the group.

"D'accord", Henri said and got a smile on his face. "This might be our woman then. Let me get just a bit closer…"

Amber's stomach was really churning when she passed an eatery. She'd had two meals on the flight and a couple of sodas, but that was proving not to be enough. She stopped walking and decided that she needed to eat something, even if it would cost her a bit of time. She wanted to be sharp and if she was fighting hunger the entire meeting then she wouldn't be. She turned around to look back the way she'd come, noting a few eateries there but never noticing someone cutting across the crowd to get closer to her. Amber was wondering just how overpriced those restaurants would be as she made up her mind to go to one of them. She raised her foot to take a step forward when an arm encircled her torso, lifting her completely off the floor.

Amber's face showed pure shock. She opened her mouth, sucking in a breath to scream, but she never got a sound out. A big hand covered her mouth and half of her face. She bit down on the hand, but she barely caught any flesh between her teeth. She kicked her legs, even as she was pulled through the door into the empty storefront. No one even noticed. She struggled and fought, but the panic was all consuming. Fear rushed up from deep inside her at the helplessness.

Henri worked his way past the last few people to where he'd seen the top of a woman's head, but she was gone. He looked in every direction and didn't see a sign on her. He frowned and stepped closer to the empty storefront.

Amber elbowed at the man's ribs and attempted to kick his shins, until she heard her name. "Amber", Jack whispered in her ear. "It's me." Her body relaxed even though her heart was still pounding.

"Jack… what that…", she managed after he removed his hand from her face.

"Shhh", he urged and took a long step towards the front door and carefully turned the locking knob a moment before Henri reached out to try the handle. It was locked and he couldn't see anybody inside when he looked through the cloudy window.

"Don't move a muscle", Jack mouthed and pointed to the dark shape peering at them. Amber was freaked out, confused, and full of adrenaline, but she stood stock still as Henri tried to make out anything on the other side of the glass. Finally he gave up.

"Gerrit do you see a tall brunette down there?", Henri asked.

"Negative", the Dutchman replied after giving the baggage claim a quick once over. "Plenty of brunettes down here, but none over 165cm."

"Then I must have seen a ghost", Henri said and slapped his hand against his thigh.

"Pull back to the car", Luke ordered. "You both might have missed her. Let's see if we can pick up her trail outside."

"Yes sir", Henri and Gerrit said.

"What is going on here!?!", Amber demanded once Jack had taken them to the very back of the empty store. She felt like a bundle of nerves.

"I was going to ask you the same question", he replied. "That guy was trying to get a positive ID on you so they could track you and abduct you once you got away from the security presence at the airport."

Amber felt like fainting, or throwing up, or both. "Abduct me… but why?"

"I have no idea", Jack said with some exasperation and for the first time Amber realized that he'd been as nervous as she'd been only he was better at hiding it. "Why are you in Islamabad in the first place? I don't remember us having any dealings here recently."

"You wouldn't know about these dealings, Jack?", Amber replied with regret.

He frowned. "Why? Were there some programs going on at the company that I didn't know about?"

Amber let out a sigh, partially to calm her nerves and partly to build them up to tell Jack the truth. "Drew did something and didn't tell you about it. It was a mistake and he feels terrible about it."

"What did he do?", Jack asked directly and Amber swallowed a lump in her throat before telling him everything she knew.

"I'm such an idiot", Stan said to himself as he sat in front of his little desk looking at the mountain of papers sitting there. "I was a booty call. A toy." He let out a sigh and realized that his fantasies about Norma were going to drive him crazy if he let them. He kept staring at the door waiting, anticipating, hoping that he'd hear Norma knock. He knew though that he might be waiting a while for that to happen again, if it happened again. "She'd been horny and I'd been her pressure valve. There's nothing wrong with that", he tried to convince himself. He got to work after a while and kept drilling deeper and deeper into Isayev's shadowy financial dealings. Stan had already proven that the money funding smuggling rings from Iran to Latvia came through Isayev's hands, but Sebastian wanted more than that. He didn't want the puppets. He wanted the puppet master. There was far more going on than Sebastian was willing to explain. Stan was pretty sure Norma knew most of it, although he wasn't going to ask her and ruin whatever tiny chance he had that she'd come back to his room and rock his world again.

Stan worked at his desk so long that he actually fell asleep in his chair. He hadn't long dozed when there was a knock at the door. He was startled awake and jumped to his feet, rushing over to open it like a child went to the Christmas tree, but he caught himself. "No chance it's her", he told himself then reached for the knob. He pulled open the door, managing to seem nonchalant, but there she was his dream woman standing outside of his door again.

This time Norma was in an Army sweatshirt and Army sweatpants with some well worn running shoes. Stan didn't know what to do or what to say. "Can I come in?", she asked as if she had to. Stan laughed and stepped aside before quickly closing the door. "So I was having trouble sleeping", Norma told him after taking a seat behind his desk.

"Really", he said.

"Yeah. I just can't figure out who would profit from both human trafficking and from arms sales plus have to work so hard to hide their money. So I had an idea, what if the group we're looking for is affiliated with a friendly government? Or even our government?"

She wants to do work??? Stan couldn't believe it. She'd come to his room in the evening time to work. The only word that fit how Stan felt was crestfallen. "I'd thought of that possibility", Stan told Norma though he had a hard time making his brain focus. At least she'd covered her body from the neck down, so she wasn't quite as distracting, but that just forced him to look at her face. He examined it in the analytical way of his. Her face was so girlish and cute, pretty even. Her freckles completed the girl next door look to her. She had an inquisitive air about and there was even some innocence in her brown eyes, but Stan knew better. The woman in front of him was a lot of things, a bit naïve on some things, but she was innocent worth a damn.

"That's an interesting theory", Stan told Norma. "I mean that's a possibility we can certainly explore. That stack of folders right there is for the human trafficking stuff, but it's been hard to penetrate too far." Norma chuckled, covering her mouth while she blushed. "What?", Stan asked with a frown.

"Penetrate", she repeated and this time Stan blushed.

"I thought you were down here for work, Norma", a somewhat perturbed Stan said. Norma only laughed harder as she stood up from his chair, kicking off her shoes as she did so.

"No not really", she said then gripped the bottom of her sweatshirt and lifted it over her head revealing that she was naked beneath it. Unlike the last time, Norma seemed pumped up already. She was already vascular and as shredded as a bodybuilder walking onto a competition stage, which meant that she'd barely gotten started. "I just wanted to see how you'd act if you thought I was."

Stan had to bite the inside of his jaw to make sure he wasn't dreaming. Norma spun to face away from him while she pulled her pants down, standing completely naked in front of him. Rivulets of sweat rolled down over and through the corrugated surface of Norma's body as she let him soak in every inch of her. "I'm trying to get better at his whole sexy word play thing. What do you think?", she asked, looking down at Stan who had gotten to his knees to worship her amazing abs.

"You've got the sexy part down", he told her then ran his finger down the center channel of her abs before looking up to meet her gaze. "The word play part needs a bit more work."

Norma laughed, making her abdominal wall flex. She held her arms out, flaring her lats a bit as she did so, then hit a double biceps pose, making her arms swell like they had in his fantasy from earlier, only Norma was even bigger in real life. She spread her legs apart a little, positioning her left leg out a little further so he could get a good look at her thighs as they tensed up. Her adductors looked like battering rams, and even her pussy looked perfect, more like her face than her muscles.

Stan had been with several hardcore muscle women and Norma was bigger than any of them had been. It wasn't even close. She should have had to swallow steroids by the boatload to get this big, but there was just no evidence of it. Not even here between her massive legs. Then Stan got hit with a thought that made his vision spin. What if the woman in front of him had built her body completely naturally? What if she was a one in a billion genetic freak?

He ran his hands up and down her leg, from the swelling might of her diamond cut calf, to the veinage running beneath her skin by her knees and up to the mighty sweeping cliff faces of her lower quad heads. The texture of her body was magical. He felt the THUMP THUMP THUMP of her heart for real this time. She flexed her quads and they were so hard they defied logic.

She relaxed her flex while his hands were on her thighs, and flexed again just so he could feel her muscles expand, feel them harden like cooling lava flows. She bit her bottom lip, looking sexily down at him as she put some extra into the flex, making her thighs bulge by an extra inch. Another surge made the definition in her quads double until striations ran from just above her knee all the way to the web of muscles, ligaments, and tendons at her hips. She turned sideways then and tensed her glutes. Stan's hands instantly went to Norma's ultra dense glutes and felt while they shrank like a collapsing black hole. Striations formed around the ram's horn edge of her ass while the center bowl concaved deeper and deeper. Stan was on the verge of exploding in his pants like he'd done several times the day before, but then Norma stopped flexing. She wasn't about to let that much of him go to waste like the day before.

"You better take those clothes off", she told him. "Before I rip them off."

"Yes ma'am", Stan said and fumbled with his belt.

Jack didn't speak a word as he led Amber towards the service hallways behind the storefronts that he'd used to get in position to save her. The workers used this hall to keep from disturbing the patrons out in the airport, and while some of them gave Jack and Amber strange looks, nobody said anything to them. Jack came to an exit door and held it open. He kept a look out while she went in. Henri, Cyril, Gerrit, or another of Luke's guys could have come into the hall at any moment. Jack looked up and down the hall once more before following Amber through the exit. They walked down a couple flights of stairs to a loading dock tucked in beneath the terminal. As soon as they came into view a pair of headlights came on and a US Embassy marked pickup truck drove towards them.

"Right on time", Jack said to Boones who was behind the wheel. "And thanks for the information. I never would have gotten to Amber in time if you hadn't told me about the service hallways."

"One of us has to study blueprints of the buildings we might operate in", Boones replied with a grin and a shake of his head.

"Amber this is my old buddy Boones. Boones this is my sister-in-law Amber."

"Pleasure to meet you", he said and shook her hand through the window. "Now, you two climb in the truck bed and get beneath that tarp. I told the guys at the gate I had a freight delivery to pick up. You two are my cargo. Oh", Boones called as Amber and Jack headed towards the back of the truck. "Your friend's back there. I put some towels around him to keep the blood contained, but don't get too near him."

"Blood? What?", a suddenly blanched Amber stuttered.

"It'll be fine", Jack tried to assure her.

"Yeah. I tied him to the bed with ratchet straps to keep him from moving. Just don't get close enough for him to bite", Boones added with a laugh as his passengers climbed beneath the tarp. Boones drove towards the gate as if nothing out of the ordinary was going on. The stern looking guards wanted to stop him and inspect the truck, but knew they didn't have authorization so they just waved him through. Boones hit the motorway and made good time to the embassy.

On the way there, Amber got a chance to see Jack's face. She wanted to try and calm him down, to spare her husband what she knew was coming, but as she rolled the last few minutes back in her head, she realized that she might have been killed. That thought made her sick to her stomach and it took all she had to keep from vomiting in the back of the truck.

Boones pulled into the underground parking area where a medical team was waiting along with two Marines. The two leathernecks kept their guns trained on Sid while he was unstrapped and put on a gurney for a ride to the medical facility upstairs. Jack, Amber, and Boones walked to a room not far away where she realized she was shaking like a leaf in a storm.

"It's the adrenaline", Boones told her. "It'll wear off."

"Do you have your secure cell phone with you?", Jack asked Boones.

"Yep."

Jack quickly dialed a number and Amber held her breath, thinking he was calling Drew. Instead he said, "Taylor, how did things go?"

"We all got here on schedule. Thomas has the upstairs while Heather and I are alternating between the first floor and basement. Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. I still can't give you the word to stand down, but I'll check on that soon. First though, can you put your uncle Drew on the phone?" Amber felt the lump in her throat grow.

"Sure", she said and started walking towards the dining room.

Amber watched Jack's face and had heard his tone with Taylor. He was certainly frustrated, but he didn't seem nearly as mad as she thought he might be, but then Jack heard Drew's voice and his expression became murderous.

"What the fuck were you thinking!!!!", he half yelled and half growled.

"Jack, look, please let me explain", Drew offered, but Jack would have none of it.

"I was still working at the company every day when you made this side deal. You WANTED to pull it off under my nose for your own goddamned ego!!! You nearly got your wife killed!"

"What?!?", Drew asked, his voice shrinking with oncoming shock.

"Your business partner Bruce told his men to abduct her and abuse her until you gave him the information on Thomas!" At the mention of his nephew's name, Boones' somewhat happy mood changed.

"Are you certain?", Drew tried to assuage his guilt.

"Oh yes Andrew! I'm fuckin certain!", Jack yelled as his mind momentarily turned to Sid. Jack hated doing that to him. Sid didn't deserve to be tortured like that, and that though made Jack even madder. "You put me in danger and our WHOLE FAMILY!!! Look around you. Our children are having to protect you from a threat that shouldn't even fucking exist!"

"Jack, I… I…", Drew began to sob.

"Don't cry, damn it! I don't need that, neither does Amber or my son. No, Drew you're going to help fix this!"

"Fix it how?", he asked with doubt and hope at the same time.

"You get yourself together and get ready to call Bruce. I'll call and tell you when. You tell him your courier missed a connecting flight or better yet tell him she had a medical emergency and you're just finding out. Then tell him you're sorry for the delay and that you're going to send another courier with the info just as soon as possible. Make him believe it!"

"Okay, Jack. Okay. But who am I going to send in Amber's place?"

"I'll worry about that. Once I confirm who it'll be, I'll get back with you. Do you have any questions?"

"No, I've got it. Really. I just want to help fix my screw up."

Jack opened his mouth to say something, but stopped, looked at Amber, and took a deep breath. "Good", Jack finally said. "Hand Taylor the phone." Drew's big hands were shaking as he handed his niece back her phone.

"I'm sorry you had to see me dig into your uncle that way", he said. "But if I could have reached through this phone I would have wrung his neck. Ok, Taylor. Carry on with what you're doing, and thank you."

"No thanks needed Uncle Jack. Just be safe", she said and ended the call.

"So this is about Thomas?", Boones said when the call was over. "Does it have anything to do with the dossier that Italian guy had on him?"

Jack nodded. "I was going to explain it, but there was need for both of us to be mad."

"Mad's not the right word, Jack Bear. My nephew's been through enough. My whole family has."

"Wait. Thomas is your nephew?", Amber asked and Boones nodded.

"My youngest brother's only child. God rest his soul."

"So", Jack said after taking another calming breath. "I guess I'll need to get back to Integrity, and we'll have to get you back to the States."

"It'll have to be a military transport out of the country", Boones cut in. "There's no way you should risk going commercial out of Islamabad. There's C-130 heading to Kabul tomorrow. I'll get you on that. You can catch a commercial flight from there."

"You are always the best", Jack told Boones. Both of them knew that there was a chance Luke and his guys would continue to keep an eye on the airport, especially the international flights.

"Now, before you say anything about your shot up coworker, I've got a plan for Sid. Well two plans depending on what happens. Well, now that I think about it… it's just one plan", Boones kind of explained.

Jack waved his hands. "I don't even want to know right now. You can tell me later."

Boones chuckled again, his mood getting a bit better. "Okay. Let me give you a ride back to work before they start wondering where the hell you went."

"So you didn't see her at the airport." Bruce was behind his desk with Luke sitting opposite him. The rest of Luke's team was downstairs.

"She didn't come here either, so it's not like we missed her. I bet that guy in Maryland didn't send her in the first place", Luke offered.

"That's a possibility for sure", Bruce agreed. "I've put some feelers out about that info and we've already gotten high seven figure offers for it. That's enough to keep us floating until we get our big payday from Damteni."

"So how do you want to proceed?"

Bruce let out a sigh. "I'll think on it. Did you ever find Sid?"

"Nope", Luke answered at once. "And it's not like him to go UA during a mission."

Bruce leaned back in his plush chair absently staring while his mind worked, about Sid, but also about his much bigger problem. "We might have to go to the source. I'll bet a defense company in Bethesda will have pretty good security, but I bet that Caufield guy's private residence doesn't have such good security."

"I don't mind a trip back to the States", Luke said and Bruce waved him off.

"We'll hire this out. Now that we're down a man with Sid missing, we'll need everybody here." Suddenly Bruce sat forward, putting his hands flat on his desk. "Where the hell is that new guy Miller? I haven't seen him since before you left to go get that bitch who never showed up."

"I saw him at the copy machine before we left", Luke informed his boss.

"Do you think he had anything to do with Sid's absence?", Bruce asked seriously, but Luke laughed.

"Come on Bruce. I had my doubts about that guy at first after you told me how you found him, but I've since seen the light. He doesn't even know how to hold a gun and sure as hell can't shoot one! Now you're thinking there's something shady about him."

"I'm just saying, he's a big guy. He might not need to shoot a gun to physically do something to Sid."

Luke shook his head. "John Miller's a workout warrior. We've talked a bit over the last few days. He told me that he does something called Crosshealth or CrossFit or some shit. He might have been in the Army, but he's not a warrior. You're heading down the wrong road with this one."

Bruce grumbled and just then there was a knock on the door. "Come in", the boss called and Jack cracked open the door, sticking his head in before finally stepping inside.

"I'm so sorry", he said as he came closer to the desk, his shoulders slumped with pious nervousness. "I've got those financials for you. I had them earlier, but I got a call that something was wrong with my visa application or something. I had to run to the Embassy because they said they could take care of it before the Pakistani government got involved. It was stupid. I forgot to answer if I'd ever been convicted of a serious crime."

"You haven't have you?", Luke asked with a bit of a smirk after glancing over at Bruce.

"No! Of course not. The only time I've ever been in court was for a speeding ticket I got in college", Jack said.

Bruce took a quick look at the papers in the folder then smiled. "I'll give these a once over, but you seem to have been on the ball with your reports so far. Thanks John. I'll see you later, and let me know if you have any more problems with that visa."

"Sure will, but I hope I got that stuff taken care of", Jack said and left the room.

Luke laughed mere moments after Jack left the office. "Still think that twerp could have done something to Sid?"

Bruce's face showed the error of his thoughts. "Ok, maybe I was going down the wrong road with that idea. So anyway, back to our information problem. We'll need to hire somebody discrete."

"I've got somebody in mind", Luke spoke up and then Bruce's phone rang.

"Hello", Bruce said and then rolled his eyes when he heard Drew Caufield's voice. "What happened to your courier? Got sick huh. Well that's too bad. Someone else is going to bring the information. Oh the encryption key has timed out. Okay we'll give you a few days to set it up again, but I can't abide any more delays. Okay. Have a good day", Bruce hung up and let out a long sigh. "His courier didn't make the plane. Her appendix burst in England. She's in a hospital in London according to him." Bruce stood up.

"So we wait on him?", Luke asked with a raised eyebrow.

"To hell with waiting. Go ahead and hire a team to go to Maryland. If he sends us what we want then we'll pay their fee and call 'em off. If that guy plays some other trick then we'll have people in place to take action quickly."

"I'm on it", Luke said with building excitement. He lived for this sort of thing.

"Oh", Bruce said as the two men started out of the door. "Find out what the hell happened to Sid. I'm actually worried about that asshole."

"I'm being as gentle as I can", Boones told the doctor looking on as he and another CIA officer put a sedated Sid behind the wheel of his now heavily damaged sedan. They'd rammed it with an Embassy car, which would come out of the CIA station's operating budget. Sid was dressed in his old clothes with the bullet holes hidden by being ripped open wider. His face was smeared with blood and already bruised from Jack's activities earlier. They slid the unconscious man into the driver's seat and then closed the door. Boones pulled out a tire iron and smashed the window, covering Sid's face with shards of glass.

"Okay, Muhammed. This show's yours now."

The veteran police detective pulled out his camera and began snapping pictures like he was working a crime scene. The set up had been a little quick, but he had to admit that the guy behind the wheel really did look dead. "I think I've got what I need", he said after ten minutes.

"Great. Get me those prints as soon as possible so I can get them to the guy at Aussie intelligence", Boones said.

"So what's going on with this guy?", Mohammed asked. "If you can tell me."

Boones chuckled. "This guy's going to be witness in a criminal case whether he realizes it or not. He's not going into the system or anything. I just need to buy some time, so we'll make his bosses think he died in a car crash so they won't look for him."

"And the Australians are going to demand the body, so the bosses won't have a body to even view", Muhammed added and Boones nodded.

"Yep. I guess there's a reason Chief Marcos suggested you", Boones confirmed as he helped put Sid on the gurney.

"I've been around the block a few times as you Americans say", Muhammed said and headed back to his police car. "Give me an hour to get this film processed, then I'll give you a call."

Jack had finally called Taylor back and told her that they could stand down from the huddle plan. That was a big relief, but nobody left Joyce's house. Since they were all assembled in one place, they decided to have dinner together. Taylor was pretty well starving since she hadn't eaten lunch.

"He couldn't tell me what was going on", Taylor told her family around the table.

"It had to be pretty serious", Heather opined.

"So is Uncle Jack's a spy?", nine year old Dylan Caufield asked with a child's enthusiasm.

"Like Jason Bourne!!!", his eleven year old brother Drew junior added.

Carol grinned at her nephews as she put some peas on her fork. "Shh. You boys can't tell anybody."

"Wow", Dylan exclaimed. "This family's got a lot of secrets!" The adults all smiled, except for Drew, who was still in a funk after the catastrophe he'd nearly caused.

"All families have secrets", Taylor said. "You just don't realize it because people don't talk about them."

"So you're saying that all families have people with super powers like you guys in them?", Junior asked, and Taylor laughed.

"I didn't say that", she was forced concede.

Sweat poured off of Norma's body like water off a falls as she held her gargantuan double biceps flex. Stan reached up, stretching his arms and his fingers to reach the tops of Norma's peaks. He'd seen some of the biggest women in the bodybuilding world and even off season only a few could even come close to Norma's size, but Norma was most shredded any three bodybuilders on a contest stage. Every muscle bulged in her titanic torso, seething and growing like her muscles wanted to burst out of her skin and fill the entire room. Stan traced the shapes of Norma's impossibly hard muscles while his hips pumped, trying his best to please this muscular vision. He lowered his hands from her boulder biceps to her wide meaty lats. He gripped the dense muscle wings and gave each a squeeze. They were so thick and vascular. Norma dropped her double biceps pose, lowered her hands, and her lats began to spread wider while getting thicker. She tightened her pecs and flexed her shoulders until they looked like bowling balls that had been attacked by a velociraptor. Ribbons of shredded girl beef rose up above her tensed up biceps and triceps. Her upper body flexed like it wanted to completely consume Stan's field of vision, not that she needed to. Stan had never focused on anything as intently as he looked at Norma.

Her body was bone hard even as she relaxed her flex. She leaned forward and put her hands on the center of Stan's chest. The little bit of force made her triceps swell while a slow chest flex rolled from her lower pectorals to the top. Then Stan saw Norma's muscles tense again. Veins and arteries shot across the surface of Norma's striated muscles like permanent lightning across stormy skies as an orgasm hit her. Stan groaned as Norma's feminine muscles tightened around him, but he wouldn't pull out.

Norma laid down on top of Stan, their bare chests pressed against one another. He felt her breathing starting to slow a little after her moment of bliss, but then Stan sucked in a breath and began pumping his hips furiously. He wrapped his arms around Norma's body for leverage as he plowed her with everything he had. Norma bit her bottom lip as Stan brought her closer to another orgasm. Her nerves felt like they'd been lit on fire. A sound, half cry and half moan passed her lips and Stan growled in response. His back and abs wanted to give out, but he caught his second wind and kept at it, giving Norma everything he had. Norma pressed against the floor, raising her body up. Her eyes were narrowed, but she looked down at Stan as he got a look of satisfaction from making his living breathing muscle fantasy cum again, squealing and tensing her fists so tightly that her forearms bulged bigger than his biceps. She slowly lowered herself down and planted a kiss before resting atop him again. Her hips kept moving though. He had his hands on her dense little glutes as the two of them continued to screw each other. She worked her hands beneath Stan's back as she wrapped her arms around his torso. For the first time since they first met, Stan got an idea of Norma's strength. It took his breath away.

Norma didn't squeeze her arms together, but she flexed her muscle hard. The expansion of her biceps, pectorals, and even abs compressed like a hydraulic pistons against Stan's torso while her arms acted like an anvil keeping him in place. Stan had never felt anything like it. Her body was so fucking hard and so fucking cut. His ribcage bent under her muscular expansion, and even though his lungs ached for a breath, Stan shot off as hard as he had ever in his entire life. His orgasm hit so hard that for the first time in his life Stan saw stars.

Norma pulled up to arm's length and looked down at Stan with a delightful and satisfied smile on her face while he now caught his breath. "You're amazing", he whispered and her smiled broadened.

"You're not too bad yourself", she told him. He ran his hands across her abs and then down to her hips and thighs. Every part of her was so huge and so hard and so cut that Stan nearly came again in the space of a minute. Norma moved off to the side, but saw quickly that his cock was getting hard again. "Wow?", she teased and grabbed his manhood with one of her small hands. "Do I excite you that much?" Stan just groaned as she gave his cock a squeeze. Suddenly she let him go and sat upright. "You know Stan, this sort of devotion to my muscles deserves some type of reward."

She threw her leg over him and instantly took him inside her again, rolling her hips slowly, but that wasn't her focus at the moment. She flexed her chest and her already unbelievable triple headed pectorals went to another level of amazing. Stan's breath came in quick gasps as he watched her chest get more and more shredded. Her entire body flushed as she strained her mighty muscles. She let out a little gasp as she kept up her flexing. She shut her eyes, focusing on adding more and more and more power to her flex. Tears of passion and pain moistened Norma's eyes just before the first pale white dots formed on her nipples. She opened her eyes and looked down as the first drop fell into Stan's waiting mouth. She smiled with satisfaction before lowering herself down. She moaned as Stan begin to drink.

"Well Director Granger was right", Station Chief Marcos said as she sat in a nondescript apartment with Jack and Boones. "There's certainly something going on at Integrity International."

"But what is it?", Jack wondered aloud while he typed on Chief Marcos' laptop.

"We know they're dealing with enhanced people", she said. "And don't worry. I'll keep the information about the boy out of my reports to Langley or to the Ambassador."

"Thanks chief", Boones said while he looked over files the CIA had on Integrity personnel.

"I just hope it doesn't come back and bite me in the ass."

"Nope", Jack said and seemed like he found what he was looking for. "That dossier will be like the McGuffin device in an old Hitchcock movie by the time we're done with this op. Nobody will give a damn what kicked off the plot."

"I'm not much of a movie buff, but I hope you're right."

Jack looked over his shoulder and gave Chief Marcos the kind of grin that Boones had seen plenty of times in the past. It said that Jack's brain was working like it had in the old days. Boones wasn't sure what is old buddy had in mind, but he knew some shit was going to kick off soon enough.

"Okay", Jack said and spun the computer around so Boones and Soledad could see it. "This is my idea for the courier."

Chief Marcos frowned. "It says here that she's suspended."

"I know", Jack told them. "This mission's not going up the chain until we have something to report so she's perfect. How else could we keep headquarters from snooping around?"

Chief Marcos blew a long breath through her nose. "I have no problem with my officers doing a bit of freelancing, but this is a lot of freelancing." She saw Jack get ready to defend his suggestion, but she held up her hand. "No, no. We'll do it your way. You don't have to convince me. Who knows, I might even end up with a bit part in one of those stories all the people at Langley tell about you guys", she said then chuckled.

"Only believe half of that shit", Boones cautioned.

"Which half?", Soledad asked and Boones grinned.

"And there's the fun of it, Chief", he replied and she had to smile too.

Jack looked at his watch then picked up the phone. "Now I'll just have to call her and see if she'll actually do it."

Angeline James had just finished dinner and now sat alone in her apartment staring at the turned off television. She'd just broken up with her boyfriend, not because of anything he'd done, but because she didn't want to be around anyone. She didn't want anybody to cheer her up, or at least she didn't think her now ex-boyfriend could actually have cheered her up. She couldn't even tell him why she was so down. She'd never explained that she was really a government agent, or she had been. She had no idea what would happen once her suspension was over. Maybe they'd reinstate her and things would go on as usual, but more likely her days in Special Programs were over.

It was such a shame though. She had so much to give. She walked towards her bedroom, stopping in the mirror and looking at her reflection. It had been months since she'd taken a dose of strength serum, but she still had the body of the most dried out fitness competitor. Her definition was almost contest level cut even if she was eating normally. She still worked out hard though, lifting way more weight than she should have been able to. It was like the drugs were lingering inside her. The government had threatened to do some tests, but never had. They'd pulled her credentials and escorted her, and her parents, out of the building. Angie pulled up her long t-shirt revealing her abs, rubbing the palm of her hand across the crowns of her impressive abdominals, lightly flexing her razor sharp biceps in the process, just to watch them swell. Her ex had adored her body, which was one of the reasons they stayed together as long as they had. She dropped her shirt and continued to her bed, turning out the light and climbing beneath the covers, realizing that she'd have to start thinking about her future. She was just dozing off to sleep when her cell phone rang. Her eyes shot open before she rolled them and groaned, after remember that she'd left it in the living room.

She tossed off the covers and ambled into the living room, but the phone stopped ringing as soon as she reached for it. She groaned again and snatched up the phone to see who'd called her, but before she could pull it up, the phone rang again. "Hello."

"Angie, it's Jack. Did I call you too late?", he asked and for some reason Angie got a big smile on her face.

"Oh no sir. I wasn't doing anything", she lied.

"Good because I've got something important to ask you."

to be continued...

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