Free Trident's First Gleaming: A Special Operations Group Thriller by Stephen Templin

you.”
    “That’s more like it,” her voice called. The bathroom door opened.
    Bo grinned. Then a stranger appeared in the doorway. Bo’s grin dissolved.
    In the doorway stood a man with longish, black curly hair and a handsome face—he looked like a movie star. In his hand, he carried a brown leather satchel. “I am pleased to make your acquaintance,” the man said.
    The man gave her a fistful of money, and she put it in her jeans pocket, avoiding Bo’s gaze. She brushed past the stranger, grabbed her handbag, unlocked the door, and ran out of the hotel room.
    Once she was gone, the man locked the door again.
    “Who are you?” Bo asked.
    “That is not important now.” Condescension filled the man’s voice. “What is important is who you are.”
    “I am a businessman with China National Petroleum Corporation.”
    “Yes, Mr. Bo Geng. That is your cover story. I want you to tell me who you really work for.”
    Bo’s heart rate sped up, and he started to sweat. “What are you talking about?”
    “You are from the Ministry of State Security of the People’s Republic of China, no?”
    Bo didn’t like how the stranger talked down to him, and he felt that the stranger was talking down to China. “Who are you?” he spat.
    “I am the commander of Syria’s cyber warfare unit, but you should be asking ‘what do you want?’”
    “What do you want?”
    “I want what you want,” the stranger reasoned.
    “I don’t understand.”
    The stranger smiled. “I want to bring America to her knees. Maybe not for the same reasons, but we both want the same thing.”
    Bo looked at him, puzzled. “Who are you?”
    “I am the one who devours the souls of humans. The one who grows spiritually stronger with each bite. I am the one who will use the Switchblade Whisper to feast on America.” He stroked his satchel.
    Bo didn’t know what was inside it, and not knowing made his gut queasy. “I know nothing about any Switchblade Whisper.” His statement was partly true. He knew what the drone was and that the Syrians had brought it down, but he didn’t know where or why.
    The stranger smiled again. “One of my people betrayed me and sold information about my cyber-warfare unit to you. Of course, he is no longer with my unit, but you sent an encrypted message to your superiors.”
    Bo pulled against his handcuffs, and they rubbed against his skin and bones, but he couldn’t free himself.
    The man stepped closer to the bed. “We decoded your message. And you claimed you found a piece of the aircraft. I want to see the piece and know where you found it.”
    “I lied,” Bo said. “I lied so I could get more money. And so China wouldn’t send me home. I didn’t find anything.”
    “Is there anyone else looking for the Switchblade Whisper?” the stranger asked.
    Bo swallowed. “Chi Lee. He is with the PLA Special Forces.”
    “Is he working alone?”
    His hands flapped in the cuffs. The more he tried to ease them, the more they tried to take flight. “I don’t know.”
    The stranger stepped closer to the bed, his body pressing against it. “I believe that you have every reason to tell the truth. But I am not sure that you truly believe that.”
    “I’m telling you the truth,” Bo said.
    The man stroked his hair like a new pet. “I believe you.”
    Bo recoiled out of disgust and whimpered. “Please unlock my handcuffs.”
    The stranger’s eyes were dark and void of emotion, like two black holes. “I have one more question: if Chi Lee does obtain the Switchblade Whisper, how does he plan to transport it to China?”
    Mentally, his nerves mixed in a blender. “I’m telling the truth—I don’t know. Please let me go.”
    “Okay, since you are not answering my last question, I will help you.” The man opened his satchel and pulled out a set of knives. “The small one is a paring knife, excellent for removing skin. Next, the long carving knife is used for slicing thin cuts of meat. Oh, maybe you will