Free Thy Kingdom Come: Book One in the Sam Thorpe series by Don Helin Page B

but he always called on her birthday. Seven o’clock in Minneapolis. She wouldn’t have left for school yet.
    Sam grabbed his cell and punched in her number.
    “Hello.”
    The sound of her voice revived him, reminded him why he was here. “Hi, sweetie. Happy birthday!”
    “Daddy, you remembered!”
    “How could I forget my special girl’s sixteenth birthday? What are you doing to celebrate?”
    “Mom is taking me out for dinner tonight. Henry, baby, is coming along too.”
    Emily didn’t care for her mother’s live-in boyfriend. Sam hadn’t met Henry yet, but he’d seen pictures— bald, potbellied, and usually sporting shiny wing-tip shoes. Oh well. He seemed to be good for Sam’s ex, and he had done well in the real estate business.
    Sam rubbed the back of his head again, still sore from the blow. “I wish I could be there to treat you.”
    “I do too. Better go, Dad. School calls. Thanks for the roses. They’re beautiful. Talk to you the end of the week?”
    “You bet. Love you.”
    Sam disconnected the cell. A huge empty feeling hit him in the gut. He should be there with Emily, not here. Goddamn Gerber had gotten him into this!
    Pounding his fist into the palm of his hand, Sam realized it wasn’t General Gerber he should blame but himself. He had missed the signs.
    When the anti-terrorist task force had raided a terrorist training base in Iowa, of all places, Sam had spotted a brochure for a flight training school in Minnesota. He remembered showing the brochure to Larry Sable, the FBI contact on the task force. He’d never forget that day.
    “Larry, what do you make of this?”
    Sable looked it over. “I don’t know but let me take it. We’ll check it out.”
    Sam felt uneasy about turning it over because he knew the bureaucracy of the FBI, and had seen their inaction firsthand. He didn’t want the damn thing to get lost in the system. His sixth sense told him to check it out himself, but instead he gave it to Sable. “Let me know what you find out.”
    “Will do.” Sable had put the brochure in his pocket.
    That was the last Sam had seen of it. He’d made a mental note to follow up, but hadn’t. He’d forgotten.
    Six months later those damn planes had flown into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. As soon as Sam heard the first news broadcast, he’d known he’d screwed up and people had died. Hundreds of people—and he might have been able to stop it. Sam would never forgive himself.
    That had been six and a half years ago. When the war with Iraq came, Sam volunteered to command a brigade. He’d led one of the first “Mech” brigades into Baghdad. He did it for all the lives that had been lost in 9-11.
    He felt better for a few days. Then he saw the war on terror getting swallowed up with Iraq. That pissed him off.
    Rotating back to the States at the end of his tour, he had spent six months at the Pentagon trying to put some normalcy into his life, but it hadn’t worked. He’d taken his guilt and frustration out on Jackie. She tired of it, and he’d moved back into the bachelor officers’ quarters at Fort Myer.
    When Sam retired from the Army, he’d started looking for a job. One day General Gerber had called Sam into his office. “Sam, I need your help,” the general had said. “We’ve got a great opportunity to go after terrorists.”
    He hooked Sam like a big fish, reeling him in using Sam’s own guilt as bait.
    This was Sam’s first undercover operation. He’d been uncomfortable, but things had gone well so far. He’d worked his way through an extensive interview process and must have passed all the tests because Aly Kassim had hired him. Aly’s firm put Sam through an orientation that included travel to a number of their plants around the country. No overseas travel yet. This was his first assignment—advisor to the fucking Patriots.
    He rubbed his head again and walked over to the bathroom to pop a couple more aspirins.

     
    Wednesday evening. Five more days to