The Powerful Pride of an Immortal (Immortal Supers Book 4) Kurtis Eckstein (psychology books to read TXT) 📖

“Y-You think that’s necessary?” I asked hesitantly, wondering if our house was really an unsafe location. I mean, with my information being under such a tight lock, combined with the fact that Lexi was listed as living at a different location, I felt like our house shouldn’t be a target at all.

It shouldn’t be on anyone’s radar.

“No, not really,” Freya admitted. “But I’m not going to let your little girl die again, Sam. Don’t worry, I’ll answer your calls. But I need to know it’s safe here for our family before we return. Because I will not let you experience your worst nightmare again.”

I took a deep breath. “I love you,” I whispered.

“I love you too, Sam.” She sucked in a deep breath as well. “I love you so much. Stay safe.”

She hung up.

I handed Jackie’s phone back to her after that.

At the top of the building, there was a helicopter waiting for us. It wasn’t even close to being the first time I’d been in a helicopter, since a lot of the dangerous, but lucrative, jobs I used to take sometimes involved helicopter drop-offs, but it had definitely been a while.

When we got to the local CDS building, where I now officially worked, I allowed Jackie to lead me down the elevator, through the building, and to her office. It was a cozy space that was more than five times as large as Lexi’s private office, including a large mahogany desk, several comfy leather chairs, as well as a pretty large leather couch. It was decorated with real plants, unlike Lexi’s fake plants, and felt just as comfortable within as it did the first day I stepped foot in here earlier that week.

Having sat in one of the chairs before, I took a seat in front of her desk, taking another deep breath as she sat as well. She let me have a moment while she got things ready, intending on recording the debriefing, which would also transcribe it as a written report. Once she was ready, I went ahead and began recounting the events, leaving out the unimportant stuff involving me knowing Heidi was going to call and such.

Instead, I just focused on us arriving at the theater, the short conversation I had with Heidi’s date, and then what followed.

It barely took five minutes, even with her questions.

We were then both quiet while she jotted some things down, having already sent the recording of our short discussion to the appropriate parties.

She then interlaced her fingers on the desk and gave me her attention again. “Well, we shouldn’t have any problem discovering the true identity of the date, based on his images posted on that dating app. And then, from there, we’ll track all of his activities as far back as we can, and have our AI system search for any unusual behavior, as well as have people manually working on the details. In the previous attacks, we weren’t able to find anything noteworthy. However, with cases like this, often all we need is one small lead, or one tiny slipup from the enemy, to nail our target down. We’ll also be careful with the information the media receives about this incident until we get him.”

I nodded, hoping they’d find something. “And what’s the plan if you do get a lead?”

“A guy like this? We rush in, fingers on the trigger. He’s too dangerous to put in prison.”

I nodded again.

Jackie took a deep breath. “You know, this is now the third time I’m thanking you for saving Lexi. It’s a significant failure on our behalf, but hopefully with the right pieces in place, we can eliminate this threat for good.” She sighed, her gaze becoming gentle. “I’m not sure I could ever fully express my appreciation.”

“Of course,” I replied, only for my tone to become serious. “But you realize this is exactly what I was talking about during negotiations, right? The fact that I’ve not been able to see my evaluation yet, could have resulted in a very different outcome this evening.” I paused to let that sink in. “I got lucky this time, but that might not happen again. My ignorance might result in a lot of people dying. So if you really want to express your appreciation, then please get that evaluation in my hands.”

She grimaced, only to nod. “I’ll try. But there’s only so much I can do. At the very least, your contract says fifteen days, so worst case is you’ll have it in two weeks.”

I sighed, knowing it was really out of her hands. “And an attack like this can’t happen again,” I added. “Until we take this guy down, I need to know what’s safe and what’s not. I mean, is my home even safe at this point?”

Jackie leaned back in her seat, crossing her legs and simultaneously crossing her arms, pushing upward on her chest as she rolled her shoulders, like she was trying to work out the tension. “We have extremely tight privacy measures in place for all of our public supers, including Lexi. And the pattern, so far, proves that those measures have been effective.”

“What do you mean?”

“All of these attacks have happened in public, even though she would obviously be an easy target if she were attacked at home while she was asleep in bed. The reason why, is because the enemy doesn’t know where she lives. They don’t even know the location where she works. And, all of our public supers have anti-stalking programming installed in their cars to detect if they are being followed. Thus, they’ve been forced to draw her out into the open. They went after her at an airport, then a mall, and now a theater.”

“Anti-stalking programming?” I repeated. “How come you never mentioned that?”

“For yourself? Because you’re not a public super,” she explained. “No one, outside of the CDS and top government organizations, knows that you have a role at the CDS. And honestly, while that programming was still installed in