My mother-in-law called me a freeloader in a room full of military officers. My husband smiled and let it happen. Ten minutes later, the newly appointed commander of the base walked across the officers’ club, stopped directly in front of me, and rendered a formal salute that left my husband staring in stunned silence.

I burst through the kitchen doors and ran straight for the promotion stage.

Ethan was still kneeling on the floor, staring blankly at the carved wooden eagle resting on the display table.

“Get everyone back, now!” I ordered General Sterling.

The remaining guests were aggressively pushed into the far corners of the room.

I approached the wooden eagle carefully, pulling a small tactical flashlight from my clutch.

I inspected the base of the heavy carving.

There was a faint, nearly invisible seam running along the bottom edge.

I used the edge of my silver hairpin to gently pry the wooden panel loose.

Inside the hollowed-out base sat a block of C4 explosive wired to a digital timer.

The glowing red numbers counted down aggressively.

Sixty seconds.

Fifty-nine.

“Agent Walker, we need to evacuate you immediately,” General Sterling warned from a safe distance.

“There is no time to evacuate the blast radius, Sir,” I replied, keeping my hands perfectly steady.

I had cross-trained with the Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit for two years before joining counterintelligence.

This was a standard, remote-triggered improvised device.

“Grace, please, run away!” Ethan sobbed.

“Shut up, Ethan, I need complete silence,” I snapped.

I stared at the complex web of red, blue, and yellow wires connected to the detonator.

Forty-five seconds.

I remembered the schematics Vanessa's syndicate usually employed.

They always wired a fail-safe trigger to the primary power source to punish anyone attempting to defuse it.

I traced the blue wire back to a secondary battery pack hidden beneath the explosive clay.

Thirty seconds.

My hands began to sweat, but my breathing remained slow and controlled.

I pulled a small, sharp folding knife from my ankle holster.

“Twenty seconds, Grace,” General Sterling cautioned, his voice tight with fear.

I slid the blade of the knife carefully under the yellow wire.

If I was wrong, this entire building would become a smoking crater in the ground.

Ten seconds.

Nine.

The Clumsy Maid Bathed His Dog—Then The Mafia Boss Said She Wasn’t Leavi...

She found her husband with another woman and walked away so quietly that...

The Mafia Boss Asked a Disabled Widow If She Was Okay

Eight.

I closed my eyes, trusted my intense federal training, and sliced cleanly through the yellow wire.

Chapter 6 - The Wooden Eagle