Operation Zulu Read online

  Beta Force: Operation Zulu

  A Beta Force Comedy Thriller

  Ernest Dempsey

  138 Publishing

  Contents

  Preface

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Thank You

  OTHER BOOKS BY ERNEST DEMPSEY

  Preface

  As of April, 2019, this book has not been released to the public and is available for a select group of people. You are on that list. It will be released sometime in mid-2019, but for now, you may consider yourself a beta reader…oh, that’s a tad heavy handed considering this new series is called Beta Force. Then again, maybe it’s perfect this way. I’ll have to think on that. For the time being, enjoy the story. This is my first foray into comedy. I’ve long considered adding more humor to my main series of stories in the Sean Wyatt Universe. When the idea for this story came to me, I felt like I really hit on something fun. I hope you feel the same.

  Ernest Dempsey

  1

  Zeke couldn’t take his eyes away from the scene unfolding before him. He watched as the dark-haired man pulled his weapon and readied to fire. The intended target had no idea of what was about to happen. Zeke wanted to yell. He wanted to warn the unsuspecting victim, but he knew it would do no good. Zeke saw it coming from a mile away and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

  The gunman held his weapon out at full extension for a long moment, as if savoring the kill. He looked like a lion crouching in the grass waiting to pounce on its prey.

  There was no one in the alley to witness the hit. It was the perfect crime, although it wasn’t technically a crime. It was an assassination, ordered by the government. Once it had that banner slapped on it, there were no stopping things—a fact Zeke knew all too well.

  “I’m sorry,” the gunman said.

  The spy spun around at the sound of the voice. It was too late, though. The gun fired, and the blast echoed through the alley. The target collapsed to her knees, her hands clutching her chest, her white blouse turning red.

  She stared at her killer, but the man wouldn’t meet her gaze. He merely stared at the sidewalk for a few seconds and then raised his weapon again. His finger tensed on the trigger, ready to deliver the fatal blow to the head.

  Suddenly, Zeke’s phone started vibrating on his desk. The unexpected noise shook him from the computer screen where he was watching one of his favorite spy movies. He pulled his feet down from the surface of his desk. He wasn't always so obvious as he killed time at work.

  Zeke Marshall had been working in the accounting department as an analyst for the GIC. He’d unwillingly followed in his father’s footsteps, going to work for the Global Intelligence Commission, one of the most secretive agencies in Washington. Everyone knew about the CIA, the FBI, and the NSA. Most people were aware of MI5 and MI6. Then, of course, there was Interpol and a half dozen other entities around the world of the same ilk. The GIC was one that kept a low profile, flying under the radar. There were only a few other agencies like it in the country, or even on the planet as far as Zeke knew. He wasn’t normally privy to such information. He was just a number cruncher, a cubicle jockey. Any dreams he may have had about going out into the field and taking down the bad guys couldn’t have been farther away.

  He’d gone through the training, knew how to fight, both armed and unarmed—but it didn’t help get him his dream job.

  He hated his job. It was boring, it didn’t pay well, and he was the butt of pretty much everyone’s jokes, at least everyone who worked in the agency. Every now and then he would see the guys who he suspected were spies or counterintelligence agents walking down the halls with their high-level clearance badges and that I’m-better-than-you look on their faces. It was a smug expression that seemed permanently imprinted on their faces as if they’d just spent the last month in Barbados on a yacht with the Swedish Bikini Team.

  Zeke always hated those guys. He was never as fast or as good-looking as them, although he’d had his fair share of romantic encounters through the years. He liked to think he had a sort of goofy adorability about him.

  He wasn’t ugly. His hair was cut relatively short and swept to one side, partially spiked on top. He decently tall at six feet, and slender but athletic. Zeke worked out all the time, though it didn’t seem to help him bulk up. He’d always been on the skinnier side, which hadn’t helped him much when the football team cornered him in high school.

  Now those bullies were in different uniforms, the suits that field operatives wore. There was something about those suits. Maybe they were tailored or perhaps imported from Italy or some other fashion-savvy country. Or perhaps it was just his imagination.

  He reached for his cell phone and glanced at the number. His eyes rolled instinctively.

  He pressed the green button and answered. “Hello, Mom. Everything okay?”

  “Oh, hello, Zeke. I’m so sorry, honey. I didn’t mean to call you at work. I must have pressed the button by mistake.”

  Zeke nodded. “It’s fine, Mom. No worries. You need me to bring you anything on my way home tonight?”

  “No, dear. I’m fine. Thank you. I’ve gotta go. My shows are on.”

  “Okay, Mom. Enjoy the shows.”

  She didn’t hear him, she’d already hung up the phone. She accidentally called his number at least three times a week. It was just a matter of when and where it was going to happen. He set the phone back down on his desk and ran his fingers through his hair, resting his forehead on his palm.

  He wished he could do something else. He wished he could be one of those field agents. It was a dangerous life, true, but it was better than dying a long, slow, painful death here at his desk.

  He looked over his shoulder and didn’t see anyone coming. Still, he thought he should probably minimize the video he’d been watching. It would be nice to have his own office, although the responsibility that came with that kind of job made it almost not worth it. Responsibility was something Zeke did not intend to add to his plate. His job may have sucked, but at least he was somewhat invisible.

  “Marshall!”

  He nearly jumped out of his chair. Spinning to the right he saw his boss standing with his arm resting on the top of Zeke’s cubicle.

  “Yes, Mr. Weathers?” He flattened his pants with both hands and tried to sit up a little straighter.

  The older man stared down at him with a stern, almost loathing glare in his eyes. His hair was silver and perfectly molded as if he was still stuck in the sixties. Zeke wondered how much product it took to get a hold like that, especially for eight to ten hours a day. Mr. Weathers had lines streaking out across his tanned cheeks from the corners of his eyes. Rumor had it the man spent more time down on the Gulf Coast of Florida than he did in Virginia. Zeke knew that wasn’t true because the guy seemed to be perpetually up his tail.

  “What are you doing?” Weathers growled.

  “Well, sir, I was just—”

  “You were just talking on your personal cell phone at work. You do realize we deal with sensitive information, don’t you, Mr. Marshall?”

  “It was just my mother, sir. She…um, well she butt-dialed me.”

/>   “Butt dialed you?”

  Carlton Weathers was Zeke’s supervisor and a major thorn in his side. Weathers had never liked Zeke. He wasn’t sure why, but from the moment Zeke met Carlton Weathers, Zeke knew they were never going to get along. Weathers was a company man. Word around the office was he’d worked there for thirty years, but didn’t want to retire. Some people said he needed the money. Others speculated that he would be too lonely if he left work behind. He wasn’t married, so that seemed plausible.

  Zeke, however, had his own theory. He believed Mr. Weathers was just a power-hungry jerk. The guy loved being in control of stuff, especially the cubicle farm in this part of the building. He was the kind of person that would tell younger women at bars that he worked for the GIC as a Special Agent. They didn’t need to know that he was just the head of accounting. Why offer up that little morsel. Weathers was like those dudes he’d seen at bars walking in with motorcycle helmets, but with no motorcycles outside. All just a show to impress the ladies.

  Zeke had considered that technique once but decided against it when he started wondering what would happen as soon as they got outside, and the young lady realized he had no motorcycle. Sure, he could lie and say it was stolen, but that would take effort, and effort was something he tried to use minimally.

  Just like at his crap job.

  “My Mom, sir, she calls me every once in a while by accident. I’m sure she just had her phone in her pocket and sat down on it by mistake. I told her I would call her after work.” That wasn’t true, but it felt like the fastest way to get out of this conversation.

  “You are not to be on your personal device during work hours, Mr. Marshall. Are we clear about that?”

  “Crystal, sir. Well, more like a really nice IKEA glass.”

  Weathers winced at the wisecrack. “You think you’re funny, don’t you Marshall?”

  Zeke cocked his head to the side for a second and then straightened up. “I didn’t get to be prom queen because of my good looks.”

  He could see the rage boiling in his supervisor’s eyes. The man gripped the edge of the cubicle with white knuckles. “You think just because your father was one of our top assets you can do whatever you want, don’t you, son?”

  “Son? That’s kind of a strange choice of words considering you’re talking about my father.”

  “His legacy is the only reason your butt is here right now. I’m glad he’s not around to see what a slacker his son turned out to be.”

  “Slacker, innovator, it’s funny how those two get confused sometimes, isn’t it, chief?”

  “You better have the Istanbul reports on my desk by the end of the day or so help me, I don’t care who your father was, I will have you cleaning my shoes for the rest of your life.”

  “Really, sir? That sounds like a heck of an opportunity, but I was really hoping for something more along the lines of errand boy, or maybe landscaper.”

  Weathers clenched his jaw and stormed off.

  “Butler, maybe? Oh, I know, laundry guy.”

  His supervisor stopped and looked over his shoulder, firing one last warning with his eyes. “End of the day, Marshall. My desk by the end of the day.”

  Zeke flashed his best sarcastic grin and nodded. Everyone else in the office was staring at him.

  “It’s all good, everyone. And don’t worry, I’ll remember all of you after that promotion.”

  They all turned around and went back to their work. Zeke ran both hands through his hair. He wasn’t worried about getting the reports done for Mr. Weathers. He’d had them done within an hour of getting to work. That was one of Zeke’s special powers. He could do eight hours worth of a normal person’s work in fewer than two, sometimes less. So he allowed himself a little leisure time with some movies on the company computers. He knew all the best ways to get around their security systems thanks to his friend in the cybersecurity division.

  Zeke received plenty of resentment from his coworkers. True, he was a cut-up, a class clown, but the perception that he didn’t do his job was simply not true. He did his job. He just didn’t like it. It wasn’t stimulating to him. All he wanted to do was go play golf, or go to the beach, or go home and play video games like he did every night. Unfortunately, while his dad left an impressive legacy when he died, he didn’t leave Zeke and his mother much money. So a playboy lifestyle on the beaches, or in Vegas, or on the golf courses would have to wait for now.

  Since he was working for the federal government, it was probably going to have to wait his entire life. Working a job like this wasn’t a way to get rich. It was a way to be bled by the company for thirty or forty of the best years of your life.

  But what else could he do?

  He’d never made a real career decision during high school or college. He’d drifted, feeling his way through life until his career was chosen for him.

  He glanced at the picture on his desk. It was of his dad and his mom. They were holding each other while they stared at the camera with big smiles on their faces. The picture was about twenty years old. Zeke had only been four at the time.

  His dad was such a great man and an even better agent. He wasn’t resigned to the accounting department. He was a field agent, though most of his assignments were classified, the details of which could never be shared with anyone, no matter how close.

  Gary Marshall was a legend in the agency. He’d been in the thick of the Cold War, operating as a spy, an assassin, and even running point for a few rescue ops in the early 2000s when things started heating up in the Persian Gulf. By then he was an older man, but could still run the show like a twenty-year-old recruit.

  The one battle his dad couldn’t win was against heart disease. One fateful morning, when Zeke was a senior in college, his father was sipping a cup of coffee as he read the paper. His mother heard the coffee mug hit the floor and she rushed to his side, but it was too late. Gary died almost instantly from a massive heart attack.

  Zeke found little comfort in the paramedics telling him that there was nothing he could have done differently. The doctors said the same thing, again, bringing almost no comfort with their hollow words.

  Zeke drew a deep breath and fought off the emotions. That was a long time ago. He rolled his chair closer to the desk and reached out his hand, grasping the picture frame. “Sorry, Dad,” Zeke said.

  He needed a drink of water. He got up and left his desk, turned left, and walked down the hall toward the break room.

  “Only twenty-something more years of this crap to go,” he grumbled as he turned at the end of the hall.

  2

  “Seriously? Are you for real?”

  The guy looked like he was straight out of a college fraternity, one from a 1980s movie. Phoenix Underwood could almost see him in a toga, chugging beer and chasing coeds around the frat house. His name was Scott Brohm, and he’d started getting under Phoenix’s skin within three seconds of opening his mouth. And that was when they met. Scott had been nothing but a massive tool ever since.

  Phoenix rolled his eyes. “Yes. I already told you, it’s my real name.”

  The guy swore, the veins in his neck bulging. “Are you serious? I thought you were messing with me when you told me that.”

  He must’ve asked that same question five times already. The guy wasn’t very bright and Phoenix couldn’t help but wonder how in the world he’d passed the necessary exams to become a field agent for the GIC. He had the genetics for fieldwork—he was muscular, athletic, and looked every bit the part of a super spy—but that was about all.

  Phoenix was pretty much the opposite, although he wasn’t that out of shape. After all, going through the training to get into the GIC required pretty much everyone to pass a physical examination and a series of rigorous tests. Still, Phoenix clearly didn’t hit the gym as much as this guy, who probably had a bed there. Phoenix was about five feet eleven inches, and 170 pounds with scraggly brown hair and matching eyes. He had a goofy, casual demeanor most of the time, but ri
ght now, Scott Brohm was getting on his nerves.

  “Yes. Okay, now if you’ll excuse me, I’m extremely busy.” He resumed typing, analyzing the codes that streamed across the three monitors in front of him.

  “No way, man. I can’t believe that’s your real name. No way your parents named you after a city in the desert.” It was almost as if Phoenix hadn’t said anything, or was speaking another language.

  “Actually, they didn’t. I’m from Atlanta. It’s often referred to as the Phoenix city, rising from the ashes of the civil war when it was burned to the ground by General Sherman.”

  Brohm’s eyes glazed over into a lifeless, vapid stare. He stayed that way for three or four seconds before he snapped out of it. “I didn’t ask you for a history lesson, dufus, okay?”

  “Well, you kind of asked for it.”

  “What did you just say to me?” Brohm leaned closer, hovering over Phoenix’s little workstation.

  “I…I just said that since you suggested my name was from a city in the desert I thought I would correct you. That’s all.”

  “Do you think I need correcting?” He flashed a threatening glare at Phoenix, who looked up innocently at him.

  “Uh, well, good talk, Scott, but I really have to get back to this. These codes don’t break themselves.”

  Brohm shook his head and walked away. Phoenix let out a long exhale. It was the first time he’d taken a breath since the situation mistakenly escalated.

  “Jeez, that guy needs to lay off the horse testosterone,” he muttered.