It turned out that Oliver was not a bad runner even if he grumbled about it under his breath. His long legs ate up the miles without a problem. However, he did have a hard time focusing on where he was going instead of marveling at the forest around us. At one point, I ran straight into his back when he stopped dead in the trail to watch a deer pick its way through the trees. The sudden stop caused me to lose my balance and I would have fallen backward if Oliver didn’t reach out and grab my elbows to steady me. Even with the quick speed he had to use to catch me, his grip was gentle. I quickly regained my balance and stepped out of his hold. I didn’t like to be touched, even if it was gentle, and the whole incident made me lose my peaceful focus.
“Isn’t that so cool,” Oliver asked with his face turned in the direction of the deer, thus not noticing my quick retreat from his grasp. I turned my attention to the forest and saw the large animal with fur made up of dozens of shades of brown with white fur covering its underbelly and cute stubby little tail. I had never seen a wild animal up close like this before and I was surprised by how big yet graceful the animal was. Why was it not spooked by our trail of runners?
“It’s a wild animal,” I murmured back, “I am sure we can find another one to ogle at later. But right now, we are being left behind.” I stepped around Oliver and started down the trail again. But I turned to watch the deer startle and leap further into the woods. I did have to admit, that it was pretty cool.
The sound of my feet on the dirt path mixed with Oliver’s panting breath formed a rhythm that lulled me into my beloved running trance once more. I thought back to the miles upon miles I ran at the behest of my martial arts instructors. I had trained in half a dozen different arts, but one thing they all had in common was to hone the ability to run. If I ever found myself in a situation that I couldn’t fight my way out, I was confident that I could run faster and further than anyone pursuing me.
About three hours later, I jogged around a corner and saw the group of recruits gathered in a loose circle outside of Whistler’s stone gates. Some were bent over with their hands on their knees while others were sprawled on the ground. As I approached, I locked eyes with Brett as he straightened out of a hamstring stretch. His left eye was just as black as Oliver’s and there was a fist-sized bruise clearly visible on his jaw. The look of raw hatred on his face punched through the pleasant haze the run had left me in, and a zing of adrenaline run down my spine.
I straightened my spine and lifted my chin to meet his gaze straight on. This I could handle. I was no stranger to working next to hostile men, and my fight-or-flight response was heavily skewed towards fight. If Brett wanted to make an enemy out of me, I would be ready.
“Hey, has he said anything to you?” Oliver asked as he came to stand behind me. “Because if he does, I will talk to Cole and let him know that they attacked me first. That you stepped in to help me out. Plus, both Vincent and Brett made the first move against you. You were just defending yourself. Well, yourself and me.”
I turned to look at Oliver in shock and disbelief. I was a lone wolf. Had been for my entire life. I had learned the hard way that the only person I could rely on was myself. People I had known for years, grew up with even, had never gone out of their way to help me out. Yet this man I had known for less than twenty-four hours was willing to step up to not only the people that attacked him but also the founder and CEO of a multimillion-dollar corporation for me? That didn’t make sense. And it was so far out of my comfort zone, I didn’t know if this was something I could handle.
“What?” Oliver asked, “Why do you look like I just asked you to disarm a nuclear bomb.”
“Nothing.” I dipped my head to hide my eyes from his as I replied, “Let’s just focus on the program. I can handle Brett.”
“No. It’s not nothing, Payton,” Oliver replied in a gentle voice that told me that he knew how uncomfortable I had become at his words. “And if needed we will handle Brett together. Like it or not, you were stuck with me the second you said that I was at the top of the twenty-first-century food chain.” He bent to catch my eye and winked at me.
Oliver’s words caused a powerful and unknown emotion to build within my chest. I wouldn’t allow myself to believe he would actually have my back if it really came down to it but at this moment, I was willing to pretend so I could embrace this amazing feeling. If I had any doubts about sticking to Oliver’s side and ensuring that he got through this program, he had just removed them by giving me something I had never felt before, a sense of belonging.
The last of the runners had caught up to the group and attention shifted toward Ford for instruction on what we were supposed to do next. His emerald green eyes scanned the group, and I got the impression he was taking in and making notes of even the smallest details. He then grumbled in his low scratchy voice that we were to go to lunch in the dining hall. Ford then turned and started walking into the Whistler compound.
“I don’t think he takes much pleasure in his work,” Oliver stated. “Do you think that the agents tasked to teach us failed to make it on a team?”
I took a second to consider this as the group started to walk towards the main building that held the dining hall. I had learned to read people quickly at a very young age. When I underestimated people or didn’t anticipate their motives correctly, the cost was usually my blood. And my instincts were telling me not to underestimate Ford. “I don’t know how they pick instructors, but I doubt that Ford has failed at much in his life. Don’t underestimate him.”
Oliver huffed out a sigh, “Yeah, you are probably right, he is intense on a whole other level. I just wonder why he would be here working with us instead of out with a team kicking-ass and taking names.”
“Teamwork isn’t for everyone,” I replied, and my stomach tightened in response. I could easily imagine a scenario where a person was capable enough to pass Whistler’s exacting standards but then was unable to find a team they could trust enough to cohesively work with.
I didn’t want to tip Oliver off to my fear that I was unfit to be a team member, so I changed the subject. “What do you think we will be doing after lunch?”
“I hope napping. I would totally get top points in napping,” he replied. This caused the corners of my lip to twitch upwards as we walked into the dining hall. There were six large dark wood tables positioned in three lines throughout the room. On the far wall, there was everything one could think of to make sandwiches. Oliver and I joined the rest of the recruits in line and once we had made their sandwiches we sat at the table at the far end of the room. The room started to fill with the recruits and other Whistler employees. However, the rest of our table remained empty.
A quiet settled over the hall as everyone ate their lunch. Either everyone was too worn out after the run to talk or they were lost contemplating their first impressions of Whistler. I thought that the people sitting in the hall eating lunch looked rather normal. Which contrasted with what I thought I was going to find inside of the super-secret, elite, paramilitary compound.
One could not just Google the Whistler Corporation and get a job application, or even a description of what the security company did. Their entire existence seemed to be cloaked in secrecy. Not that you needed top-secret clearance to learn about Whistler, but you did have to dig down past the first couple layers of normal internet traffic to find anything remotely connected to Whistler. If I had to guess, I would say they had a scrubber on their payroll. A person whose entire job was to erase any digital footprint that Whistler left in its wake.
I had stumbled onto Whistler by accident. I had been looking into possible positions within the military. As I was researching records of past missions, I kept encountering mentions of aid given by the Whistler Corporation. As I followed the lines of information back, I learned Whistler was a sort of private military organization. I described it as ‘sort of’ because they also participated in jobs and projects that were decidedly un-military. I had found evidence of Whistler influence all around the world from Israel to Russia, to Angola, to Bolivia, and all fifty states.
When I dug deeper into the records, it appeared that none of the personnel involved in the different missions repeated. It seemed that Whistler provided a different group of agents for each event. This piqued my interest and I had doubled my research efforts into Whistler. Once you knew what you were looking for, a lot more information was available. The Whistler corporation marketed itself as a private security firm that specializes in protection and intelligence. They attributed their high success rate to a system that utilized highly trained and cohesive teams made up of 4 to 10 members. When a job was presented to Whistler, that job would be assigned to the Whistler team that was best equipped to ensure a favorable outcome for the client.
As far as I could tell most Whistler recruits either worked in proximity to a team of current Whistler agents or somehow drew the attention of Whistler by excelling in their field of work. Once a person gained interest, they were directed to an encrypted website that explained Whistler’s mission and working structure along with a job application. I am guessing this is how Oliver found himself sitting within this recruitment class. His brother, a current Whistler agent, had brought Oliver in to work some job where they needed his computer skills. After said job was done the team had agreed that Oliver would make a good agent and he was directed to apply.
I had never worked in the military or law enforcement. I had not encountered a Whistler team in the field and wowed them with my prowess in hand-to-hand combat. I had not been directed to apply. In fact, I was pretty sure if they knew my real job history, they would have me forcibly removed from the premises. I had filled out the application with information from my fake identity after I had decrypted the Whistler websites because I was curious.
At the time I hadn’t actually thought that they would accept me to come to this six-week job interview because one - they were a security company and I was using a fake identity, if anyone would be able to figure that out I would have thought Whistler would have, and two - I am not really the hero type. From my research, I could tell they generally targeted good people who liked to risk their lives for others.
When I received the acceptance email to this training program, I had been looking for purpose, some way to give meaning to my existence, and a direction to use when pushing forward into my future. I was equipped with a new identity, courtesy of the United States government, that provided me with a blank slate. The problem with slates is that you can always see what you try to erase. I had accepted the invitation to become a Whistler recruit with the idea that maybe here I would find something to write on that slate that would block out my past.
My musings were interrupted by a booming voice that directed us to return to the conference room. I identified Griffin as the owner of said booming voice and wondered what this afternoon would have in store for us. I accompanied Oliver as we put our dishes in a bin and walked over to the conference room. The atmosphere within the room was more subdued than it had been that morning and I guessed that was due to sheer exhaustion. We must have run close to a marathon that morning and the majority of the men had the tell-tail signs of being hungover. As we settled into our chairs Griffin, Dwight, and Ford entered the room and moved to stand in the front. Griffin and Ford moved to stand in the corner while Dwight leaned against the podium in a way that mimicked how Mr. Bennet stood hours earlier.
“Hello trainees,” Dwight drawled in a deep southern accent, “Now that Ford has run the excess energy out of your systems, we can get down to brass tax. Here at Whistler, we tackle problems through teamwork. Thus, it only makes sense that we evaluate your aptitude within a team environment.”
Disappointment descended on me at Dwight’s words. I was confident in my ability to rise to the challenge in most environments. However, when you add more people to the equation success becomes increasingly more difficult. Not being able to do everything myself meant I would have to trust someone else to complete the task. Trust and me did not have a good relationship.
“These next six weeks will be broken down into three different two-week sessions. For each session, you will complete certain tasks as a team while others we will ask you to complete individually. At the end of each session, you will go head-to-head with another team in a mock scenario that mirrors real jobs Whistler agent’s face.”
Hmmm, out-and-out competition. Hadn’t Mr. Bennet asked us to refrain from being competitive?
“The first session starts today, and you will be able to pick your own five-membered team. The members of each team will be randomly selected for the second session. For the third section Griffin, Ford, and I will choose six people that have demonstrated leadership skills to be formal team leaders. They will then pick their other four team members.” This caused people to straighten within their chairs and look at one another. Most looked like they were already picking their teams through non-verbal communication. I had no idea how I would convince people to let me join their team. The only other people I had even spoken to other than Oliver was Brett and Vincent. And somehow, I didn’t think they would welcome me as a teammate.
Dwight cleared his throat to regain everyone’s attention, “Remember, as this program progresses, more and more current Whistler teams will arrive and observe how you progress through this program. The end goal here is not to win at everything, but to assess your abilities so we can place you within the correct Whistler team.” Dwight then directed everyone to split into groups and gave everyone half an hour to introduce themselves.
I slowly stood and remained next to Oliver as a chaotic hustle to form groups occurred around us. I watched as Elena stood and walked purposefully to a tall and muscular man with short dark hair. Elena then slowly ran her fingers down his arm and flipped her hair behind her shoulder as she looked him in the eye and whispered something in his ear. The man’s neck flushed pink as he gave Elena a head nod. The man was Derik Hanson. He had an almost spotless record with Seal Team 6 and was one of the most accomplished and skilled people here. And Elena had just inserted herself on his team.
I understood how she did it. Moreover, I could have also pulled out the fake charm and maneuvered my way onto a team, but it seemed wrong to manipulate future team members. I refuse to pretend to be anything other than myself. If that meant I was thrown out of this program, then that must indicate I’m not Whistler material.
When the shuffling slowed down, Oliver pointed at a group of three men that were looking around the room in search of two more for their group. I nodded, thankful that I would be on the same team as Oliver, and we make our way over to them. Oliver approached them with a megawatt smile and an outstretched hand.
“Hello. My name is Oliver Paxton, and this is Payton Taylor,” he stated as he shook each of their hands. “It looks like fate has decided to make us teammates.” After Oliver was done with his introduction I decided to follow suit, swallowed by dislike for being touched, and shook each of the men’s hands.
“Great, we get stuck with the girl,” stated the relatively short one with a dirty blonde buzz cut. I was about to defend my position when a cool English accent beat me to it.
“Now Victor, don’t get stuck on stereotypes. Having a beautiful woman on our team can present a lot of opportunities that would have been unavailable to us if Payton had decided to join another group.” The speaker then turned to me and said, “Please ignore him. His mouth always moves before his brain has time to process the words. My name is Jon Cavanagh. This is Amir Safar,” he gestured to the dark man I guessed was of middle eastern descent, “and this idiot is Victor Vasin.”
Jon was about five-ten with floppy hair made up of dozens of different shades of brown, reminding me of the deer we had seen earlier. He had a slim build, but I could tell he was a trained fighter by the way he carried himself and planted his feet. His personnel file stated that he had been working for a division of Interpol when he had encountered and worked with a Whistler team on a kidnapping case. He was looking at me with deep brown eyes that conveyed a tentative acceptance. Jon was clearly going to take the role of leader to our rag-tag team and he was willing to give me a chance to prove myself.
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