by Misty Evans
He still hadn’t looked at her. “What is this about?”
“My other operation. Chica Bonita.” Ever so slowly, his gaze rose to hers. “There’s been a new discovery. My boss is in town to check it out.”
Her stomach suddenly did a nose dive. There was no point in asking further questions. She could see by the set of his chin he wasn’t going to answer anything. In fact, he looked like he was about to haul her upstairs, handcuff her to the bed, and start asking her questions.
“I’m coming with you,” she said, heading for the bike.
He backed up another foot, keeping her at a distance. “No you’re not.”
She kept charging. “Maybe I can help.”
Another foot. He held out a hand to stop her. “You can’t.”
“How do you know?”
His mouth twitched as if he were subduing a smirk or maybe a curse. “Because I know.”
What was he hiding? “Either you take me, or I’ll get one of your security goons to drive me.”
“You don’t know the address.”
“There aren’t that many places outside of town where you would meet someone. I’ll go door to door until I find you.”
The smirk broke free. “Goddamn, you’re stubborn.”
“Little Gran said it was a gift.”
“Little Gran was a good cook but she was crazy.”
She slapped his arm. “She was not.”
He chuckled, then grew serious again. “I’m seeing my boss. You go with me and he might force you to go back to America before we get Morales.”
Sophie leaned forward and patted his cheek. “Oh, Nels, haven’t you learned by now that no one forces me to do anything I don’t want to do?”
Before she knew it, he grabbed her wrist. “You need to trust me and sit this one out, Soph. I’m not kidding. Let me go see my boss and find out what’s going down with Chica Bonita. Then I’ll be back to finish this op with Morales.”
Trust him. After the past twenty-four hours, it should come naturally.
It didn’t.
She wanted to—God how I want to. She’d trusted him with her body. Trusted him with the truth about the ledgers.
But could she trust him not to blow her operation? Not just Morales but the lost girls too? “What’s going on at Chica Bonita that would bring him down here when we’re ready to arrest Morales and end it anyway?”
“I can’t share that.”
“Of course you can’t. Let me play devil’s advocate here, though. What happens if your boss decides to shut down whatever’s going on at Chica Bonita before I arrest Morales for the rest of his cartel dealings? What then, Nels?”
He pulled her closer, turned her hand around and kissed her palm. “I won’t hang you out to dry, I swear.” His eyes were earnest, his tone sincere. “No matter what happens with Cooper Harris and Chica Bonita, I will be back to help you take down Morales tomorrow.”
She believed him. The realization came like a roller coaster, building, building, building and then winging over the crest. Her stomach went into free fall. A sweet lightheadedness made her head swim.
I trust him.
A new form of hope sang in her veins. Sophie gave his hand a hard squeeze, then stepped back, her fingers sliding through his ever so slowly as he reluctantly let go. “Thank you, Nels.”
He opened his mouth as if he were going to say something else. Then he shut it and released her hand fully. For a long moment, he sat staring at her. Quiet. Resolute.
“Hurry back.” Sophie blew him a kiss and watched him ride away.
Thirty minutes later
Outskirts of Tijuana
Cooper heard an approaching bike.
He’d heard bikes come and go all night from the apartment above the bar. The place rented by the hour, but for him and Agent Rios, he’d cut a deal. Twenty-four hours and silence about their presence in exchange for a sizable wad of cash and the promise he would overlook certain abuses of the law going on downstairs.
He didn’t want to arrest anyone; this was Mexico after all. Not his jurisdiction. But he had plenty of contacts and friends, in low places as well as high, that could make the owner of the bar’s life hell if he chose to get in touch.
Glancing out the upstairs window, he saw the wild hair and the vest and knew it was another Savage. Not just any Savage, though.
Nelson Cruz had heard he was in town.
The bike pulled up out front and Cruz dismounted. He looked up, caught sight of Cooper in the upstairs apartment window. Cooper motioned for him to come around back.
Cruz took something out of the motorcycle’s saddlebags, then hoofed it around back. Ten seconds later, there was a knock at the door.
“Yo,” Cooper said.
Cruz entered, a leather bound book in his hands. “Couldn’t stay away, huh, boss?”
If only. “If you’d done your job and taken out Chica Bonita like you were supposed to, I wouldn’t need to be here.”
Cruz knew he was kidding and the two did their normal manly hand grasp, half-pat on the back hello. Dust rose from Cruz’s vest where Cooper slapped him.
“Dyer said you brought Rios with you and you’re looking into some underground railroad?”
Cooper returned to his post at the window. The sandy area around the bar was so dry, it was hard to imagine it had poured last night. “The papers the illegals are carrying are quality stuff. ICE and the Bureau believe there may be a dirty agent down here helping these women with the paperwork.”
There was a long pause as Cruz stared him down. “You’re looking for a dirty agent?”
Cooper stared back. He needed coffee.
Cruz folded his arms over his chest. “What branch? FBI? ICE?”
That was the dig. “Could be any of them. Agent Rios is in town right now asking around about runaway girls. Where they go, where they hang out, where they disappear to. She’s pretending to be looking for her little sister’s friend who ran away from home and is determined to get to America after a drug cartel killed her parents. I’m hoping Rios can infiltrate this underground railroad and figure out who’s in charge.”
“Damn.” Cruz smacked the book down on the table. “I was hoping she was here.”
“Why?”
“I need her to look at this ledger. The entries are written in code. Dyer said Rios could probably figure it out.”
Cooper cocked his chin at the book. “Something in particular you’re looking for in that one?”
Cruz’s silence told him all he needed to know. Agent Sophie Diaz was the one interested in what the ledger said, not Cruz. “How is your charge? I’m surprised you didn’t bring her with you.”
“Diaz? Fine.”
“Ready for the sting tomorrow?”
“Chomping at the bit.”
“She willing to share with the CIA?”
“Not on your life. She’s worked this operation for nine months and now the CIA is going to blow in and take the credit.”
“All they want is this European dealer. I’ll make sure Diaz and the Bureau get Morales.”
“Morales’s little sister is home from Mexico City. We need to make sure she’s safe before, during, and after this thing. She’s only eleven and she’s blind. She seems to have no idea her brother is a drug lord.”
Every member of Cooper’s taskforce had a conscience. It sometimes caused problems, but it made each of them better agents. “I’ll do everything in my power to make sure the girl is safe.”
“Agent Diaz will appreciate that, and so will I.”
“Rios will be back in a little while.” Cooper went to the wooden table and pulled out chair. “Meanwhile, I need to put eyes on Chica Bonita and figure out how these women are getting the girls through there.”
He sat and showed Nelson a simple sketch he had of the property’s layout. “You know the grounds and the building itself from your raid two years ago, right? You’ve been inside.” He handed Cruz a pencil. “If you were using the place to run
a smuggling operation, how would you go about it?”
The agent resisted sitting for a moment until Cooper shoved the chair across from him out with a kick of his booted foot. “Sit. I need help with this. You can get back to Agent Diaz in a few minutes. I assume you left her well-guarded.”
“She’s safe.” Cruz dropped into the chair. “There’s something else I need to tell you.”
Cooper listened as Cruz explained about the warehouse where Morales manufactured his drugs. “Agent Diaz says by her calculations they’re shipping out a hundred pounds of bath crystals every week, all headed to Southern California.”
Morales was supplying bath salts to Southern Cali? Cooper’s day just got brighter. “So at least one of our major suppliers could be out of business by Monday morning. If he’s the only supplier, we can shut down Project Bliss.”
The guy’s knee bobbed up and down with nerves. “Possibly.”
“Nice job, Cruz.”
“I still didn’t find those missiles.”
“While I’d like our taskforce to get credit for finding them, that’s not our gig. The CIA is in charge of those damn missiles. They should have done more to get eyes on them before tomorrow. But as long as Morales brings them to the drop point, and all goes as planned with the takedown, they’ll be out of commission shortly.”
Cruz tapped his thighs with his thumbs, looking at the table. “And what if the takedown doesn’t go as planned, Coop?”
His agent new something he wasn’t sharing. Had to be something with Agent Diaz again. “What are you worried about specifically?”
He shrugged, trying to look nonchalant. “There are too many players. Too many agendas. Maybe I’ve been under too long, but I got a bad feeling about this CIA thing.”
Cooper did, too, but knew it was as much a part of his competitive nature as it was about worrying about the op blowing up. “None of the agencies play well with each other. That’s part of the point of our taskforce, to create stronger bonds and reinforce solid communication. When Agent Rios gets back, I’m sure she’ll have insight for us into the CIA’s perspective.”
Cruz didn’t look like he cared about the CIA’s perspective, but he picked up the pencil and started making notes on the sketch. “This is not an entrance. There’s a service door back here. Under the platform is a hidden metal door to the basement. Like a storm cellar. If the women are using Chica Bonita for smuggling, I’d lay odds, this is where they’re entering and leaving.”
As he went on, giving Cooper a detailed account of the building’s layout and the best spots for surveillance, Cooper sat back and listened. Whatever Cruz was hiding, he was still a damn good agent.
Cooper hoped Agent Diaz wasn’t about to cut him off at the knees.
Chapter Twenty
Sophie still hadn’t gone inside. After Nelson had ridden away, she’d sat at the patio table, sending a text to Wanda Kohl in the States and watching the peacock and other birds make their way into the garden. So much had changed in the past few hours. She had changed.
Yes, she still wanted to know what had happened to her sister. She still wanted to shut down the Morales drug cartel and make sure Lexie had somewhere safe to go when Rodrigo landed in federal prison.
Then there were the girls she’d been helping sneak into America. She’d been over it and over it in her head, and there was no way she could continue helping Yolanda transport the Chica Bonita girls across the border. The upside was that once she put Morales out of business, he would no longer be able to use Chica Bonita for human trafficking or anything else, if he was indeed resurrecting it.
Another cartel leader would surely come along and Yolanda and her crew would renew their efforts to transport the lost girls into safer territory where they had a fighting chance to get a good education and live with a supportive family. There have been times in the last few months when Sophie had fantasized about leaving the FBI and devoting herself to the same cause, only from the right side of the law.
That was a fantasy. The only way she could bring about true change and shut down the criminal enterprises involved in human trafficking was to stay in the Bureau.
Her phone buzzed with an incoming text. Wanda at Child Services. Looking into an option for you to gain temporary custody of the girl until a permanent home can be found. I’ll know more soon.
Sophie sat back. Her take care of Lexie? Out of the question. She adored the girl, but Lexie shouldn’t be forced to live with the undercover agent who had taken down her brother, and there was no way the Bureau would let Sophie do such a thing.
The fantasy about leaving the FBI flashed through her mind again.
Don’t be ridiculous. The Bureau is all you have.
Except maybe she had Nelson too.
Nelson and Lexie all in one package. Now that was a fantasy.
Stomach grumbling and ready for some strong coffee, Sophie pushed out of the chair and went upstairs to her apartment.
Right as she opened the door, the hairs on the back of her neck stood straight up. Someone was inside.
Holding her breath and going completely still, she started to ever-so-slowly release the doorknob and step back when the door was jerked out of her hand and a man she hated stood in front of her.
“Sophie, you little minx. Where the hell have you been?”
He was ten pounds heavier than the last time she’d seen him and he was failing to grow a beard. Deep creases lined his forehead and the bags under his eyes sagged like weighted hammocks.
If there was a hell, the CIA was the devil. “Get out of my apartment, Agent Blue. You shouldn’t be here.”
“Where did you and your bodyguard go this morning?”
She shoved him backward and shut the door behind her, fearing that some guard might come by and overhear them. “None of your damn business.”
“Not my business?” He pushed her up against the door, held her there. “This whole operation from front to back is my business. Now where’s your bodyguard? I’d prefer he not walk in on us and try to kill me.”
“He wouldn’t be my bodyguard if it weren’t for you and your stupid idea to take out a hit on me, Guido.”
The undercover operative who’d wormed his way into the Morales cartel five-plus years ago scratched his scraggly beard and chuckled. “I had no idea who he really was when I hired him to kill you. Although, I did think twice about hiring him at all, since he looked like he might actually be able to get the job done.”
“Lucky for you, he’s not a real Savage.”
Blue leaned closer, his breath smelling like tequila at seven in the morning. “Lucky for you, you mean. Who does he work for? Is he one of you?”
“You didn’t run his face through the CIA database in your spare time?”
“He’s Agency?”
“Immigration, but he’s better at his job than you are at yours.”
“Is that why he’s not here right now? He left you all alone when there’s a hit out on your life? Doesn’t seem too swift to me.”
“He knows I can take care of myself.”
For emphasis, she kneed him in the balls.
He was half a second ahead of her and managed to deflect. She still made contact with his thigh, causing him to flinch and grunt. That was all the opening she needed. Using her elbow, she landed a hard jab into his diaphragm and sent him down on his ass.
“Now tell me what the hell you’re doing here,” she said.
“God, you’re a bitch.” He gained his feet, chuckling and rubbing his sternum. “Did you find those ledgers?”
She wasn’t the only one who wanted them. The details they provided were of interest to him and the CIA as well as her and her agency. One of the reasons he had infiltrated the cartel was because the CIA was suspicious of Ciro Morales’s possible involvement with a Cuban Marxist group who had been funded by the Chinese government to gather intel on America’s missile program. The CIA believed there were details of top secret information in those ledgers, as well
as Ciro’s contacts in the terrorist world.
Agent Blue thought Sophie was going to turn those ledgers over to him when she found them. In exchange, he’d offered to help her with the paperwork for the lost girls. She’d never planned to give the ledgers to him; he’d been unable to find them when he worked for Morales and then had gotten himself fired when Ciro had died and Rodrigo had taken over the reins. She may have wanted the ledgers for a different purpose, but they belonged to the FBI now.
“I don’t have them.” Thank goodness she had taken them with her that morning and then forgotten them in the saddlebags on Nelson’s bike. Time to throw him off that bone. “Do you know about the exchange tomorrow?”
“Yeah. Agent Borcillo thinks he’s going to finally nail this European asshole he’s been chasing for the past sixteen months, but there are no missiles. I told Borcillo that a dozen times. I never saw any in the five years I worked for Ciro and you can’t hide something like that. Whatever the kid is bringing to the table tomorrow, it ain’t missiles.”
“Rodrigo claims he’s buying another exotic snake.”
“Fucking nutcase. I hate that kid.”
Suddenly, Sophie remembered the floppy disk Nelson had found in the trays of uncut diamonds. What was stored on that disk?
A new thought made her take a step back. Blue was right; there weren’t any physical missiles.
Only the technology to build them.
“You need to leave,” Sophie said, hustling him to the door. “Don’t come back here again. I have less than twenty-four hours to finish this mission and I don’t need you or anyone else, regardless of your agency credentials, blowing it for me. If everyone does their job, we’ll all get what we want tomorrow.”
“I need those ledgers,” he snarled before backing towards the door. She liked the fact that he didn’t feel safe turning his back on her. “If you screw this up, Agent Diaz, I will bring the full force of the CIA, and the president himself, down on your fat ass. I know all your dirty little secrets and I’ll be happy to tell the Bureau every last one of them.”
