Fixed Asset (Downrange), page 17
“Can’t say I’ve worked with every hacker out there,” Pete said. “But he’s the best I’ve personally worked with.”
“Then why is my intel light on Calista and the assholes she supposedly killed?”
“What makes you think they’re assholes?” Aiden inquired.
“Typically, women don’t kill men for no reason. They’re emotionally driven to kill.”
“Puts a whole new spin on turning feelings into felonies,” Ryan muttered.
“You need a coffee mug with that on it,” I told him. “Instead of ‘fuck your feelings,’ you need one that says ‘don’t make me turn my feelings into felonies.’”
I heard some chuckles but didn’t look up to see who I’d amused.
“Where the hell did you find this chick?” Ryan went on.
I felt my shoulders stiffen.
“What?” Jack’s grunt was a warning.
“Where’d you find this chick?” Ryan repeated. “I need the coordinates, ASAP, so I can see if there are more of her there.”
Oh . . .
Well . . .
That was a nice thing to say.
“No dice, my good fellow. I am my own special brand. A one-off, never to be made again.”
“So what you’re saying is, I have to challenge Jack to a duel at dawn and hope I’m quicker on the draw so I can take you from him and not look over my shoulder every day for the rest of my life.”
Jack growled.
I smiled.
“You could hope you’re quicker than Jack, but I guarantee you I’m faster than the both of you, so you’d lose the duel and I’d ride off into the sunset with Jack.”
I dreamed of us horseback riding—and baby, I gotta admit, that one threw me. My ass has never been on the back of a horse, and I have no interest in ever riding.
My smile got bigger.
The laughter I heard that time was definitely Jack.
“You think you’re faster on the draw than me?”
“No doubt. When we get back from Mexico, I’ll prove it to you.”
“Ten bucks says I’ll smoke your ass.”
That made me crane my neck and look over at the makeshift workstation—a.k.a. two end tables pushed together so Ryan and Aiden could open two spiral-bound road atlases.
Ryan looked smug and sure of himself. Aiden was giving me a ‘you don’t wanna make this bet’ look. I glanced at Jack, and his features were neutral.
“Twenty bucks says I can draw from the hip and put a bullet downrange faster than you. Another twenty says I can clear a course faster than you. I’ll throw in another ten that I score higher on accuracy too.”
Suddenly, Ryan didn’t look so sure. “I feel a moral obligation to warn—”
“You’re not morally obligated to tell me anything,” I cut him off.
“Because you don’t want to have to reciprocate and tell me your quals.”
He was correct.
I shrugged.
“You’re on.”
I nodded and looked back at the tablet with Shep’s report. “Just don’t be a sore loser and bellyache when I take your fifty bucks.”
“I never lose.”
Famous last words.
“Oh, and I don’t take ones. My name’s not Candy, and I don’t wear glitter and clear platform heels.”
“Do strippers still accept dollar bills?” Mason joined, because of course he wouldn’t miss out on a stripper conversation. “I thought with inflation they were up to fives.”
“Like you don’t know,” Aiden threw in.
“Never been to a strip club. What, do they only accept Venmo and Cash App now?”
Mason had never been to a strip club? On one hand, the guy was extremely good looking. He wouldn’t need to buy a lap dance to see some action. But I knew plenty of good-looking men and women who’d visited strip clubs.
“You’ve never been to a gentlemen’s club?” Ryan asked.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Mason arrogantly waving a hand from his face down his body.
“Do I look like I need to visit a gentlemen’s club?” Mason voiced my thought.
I left them to the squabble I’d inadvertently started and tuned them out.
Carlos Quintero was your typical gangster—wannabe warlord, clawing his way up the criminal ladder. He’d expanded his cousin’s prostitution ring and now controlled more than double the bars and hot spots than Rafael had. He might’ve cut out the high-interest-loan portion of the old regime, but he’d expanded the gambling.
“Why hasn’t the cartel just gobbled up Carlos’s territory?” I again asked out loud but to no one in particular.
Pete again was the one to answer, or in this case, question. “What do you mean?”
“For that matter, why did they allow Rafael to operate? Juárez is a cartel stronghold. Big players. And here’s this small-time gangbanger.”
“They take their cut,” Pete told me.
“Think about it like this,” Aiden started. “The cartel is McDonald’s—it’s easier to franchise. They get to take their cut without the hassle of ownership.”
That analogy only sort of worked. But I caught his meaning.
“The cartel lets him rent space and do his business, and they collect a percentage of his earnings?”
“Yup.”
“So, if Carlos has this beautiful Russian woman—who, as Mason pointed out, would get top dollar—would he share the news of his good fortune with the cartel, or would he move her out of Juárez, sell her privately, and keep all the money for himself?”
“Fucking shit,” Pete growled.
“He’d move her before the cartel caught wind he had her,” Mason said. “Either to keep the money or to stop the cartel from coming and getting her so they could sell her to one of their contacts. We’re looking in the wrong spot.”
Well, damn.
I heard chairs scraping against the floor and paper rustling as the men moved from their positions to join me back in the living room. Not that the dining room and sitting area off to the side weren’t one big room, it was just that the furniture—and there was a lot of it—delineated the spaces.
The men immediately started brainstorming.
Aiden began. “He wouldn’t bring her into the US.”
Ryan then took over. “He’d take her out of Chihuahua, and the cartel has ties to Michoacán. Those two states are out.”
“The Sinaloa Cartel would eat him alive,” Jack put in. “That state’s out.”
How many states did Mexico have? Thirty-one? Thirty-two? At this rate, we’d be here all night.
“Tom’s source in Juárez said there was a Russian going up for auction. If that intel is out, there’s a good chance the cartel already knows,” I said, contradicting my own theory.
“Not if Tom’s source is inside Carlos’s organization,” Pete answered. “Cat, you call him and ask who his source is and if he has any idea where Carlos would take her.”
I fought back a salute as I stood to get my phone out of my backpack. I really needed to find the time to go back to Arizona and pack. “I know the timing sucks, but I only have two days’ worth of clothes with me. I left my suitcase back in the hotel in Honduras—”
“I asked—”
I interrupted Jack right back. “If I had anything important in my room. The answer is still no. I had clothes, nothing else. But we’re gonna have to stop at a mall or something on the way home.”
“I got a tee you can have, Kitty,” Mason goaded Jack.
“Yeah, yours would probably fit me better than Jack’s.” That was a lie. Mason was way broader than Jack. “I could also use some pants. What size shorts do you wear, extra-shlong-long?”
I was digging through my bag when my joke landed.
The room exploded in laughter. As any good teller of a joke that had landed perfectly, I did not laugh. I smugly found Tom’s number and put my phone to my ear. I was walking out of the room to get away from all the chortling when Tom answered.
“Catarina.”
I didn’t know what part of the world he was in, but it sounded like I’d woken him up.
“Is now a good time?”
“I’ll call you right back.”
The line disconnected, and a moment later, an unknown number called back.
“Are we secure?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Is your source inside Carlos’s crew?”
“I can’t say. Why?”
Typical.
“If he’s not on the inside, then the cartel knows Carlos has the girl. If he’s on the inside and this information hasn’t been leaked, then Carlos has moved the girl.”
“Goddamnit. I didn’t think of that.”
“So? Is he in or out?”
“Inside.”
Great, now we were looking for a needle in a haystack.
“Any ideas where he’d take her?”
“The Sinaloa—”
“Not to be rude, Tom, but we’ve already scratched the places he wouldn’t take her off the list. We need intel on where he would.”
The laughter in the other room had quieted. I could now hear faint murmurs, but I couldn’t make out what they were saying.
“Carlos has ties in Baja Sur. A cousin in Tortuga Bay.”
“Anywhere else? Out of Mexico?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Did Calista kill Victor Stone and the two lawyers?”
Silence.
“If she had killed him, why would she kill him?”
More silence.
“You’re asking a lot of this team, of Berta. If she murdered them in cold—”
“Victor Stone was a pissant who had issues with the word no. He also had a reputation for certain . . . proclivities. One of those kinks was inviting his friends to the festivities. Consenting adults do what consenting adults do, and that’s no one’s business. However, without the consent, that’s something else entirely. And let’s just say there was no consent.”
I hadn’t realized I was grinding my molars until my jaw started to ache.
“Did he—”
“No. Not her. If she did kill Stone, it was because she walked in on him forcefully taking something that was not offered.”
I had yet to meet this woman and I already liked her.
“What do you want with the Honduran president’s wife and children?”
“Nothing,” he bit out.
That was a lie.
“You know, in the Army, I was called a human lie detector, and I didn’t need to be in the same room as the subject to pick up on an untruth. You of all people should remember this about me, seeing as you’ve used my skills in the past. Which I’ve thought about, and it annoys me to no end that you played me and I didn’t catch your lie. But I’ve come to the realization it’s because you didn’t fully lie. You did want me to find Berta and give her your intel. You simply omitted the truth behind why you wanted that, and your intel was bogus. You played me once, Tom. It won’t ever happen again. What do you want with the wife?”
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit—”
“You’re highly intelligent. I wanted you with me at the Agency. I knew I’d never get that. I want your skills available to me in the future, so I say this with respect, but leave it the fuck alone.”
That last part was said with authority but was tinged with melancholy.
There was a connection.
“Do you love her?”
“Leave it alone, Catarina.”
He loved her.
“Sure,” I lied. “One last thing. You said Calista’s father saved your life. He owned—”
“His father cleaned money for the Irish mob. When the time came for him to take over the family business, he found he couldn’t stomach it, and he approached the CIA.”
“You turned him into an agent?”
“Yes. He was assigned to me because I’d been tracking a bomb maker with ties to an Irish crime syndicate. I was in Liverpool. My intel said Danny was visiting a church. I was on my way there when Calista’s father called to warn me I was walking into an ambush. Fifteen minutes later the church blew up. If he hadn’t called, I would’ve been inside.”
“Does Calista know about her father?”
“No. Neither does his widow, and I’m trusting you not to tarnish the man’s memory. He didn’t volunteer to clean the mob’s money. And as you know, when you’re in, you’re in for life. Generations. His father made that deal. In the end, he did the right thing.”
And as his reward, his daughter had been kidnapped and trafficked.
“You have my word I will not tell her, and I’ll inform the team—”
“Keep that to yourself.”
I felt a prickle hit the base of my spine. He was asking me to keep something from a group of men whom I was bonding with. We were learning to trust each other. One of those men was Jack, who I trusted implicitly and would not keep secrets from.
“I can’t do that, Tom. I won’t keep something from my team. I trust them, and they will not betray my request and speak to Calista about this.”
“Catarina—”
“There is nothing you can say that will make me change my mind. I will not keep this from them.”
I waited a few moments for him to say something.
When he remained silent, I went on, “Call me if you get anything about the location of the auction.”
“I will.”
I disconnected the call, turned to get back to the team, and found Mason leaning against the wall, listening to my conversation.
Warfighter Mason was in the house. His stare was blank, mask fully in place, a thousand-yard stare that gave away nothing. This state, absolutely devoid of any emotion, was different from the other times he’d slipped into this persona.
Dead man walking.
That’s what he looked like—dead in the eyes.
I lifted a brow, inviting him to speak first.
“What did he want you to lie to us about?” Mason asked.
Tom hadn’t asked me to lie. He’d asked me to keep a secret, but I figured that to Mason, they’d be one and the same. So I answered.
“Calista’s grandfather made a deal with the Irish to clean their money. When her dad took over the laundering, he called the CIA. They turned him, and he became Tom’s informant. Her dad warned Tom he was walking into an ambush and saved his life.”
Mason was silent.
“Did I pass?”
“What?”
God, now the man was going to play dumb.
“Don’t,” I hissed. “Be honest about it. You heard what I said to Tom. You knew he wanted me to keep something from you. You heard me tell him I wouldn’t. You asked what that was. I told you. So, did I pass?”
“You’re asking me if you passed, not if I trust you.”
“We’ve already established this. I know you don’t trust me, and that’s okay. I get it. You trust me not to let you get shot. I trust you won’t tell someone to knife me to death. So we’re good.”
Mason’s mask bled away.
God, who hurt this man?
I understood being private. I understood holding your cards close to your vest. I knew what it meant to turn battle time on and, when it was over, turn it back off. But I had never seen someone break so hard, so fast, that the mask slipped on and off like his did.
“I promise I’ll step in front of a knife for you.”
I shook my head. “Great.”
“I . . .” Mason trailed off. “It takes me a while. Especially with women.” He paused again. “I’ve known Mia most of my adult life and trust her, but . . . I don’t. I love her more than anyone, including Pete. She’s not my blood, but she’s my sister, and I still can’t allow myself to get too close. So . . .”
So there was no chance he’d ever trust me.
That was sad. I didn’t like it. But that didn’t mean we couldn’t be friends.
“You don’t need to spill your deepest, darkest secrets for me to be your friend.”
Relief and pain and panic melted together.
It was time to change the subject.
“We need to call Shep. I think Tom’s in love with the president’s wife. Or maybe not in love, but there is an emotional connection.”
The look of shock on Mase’s face was hilarious, but I didn’t have time to marvel. “Mason!” I snapped.
“Right. We need to call Shep.”
I started his way. He pushed off the wall, and I got no farther. He grabbed my arm to stop me.
“Don’t let me do to you what I do with the others.”
Was he giving me permission to pry? And why me?
“I’ll dust off my crowbar when we get home and start chipping away.”
“You might need an excavator,” he mumbled under his breath.
He was. He was giving me permission.
And I wouldn’t waste the opportunity by asking questions that did not matter. If Mason Hughes had picked me to break through his walls, and that might help him open himself up to the others—I’d learn to drive an excavator, and I’d dig.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Pete had called Shep. We were running through possible locations when Catarina walked into the living room with Mason on her heels.
“Carlos has a cousin in Baja,” Shep was saying. “Hold on.”
Catarina stutter-stepped to a halt, tilted her head, and narrowed her eyes. I didn’t get the chance to remark on her strange entrance before she shook the look free and filled us in. “The cousin lives in Tortuga Bay.”
All eyes went to her.
“That was all Tom had on the cousin’s location. And his informant is on the inside.”
“What else did Tom give you?” Pete inquired.
She filled us in on Calista’s father and Tom’s request to keep it from us. I glanced around the room and saw near-identical expressions on all the men’s faces—respect.
“Something wasn’t sitting well with the president’s wife, so I pushed him about it. He told me to drop it. It wasn’t evasion, it went deeper. There’s an emotional connection.”
“Why do you think that?” Shep asked.
Cat stared at Pete’s phone on the coffee table for a second in what appeared to be disbelief before she answered, “It was in his tone. There was a sadness there. The way a man whose heart was broken would not want to talk about the woman who broke it. I asked him if he loved her, and he told me to drop it. The demand was forceful but, again, mixed with sorrow.”
