We went inside the house and I told the boys the good news. They were so excited that my case had been dismissed, but when they learned I was sending them away, their enthusiasm faded and they got upset. I explained it to them as well as I could, while sparing them the unnecessary details. When Sara was out of earshot, I told them I needed them to protect their mother. To be strong and to keep her safe. They didn’t want to go, but they understood and agreed. Mandy would stay behind with me, not only to keep me company, but to serve as my early warning system. Her ears were better than mine, and her bark was louder.
Sara went to pack everyone up to leave. I wanted them gone as soon as possible. For all I knew, Christina was watching the house right now. I didn’t care about Sara’s work or the boys’ school or anything else. I wanted them out of here and somewhere safe, fast. While Sara was filling bags, I got on the phone. I called Ingo, and we discussed the plan.
The next call I made would take some serious convincing. I needed them to listen, believe me, and go along with the plan. But I now had the ammo to get them to do it. The information on the thumb drive continued to prove useful. I hated depending on anyone other than Ingo, especially since I didn’t know who else I could trust. If this was going to work, though, I would need help.
Chapter 98
Sara left with the boys shortly after lunch. I was anxious until they drove away. I insisted she not tell me where they were going. I didn’t want anyone to be able to use me to find them. I told her to get in the car and keep driving until she heard from me. While she packed, I ran out and bought her a disposable prepaid phone. I made them all leave their cell phones at home so they couldn’t be tracked. The boys moaned and groaned, but it was for the greater good.
Once they were gone, I breathed a little easier. I prayed no one followed them, but I told Sara to pay close attention just in case. I even shared a few tips Ingo had given me on how to spot and lose a tail. With any luck, it wouldn’t come to that.
The rest of the day went by without incident. Mandy and I hung around the house and acted like everything was normal. As night fell, my anxiety continued to rise, and I couldn’t eat. I’d been smart, I set a cunning trap, I even recruited help. Yet, I still felt like a lobster pressed up against the corner of the glass, just waiting to be plucked from the tank and boiled.
Around ten o’clock, I turned off the TV in the living room and closed up the downstairs for the night. Once again, Christina was showing a surprising amount of patience. Now that Enrique and Gustavo were dead, along with Uncle Luis, she had no reason to leave me alive. I knew too much. More than even she knew, thanks to James and his fully loaded thumb drive. At any time, I could give up what I knew to the FBI. What was she waiting for?
The naive side of me tried to convince the rest of me that she wasn’t coming. She was the undisputed head of the family now, the twins were dead, and I was inconsequential to her. No threat here. But I knew better.
I grabbed a glass of water, turned off the downstairs lights, and double-checked to make sure everything was locked. Mandy and I were about to head upstairs when I heard something that caused me to freeze in my tracks. A collection of small bangs came from the front door, followed by small clouds of black smoke. All of the new locks Sara had installed fell noisily to the floor and the door swung open without resistance. When the smoke cleared, Christina stood in the doorway with two oversized goons at her side.
I dropped my glass of water and dove behind the couch as she raised her gun and leveled it at me. I reacted just in time as a bullet whizzed by and blew out a pane of glass in the French doors behind me. I heard her curse, and then footsteps coming into the house. My heart pulsed in my ears and I wondered what was taking so long. I didn’t have a gun and I was in no position to get one. Mandy barked viciously at the intruders and I feared for her safety, but I couldn’t get to her. I was pinned down.
Suddenly voices were all around, shouting commands.
“Freeze!”
“FBI!”
“Drop your weapons!”
“Down on the ground!”
The two idiots with Christina didn’t follow instructions very well. They wheeled on the FBI agents and were shot where they stood before they could even fire. She, on the other hand, hit the deck before the shooting started and threw her pistol aside.
“Hands behind your head!”
“Don’t move!”
I peered out from behind the side of the couch and the two of us locked eyes as her hands were being bound behind her back. She glared at me intensely, but she didn’t seem angry or even surprised. It was almost as if she knew something I didn’t.
Two FBI agents got her to her feet and walked her out. She didn’t say a word. I stood up and carefully shook the glass shards from my shirt and hair. More agents filed in and out. They zipped up the two dead bodies in large black bags and carried them out.
Agent Felix Lesco strode in looking pleased with himself. After I had hung up with Ingo, I called the FBI. I had enough information on Special Agent Paxton Stamper to get his ass fired and, hopefully, thrown in jail. Agent Lesco was next in command. He was more than willing to assist in my little plan once I gave him the dirt on Stamper. He was looking at an immediate promotion, so he acted swiftly, went to his superiors, and got Stamper canned, an investigation pending. Agent Lesco arranged for a team of agents to watch my house and move in if anyone tried anything.
“Well, that was easy,” he said. “Almost too easy.”
“What the hell?” I barked as he walked toward me, and the smug satisfaction vanished from his face.
“What?” he asked, hands out, looking confused.
“What the hell took so long? She almost killed me!”
“Well, you turned off the lights on the front porch, despite my instructions. So we didn’t have a good visual. For a minute it looked like she was just trying to unlock the door, so we thought it might be your wife. We couldn’t see her affixing the plastic explosive to the door. Only after the explosions and the smoke did we realize what she was up to. We moved as quickly as we could once she breached the door.”
Shit. The light. I realized my mistake as soon as he said it. I’d closed up the house the way I normally did, including all of the downstairs lights. I’d forgotten what we’d discussed, and it almost got me killed.
“And the two guys with her?” I retorted, still on edge from being shot at.
“Dr. Spero, it’s over. They’re dead, and she’s in custody. Let’s not find fault in the details, shall we?”
He was right, of course. I didn’t really know what I expected him to say, or why I was questioning him in the first place. I knew the play, and he didn’t. He’d served his purpose and I was still alive. I should be happy enough with that. I apologized, thanked him profusely for his help, and wished him luck with the promotion. He told me he’d be in touch about the report he would have to file, and I agreed to cooperate whenever and wherever he needed.
We shook hands and he left. Not long after, the rest of the agents and support staff departed. They had what they needed. They left me alone to deal with the blood, the glass, and my splintered front door. Once they were gone, I ran upstairs to grab something in preparation for what was coming, then came back down to clean up. Mandy watched with fascination as I swept up the glass and duct taped a piece of cardboard over the opening in the French door. I got down on my hands and knees to scrub the blood off the tile, and she wagged her tail and licked my face.
“I love what you’ve done with the place.”
I looked up and Callie Ann was standing in the threshold of the front door, which still sat wide open against the wall. The moment I saw her, my heart raced. She looked as incredible as ever. Black, skin-tight pants tapered their way down her long lean legs and caressed her ankles before giving way to black, strappy high heeled stilettos. A sleeveless black lace V-neck hugged her
curvaceous upper body, leaving her midsection uncovered, and hid just enough of her incredible breasts to keep the imagination at work. A black lace choker and matching bracelet completed the outfit. I swallowed hard and it was so loud in my ears, she might have heard it from across the room.
“Thanks,” I said. “I’ve been saying I need to remodel the place.”
Mandy ran over to her and smelled her up and down. When she was satisfied, she ran off. Callie Ann smiled her sexy smile and walked toward me. “I’d help, but I’m not really dressed for cleaning.”
“I see that,” I replied, trying not to stare. “What are you dressed for?”
She smiled. “A little of this and a little of that.”
I gave a half-hearted smile, stood up, and carried the bloody rags over to the garbage can in the kitchen. I turned to her and asked, “What are you doing here?” I hadn’t seen her since the day I bailed James out of prison, but I knew why she was here.
“I wanted to make sure you’re okay. I care about you, Simon. You know that.”
I nodded.
“Can I get you something?” I asked. “Something to drink?”
“How about some wine? Red?”
“Sure.”
I pulled a bottle from the wine rack on the counter and grabbed the corkscrew from the drawer. I put the opener on the bottle and started twisting.
“Where are the wife and kids?” she asked.
“They took a trip,” I said, my blood pressure climbing.
“During a school week?”
“Yeah, they just needed to get away.”
“I bet,” she said.
I poured the wine and brought her a glass.
“None for you?” she asked. She took a sip of her wine and moaned. She was beautiful and sexy and tantalizing, and for a second, I almost forgot where I was.
“Not yet,” I replied. I pulled myself together and dug deep for the courage to do what I had to. As quickly as I could, I drew the pistol from my inside waistband holster and pointed it at her. Ingo had lent it to me, and I’d run upstairs to get it after the FBI left. Their one condition was that I was not to be armed. I had reluctantly agreed, and it nearly got me killed.
“What’s this?” Callie Ann asked, innocently.
“You can drop the act, Christina,” I said.
A broad, sexy, and wicked smile spread across her face. “Very good, Simon. When did you figure it out?”
“Once I realized that my attorney had lied to me about everything else, I had my suspicions. But when I met Carlos and your Uncle Luis, I knew for sure.”
“How’s that?”
“It was something Luis said. He called you a tall, confident, powerful. That’s not Dr. Norris, that’s you. Whoever Dr. Norris really is, she’s a small, unimpressive woman. She did her best to impersonate you, but something was missing. That confidence, that strength. Plus, she looked nothing like any of your siblings.”
“Clever,” she said.
“In the end it was something your men said outside the house that tipped me off. Sara overheard them talking. You know, you really should dress more conservatively. You’ve got your own men drooling over you.”
She smiled, but said nothing.
“I have to hand it to you,” I said. “That sob story about your fiancé... Miles, wasn’t it? That was really good. You really had me going. Is anything you told me true?”
“Does it really matter, Simon?” She turned away from me, wine glass still in hand. I wasn’t sure what she was doing or where she was going, but then she started backing up, coming toward me.
“What are you doing?” I asked. “Stop!” I moved backwards to match her pace.
“What are you gonna do, Simon? Shoot me?”
I wanted to but I knew I couldn’t. She knew it too. We both kept backing up until my back was against the French doors. She kept coming until her hair was draped over my gun and the back of her neck was pressed against the muzzle. Before I could say anything, she whipped around and splashed her wine right in my face. It burned my eyes and I couldn’t see anything. She grabbed the gun from my hand and punched me in the gut hard enough to double me over and drop me to my knees. I wiped the wine from my eyes and waited for her to shoot.
“Get up,” she said.
I stood, careful not to make any sudden movements. My eyes burned, but slowly my vision cleared. She was standing eight to ten feet away from me, far enough that I couldn’t go for the gun, but close enough that she could still shoot me easily.
“Take a seat,” she said, and waved the gun toward the easy chair next to the couch.
I sat where instructed and dabbed at my eyes, which were still watering.
“Where is he?” she asked.
“Who?” I replied, rubbing my eyes.
She cocked the gun and I sat back in the chair, more scared than I’d ever been.
“I’m going to ask you one more time,” she said with a chill in her voice. “Where... is he?”
I raised my hands slowly in the air and looked at her. Even with all the anger and vitriol in her face, she was still the most beautiful creature I’d even seen. “I swear to you, I don’t know who you’re talking about?”
“James, you fucking idiot!” she shouted, startling me.
“James?” I asked, naively. “Why are you looking for James?”
She stared at me, trying to decide if I was lying or just stupid.
“You really don’t know, do you?” she said, and laughed. “You’re not very bright, you know that, Simon?”
“More and more every day,” I said.
“Your pal James stole a hundred million dollars from us,” she said sharply. “And when I get my hands on him, I’m going to gouge his fucking eyes out until he tells me where it is.”
My mind was spinning. Suddenly everything clicked into place. That’s why they wanted to get to James in prison and why Christina was after him now. It wasn’t for what he could do, it’s for what he did do. How in the world did he steal a hundred million dollars from the Escalantes? I wanted desperately to know more, but I was terrified to ask.
I needed to find a way to stall. Ingo was late. I looked around, wondering where the hell he was, and thought about what I would do or say next. Christina looked at me and grinned, as if she knew what I was thinking.
“If you’re wondering about your South African friend, he’s not coming.”
Chapter 99
The house was set squarely in the middle of three acres with nothing but water and trees surrounding it. Ingo had purchased the land during the housing crisis at a serious discount, and built the house not long after. It was a two-story four-square box design with a wide front porch and an attic that had three-hundred-and-sixty degree viewing angles. He built it so he could, as he told it, “See them coming from any direction.” With Deya and the kids still living in Australia, he lived in the large house alone with his two black labs.
The sun set on Tuesday and he was preparing for the drive over to Simon’s. The plan was to ambush Christina, the real one, and make sure she didn’t get away. Simon would use the FBI to make Christina believe they’d fallen for her little ruse with Dr. Norris. And once the FBI was gone, Christina would, hopefully, take the bait and move in for the kill.
Ingo was dressed and ready to go. The only thing missing was his pistol and holster. He was about to head downstairs to his gun locker to fetch them when the dogs began barking. They’d been trained to bark at any suspicious sounds or smells, so he took the warning seriously. Before he even reached the stairs, the power went out. He heard the sound of breaking glass and the dogs went wild. They took off running in the direction of the sound, while Ingo moved slowly as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. He felt his way until he reached the closest bedroom. He made his way over to the nightstand and pulled out a heavy flashlight b
ut did not turn it on.
He moved slowly back to the doorway, stood just inside the room, and listened for footsteps. He waited patiently until they made their way upstairs. He assumed there would be more than one. A two-man team is the absolute minimum one would send on a job, especially a hit. The dogs had stopped barking, which meant the intruders had probably killed them. Ingo’s blood boiled. He had raised the two labs since they were puppies and trained them himself. He had no intention of letting their deaths go unpunished.
He stood quietly, controlling his breathing. He heard the creak of the wooden stairs. Someone was coming. He heard them reach the top of the stairs and step out onto the landing. When the footsteps got within a few feet of the doorway, he jumped out into the hallway, flashlight blazing. As he had anticipated, the intruders were wearing night vision goggles, and the bright beam from the flashlight was blinding. The intruder fired his suppressed pistol wildly several times, but came nowhere close to Ingo. With a sharp crack to the head, the heavy flashlight brought the intruder crashing to the ground, unconscious. Ingo squatted down, picked up the pistol, shot the intruder in the head, and tucked it into his belt behind him. He pocketed the spare magazines, grabbed the night vision goggles, and stuffed the flashlight in his back pocket.
His slipped on the goggles and remained motionless, listening carefully. He still had no idea how many more there were, but he knew there was at least one left. No one else had come upstairs; he would have heard it. So the second floor and the attic were clear. That left just the first floor and the basement. Most houses in Florida didn’t have a basement, but Ingo built one for storage and as a safe room. If there was more than one intruder left in the house, they had probably split up to search the floors more efficiently. He had to act fast before they were back together.
He moved to the stairs and headed down, avoiding the squeaky spots he’d come to know over the years. With the night vision goggles on, he could see flawlessly. He made his way to the first floor without making a sound. The intruder in the kitchen, however, wasn’t as cautious. He forgot to look down and tripped over the dog bowls on the floor. Ingo moved swiftly but silently toward the kitchen, pistol up in the inside ready position. He got low and peered through the doorway in the direction of the dog bowls. The intruder was cursing himself under his breath when two bullets struck him, one in the chest and one right between the eyes. He was dead before he hit the floor. Ingo ejected the magazine from his pistol to check the status and slapped it back in. Still nine rounds left with two more mags in his pocket.
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