She saw an email from Hans Vigo that had been read. She didn’t remember reading it, but she was so exhausted last night she might have forgotten. She opened it again. It was a profile of Nicole Rollins along with some other information about the case, Tobias, and the young prostitute Elise Hansen.
She definitely hadn’t read this email. She would have remembered. She thought back to last night … she hadn’t checked her email, and this morning she’d skimmed through her messages on her phone only looking for emails that hadn’t been read.
She tensed, straightened, and listened. The shower was still going. She brought up her computer log and scanned it. She’d arrived home last night at nine ten. Her email had been accessed at seven thirty. She’d been asleep from one a.m. until five … her email had been accessed at two in the morning. The email from Hans Vigo came in late last night. It had been opened at two ten a.m. and then printed. The computer log showed her that several other emails had been read, yet those had been marked unread in her email program.
The bastard forgot to mark this email as unread so she wouldn’t know that it had been accessed.
And he’d done it again just one hour ago.
That bastard had made love to her, watched her fall to sleep, then snuck out and spied on her.
No—he wasn’t spying on her, he was spying on the case … and the only one he could be spying for was Nicole Rollins.
“Hey, babe,” Eric said behind her.
She whirled around and realized too late that she should have put on a poker face. Eric immediately saw the truth.
The shift in his handsome face had her reeling, from affection to fear to anger. “It’s not what you think,” he said. He wore nothing but a towel around his waist.
“Really? So you’re not helping Nicole Rollins?”
“I didn’t have a choice. I’m sorry, I didn’t want to hurt you. I like you, Kenzie.”
“Bullshit. You used me. You’re a fucking cop! She killed your friends. People we know. Barry Crawford!”
He made a move toward her and she grabbed her gun from the desk and pointed it at him. “Don’t move, Eric.”
He kept his hands up. “Kenzie, I’m a dead man in prison. You know that.”
“You should have thought about that before you jumped in bed with the cartels. Before you helped a cop killer.”
She glanced at her phone on the desk. She needed to get backup. She needed to subdue Eric first.
“Sit down,” she ordered, motioning toward the closest chair. “Now.”
He stepped toward the chair, then suddenly turned and rushed her.
She fired her gun. The bullet hit him in the abdomen. His momentum had him falling into her. She kicked him away and kept the gun on him.
“You shot me!” he said. He held his stomach and blood poured through his fingers.
With her gun still trained on him, Kenzie called 911 for an ambulance … then she called Abigail Durant.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Lucy and Nate rushed to the hospital and found Kenzie in the waiting room, pacing, her arms wrapped tightly around her body. Lucy had already spoken to Hans and there was a team going through SAPD Officer Eric Butcher’s apartment, finances, computers, and phones. This was their first viable lead—they had the inside man.
“Kenzie,” Lucy said.
Kenzie turned and stared at her. Her eyes were swollen from crying. Lucy stepped forward to hug her, but Kenzie turned away. “I told Abigail everything I know.”
“I’m here for you.”
That was partly true. She wanted to make sure Kenzie was okay, but she also hoped that she had information about Rollins’s location. Sean had been gone for five hours. They didn’t have much time.
“Kenzie,” Nate began.
“Stop. Just stop,” she said. “I’m an idiot. I was sleeping with him for three months. Practically since our first date. I liked him. I more than liked him. He was funny and cute and I—I—” She took a deep breath. “He used me.”
Lucy wanted to tell her that wasn’t true, but she couldn’t. So she said, “He used a lot of people, Kenzie. Ryan was the one who introduced you to him after Operation Heatwave. Ryan feels like shit, too. But it’s not his fault, and it’s not your fault.”
“Tell that to Barry Crawford and Samantha Archer.”
Emilio ran into the waiting room and immediately hugged Kenzie. She accepted momentarily, then pushed him away. “I’ll be okay, Emilio. I wish I’d killed him. He’ll probably survive. What does that make me?”
“Human,” Emilio said. “But I have some good news. The body in Barry’s car? It’s not Barry.”
Kenzie blinked at him. “I can’t believe the lab processed the DNA that fast. They only got it an hour or two ago.”
“Julie Peters just called me. She called in a bone expert from the university—and he’s positive that the body is that of an adult male under the age of twenty-five. She then called the FBI lab and got Barry’s blood type from his employment records. Barry was A positive. The victim was B positive.”
Kenzie stared at him. “He’s alive?” Then her face clouded. “If he’s alive, then where is he? Is he a traitor? Did he turn on us, too?”
“We don’t know that,” Emilio said.
But Lucy had thought the same thing as soon as Emilio said the body wasn’t Barry’s. If the body in the trunk wasn’t Barry, where was he? Who had stolen his car? Why had they left it at the airport? To throw them off? To keep them from looking? To delay them?
Delay. If the FBI thought that Barry was dead or missing before Nicole’s escape, everything could have changed. There was no guarantee that the schedule would remain the same. So hide Barry’s car in plain sight—he was supposed to be on vacation for his twenty-fifth high school reunion. A long weekend. No one would miss him.
If Barry was involved, he would have simply driven off, and no one would have thought anything about it because he wasn’t expected to be back until Wednesday morning. But if he wasn’t involved, if he was grabbed between his house and the airport, why would Nicole’s people put his car at the airport, but keep him alive? There were other places to dump a car. To mess with the FBI? To confuse them? To implicate Barry?
Or maybe Nicole had nothing to do with it, and it was Tobias, playing games again like he’d done with Elise and Harper Worthington. Create an elaborate plan to kill Worthington, but one that ultimately tripped him up.
“Barry is a victim, not a suspect,” Lucy said.
“You can’t know that!” Kenzie said.
“I know Barry.”
Kenzie shook her head. “How? You worked with him on one case. You’ve been in San Antonio for only six months. How can you say with any certainty who anyone is or what they’re capable of?” She tossed her hands in the air. “None of this shit happened until you got here. Barry said something the other week and I didn’t get it, but now I do.”
“What?” Lucy asked quietly.
“Where Lucy Kincaid goes, trouble follows.”
“Hey,” Nate said, frowning. “That’s not fair.”
“And what is it with you, Nate?” Kenzie asked. “Following her around like a lovesick puppy? You haven’t left her side since Monday. And Ryan said you’re staying at her house while her boyfriend is out of the country?”
“Stop,” Nate said. Maybe it was his tone or his posture, but Kenzie took a step back. “You’re out of line, Kenzie. I know you’re upset, I don’t blame you, but you’re wrong about everything. Rollins kidnapped Sean Rogan this afternoon. He’s been missing for nearly six hours and we have no idea where he is. We came here hoping you might have some information from Butcher, a clue—something you don’t even know is important—and you decide to use this opportunity to slam Lucy? To make insinuations? That’s not like you. Snap out of it and help us, or we’ll go back to headquarters.”
Kenzie stared at Nate. “I—” She turned to Lucy. “I didn’t know.”
“It’s okay.”
; “No, it’s not.” Kenzie rubbed her face with both hands. “If I knew anything, I’d tell you. He fooled me. He practically moved in with me these last two weeks and now I know why.”
Emilio said, “I’ll stay here with Kenzie and talk to Butcher as soon as he’s out of surgery.”
“Thanks, buddy,” Nate said.
Lucy was nearly paralyzed. Six hours and counting. Every passing minute was bringing Sean closer to death.
“Luce,” Nate said quietly, “we’ll find him. Let’s go.”
* * *
Kate Donovan nearly jumped when she saw the message pop up on her screen. It had to be from Sean, though it was a long string of computer code that he must have written on the fly. She studied it for a minute, then realized he was giving her access to the computer he was using, a back door.
She immediately copied and pasted the code into her programming system and her screen went blank.
“What the fuck?”
Then a new desktop came on. It was a back-end portal into the US Treasury.
“Holy shit, he’s hacking the US Treasury.”
The Secret Service protected the nation’s money, and this was going to show up on their radar, if it hadn’t already.
She immediately called Zach Charles in San Antonio. He answered on the first ring. “Zach, it’s Kate. Are you in the conference room?”
“Yes.”
“Put me on speaker. Sean just contacted me. I’m getting into his computer now, working on his location.” She split her screen and scrolled through the files until she found what she wanted. “WestNet is the provider,” she said.
“Roger that,” Zach said. “Pulling up their territory.”
In the background she heard voices, then Hans said, “Kate? What’s the status?”
“He’s hacked the Treasury.”
“How long does he have?”
“I don’t know. He could do it faster, I’m sure, but he knows it’s going to take us time to reach him.”
“We don’t have time. Where is he?”
“I’m working on it!” She and Sean had come up with the technical end of this plan, and when he lost his watch she feared their backup plan wouldn’t work.
Zach said, “I have the map of WestNet. I’m overlaying it on the Texas Holdings map.”
Kate said, “I have the ISP, am pinging it now. Shit.”
“What’s going on?”
“Security issues. Sean tripped a silent alarm, so to speak.”
“By accident?”
“I doubt it. I’ve read his files, I know what he’s capable of.”
Hans said, “So does Nicole Rollins. If she thinks he’s delaying—”
“Look, I’m doing the best I can! If Sean tripped the alarm, there’s a reason.”
In the background Zach said, “Two Texas Holding properties overlay with WestNet. One sixty miles northwest of the city, one seventy miles directly west of the city. Both over one hundred acres.”
Hans ordered two teams to head toward each property. “Backup will be coming. Stay off the coms. Cell phones only. Go.”
“I got something,” Kate said. “Sean sent me a note. Damn, I got it. I’m sending you the coordinates now and I’m sending them to Jack. The compound is west of your location. It’s going to take you an hour or more to get there.”
“We have alternative transportation. Good work, Kate.”
“It’s only good work if you get him out alive.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Hans stayed at FBI headquarters to coordinate the teams. Lucy, Nate, Ryan, and Brad were in a Bexar County Sheriff’s helicopter heading to a landing point ten minutes from the compound. They couldn’t get any closer by air if they wanted the element of surprise.
Jack was on the ground already, and field teams were en route, but it would take time to bring in enough people to swarm the compound.
As soon as they landed, Lucy called Kate. “Status.”
“Sean’s taking his time. He’s sifting through accounts. He’s transferred five million dollars so far. He’s given me the access information for their accounts, but I wasn’t fast enough the first time and they moved it almost immediately into another offshore account. This isn’t easy, Lucy.”
“I need to know that he’s alive.”
“He’s stalling, but working methodically. Giving them just enough so they know he’s following through.”
“How much time?”
She paused. “Twenty minutes, tops. Fifteen, to be safe. Be careful, Lucy.”
Lucy hung up and Nate said, “Jack’s already in position. Backup will be here in twenty.”
“Sean doesn’t have twenty minutes. He can’t stall forever.”
Ryan said, “Proctor is with the marshals and they’re en route. Proctor is coordinating from the tactical truck, but they’re still fifteen minutes out. The sheriff’s departments from Bexar, Kerr, and Bandera Counties are putting up roadblocks on every highway. The Rangers are moving into every area in between—the terrain is difficult, lots of back roads, dirt roads, creeks, vast open spaces. We’ll have two helicopters up and circling an outer loop to avoid being spotted, but they can come in fast when needed. Two more on the ground waiting for orders. Every county surrounding the compound is on alert.”
Ryan pulled out his phone. “Zach just sent us an aerial map of the compound. Check your email.”
They all pulled out their phones. There were several outbuildings, but the main house took up the center of the property. “Nate, you’ve talked to Kincaid?”
Nate nodded. “Jack is set up here,” he said and pointed to a ridge with a direct line-of-sight to the house. “He said there are four men patrolling outside the house, and there are at least two roaming patrols of two men each.”
“Eight on the outside and how many inside?”
“No word on who’s inside, but there’s an Escalade in the drive. We ran the plates; it’s owned by a company in San Antonio that has no employees.”
“Another shell,” Brad said.
Nate nodded. “There’s a security camera at every corner of the house.” He pointed to another building on his phone. “A barn here may have other vehicles or ATVs. There’s at least three good escape routes that we can close off, and three more that are only accessible on foot or ATV.”
“They’ll use the alternate routes,” Ryan said. “If they know we’re coming, they’ll know we have the roads blocked.”
“That’s what Jack said. But our primary goal is hostage rescue.”
Sean. The hostage. Lucy nodded. “Let’s go.”
Nate looked at her.
“I’m not staying behind,” she said.
“We’ll get into position and wait for Jack’s signal.”
“We have to take out the cameras,” Lucy said.
“How?”
“Kate. She’s into their network, she can find them.” Lucy called Kate.
“Status is unchanged, Lucy.” Kate spoke fast.
“There are four security cameras outside the house. Can you kill them?”
She didn’t respond right away. Lucy heard her fingers flying over the keyboard. “Yes,” she finally said. “When?”
“Timing,” Lucy asked Nate.
“Five minutes until we’re in position, then we’re just waiting for Jack to give us the all-clear—meaning the roaming patrols aren’t between us and the house. We’ll need to take out the four guards.”
“Eight minutes,” Lucy said to Kate. “And give Sean the heads-up.”
“I’ll try—but that’s going to be tricky. Be careful, Lucy.”
Lucy hung up. “Tell Jack,” she told Nate.
“Eight minutes might be cutting it close.”
“We’re already cutting it close.”
* * *
Barry was dying in front of Sean and he could do nothing to help him.
Elise danced around Sean’s workstation, touching him at every opportunity, and Nicole kept pushing her back. “What
’s that?” Elise asked. “Is that how you did it two weeks ago? I knew the network couldn’t be that slow. How did you get the passwords? Or do you just know all the back doors? What—”
“Knock it off, Elise,” Joseph said.
“Is this how you destroyed Mona’s files? Do you have the blackmail files? I want them back. Can you show me how?”
“Elise, stop!”
She pouted. “I wanna learn to do what he does.”
“You don’t have the patience,” Joseph said.
“Leave her alone,” Tobias said. He was sitting at the bar watching the security screens and eating.
Sean had never witnessed such a dysfunctional family. They’d been arguing and bickering from the minute Tobias and the others arrived. He’d finally pieced it all together, how they were connected and how they operated. They were all a different kind of crazy. Joseph, however, was the one he had to watch out for. He was the only one who seemed to have a clear head for planning. Nicole might have … except she had gone from being in total control when Sean first arrived to being fidgety and restless. Because of Maggie.
It took Sean a bit longer to put together the clues that Maggie was Tobias’s mother and Nicole’s aunt. Elise was the product of Tobias’s father and Nicole’s mother. Making her a half sister to both Nicole and Tobias. It was enough to make Sean’s head spin, and he wondered what family dinners had been like. But Elise was much younger, and Nicole was already in the DEA by the time she was born.
Sean had stalled longer than he thought he could get away with because the five of them were arguing, but Maggie was becoming suspicious.
“It shouldn’t take this long,” Maggie finally said.
“We have eighteen million in our primary account,” Joseph said. He was monitoring the banking information. “Five more and we’re done.”
“Why stop at twenty-three million?” Tobias said from across the room. “He’s hacked the fucking Treasury. We can take a hundred million. More!”
“We stop at twenty-three because we need to leave Texas,” Margaret said. “It’s no longer safe. I can’t believe how you all have fucked this up.”
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