Wind River Undercover

by Lindsay McKenna

  “Really?”

  He heard hope in her tone. “Yes, really. I’ve kind of wondered that since I get to play cowboy and ranch owner, maybe I’ll find out if the call of Wyoming is stronger than that of a DEA undercover agent. At the end of the mission, I’m sure I’ll know which way I want to go.”

  “Just think,” she said, “Andy being married to Dev? We might have grandkids soon and I’m so excited about that!”

  “It would be nice to hold a baby or two, huh?” Maud had been the best mother growing up. Never had four children been lavished with so much love and affection. It was exactly what they needed, having been abandoned by their biological mothers.

  “Ohhhh, I dream of that happening!! I think Andy and Dev still want to wait, but they’re close to thirty years old.”

  “Women are having children later,” he agreed. “Career first and then family, which is okay.”

  “I know,” Maud grumped, “but I’m in a hurry to be a grandmother. And so is Steve.”

  “Both of you,” he said, a catch in his voice, “were so loving to all of us. I never realized just how much care and attention you gave us until I got out into the real world. I saw a lot of crappy, broken homes. Places where parents should never have been parents at all. And the kids always suffered. I used to hold a lot of anger against my unknown mother, but after seeing what I’ve seen, and what you two gave all of us? I think we were the luckiest, most loved and cared for children in the world.”

  “We love all of you, now more than ever,” Maud whispered. “We’d better stop this or you ’re going to make me cry, Gabe,” and she managed a wobbly laugh.

  His hand tightened around his cell phone. “Sorry,” he said, meaning it. “Listen, Hardiman gave us two weeks to get out to Wind River. Agent Navaro said she’s ready to roll in two days. So am I. How about we drive out there and stay with you two birds? That way, we can see Sky and Andy, plus you.”

  “Oh! We’d love that!”

  He could hear the joy vibrating in her voice. Warmth flowed through him. “Hey, it’s all going to work out, Maud. Now stop your worrying.”

  “You can have your old bedroom back for the stay. Agent Navaro, as I understand, is a woman?”

  “Yes.”

  “She can choose between Sky and Andy’s old bedrooms. It will be so wonderful to have you both here!”

  “Something that I’m looking forward to, Maud.”

  “Is Ace still with you?”

  “Absolutely, he is. He’ll be going down there with us. He’s a great guard dog. Listen, I’m going to crash. It’s been a rough day for me and I’m totaled, but happy. I’ll call you when we hit the road, okay?”

  “Sounds great, Gabe. And gosh, can I call you on your cell phone now?”

  “Sure, you can,” he replied, and he gave her the number. “It will take us two days to reach you. We’ll probably stay overnight in Colorado and arrive late afternoon on the second day.”

  “Don’t be a stranger. Stay in touch with us, okay?”

  Chuckling, he sat up, placing his sock feet on the carpeted floor of his hotel room not far from the DEA HQ. “I promise. Tell Steve I love him, that I’m looking forward to some wicked chess games with him, and give him a big hug of hello from me when he comes in tonight?”

  “You bet I will, Son. We love you. Night, night . . .”

  Night, night. Those were softly spoken words Maud always whispered to him when she tucked him in his bed when he was a young child. How many times in high tension and dangerous nights had he replayed those words and imagined Maud’s strong, lean hands ruffling his hair, smiling down into his eyes, filling him with her boundless love? Many. Gabe wanted to tell her that, to let Maud know just how much her love was an antidote to his undercover life. He’d make sure and not tell her about those dangerous situations, however. She worried enough.

  Chapter Three

  April 4

  Anna pulled up at the hotel in her black pickup with a U-Haul trailer behind it. Gabe stood waiting out on the curb with his beautiful dog, Ace, on a leash. It was the third morning after the mission briefing. The sun had just risen as she arrived.

  He was wearing his straw cowboy hat, a Stetson, he’d told her, a hallmark of ranchers in the West. She wasn’t impressed, but he seemed to be proud of it in a quiet, disarming, almost bashful way. He wore the same scuffed wrangler boots, and a green-and-white plaid cowboy shirt, the sleeves rolled up to just below his elbows. She didn’t want to admit she liked his muscles, and the dark hair sprinkled across his forearms. He was handsome in an interesting way, but didn’t seem to realize it as some dudes did, who played upon their looks and body to attract a woman. She was pretty sure he was wearing the same Levi’s as a few days ago, since they looked wrinkled and work-worn. There were three luggage cases near him as she braked to a stop. He tipped the edge of his hat toward her. A cowboy greeting? Anna wasn’t too clear on what cowboys did except ride horses and herd cows. They didn’t have cowboys in Guatemala.

  She climbed out, coming around the front of her truck. She, too, wore jeans, a three-quarter-sleeve purple tee, and tan sneakers. She loved her long hair, but always had to capture it up off her neck when on duty. This morning’s travel toward Wyoming made her put it into an out-of-the-way ponytail.

  “Good morning,” she greeted, coming to a halt, seeing what she thought was happiness or pleasure glinting in his gray eyes as he studied her. “This is Ace?”

  “Sure is. Let me do the introductions so he knows you’re not only friendly, but you mean something to me personally. He knows the difference.” With a command, Ace stood up, his golden-brown eyes, large and focused on her, studying her. He had Ace sniff her fingers and then walked the dog around Anna, coming back to the front, where Gabe ordered the dog to sit.

  “He’s absolutely gorgeous with that black mask over his face and that fawn-colored body,” Anna said. “We have a lot of Belgian Malinois in service as drug-sniffing dogs down in Guatemala.”

  “Ace is smarter than I am,” he said, smiling a little, giving one of the dog’s sharply pointed ears a caress. “He knows now that you’re like family to me. And he’ll guard you just as quickly as he will me. You can come and pet him if you want.”

  Grinning, Anna said, “Oh, in a heartbeat,” and she crouched down, placing her hands slowly on Ace’s head. He began to pant, his pink tongue lolling out one side of his mouth, his long, busy tail thumping. “Good sign, he likes me.”

  Gabe chuckled. “He’d be out of his mind not to,” he said, and then met her smile. “I’ll teach you his commands on the way to Wyoming.”

  “Great.” She ruffled his neck and she smiled as he licked her cheek. “Oh! That was a nice kiss! Sweet dog.” She gave Ace a final pat and said, “Let’s get going. I’ll open up the second seat so Ace can get in.”

  “Roger that,” he said, giving Ace a command to walk at his side. Once Ace was in the back seat, Gabe went over and picked up two of the bags. “Mind if I put them in the truck bed? It will give Ace the room he needs to stretch out. He’s an eighty-pound dog.”

  She picked up the third one. “Not at all. We can place them in the trailer, if you want? That would be safer.”

  “Nah, nothing in here except clothes. The bags are waterproof.”

  “There’s some rope in my metal tool chest,” she said, and she pointed to it as they walked to the back of the truck. “Let’s tie them in by their handles.”

  “Good idea. That way, they won’t fly out. Have you had breakfast yet?”

  “Yes, grabbed a bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit at McDonald’s on the way over here.” She hefted the dark ballistic blue nylon bag over the top of the pickup and set it gently on the bed. “You?”

  “Let’s stop at one on the way out of San Diego. Maybe at El Cajon? There’s only one way in and out of San Diego if we want to go east and that’s up through Interstate 8. Ace especially loves their Egg McMuffins.”

  Grinning, Anna said, “Roger that, Inters
tate 8,” trying to ignore his maleness. They were close and she caught the scent of fresh soap, noting with her sniper’s all-terrain alertness that his reddish-brown hair was damp and recently washed. He was clean-shaven, as well. In no time, after she gave him the rope from her toolbox, he’d expertly tied the bags in so they couldn’t be lost in transit.

  “You don’t have much to move,” she noted, straightening and standing next to him.

  “Been two years undercover. I was rarely north of the Mexico border except for clandestine meetings in dark alleys somewhere in San Diego with my handler.”

  “Hmm, that explains it. Well, ready to go?”

  “Yeah,” he said, smiling over at her, “let’s saddle up, pardner.”

  “Pardner? Is that Western slang for let’s blow this joint?”

  “Every cowboy has a buddy and we call them a pardner. Come to think of it, you’ll need to be schooled on some of the Western sayings and things like that so you fit in as a wrangler at my new ranch and don’t bring attention to yourself as an outsider. If they do sense that, people will become wary of you.”

  “Sounds good. Now that we’re undercover,” she said, and walked around and climbed into her truck. As she belted up, he climbed into the cab. “I’m all ears to slang.” Pointing to the cup holders in the center between them, she said, “I bought you a large coffee. It’s black, but there’s cream and sugar in the glove box if you need it. Figured you might like some this morning.”

  He gave her a keen look, the corners of his mouth drawing upward. “You’re good, Agent Navaro. Really good. Thank you for being so thoughtful.” He fastened his seat belt and then took the coffee, taking a slow, pleasurable sip of it, making a sound in the back of his throat.

  “You sound like a satisfied cougar after a kill,” she noted wryly, pulling away from the curb and maneuvering back into traffic. Inwardly, she felt good about the look on his face. For a moment, that mask he wore dissolved, and the man she saw beneath it shook her deeply. In a good way. But not in a way she needed right now. She was on assignment and that meant no fraternization. It had to be all business. This time, she lamented that reality.

  Chuckling, he said, “Call me Gabe. Where we’re going? We need to lose the agent side of ourselves into the nearest dustbin. When we get home to Wyoming, first names are pretty much it, unless you meet a stranger and then it’s Mr., Ms., or Mrs.”

  “Okay,” she murmured, speeding up, taking the middle lane of outgoing traffic toward the mountains ahead that they’d have to climb. “I’ve never been undercover. Well, that’s not true. As a sniper, I was ALWAYS undercover, but it was in a hide. What do people call each other in Wyoming? Do they have nicknames, too?”

  “Well, since we’re working together, we will be on a first-name basis. I noticed in the mission details that they’re changing your last name to Dominguez and removing your real name, Navaro. I read in the report that the DEA gave you a passport from Buenos Aires, Argentina, to help cover your tracks.”

  “With good reason,” she said, frowning. “I’ve got a one-million-dollar bounty on my head by Pablo Gonzalez.”

  Scowling, Gabe said, “I didn’t know that. That info is not in the details I read.”

  “Well, it’s a way of life. I came to the States for Marine Corps sniper school, graduated, and then went back to my home country, Guatemala, and began stalking drug lord top-tier people. I figure if I took them out, instead of the mules and drug soldiers at the bottom rung of the ladder, I could disrupt their movements.” Her voice turned satisfied. “And I have. Continually.”

  “Which earned you the high price on your head.”

  “Bingo.”

  He watched the traffic, checking the rearview mirror. It was just habit, memorizing cars behind them, in case there was a tail of some kind from a local cartel discreetly following them. “Being a sniper on the move all the time must have been pretty stressful?”

  “No more than you playing a bad hombre when you really aren’t and infiltrating drug cartels.”

  He sipped the coffee gratefully. “Where we’re going? It’s normal for you to call me Gabe.”

  “Then you can call me Anna.”

  Nodding, he continued his perusal as another, faster car, passed them. He trusted no one and there was a lot of drugs hauled up Interstate 8, up and out of Southern California, over the Cuyamaca Mountains and then down into Arizona and the golden sand desert. This highway was a well-known drug gateway. “You have weapons for us?”

  “Yes. Pop the center lid,” she said, and she pointed to it between the front seats.

  He did and found two Glocks.

  “Both loaded, bullet in the chamber of each and safety off,” she warned.

  “I’m assuming you have a concealed carry license for both of us?”

  “Yes, California and every state in between here and Wyoming that we have to drive across. The DEA obtained them for us. I don’t think we’ll get pulled over by law enforcement, but in case we do, the papers are in the top of the glove box. I didn’t think it would be smart to be carrying our DEA ID on us. I have my agent info on my iPhone, just in case.”

  “Same here. But I don’t think anyone will pull you over because you’re driving slower than the speed limit with that trailer behind us.”

  “Right on.” They were approaching El Cajon now, the Interstate 8 curving around, the stony Cuyamaca Mountains silhouetted in the distance.

  He set his straw hat on the seat between them. “How are you feeling about coming to Wyoming?”

  “I was bored with my surveillance job out of Descanso and the area surrounding it. Been doing it for a year now, and I wanted to do something else. I didn’t know what,” she said, giving him a wry glance, noticing the mask had not yet settled back into place. Good. She was far more curious about Gabe, the man, than she cared to admit to herself right now. “I’m really anxious to do something new and get out of my rut.”

  “Do you have any skills with horses, ranching, or cattle?”

  “Not with cattle.” She heard him chuckle. “But I’m a quick study. I grew up on my parents’ estancia and was riding horses from the time I was eight years old, onward. My father preferred an agricultural farm instead of raising cattle. He believed in helping the poor and worked with food banks and kitchens in Antigua, with our leftover produce that was bruised or disfigured and couldn’t be sold to grocery stores in the United States.” Her voice lowered. “My father was well loved by everyone.”

  Hearing the loss in her low tone, he asked, “You grew up in a rural area, then?”

  “Yes. Antigua is the old capital of Guatemala. Our estancia was on the outskirts of the city, in the agricultural district near Santa Ana. I went to an all-girls Catholic school there and later, received a scholarship to attend Yale and go after a degree in law. My mother, Maria, is a prosecutor with a degree from Yale and I wanted to follow in her footsteps.”

  “According to the bio they had on you, things changed after your father was murdered.”

  “Very much so. I don’t regret it, though. The way I look at it? I’m in law enforcement instead of being an attorney, but it’s still about righting wrongs and defending those who are innocent and unable to protect themselves from these bloodthirsty cartels.”

  “Interesting perspective,” he said.

  “Why did you get into dangerous undercover work?”

  His mouth quirked. “I went into the Marine Corps at eighteen, a real headstrong risk taker. I later moved into black ops recon work behind enemy lines and really liked it. I also worked as a dog handler and located IEDs with my dog’s help. After I got out, the DEA came knocking at my door. They were recruiting a lot of US-born Hispanic males to infiltrate the cartels across the border from San Diego. I went into it thinking I knew everything, but I learned very quickly, undercover work was different from my recon work. Ace went with me as part of my undercover identification.”

  “That kind of work would make me feel like I was schizoi
d. I couldn’t live two lives. I really respect what you did.”

  He nodded. “Yeah, you assume a whole new demeanor, a backstory, and pray to God that the DEA has gone deep enough into your personal record that your story holds. Luckily, it did.”

  “But you didn’t like what you were doing?”

  Shrugging, he said, “I was younger then and still had some risk taking to do. It was all right. I got satisfaction that we’re sending some of the biggest Central American cartel lords to prison here in the US after extraditing them. That made me feel good about it.”

  “Didn’t you miss your family, Gabe? I know I would.”

  “Especially around the holidays,” he murmured fondly. “My parents really threw great holidays for the four of us kids. I think sometimes they were trying to make up for what we couldn’t celebrate with our biological parents. The four of us were adopted.”

  “Your adoptive parents sound like incredible people,” she ventured, giving him a sympathetic look. “I’m looking forward to meeting them.”

  “Oh,” he teased, leaning back and spreading his long legs out before him, “you’ll fit right in. My sisters, Skylar and Andy, are both no-holds-barred twenty-first-century strong women. They don’t put up with this world we live in right now. They’re just as independent and confident as you are. I’m sure you will take to them and vice-versa. BFFs.”

  “They sound like a perfect match for me. I like to be around can-do people, women or men. There’s been times when I’ve been scared to death while I stalked a drug lord, but I just shoved it aside and relied on my muscle memory and training.”

  “And look where it got you. You’re alive and well.”

  “I could say the same for you.”

  “For our age? We’ve done a lot, been through a lot in our twenties.”

  “That’s funny, it sounds like you’re pining for quieter waters now? The risk taker in you is satisfied and you don’t want any more danger?”

  He gave her a praising look. “You’re really good at picking up on people’s emotions, aren’t you?”