He hadn’t spoken to Bella since. He regretted it. If he’d kept tabs on her, he would know where she was. He could have prevented her from following Egan too far down the rabbit hole. Egan had nothing to lose—and Bella thought she had nothing to lose. Together they were dangerous.
Egan’s group was similar to RCK in some ways—they hired mostly former military and law enforcement and strictly vetted their staff—but there the similarities ended. Egan focused on one thing: rescuing underage girls from the sex trade. Noble in many ways—if Egan hadn’t severely and repeatedly crossed the line, JT could have worked with him.
But Egan was lost, and he’d brought Bella along for the ride.
Simon Egan himself opened the door before JT even knocked. He nodded, glanced at Jack. “Kincaid, right?”
Jack didn’t respond.
JT said, “Where is Bella?”
“It’s complicated.”
It took all of JT’s willpower not to deck Egan.
“Come in,” he said and opened the door wider. Two plainclothes guards stood at strategic points in the entry. Egan nodded to them, and they walked away. Unseen, but certainly following JT’s every move. “I’m trusting we can have a civil conversation,” Egan said.
“Are you going to lie to me?”
“My office.” Simon walked down the wide hall toward the back of the mansion and opened a set of double doors. His office was stately, looking out on the backyard through six two-story-tall windows, three on either side of his desk. Lights illuminated the dusk, revealing well-manicured lawns, a swimming pool, and many trees affording shade and privacy. The office doubled as a war room with maps and tables for meetings, multiple chairs, a white board with numbers that would take JT time to decipher. Doors on either side of the office led to other rooms.
Simon had made his money during the dotcom boom more than twenty years ago. Once, he and JT had been friends. Simon had hired Rogan-Caruso—long before Jack came on board—twice. Once to solve a corporate espionage case, and once as protection for him and his board when they traveled to Hong Kong for a critical meeting. Simon sold his company years ago for a fortune, and retired to Montecito with his daughter after his wife died of breast cancer. She’d only been thirty-six.
Once, JT had sympathy for the man. Losing his wife and raising a young daughter was difficult, no matter how much money one had. Egan consulted from time to time with other up-and-coming businesses, but mostly he became a recluse. He was eccentric and brilliant and had built a castle for his daughter.
Like many teenagers, Savannah thought the castle had a moat, and she rebelled. One of her rebellions went south real quick. The boy she was dating was not so much a boy as a young man prone to criminal acts. He stole a yacht and ended up being caught by Mexican authorities off their coast. He and Savannah were put in prison, and Simon paid to get Savannah out—but not the kid. Savannah was furious, went back to try to buy her boyfriend’s freedom, and was again arrested—only this time, Simon couldn’t get to her.
Simon didn’t call JT for help, at least at first. And a bad situation turned ten times worse.
By the time Genesis Road, Laura and Adam’s organization, had found Savannah in a brothel, she was addicted to heroin and half out of her mind. They brought her home. Simon did everything in his power to help his daughter, but in the end, Savannah killed herself and Simon found her body.
He’d never stopped blaming himself. And, in many ways, he blamed Laura and Bella, who had negotiated for Savannah’s release. Too little, too late, he’d once said in a rage.
Simon created a vigilante group to rescue underage girls from forced prostitution. JT knew that Simon used Bella’s guilt that she couldn’t save his daughter against her. Twisted it into some sort of justification for vigilante justice. Bella was ripe for the picking, and Simon knew it.
JT would never forgive him.
“Explain,” JT demanded. “Where Bella is, what she’s been doing, why she’s impersonating a doctor.”
“Sit down, JT. Jack. Please.”
JT didn’t budge. Jack stood just inside the door. Whether he was protecting JT from Simon’s men outside, or Simon from JT, he wasn’t certain.
“Bella is fine,” Simon said. “I can assure you.”
“Call her right now, have her tell me that herself.”
“That would put her in danger. She’s deep cover, as you know.”
“As I found out last night. No bullshit, Simon. Tell me exactly what’s going on.”
“If you sit down, I’ll explain. We used to be friends, JT. Please, sit.”
JT didn’t want to give him the satisfaction, but he sat across from Simon’s desk. Jack remained standing by the door. Simon sat across from JT. He had a tablet on his clear desk. He typed a command, then turned the tablet to face JT.
“Bella sent this Monday morning.”
JT read the message twice, burned it into his memory.
Going dark, dumping phone. 2 girls out, RB didn’t make it. Think we’re heading east, don’t know how far. Will make contact soonest. Alert Dec.
“Where is she?” JT asked again.
“She’s fine, she’ll reach out as soon as it’s safe.”
JT slammed his fist on Simon’s desk. “You haven’t heard from her in over thirty-six hours! She’s not safe. You don’t know if she’s been compromised or killed. Don’t you have a handler on her? Doesn’t she have back-up?”
JT knew she did—and knew who it was—but after talking with Declan, they agreed that Simon shouldn’t know they were already working together. If Simon shut Declan out of the information loop, Bella would be in even greater danger.
Simon bristled. “I have a man in Phoenix who Bella trusts. He’s working on tracking the group. He knows what he’s doing. You trust him too.”
JT waited a good five seconds before he said, “Cross.”
Simon nodded. “One of your own.”
“He burned that bridge three years ago when he went to work with you.”
“That was your bridge to burn, not his or Bella’s. I’m sorry about how everything turned out, but Bella is a grown woman who can make her own decisions.”
It was all JT could do not to leap over Simon’s desk and choke him. Instead, he said through clenched teeth, “I want everything you have on what Bella has been doing undercover. She’s been under for months. Moving from city to city with these people.”
Simon didn’t react.
“A cop was murdered and you think this is okay?”
“You know me better—”
“That’s right, I do. And you are so twisted up inside that you will justify anything.”
When Simon remained silent, JT said, “You either work with me to find her, or I will find her on my own. Do not doubt that I can.”
“You’ll risk the lives of hundreds of innocent girls. Can you live with yourself?”
JT stood and started to walk out.
“JT, wait.”
He turned to face him.
“Martin Hirsch is the number two guy in the largest human trafficking organization in the southwest. He has more than two dozen cells—houses with ten to twelve girls—spread all over Los Angeles, Tijuana, Phoenix, Juarez, El Paso … and he’s growing. We were brought in to locate Hope Anderson who was sold by her stepfather fifteen months ago. One of Bella’s contacts said Hirsch lost his doctor, so we created a perfect false identification. She has a passport, license, social, full history as Isabella Carter. A doctor who lost her license because of a malpractice situation. We planted court documents if they looked that far. It took her months, but she was finally brought into the organization. She’s already directly rescued five girls—five girls who have a future because Bella was there. Indirectly, she’s saved hundreds. But we haven’t found Hope, and she’s at great risk. We don’t know who’s in charge. Hirsch is number two.”
“Why aren’t the police investigating him?”
“He’s wily. No hard evidence. No one w
ill speak out against him. His inner circle is extremely small—he trusts very few people. That Bella could get so close is a miracle, and I’m not going to blow it.”
“She’s in danger!” JT wanted to throw the code at Simon—that Bella had asked Declan to extract her—but then Simon would know that Declan was talking to JT and cut him out of all future information. Declan was the only conduit to Simon at this point.
“She knows what she’s doing, JT. She has a lead on the guy in charge, but until we get eyes on him, we can’t do shit. Our intel—which Bella has worked painstakingly to get—tells us that Hirsch and his partner are trying to establish a major operation in a port city. We don’t know where. We’re thinking either Galveston or Shreveport, possibly New Orleans. With everything that’s happened to the cartels and the human trafficking operation in Texas over the last year, there’s no clear group in charge.”
JT’s instincts hummed. Kane had been instrumental in shutting down several trafficking organizations in Texas and northern Mexico, largely because RCK’s mission collided with cases Jack’s sister Lucy had worked in the FBI. Working together, law enforcement with RCK, they’d stopped a lot of bad people.
But there was always someone ready to take their place.
“I assure you,” Simon continued, “Bella sent that message—and she’s safe. She’s the smartest operative I’ve ever worked with—I shouldn’t have to tell you that. She’s in deep because that’s the only way we can find Hope and shut Hirsch down.”
“You mean kill him.”
Egan didn’t say anything.
JT couldn’t very well judge Egan for taking out a human trafficker who bought and sold girls like property. But the game was dangerous for all involved, including the girls being prostituted, and Bella was in the middle of it.
“Where is my sister?”
“You read the message. She’ll call me when she can. My team in Phoenix is tracking her. I promise to call you when I hear from her.”
Team? By team Simon meant one person. Declan had already told JT that he was the only operative on the ground with Bella.
“Do that,” JT said. “And one more thing: tell her to call me.”
“I don’t think that would be wise.”
“Because you think I can convince her to stand down.”
“Because you will put her at risk.”
“That’s bullshit.”
“Right now, she’s gathering information because she’s a trusted part of Hirsch’s operation. As soon as we get a location on Hope and rescue her, we’ll pull the plug—Bella will walk with as many girls as she can. We had a huge success last year in Nevada. I’m certain you heard about it.”
JT had. But Bella hadn’t been the one in deep cover—she’d been the handler, tracking her partner, making decisions with all the intel her partner developed. Now? Bella was in deep, too deep, for too long.
“Undercover work is dangerous,” JT said. “And the longer an operative stays deep, the more dangerous—and difficult—the work is. What did she have to do to prove herself? These people aren’t going to sit back and let her take the moral high ground on anything. Bella is going to have to live with the consequences of her actions—as if she doesn’t have enough to deal with.”
“You’ve never given her enough credit, JT. You still see her as the wounded dove you rescued. She’s a warrior, and she always has been.”
He’d never seen Bella as a wounded bird. She had always been a fighter—it was the fight that was tearing her apart. He’d been so proud of her when she joined the Seattle PD. Her skills, her strong sense of honor, of justice, of right and wrong. She’d made a great cop. The structure of the police department and the rules they had to live by tempered her vigilante streak. She’d needed the rules, she needed to believe in something more than her own vendetta.
And then Simon Egan came along and shattered everything that JT and the Dixons had built in Bella.
“I want to see any message she sends,” JT said. “You have my private number. I want the message, and I want to know exactly where she is. If you lie to me, if you bullshit me, I will find her myself.”
“I promise, as soon as I hear from her, I’ll contact you,” Egan said.
He was relieved, and that made JT even more suspicious.
“If I don’t hear from you within the next twenty-four hours, I’m going in.”
Egan bristled. “We are so close to locating Hope—”
“But you don’t know where she is, and you don’t know where Bella is, so from where I’m sitting, you know shit.”
JT rose from his seat and walked out. Jack followed. As soon as they reached the car, Jack said, “You don’t believe him.”
“He knows more than he’s saying—I think he knows where Hirsch was heading when Bella went dark. Declan said he’s on his way to Las Cruces, but that’s too small to be the final destination. He has to be going to El Paso or San Antonio or Houston. A major city with a lot more places to hide out than Las Cruces. He also didn’t tell us everything.”
“Like about this ‘Z’ Declan Cross mentioned as being the possible leader. He specifically said that they didn’t know who was running things.”
“He would argue that he doesn’t know who ‘Z’ really is, but it’s just semantics. He didn’t want us to have that information.”
“It also confirms that Cross is on our side.”
“Cross is on Bella’s side, I have never doubted that, but that doesn’t mean our side.” JT paused. “I also think Simon’s worried. He’s good, but he has a tell. We’re going to find Bella—but we need help.”
“Anything.”
JT glanced behind him as Jack pulled out of Simon’s compound. “You caught the intel about Texas.”
“I did.”
“Lucy might have information that will help.”
“Because she recently took down the Flores human trafficking pipeline.”
“That, and because she understands better than most how those people operate—and who might be taking over.”
“You don’t need my permission.”
“I don’t have to tell you how dangerous this is—even for an FBI agent.”
“Lucy can take care of herself. And she has Sean. Make the call.”
JT called Kane, filled him in on what Simon said.
“You want me to reach out to Lucy,” Kane said.
“You read my mind. Can you stay close to her for awhile? In case there’s some blowback?”
“Of course.” He hung up.
Jack pulled into the private airstrip outside Santa Barbara. “Are we heading to Texas?”
JT didn’t know where to go next. He called Declan.
“You were right,” JT said. “Simon didn’t tell us about the extraction note.”
“Bastard. Is he onto us?”
“No. I cursed you.” JT almost laughed. While he hadn’t been happy with Bella’s decision to join Simon’s group, he had been relieved when Declan did—and quietly promised JT that he would take care of her. What Simon didn’t understand about Navy SEALs is that when you served in the same platoon, when you lived and breathed the same mission for years, you didn’t let disagreements affect your loyalty.
But Simon was loyal to no one.
“I just left Phoenix. I’ll be in Las Cruces in the middle of the night then pound the pavement. You on your way?”
“Laura said the girls didn’t have any information about where Hirsch might be headed. I want to talk to them before Laura takes them to Seattle.”
“You know how she gets—she’s very protective.”
“They know more than they think they do.”
“Kid gloves.”
“You don’t have to tell me. Let me know what you find in Las Cruces—and if Bella reaches out.”
“Roger that.”
CHAPTER SIX
Wednesday
FBI Special Agent Lucy Kincaid opened the last cold case file on the table.
She ha
ted that she kept looking at her watch, waiting for the lunch hour to arrive, but she was almost done with this unnecessary and time-consuming project.
For two months she’d pored over every cold case in the San Antonio office, verifying information, calling witnesses and victims to update their contact information and ask if they had anything to add, anything that might help agents take another look. She’d organized cases of agents who’d left the bureau, updating the information and sorting through those with only dead ends. Lucy forwarded all cases where the statute of limitations had expired to the head analyst to close. The work was time consuming, boring, and thankless.
Yes, the work should be done, but it could easily be completed by an analyst or civilian employee. As a sworn agent, she was stuck at a desk—well, the smallest conference room because of the plethora of files—and tasked with a tedious chore. It wasn’t that she thought it was beneath her, but there were only eight sworn agents in her squad and everyone was overworked. Except her—because her boss wouldn’t assign her a case.
She had every cold case file in front of her, not just the Violent Crimes squad. Most were computerized, but one of her tasks was to verify information in the computer with the hard copies. Every discrepancy she noted and every fact she verified, then wrote up a one-page report for the field agent and gave the file back to them. Cases of agents no longer in the office were compiled and sent to the current supervisor of the appropriate unit: cybercrimes got cybercrime cold cases, white collar crimes got white collar cases, and so forth. Most of the cases were duds, no chance of being solved with the information they had or could reasonably obtain.
Some of the conversations she’d had were heartbreaking—like the grandmother who was the lone surviving family member of a college boy who’d died under suspicious circumstances at a local university. There was no new information on the case, and Lucy felt distinctly uncomfortable, as if by calling she’d given the elderly woman false hope.
The children, now grown, who’d become orphans after their parents had gone missing while on vacation in Mexico.
The husband who’d remarried after his wife was the fourth of five victims of a serial killer who preyed on young redheaded women throughout the large state of Texas—an investigation that encompassed three FBI offices, more than ten years ago—then nothing. The agent in charge of the investigation was long gone from the FBI, and there was no new information or victims. Conventional wisdom was that the killer had gone to prison for another crime. The husband broke down during their call.
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