The Traitor

by Jo Robertson

  Hashemi kept her waiting over a half hour. If he didn't see her soon, she would miss her flight. And the mountain of work piled on her desk. She could schedule a later flight, but she had no intention of leaving behind any of her Vargas files without getting an explicit working agreement with Hashemi for continued access to their information.

  She knew the agent would fight her on this, but she came prepared for opposition.

  The door to the office swung open and the receptionist – Mrs. Roberts, the name sign indicated – rose from behind her desk in time to greet the person leaving. A lanky, fair-skinned man with an open, laughing face – too open to be the DEA agent, Bella surmised – eased past the dragon lady and caught Bella's eye. He wiggled his brows in a passable Groucho Marx imitation and swept piercing blue eyes over Bella.

  "Sorry you had to wait," he said, a grin splitting his pleasant face. He shook his head and smiled knowingly as if he were in on a huge joke. "Hashish will be very surprised."

  "Hashish?"

  The man tossed the words over his shoulder as he exited through the reception area door. "Agent Hashemi," he explained with a wider grin. "What I wouldn't give to see the look on his face."

  The door clicked shut behind him as Bella heard Mrs. Roberts say something about an eleven o'clock appointment. Humph – more like eleven-thirty.

  Then distinctly, her voice amused and motherly at the same time, the assistant said, "I don't think so, Agent Hashemi." The older woman turned to Bella and gestured toward the open door. "Don't keep him waiting, Ms. Torres."

  Bella smoothed her suit skirt, adjusted her cuffs, and clutched the briefcase firmly in her left hand. She spared Mrs. Roberts a brief look of challenge before she stepped through the office door, her chin tilted and her eyes snapping.

  Not a girl from the barrio for nothing, she prepared to do battle – and immediately froze in shock. Damn her silly sisters and their stupid tricks. Double damn her own reckless sense of adventure. She took a fraction of a second to recover, quicker she was satisfied to note, than Agent Hashemi – Ashraf, call me Rafe, long A – Hashemi, the son of a bitch.

  She extended her hand in greeting and put on her court voice as he stood behind his desk, mouth still gaping. "Agent Hashemi, I'm Assistant District Attorney Isabella Torres from Bigler County."

  #

  And I am seriously screwed, Rafe thought the moment Mrs. Roberts ushered ADA I. Torres into his office. He stumbled to his feet, at a loss for words for the first time in longer than he could remember.

  Dressed in a professionally-cut gray suit with a white blouse buttoned at the neck, she looked like a school teacher or a minister's wife. But neither her long hair pulled into a severe knot at her nape, nor her minimal makeup, could hide her natural beauty or the memory of the siren from last night.

  Christ, who could've imagined the sexy woman he'd spent the night with was the ADA from up north? The one whose repetitive emails contained a single annoying refrain: Their office would not turn over their case files on Diego Vargas.

  The hand she extended was far firmer than the one which had trailed fingers across his body twelve hours ago. With a voice far more strident than sexy, her first question was like a thrown-down gauntlet. "So, tell me, Ashraf, did you know last night who I was?"

  Before speaking, Rafe nodded to dismiss Mrs. Roberts, eyeing the composed and modestly dressed Isabella Torres until his assistant left. This Isabella was a study in contrast from last night's woman who'd moaned beneath his ... Shit!

  Why had he ever thought those dark eyes were warm and inviting? Right now they snapped at him as sharply as a whip in a lion tamer's grip. He pulled himself together and met her coolness with a glare. "Of course I didn't know who you were. Whatever you think of me personally, I'm a professional."

  Rafe had known all along that Bigler County had no option but to turn over their Vargas case files to him. He'd just never expected the man – woman – to turn up in person to do it. He gestured toward the padded chair in front of his desk. "Please sit down, Ms. Torres. Let's straighten out this misunderstanding."

  Torres took the chair opposite his desk and perched on the edge, setting her briefcase on the floor. Her slender hands clasped in her lap. She looked pale. And severe, with her long black hair pulled tightly back from her face.

  Silence. Her dark, clear eyes remained unfriendly.

  Unnerved in the face of her quiet militarism, Rafe sat down, folded his hands, and pasted what he hoped was a pleasant smile on his face. "When D.A. Barrington called a few days ago to say the files were on their way," he began, "I assumed they'd arrive by courier or special delivery."

  "You probably never dreamed the – what did you call me, oh that's right – ballsy ADA would deliver them herself." She referred to a momentary lapse in judgment when he'd used the term in an email to Charles Barrington.

  "Actually, I thought 'himself,'" Rafe replied with a calm smile that belied his turmoil.

  Merde! Scheisse! Shit! The ability to swear – and speak – half a dozen languages made him quite good at his job, but right now his mind scrambled for a way to handle the current situation. Should he ignore it, pretend last night never happened? Blow it off like a bad joke? Jesus!

  After a moment he said, "Look, maybe we should meet the, uh, issue head on and agree to put it behind us." Bella from last night would've gladly agreed, but he wasn't sure about today's Isabella of the fiery eyes.

  He paused and waited for a reply that didn't come. "Would that work for you?" he asked a long moment later, curbing his impatience.

  Torres contemplated the scene out the small window and then swept those bottomless eyes up to meet his through thick lashes. She inclined her head gracefully as if she was doing him a big favor. "Of course. What happened between us last night was very ... unfortunate, but hardly the end of the world."

  Unfortunate?

  He scowled before catching himself and continued in as smooth a voice as he could manage. "Okay, then, we're in agreement. We go on as if it never happened."

  Since Rafe never had any intention of cooperating with Bigler County in the Vargas investigation, the idea of putting it behind them was the best solution. Get the uncomfortable moment over with, obtain the damn files, and move on, never to see ADA I. Torres again.

  Isabella, call me Bella, Torres.

  They would treat last night as a casual encounter between consenting adults.

  Right?

  Why had he assumed only a man could be so ferocious in refusing a request from a federal agent? And what a cosmic joke that he, who rarely had time to date, would hook up at a bar with the very person he'd been wrangling with over the Vargas case files! What the hell were the odds of that?

  Suddenly he recalled that his email address had also contained simply his initial and last name. A. Hashemi. And he'd only mentioned his full given name Ashraf last night. Call me Rafe, he had insisted.

  And then he wondered. "Did you know who I was?" he countered belatedly.

  "Don't be ridiculous." She seemed restless as she jumped up from the chair and examined the enlarged photo of Parker Center on the east wall. "I had no idea who you were."

  For some odd reason, relief flooded through him and on the heels of that, genuine remorse. "Look, Isabella, I'm sorry."

  Her back to him, her voice small-sounding, she whispered, "Yeah." Then she squared her shoulders and turned to face him. "You're right. Let's put this thing behind us."

  A wave of regret washed over him for the what-might-have-been. He'd heard that remembered passion was sweeter than the real thing. If so, he was in a helluva lot of trouble. Last night the warm, willing proffer of Isabella's body had clouded every sensible restraint he usually put on himself.

  Instead, he'd thrown himself into the intensity of giving her pleasure. And there was no doubt that Isabella had been thoroughly pleasured. He felt himself grow hard behind the desk that shielded his lower body.

  Now what?

  Would Torre
s use their brief relationship as leverage to stay involved in the Vargas case? Looking at her grim face, her minimal makeup, and her set jaw, he couldn't believe she would risk her career by going against her D.A.

  She couldn't be more than twenty-eight. Twenty-nine? Young for an ADA, and that meant she was ambitious. No, he didn't think she'd want last night's events splattered all over the small world of law enforcement any more than he did.

  He stood and bought himself time by adjusting the blinds behind his desk and looking out over Temple Street. When he resumed his seat, he felt calmer, ready to proceed. He smiled. "After all, the stakes are the same. The Bigler County District Attorney's Office has information on Diego Vargas that is germane to my federal case."

  She nodded, throwing a glance at her briefcase still resting on the floor by her chair.

  "There's never been any question that your office would turn over the files," he reminded her.

  "We have no choice?" He knew her asking closed the door to any secret hope she might've harbored.

  "Exactly." And, he thought, last night didn't alter that fact.

  Rafe took in her appearance as she stood under the picture. Isabella Torres looked as different from the bright, sexy Bella who'd spent the night entwined in his arms as oranges from lemons. Even her mouth, drawn in tight puckers, hid the other woman.

  He recognized both her conservative suit and prim hair style as attempts to detract from her looks. Torres wanted badly to be dealt with on her abilities, not her beauty. Well, she failed miserably.

  In just a few moments of observation, Rafe had learned a great deal about Isabella Torres. Whatever that said about him, he intended to use this knowledge to his advantage.

  Chapter Eleven

  "So, Ms. Torres." Agent Hashemi leaned back in his chair and let the words hang as she moved back to stand behind the straight-backed guest chair. She glanced around the office, noting the relative plush of his office compared with her own meager, cramped one.

  Clearly Hashemi expected her to fill in the unspoken blanks. She shifted her position, gripped the back of the chair, and put on her best prosecuting attorney's look. "Agent Hashemi," she countered.

  Except for his initial reaction, the federal agent was a cool one. He now sat in front of her as relaxed and unruffled as if they'd never met, as if nothing had ever happened between them. She'd give him points for his professionalism. The opposite of her, where every cell in her body worked double time to control her emotions.

  The sense of betrayal that sucker punched her the moment Mrs. Roberts had announced her, hit again like a mortal blow. Trying not to betray her agitation, she gripped the chair more tightly to keep him from noticing her trembling hands. And to keep him from looking down at her.

  Over the years, when interrogating suspects, she'd learned to stand over them to indicate her superiority. Right now she needed to feel she had more power than Agent Hashemi, even if it were an illusion. She'd get down to brass tacks, but she'd make him work for every scrap of information.

  Rafe cracked first. She had hoped he would. She was very, very good at the power play game. However, his voice was all reason and rationale when he spoke. "Should we continue now that the awkward part is out of the way?"

  Rafe. She had to stop thinking of him as Ashraf, call me Rafe. The shortened name reminded her of how she'd groaned his name aloud. She shook her head abruptly and prayed the color in her cheeks didn't betray her thoughts. "That's probably a good idea."

  She reached for the briefcase she'd left by the chair, propped it open on the edge of his desk, and extracted a thin file. She pushed it across the desk to Agent Hashemi. Watched him frown and heft it in his hand, noting the weight of it. He stood and sat on the edge of his desk, their eyes nearly on the same level. He looked first at the folder then at her and back again to the file. "The Diego Vargas report?"

  She nodded.

  After a long moment, he opened the manila folder and quickly perused the contents. It didn't take long. "What's this?" he grated out, slapping the file down on his desk.

  Bella forced sarcasm into her voice. "Isn't it obvious?"

  His face burned under the burnished color of his skin and he drummed his fingers on the desktop. "Where's the rest?"

  "It's all there," she answered pointing to the meager file, "all the official stuff. Any other material on Vargas is work product. My personal work product." She watched the truth dawn on him. She didn't really need to add the rest, but she did anyway. "I'm not required to turn over work product to anyone." She paused and smiled sweetly. "Not even to the federal government."

  Hashemi eyed her with irritation and reached for his phone. "We're not on opposite sides concerning Vargas, you know."

  She raised her eyebrows, and he shook his head as if dealing with a recalcitrant child.

  "You know it'll take less than a minute to get what I need," he threatened, his voice mild but his jaw clenched.

  "Maybe, maybe not," Bella replied. "Charles Barrington may eventually coerce me into giving you the rest, but do you really want your investigation to stall that long?"

  Rafe didn't like the smug look on her face. If she wanted to play hardball, she would learn he'd invented the game. "What makes you think your information's that important. You sound pretty sure of yourself."

  "I am. I have to be." She shrugged slender shoulders. "A woman in a man's world and all that."

  He let his right hand relax on the phone and tapped the skimpy file with his left. "Are you trying to tell me that you have no other official notes except what's in here?"

  She nodded, as if satisfied with the strength of her position, and sat down, crossing her legs at the knees and tucking her skirt around them like a prissy school teacher.

  Rafe didn't like the game she was playing, but he'd bet he was better at it than her. He was curious about only one thing. Why would she lead an investigation in this impractical way? Wouldn't it be easier for her to copy her notes and pass on the originals to him? Run a quiet parallel investigation of Vargas? Why make a big fuss over jurisdiction when she had to know she'd lose in the end? What was her hidden agenda?

  He eyed her speculatively. "What about the rest of your investigative team? The cops' reports, witness interviews?"

  While Isabella stared at her lap, Rafe's intuition told him she was wondering how much to tell him. And that fact informed him she was holding back much more information than he'd initially supposed. She flat out didn't trust him. He didn't trust her either, but her hesitation pissed him off. "Look, sooner or later I'll get everything. Why not cooperate with me?"

  "What's in it for me?"

  He knew what she meant and it sounded like blackmail. She wanted to continue on the investigation. He considered what it would cost him and how much she could compromise the direction he was taking the case if he didn't cooperate with her. On the other hand, did he really want to work with her? See her every day? That seemed like a recipe for disaster.

  He almost decided to tell her she could go to hell, but thought about how he needed to switch his headquarters anyway. Diego Vargas lived in Sacramento and Rafe would have to fly up to Bigler County, which bordered on Sacramento County, right away. He suspected Vargas' drug dealings had their origins up north, not here this close to the Mexican border. At least, that was part of his latest strategy – he didn't think Vargas was getting his drugs from Mexico.

  "I won't promise anything, but maybe we can work something out," he finally answered, sliding back from his desk. At the surprised look on her face, he added. "No promises. Understood?"

  "Absolutely." She smiled like a child who'd gotten away with something on Daddy's watch.

  He had the distinct feeling she'd just played him. What the hell had he gotten himself into? Isabella Torres was much craftier than he'd thought. "Now what about the rest of those documents?"

  She grinned. "They'll be waiting for you when you arrive in Sacramento."

  "Our Mr. Vargas has his fingers i
n a hell of a lot of enterprises," he said, pulling out his own thick book on Vargas and watching her eyes grow larger. "What particular part of his criminal activities are you looking at?"

  Before she could respond, the noisy buzz of a cell phone sounded inside his pocket. He reached inside his jacket and removed it, held up a forefinger to forestall her answer, and flipped it open. A feeling of relief surged through him. Lupe Rodriquez. Thank God.

  He'd already beaten himself up over ignoring his intuition in the alley and getting the two of them assaulted. Since then, an irrational idea had begun to worry him, the thought that the blood in the alley belonged to Lupe Rodriquez and Rafe was guilty of not protecting his informant better.

  "Sorry, I need to take this." He swiveled his chair toward the window, his back to Torres. "Lupe, what the hell ... " he barked into the phone before being interrupted.

  It was Lupe's phone but not Lupe's voice.

  "Lupe's not here anymore." A deep voice with a slight accent.

  "Who the hell is this? Where's Lupe?"

  The voice ignored the question. "Lupe's not anywhere anymore. And you should be very careful, amigo, or you might be next."

  The cell phone went dead in his hand.

  "What's wrong?" Isabella asked, her finely arched brows drawing together at the sharp sound of his response. "Lupe – that's the man who was with you in the bar last night, isn't it?"

  He couldn't answer her, couldn't even look at her. If anything had happened to Lupe because Rafe had been ... God, he didn't want to think about the possibility.

  "Is this about what happened last night?" Her voice sharpened to a razor's edge of frustration and curiosity.

  Rafe made his face as hard and glacial as the spot in the middle of his chest felt. "How can you ask about something like that now?"