by S. K. Lessly
Emily, continuing to be as nonchalant as she could, picked up a file she had placed on the seat next to her and opened it. She pulled out a picture of a man, placed the folder back down and studied the picture in her hand. It was only a picture of his face, which was all she needed. He still looked the same. The same chiseled jaw, short hair, and blue eyes.
Those cold blue eyes of his always sent chills of passion through her when she looked into them. Even in this picture she could feel the intensity in his eyes. Those were killer eyes looking back at her. No matter what the file said about him becoming domesticated, she could still see the killer spirit inside of him.
“I wonder what it would take to set the killer free,” she said into the stillness of her car.
Emily lightly touched the picture with her fingertips, caressing his cheeks, running her fingertip down his nose and along his jaw. For close to a year, this man belonged to her. She thought back to the many assignments they had worked on together as well as the rough and downright carnal fucking that used to always end their nights. Josh was a beast in between the sheets. He did everything she loved, pleased her to no end, and she did the same for him.
She had done her best to capture his heart. It wasn’t easy, especially since she’d had to fight to get his attention from that black bitch of his. Misty had been a thorn in her side. And even when she had Josh right where she wanted him, the bitch still got in the way. Emily had contemplated offing Misty many nights. Thinking back now, she should have killed the whore when the opportunity had presented itself. Maybe everything would have turned out differently. Maybe she could have talked Josh into going with her instead of the latter.
Movement snatched Emily’s attention away from the picture in her hand to the idling BMW in front of her. Emily reached for the folder again, opened it, and pulled out another photo. She studied the long front view of a very beautiful woman named Kenya Cooper. Emily had to admit that Josh had done a good job picking his wife. The woman she’d just seen in person seemed like the type that would make Joshua feel very domesticated.
Emily shook her head at the thought of Josh being domesticated. She had never considered him marriage material. The life that he led didn’t give him the room to be tied down to anything but his work. Apparently, she was wrong or he wasn’t the man she’d thought he was.
Emily noticed the small truck back out of the parking space and drive slowly to the exit of the parking lot. She put both pictures back into the folder, waited a little bit before she started her sedan and slowly peeled out of her parking space. Emily didn’t need to rush. The tracking device she planted on the SUV would provide the woman’s location to her phone as long as she’s within seventy-five feet. She picked up her phone, brought up the tracking software installed in her phone, and watched a graphic street map appear with a moving yellow blip traveling along the map on her screen.
“There you are, Mrs. Cooper. Take me to my man.”
Emily maintained a safe distance from the SUV as it made various turns to an unknown destination. The morning had just begun and it was too early for lunch. Although maybe it wasn’t. After all, the woman was pregnant.
After following the woman for about ten minutes through the streets of Virginia, Emily changed her phone screen from the tracking software to her directory. She found the number she needed, pressed the call button, and waited for the connection to her Bluetooth application.
After a few rings, a tentative voice answered, “Hello?”
Hearing the sound of his voice caused Emily to smile, something she didn’t do often.
“Hey there, lover, it’s me.”
There was a long pause, which Emily expected. She had been gone for quite some time, so she didn’t expect a warm welcome.
Finally, after what seemed like forever, the caller breathed into his phone and then replied, “You’re back.” There was weariness in his voice
Emily’s smile broadened as she made a right onto Route 1, heading into the D.C. area. She continued to follow the SUV, not too close but close enough to keep it in her sight.
“Yes, it looks that way.”
“Why are you back and what do you want?”
“Oh come on, handsome,” Emily cooed through the Bluetooth connection in her car. “Don’t be like that. You know I’ve missed you while I was gone.”
The caller grunted. “Yeah, I bet. You do know that the agency has a rehabilitation order on you?”
Emily laughed as she heard the news. A rehabilitation order given by the CIA only meant one thing: she was to be killed on sight.
“Well, my love slave, I wouldn’t have expected anything less, considering. But don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”
The caller grunted again. “Yeah, I bet.”
Silence filled the car while Emily maneuvered through D.C. traffic. She knew the caller wouldn’t be thrilled to hear from her. The way they had left things wasn’t very ideal for the either of them. However, Emily knew things would change, and it would be in her favor.
Emily heard the caller blow out a harsh breath before asking, “What do you want?”
What do I want? She thought to herself. A shiver racked her body, and she suddenly felt her skin flush with anticipation. Her smile deepened and became more sinister as she tightened her grip on the steering wheel.
“Oh, baby, you know what I want.” She let that hang in the air for bit before she added, “But I’m willing to wait for that. What I need is for you to bring me out of the cold.”
Emily heard another deep sigh on the other end of her connection and then silence. She waited.
“What are you up to, Parsons?” the caller finally asked.
“What I’m always up to: revenge, bloodbaths, death, and destruction…the usual. This time the agency isn’t in my sights, though. But I need help to do what I came here to do.”
“Did you not hear what I said earlier? There is a standing order—”
“Oh please! Do you really think that’s going to hold water? You know they wouldn’t risk taking me out. I’m too valuable. They’d rather have me back in the folds where they could control me. Just trust me and bring me in.”
Relenting, the caller replied, “Okay. When?”
“I’ll call you,” she answered and hung up the phone.
She noticed as she spoke to her lover that Mrs. Cooper had indeed stopped to get food. She didn’t understand why she’d traveled all the way out to the farmer’s market district in D.C. when she had passed countless fast food places and grocery stores. Maybe she wanted fresh fruits to eat instead of fast food. She did look a bit uppity, Emily concluded. Maybe she did this on the regular.
Emily watched the pregnant woman park her SUV close to the entrance of one of the larger market warehouse buildings, step outside of her car, and waddle quickly inside.
Emily found a parking space a few rows back, turned off her car, and prepared herself for the wait. There was no need to follow her inside. She hated shopping and crowds even more. She had the entrance to the warehouse and her truck covered. There was no way she’d miss her leaving. Emily stared out as she watched the woman disappear into the throng of people before she moved her eyes from her windshield to the folder next to her. She fondled the manila folder before opening the flap and stared down at the picture of Joshua Cooper.
She ran her fingers along its glossy texture before she picked it up.
As she fell into a trance, staring at his blue eyes, Emily racked her seat back, brought his picture close to her face and kissed it.
“Oh, how I’ve missed you,” she whispered to the picture. She felt her body heating up again. This time she succumbed to the feeling. Keeping her eyes on the photo, she slowly slid her left hand down the front of her green short sleeve shirt, into her black tights. Feeling the warmth of her skin against her touch, her fingers eagerly crawled to her moistened lips.
Emily licked her lips and then licked the photo as her fingers found its target.
“Ohhh, Josh…” rang out in a pained whisper as she plunged her fingers into her wet core.
********
Izabella Fuentes stared at her screen trying to make sense of what she saw. The autopsy didn’t coincide with the intelligence she had gathered. CIA Agent Diane Deonatti was last seen in South America a few weeks before the date they had listed as her time of death. But the autopsy said she had been dead three weeks in Russia.
That can’t be possible.
Izabella typed another name in her search engine and brought up everything she could find on the man known to the intelligence world as Cupid.
The only things she’d known about the man was how ruthless he was, which was enough information for her. He was allegedly responsible for fifty-five assassinations of dignitaries all over the world. Some he had handled himself while others he’d contracted out for his personal team of mercenaries to handle. The majority of the killings were paid hits taken out by others who wanted power they felt was owed to them or to overthrow a specific government for power they just wanted. Some just didn’t like a person or that person had stolen their wife or was more successful or likeable, and they wanted them gone.
Money was the root to Cupid’s evil. He worshipped money and power. His gain came at other people’s expense. For the life of her, Fuentes couldn’t understand why Diane had gotten mixed up with such a dangerous and vicious man.
Izabella Fuentes had worked for the CIA for close to seven years. She’d started out as an analyst for the directorate of analysis, but soon moved up as one of the lead analysts for the directorate of support. This division of the CIA was responsible for supplying their operations teams with any and everything needed to complete all critical missions of defending the nation.
The analysts in this division stayed behind the scenes, gathering data, communications, security, human resources, and logistics to any clandestine operator in the field. They stayed in the shadows, only aiding field agents from a distance whenever necessary.
Izabella loved her job. She wasn’t naïve to the rumors of corruption and espionage that went on within the company. But she believed in the work she did. She believed that people like her boss were a part of the good guys, and the good always won over the bad.
She heard a knock at her open door before a familiar voice called out, “Iza!”
Izabella turned from the computer and looked up. She found another one of the senior analysts in her group standing in her doorway. “Yeah, Jared?”
“Did you get the email I sent you on the name of that FBI agent that had it out for Deonatti?”
Jared Mumphrey was a round man that stood about 5’6”. His careful comb over looked a little rumpled, Izabella noticed and wondered if what he’d found was the reason for his appearance. She couldn’t concentrate on that now because all she has heard was that he’d come through for her.
“No, I didn’t see it. I thought you said he didn’t work for the FBI,” she said as she brought up her emails.
“He doesn’t. He was undercover working on another case entirely during the time he ran into Diane. Actually, they were working undercover in the same place.”
Her eyebrows rose as she met his sunken, dark eyes. “Really? Where?”
He shrugged. “I forgot the name of the company, but it was in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, of all places.”
“Were the two of them working on the same case?” she asked as she scrolled through the documents Jared had sent to her.
“No. Well, not at first. That’s what Diane’s case notes said. At the time, she was looking into some drug cartel. The cartel was dealing with some privately-owned shipping company in New Jersey. And they lost the shipment. Diane caught wind of the issue and thought this would be the perfect time to take down this cartel.”
Izabella quickly read over the notes and sat back in her chair. She looked at Jared. “So, I don’t get it. Was this cartel into some national security thing? Why was she looking into this group? Why did she even care?”
Jared shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. I didn’t read all of her case notes.”
Izabella gave him a look that told him she didn’t believe a word he’d just said.
Jared chuckled and walked further into her office. He dropped his bulk into one of the chairs facing her desk. “Okay, yeah I read her case notes, Hell, I couldn’t resist. Unfortunately, I didn’t find anything worthy of her or this agency’s attention.”
“All right, tell me what you found out.” Izabella requested.
“A lot of conjecture and speculation is what I found out. Okay, for some reason, Diane went undercover with this company in Pittsburgh. Documentation says that the CEO of this company had two questionable clients that Diane had discovered. One was a shell company for some Mexican cartel and the other was some shipping company. She recorded in her notes that this cartel had started making moves in the U.S., selling drugs to some of the large mob families here. What she told the CEO was that this cartel was using the money they made to fund drug trafficking and guns throughout the States and Canada.
But I couldn’t find any proof of that. Sure, that didn’t mean that this cartel wasn’t doing dirt, but I just couldn’t find anything to confirm her story. According to her case notes, her game plan was to see if she could get in with this family in a roundabout way in order to get to the shipping company to flip on the cartel. Things went down south and blew up in her face, though.”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, the family that owned the shipping company that was wrapped up with the cartel lost a huge shipment for some Russians. They ended up finding it, but the cartel decided to make them pay for their screw up.”
“In what way?” she asked.
Jared shrugged. “In the only way that matters: money.”
“How much did they have to pay?”
“Five million dollars.”
“Holy shit!” Iza blurted out.
“Yeah, that’s a lot of moolah.”
“I’ll say. I’m assuming the family didn’t have that kind of money.”
“Nope. They paid half of the money and was working out something with the cartel. To ensure that this family paid them what they owed, they kidnapped the owner of the shipping company’s wife.”
Izabella sat up. “Okay so what does that have to do with this so-called FBI agent ummm…” She looked over at her screen and scrolled down until she found the name she needed. “Joshua Cooper?”
Jared sigh and stood. “I don’t know. I guess you’ll have to find that out for yourself. I will say that there are some serious holes in Diane’s case notes. They’re holes that don’t make sense to me, but maybe they will to a fresh pair of eyes. I’ve been looking at that stuff for hours.”
Iza smiled. “No problem, Jared. Thanks for the information. By the way, are you okay? You seem a little tense or distracted?”
Jared smiled. “I’m good. Nothing I can’t handle.”
She smiled back. “Okay, let me know if I can help with anything.”
“Will do.”
Izabella watched Jared disappear from view before she turned back to her computer screen. “So, Joshua Cooper, who do you work for?”
Izabella read through Diane’s case notes as well as some of the side notes Jared had written. From Jared’s notes, he couldn’t find the government agency that Mr. Cooper worked for. He only indicated that he was a government agent. Just as she thought, it was a lost cause. A name popped off of the screen while reading Diane’s case notes.
Fuentes smiled, but not because of happiness. It was due to contempt. She hadn’t seen him in a very long time. She wasn’t sure she could trust him considering their history, but she decided to try. Maybe he had changed after all these years. After all, what happened wasn’t her fault.
She picked up her phone and scrolled through her contact list. She found his number under his initials and hit the call button. She leaned back in her chair and put the phone to her ear. After six rin
gs she heard a gruff and disgruntled voice boom through the speakers of her phone.
“What the fuck do you want?”
Izabella sighed, took a second to swallow the bile she had for this man, and put on a fake smile. She hoped the smile on her face would mask the distain she held for this man.
“Hello, Jacks. It’s good to hear your voice too. How’ve you been?” she asked as cheerfully as she could.
Twenty painful minutes later she clicked off her cell and closed her eyes. She didn’t think in a million years she would ever speak to that ass again, much less ever work with him. Yet she was doing exactly that. Furthermore, she didn’t trust him at all. She wasn’t sure he would come through for her, but she still found herself crossing her fingers.
She refused to tell him what she was working on over the phone. Besides not trusting him, she wasn’t sure how deeply involved he was with Diane and her secrets. Diane had used a few key words to indicate that she and Jacks were more than just working together. She was using him to get close to Joshua, but also to solve her case. Izabella wasn’t sure what part Joshua played in Diane’s case, but she seemed to have had a serious hard on for this man. So much so that later she went to great lengths in order to…
Another knock on her open door brought her out of her thoughts as her eyes rose to meet her guest. It was her boss.
She sat up straight in her chair and stood. “Mr. Santini, sir.” It wasn’t often the Assistant Deputy Director of the CIA came to visit the likes of a lonely analyst. She nervously ran her hands down the front of her white blouse and dark blue skirt as if she were dusting herself off.
“Izabella, dispense with the sir crap,” Agent Luther Santini chastised softly.
“Sorry, sir. I mean, sorry,” she corrected herself quickly.
Izabella inwardly chided herself for her blunder. The man just made her nervous. It wasn’t the fact that he was her superior. She wasn’t intimidated that easily by authority. And it had nothing to do with the fact that this man was sexy as hell; tall, lean, muscular with dark hair and even darker eyes. Well, maybe it was, but she refused to admit it to herself. Typical crush on your boss was all it was, she’d told herself. And yet, if he would ask her out, despite the agency’s strict fraternizing policy, she’d jump on him in a heartbeat.