Deep Blue Trouble

by Steph Broadribb

  Tell Monroe to leave me be. He owes me that.

  I’d had my suspicions, but now I knew for sure. This wasn’t a straight fugitive recovery; there was a whole other hidden agenda going on between Monroe and Gibson. Back when I’d taken the job, Red had warned me against federal bullshit. Now I feared that the bullshit surrounding this job wasn’t federal, it was personal between Monroe and Gibson.

  And I needed an answer.

  24

  Next morning, I called Monroe early, before I left for McGregor’s office.

  Unsurprisingly, he quickly got real evasive.

  I held the line. ‘I want to know what you’re not telling me. Why does Gibson Fletcher think you owe him?’

  Monroe sounded irritated. ‘I said it’s need-to-know, Lori.’

  I kept my tone no-nonsense firm. Wished we could be having the conversation face-to-face rather than by phone. ‘If I’m getting jumped in parking lots, I do need to know.’

  ‘I’m sorry that happened, but you know the risks of the job.’

  Son-of-a-bitch. ‘But that’s the thing. I don’t know the risks, because you’re not telling me.’ I took a breath. Knew that getting Monroe all defensive wouldn’t help none. ‘I’m trying real hard to do a good job here, but with patchy data my chances are limited. The more you give me, the better the chance I’ve got.’

  ‘It’s a clearance thing.’

  ‘Clearance, my ass.’

  Monroe sighed. ‘Just do your job, okay. Work with Dez and fetch back Fletcher.’

  ‘I am. But Fletcher knows I’m onto him, and he knows you sent me.’

  Monroe didn’t seem at all surprised Fletcher had figured out I was working for him. ‘We’ve got history is all,’ he said. ‘That’s enough for you to know.’

  ‘What kind of history?’

  ‘It’s not relevant to the job.’

  ‘First, I didn’t have clearance, now it’s not relevant. Seems you’re grasping for any kind of reason not to tell me, Monroe. That makes me uneasy. Tell me why you need the gap between Fletcher being taken into custody and him getting returned to gen pop.’

  ‘I’ve told you, I need a conversation with him.’

  ‘Why?’

  Monroe was silent. I could just make out his breathing; it sounded shallow, rapid. He was nervous for sure.

  I decided to push him a little harder. Kept my tone firm. ‘I asked you a question.’

  ‘This conversation is over, Lori. Unless you’ve got something new, just message me at checkin tonight.’ The burner beeped as he ended the call.

  Slinging it into my purse I thought on my next move. Monroe had been real evasive about his history with Fletcher. He’d given me no answers, and I was no further forwards. He said their past had no bearing on my job, but I couldn’t believe that was true. Back when JT was my mentor he’d told me a person’s past behaviour – the people they confided in, the actions they took – was key to predicting their behaviour and reactions in the present. Don’t make assumptions, he’d said, but the more you knew about a person’s relationships and everyday patterns, the more successful you’d be at working out where they’d be and what they’d do in any situation.

  If Gibson thought Monroe owed him something then their history was a whole lot more than some brief contact. Something had happened between them and that something was a big hole in my understanding of my target. Their history had caused Gibson to jump me and use violence to warn me off – something I’d not predicted, because the details of his past with Monroe were unknown to me. That hole in my knowledge made me vulnerable. I hated that; it scared me. If he’d wanted to, Gibson Fletcher could have killed me last night.

  He didn’t, because he wanted me to deliver a message to Monroe – to get him to back off. But Monroe wasn’t going to; he was upping the chase – raising the stakes by adding Dez McGregor and his team into the mix. That would make Fletcher pissed. Could be he’d come after me again, to finish what he started.

  The risks of the job were just getting higher. I didn’t know how far Fletcher would go to get me off his tail, but I couldn’t rule out him attacking me again. I wondered if the risk was worth it. Glanced at my carryall by the foot of the bed. Five minutes and I could be packed and out of there. Go to the airport, and catch the next flight to Florida. It was real tempting.

  Then I thought of JT all cut up in an infirmary bed in jail, and Dakota at camp – finally able to be a kid, enjoying hikes and horseback riding rather than being sick and enduring treatment after treatment. I sighed. If I wanted to get JT away from the Miami Mob, and Dakota’s future safeguarded, I had to stay on this job. Had to catch Gibson Fletcher, and had to give Monroe his time with the fugitive before hauling him back to Florida.

  One thing was for sure, though – if I was going to finish this job successfully, safely, I needed to fill in the Monroe-shaped gaps. I had to know what had gone down between him and Gibson. If Monroe wasn’t going to tell me I’d just have to get the information another way.

  Grabbing my cell, I tapped out a message to Red: Let me know how it went this morning. Also I need intel on Monroe asap. Call me soonest. LA

  Then I grabbed my coat and headed for the door.

  25

  A team is a lonely place when you’re the one that doesn’t fit. Dez clocked the bruise down my face soon as I walked into the bond shop. He raised his eyebrow. ‘Get into some rough stuff last night?’

  Bobby Four-Fingers guffawed. ‘Maybe that’s how she likes it.’

  I narrowed my eyes. Glared at Bobby. ‘I pretty much like it any which way just so long as it ain’t with you, sweetie.’

  His cheeks flushed. ‘I was only having some laughs.’

  Shaking my head, I turned my attention to Dez. ‘I got jumped in the parking lot of my hotel last night. It wasn’t a random attack. The guy gave me a message for Monroe, telling him to back off. The guy was Gibson Fletcher.’

  That wiped the grins off their faces. Dez glanced at Jorge, who was sitting quiet in the corner, hunched over the computer as usual, then back at me. ‘You sure it was Fletcher?’

  ‘One hundred percent. I recognised his voice.’

  Dez frowned and gestured to my bruised cheekbone. ‘You didn’t get close enough to see his face?’

  ‘I got plenty close enough, but he jumped me from behind and by the time I was face-to-face with him I’d had my head bounced off an SUV so my vision wasn’t all that.’

  Bobby Four-Fingers let out a long whistle. ‘Shit, girl.’

  Dez’s frown deepened. He ran his hand across the stubble on his chin. Shook his head. ‘So you can’t be certain it was Fletcher?’

  ‘I’m sure.’ I stood my ground. ‘Once I hear a voice, I remember.’

  He glanced over at Jorge again. ‘Only, the thing is, we got ourselves a confirmed sighting of our target last night. He lost the tail we had on him, but they said it was definitely Fletcher.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Rosarito, Mexico.’

  My local geography knowledge wasn’t so hot. ‘How far from here?’

  ‘An hour maybe.’

  ‘So he could have moved from here to there last night.’

  ‘He could.’ Dez’s tone made it sound as though he doubted that’d happened. ‘Or one of us had a mis-sighting.’ He stared at me real hard. It didn’t take a genius to know he was thinking I was wrong.

  ‘I know it was Gibson Fletcher who attacked me.’ The way I saw it, an hour’s drive was nothing. Sure, he’d have had to get across the border twice, but otherwise the journey was easy. ‘What time was he spotted in Rosarito?’

  Dez glanced over at Jorge.

  ‘23:48,’ Jorge said. He had a soft, melodic voice, his accent making even the time sound romantic.

  Damn. ‘I got back to my hotel around eleven-thirty.’

  ‘Man couldn’t be in two countries at one time,’ Dez said, rubbing his forehead.

  I nodded. ‘Yup, I figured that.’

  ‘So what
’s the next move, boss?’ Bobby Four-Fingers asked.

  ‘We wait for another spotter to confirm Fletcher’s in Mexico.’ Dez sounded tired, the rush of thinking he was close to his target gone. ‘No sense in moving before we get that.’

  ‘Why? If you really think he’s there what’s to stop us taking a look.’ I gestured to Bobby Four-Fingers and Jorge. ‘If we’re there as a team there’d be a whole lot more chance of finding him – four more pairs of eyes to spot him.’

  Dez shook his head. ‘I told you before, it don’t work that way.’

  ‘I don’t understand why it—’

  ‘Because I say so.’ Dez gestured to my face, scowling. ‘And from where I’m standing you don’t look nearly tough enough to be going over the border.’

  I put my hands on my hips. ‘I’m just as tough as—’

  ‘Enough!’ Dez thumped his fist down on the desk. A pen rolled across it, and fell onto the floor. A stack of files wobbled and cascaded down, covering the keyboard of the computer next to them. Cussing, Dez turned and stomped out of the office. Moments later I heard a door upstairs slam. Then silence.

  ‘Prick,’ I muttered. I looked at Bobby Four-Fingers and Jorge. ‘What the hell was that about?’

  Jorge said nothing. He looked real uncomfortable.

  Bobby nodded towards the desk opposite the one Dez had been sitting on. It didn’t have a computer on it, just a bunch of files stacked twenty high. ‘That workstation wasn’t always empty.’ Something in Bobby’s tone told me things hadn’t gone well for the person who’d sat at that desk.

  ‘What happened?’ I asked.

  Bobby didn’t say anything. He glanced at Jorge.

  Jorge met my gaze for the first time since I’d been at the bond shop. He shook his head. ‘Mexico isn’t so friendly to bounty hunters.’

  ‘So I’ve heard, but it’s not exactly a safe job, anyways. I don’t get why we can’t—’

  Jorge shook his head. Looked sad. ‘You talk a lot, but talking isn’t always so smart. Over the border, talking is one of the things that’ll get you killed.’

  I frowned. It seemed odd to me. These guys were real worked up over Mexico, yet this was their line of work, their world. I gestured to the empty desk. ‘Is that what happened to your friend?’

  Bobby Four-Fingers adjusted his ball cap. Looked real uncomfortable. ‘We don’t talk about that.’

  I raised my eyebrows. ‘Well, you kind of brought it up.’

  ‘Cartels don’t like bounty hunters.’ Jorge spoke slow and steady, kept his eyes on mine, not blinking. His tone was neutral, matter-of-fact, but the muscles in his neck were tight, his posture rigid with tension. ‘Any bounty hunter who steps across the border has an automatic price on their head, doesn’t matter who they’re chasing or why. The cartels want the hunters to stay out, and killing is the best deterrent. That and making an example of them – murder with a flair for the dramatic. Dragging them between vehicles till their bodies break; leaving them buried up to their necks in the desert; having them trussed up and used as target practice. Videos taken. Photos of…’ Jorge’s voice trailed off.

  ‘I’m sorry about your friend,’ I said. Couldn’t think of anything more to say.

  The memory of cradling my best friend Sal as she died in my arms from a gunshot wound ten years previously replayed in my mind. When you lose someone through violence, no words can make it okay. Nothing can bring them back. The pain stays raw. I knew that from experience.

  Jorge nodded. He turned back to his computer and started tapping away at the keyboard again. I looked at Bobby Four-Fingers. His face had flushed, his eyes a little watery.

  He gestured towards the other desk. ‘If you need somewhere to work you can set up camp here. It’s Dez’s, but he doesn’t use it. He has another upstairs. Prefers things that way since what happened.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. I knew not to push further for the specifics on what the cartels had done to their colleague. Could see the sharp knife of fate was still close and bloody. ‘Can I use the computer? I need to access some documents on my email and it’d be a whole lot easier to read through them on a big screen.’

  Bobby wiped his hand across his face. Nodded. ‘Sure. The password’s EASYRIDE.’

  I switched the PC on and as I waited for it to whirl into action I checked my cell for messages. There was still nothing from Red, yet it’d be gone lunchtime in Florida. Opening the message I’d sent him earlier I saw its status said delivered. That meant he’d not read it, and Red always looked at his messages as they came in. That he’d not read it yet made me feel real uneasy.

  *

  Hours passed, but there were still no further sightings of Fletcher. I was starting to feel stir-crazy corralled in the bond shop with just the whirl of the ceiling fan and the constant, rhythmic sound of Bobby Four-Fingers chewing gum as a soundtrack.

  I buried myself in the details. Monroe had sent through the prison logs and the manifests for all the other aircraft that had landed at the airport in the time window between Gibson Fletcher’s escape and Clint Norsen’s sighting of him. I went through the flight lists first; pages of names, none of them Gibson’s. It was looking ever more likely that he hadn’t flown.

  At one pm I walked next door and bought a Subway sandwich – tuna melt on Italian – and an iced tea. I brought them back and had them at my desk. Jorge had gone out with Dez on a job, leaving me and Bobby Four-Fingers alone in the office. Bobby was filling out paperwork while listening to a ball game on the radio – the Yankees were playing a smaller team for charity. It made me think of JT. He loved the game. Loved the Yankees. It’d been a source of friendly friction between us when I was training with him – jibes about my team, the Red Sox, used to motivate me through the exhaustion. I smiled at the memory.

  *

  ‘Come on, Lori. You’d be too slow even for the Red Sox.’

  I gritted my teeth. The hill was my nemesis. It had been ever since the start of my training, although back then I just had to hike up it. Six weeks later, JT expected me to run and filled my backpack with rocks to make it harder. Told me it was good for me; that I needed stamina and determination; that I had to be able to hit the wall and push through it. That afternoon he wanted me to shave thirty seconds off my previous time.

  Eight miles. Near on vertical ascent. All during the hottest part of the day. I was glad that the forest offered some shade, making it maybe eighty-five degrees rather than ninety. Still, the zigzag pattern of the pathway, the humidity and the kamikaze desire of millions of bugs to fly straight into my mouth took their toll on me as we neared the last mile. I was on track, though. I was beating my previous best.

  Then things went wrong. Reaching the final turn in the path I slipped as I tried to avoid a tree root sticking up across the narrow track. I felt a muscle twinge in my knee. Grimaced. Knew there were only another sixteen hundred yards to the top.

  I limped a couple of strides.

  ‘Don’t slow.’ JT instructed.

  I pushed on through the pain. Shot a look at JT. He’d barely broken a sweat. Looked as if he’d been out on an afternoon stroll.

  ‘Swing your arms harder,’ he said. ‘Strong legs.’

  Damn. He made me want to kill him and kiss him all at the same time.

  ‘Lean into the slope. Eyes on the top.’ He surged ahead of me. ‘Race.’

  It was all I could do to stay upright and keep breathing. I cussed under my breath and he lengthened the distance between us.

  JT looked back. Grinned. ‘Don’t you quit on me.’

  ‘I’m not a quitter.’

  He beckoned me on. ‘Show me.’

  I pumped my arms harder. Determined to beat my previous time. Determined to catch JT.

  We sprinted up the path. JT in front, me behind. It was too narrow to run side-by-side here. I stayed on his heels. My breath was loud in my ears, my legs were screaming from the strain, the rocks in my backpack rhythmically banging against my spine.

 
At three hundred yards to the top JT pulled four paces ahead of me. I pushed myself harder. Fought to keep my breathing controlled and even. Focused on the summit.

  ‘Keep it going,’ JT shouted.

  I said nothing. Shortened the gap to two paces between us. I remembered what he’d told me before about hill running – take shorter, quicker strides rather than longer ones to increase your speed. I accelerated.

  The last twenty yards of the path broadened out again. I saw my chance. Swung left and sprinted around JT, my legs strong, my arms pumping, my focus on the finish, giving it one hundred percent.

  I beat him. Turned, and as I did I stumbled. Fell. Hit the dirt with my shoulder and then my hip. Rolled onto my back, lay arms-out like a beached starfish, and laughed.

  JT stood over me, checked his stopwatch. ‘Nicely played. Thirty-six seconds faster, too.’

  I raised my fingers to my forehead in salute. I was still breathing heavily, getting the air back into my lungs. ‘I’m not a quitter.’

  ‘Always knew that.’

  I smiled. ‘So what’s my reward?’

  ‘I’ll think of something.’

  He held out his hand to help me up. I took it, and made as if I was going to stand, then lay back and pulled him down to me.

  He didn’t put up any resistance. Grinned, and kissed me on the tip of my nose. For a man who said he preferred to be alone, he sure seemed to enjoy us being together. Not that he’d say as much, of course. Not that he’d talk about us, even on the odd occasion I grew bold enough to raise it.

  I reached out to him. Stroked his face, my fingertips trailing across his stubble. ‘You know, I think you like me being here, really.’

  He didn’t answer, not with words. Kissed me instead, long and slow, like we had all the time in the world.

  Afterwards, as we lay on the forest floor, looking up at the birds singing above us in the tree canopy, I felt happy for the first time in a long while. Of course, I knew even then that it couldn’t last.