Logged out, Fernando stared at the tablet’s colorful screen. The blinking cursor in the browser’s address bar promised he could visit anything he wanted. The black ribbon of road outside his motel room told the same lie. No matter how he tried to put it out of his mind, he only wanted to go in one direction.
Javier’s warnings rang in Fernando’s ears, but the fugitive could not muster the will to heed them. He had to get in touch with Carolina, or at least make sure she knew a way to get in touch with him.
He created a single-use e-mail account and sent Carolina a brief message. “If you ever want to reach me, I want you to know how to find me,” Fernando wrote. He followed with instructions for logging into the encrypted dropbox he shared with Javier.
Chapter Eleven
Javier made a few more attempts to hint to Emily that she shouldn’t leave him alone in her apartment. She seemed intent on trusting him, an attitude that only served to make him feel guiltier by the minute.
To his relief, before she left to meet with her contacts, she changed out of her shorts and tank top and into a worn light-blue pantsuit. The sensible outfit didn’t hide her beauty, but it made Javier feel better to know that whoever she spoke with wouldn’t be able to ogle her nipples through the tank top’s thin white fabric. That was a pleasure he hoped to reserve for himself.
Emily stopped before leaving the apartment. “Javier,” she began, and finished the statement with a kiss that left him aching for her.
After she shut the door behind her, he leaned against the thin wood for a long time, toying with a patch of peeling paint running up the doorframe. He wished they’d met under any other circumstances.
Slowly, he walked to her desk. She’d obviously been burned by men before. That Matthew Lodi character was a piece of work and a jerk besides. Considering what seemed to have happened between them, Javier couldn’t understand how Emily could trust anyone to wander around her apartment unsupervised. He hated betraying the faith she’d placed in him.
He took a deep breath and pushed the start button on her computer, wincing at the cheerful notes it played as the screen came to life. “Please have a password, please have a password.” He begged out loud as the old machine chittered and scraped to life. If she’d protected her computer a little, Javier might be able to justify leaving it be.
He had no such luck. Emily had left her computer wide open to anyone with access to her apartment. He frowned at the desktop. Not only did he have no excuse for avoiding Fernando, he now understood how a bonehead like her ex had been able to steal from her. For a moment he imagined helping her to lock things down after she returned. The fantasy disappeared quickly, however, when he tried to imagine explaining how he’d figured out the task needed to be done.
Javier bit the corner of his lip and proceeded to get online, set the browser to incognito mode and obscure his path over the Internet. Fernando had logged into their encrypted dropbox recently. Javier frowned as his brother’s recent message appeared onscreen, full of detailed information about how to reach him.
He’d set up the dropbox for Fernando because he’d never before been able to envision a situation where his own knowledge could be dangerous. His older brother trusted Javier with good reason. Javier had always been fairly certain that he would die for Fernando if it became necessary.
Fernando’s alleged crime changed everything. Javier could no longer give himself the luxury of avoiding the details of his brother’s activities. He would help his brother one last time, ask the questions that needed to be asked, then say he couldn’t help him anymore.
He started his own message and filled Fernando in on everything he knew about the two bounty hunters that pursued him. Then he explained he’d been compromised. “Change locations as soon as you can and don’t post any more information to this account. I’ve been compromised and can’t guarantee that information I have is secure. Don’t trust messages you see here either.”
Javier hesitated, afraid of worrying his brother. He considered explaining his relationship with Emily, then laughed. He couldn’t even explain that to himself—what could he possibly tell Fernando?
He steeled himself to say the rest. Javier barely looked at the keyboard as he typed. “Brother, I’ve never asked about what you do, and you’ve never told me. I know I’ve benefited tremendously from your work and your generosity, and so in that way I share at least some of the blame for any crimes you have committed. At the same time, I believe I’ve paid my dues by providing you with the best protection available in the modern age.
“I’m at an impasse now, because I can’t live with the latest news of what you’re supposed to have done, and the circumstances make it impossible to close my eyes to it. I wish you had told me the truth when I saw you last. I wish I could have asked for your side of the story. What I know now is, no matter if you’re guilty or innocent this time, I can’t do this anymore. I don’t have the stomach to be a full partner in what you do, and I’ve been lying to myself that I can get away with being less. I don’t know what I’ll do for a living, but I should have figured that out long ago. It’s my responsibility.
“I love you, Fernando, even though we don’t use words like that with each other. I’ll miss you terribly, and I hope the help I set up for you over the last several years continues to keep you safe and well-prepared. But don’t get in touch, even if the heat cools down. I can’t be your accomplice, and I can’t promise to keep your secrets anymore.”
Javier’s hands trembled as he saved the message and logged out of the dropbox. The words had poured out of him, so much simpler than the uncertain mess in his head. Hard as they had been to write, he knew he’d done the right thing.
He did love Fernando, but it had been more than a dozen years since they’d had an honest conversation. In every way that counted, his brother was a stranger. He missed the cool older boy who had stuck beside him after they’d been separated from their mother, but he hadn’t seen that kid in forever. The current Fernando had opinions on every part of Javier’s life, but no real understanding of who he was and what he wanted to do.
Javier’s heart unclenched from a tight fist he hadn’t known it had been making. He wasn’t a kid anymore. Plenty of people had to find their place in life at age twenty-five. Javier wouldn’t be the only one, and he had plenty of skills to try. He’d have to lie to Emily for a few more days, withholding information about his brother’s location, but once he could be sure Fernando had moved on, he could tell her anything he wanted. Crazy as the idea was, they might be able to have something together. He wanted the chance to be with her honestly.
With a smile on his face, Javier visited the site where he stored his projects. Emily had been right about bug bounties—they gave him a starting point. He continued his analysis of security flaws in a major browser. Before Emily had come into his life, he’d thought he found a significant bug. A little more testing, and he might be able to submit the find.
Javier’s work absorbed him completely. He scrolled through complex code on Emily’s computer, so comfortable in that virtual environment that the unfamiliar physical details around him disappeared. He barely heard the door creak open. When she walked up behind him and rested two delicate hands on his shoulders, he smiled up at her as if they’d practiced this routine a thousand times.
She looked tired. He took her hand and kissed the palm. “How were the errands?”
She tugged away. “You’re on the computer.”
Guilt flashed through Javier. She should be suspicious, because he’d contacted Fernando just as she’d feared. On the other hand, he hadn’t truly betrayed her, had he? No matter how she might see it, Javier knew in his heart that he’d behaved with as much integrity toward Emily as possible. In a few days’ time they’d be on equal footing as far as what they knew about his brother. Because of what Emily herself had helped him to see, Javier would be free of criminal influence from here on out. He could become the kind of man she could be proud to have at he
r side. He arranged his facial expression into a smile to match this knowledge. “I’m working on a security analysis of a browser. Those bug bounties you talked about.”
She sighed and sat on the floor beside his chair. “Okay, I don’t have the energy to question that right now. You seem happy.”
“I am,” Javier said, feeling the truth of the words in his bones as he spoke them. He reached out to her again, settling one hand in her thick, tawny hair. He liked how fine and strong it felt between his fingers.
She leaned against him, going boneless with a telltale sort of exhaustion.
“What about you?” he asked.
She avoided the question. “I bought you some stuff. Clothes and shaving gear, that kind of thing. Not as nice as what you had on, but I couldn’t afford to spend too much. I put it on the couch.”
“Thank you,” he said sincerely. “Now what’s the matter?”
“You’re not going to like this.”
“Did you forget to pick up the condoms?”
She cracked a smile. “No, though I’m not sure if you’re still going to want them.”
“You didn’t get back together with the beefcake?”
She stood and stepped away from his hand. “You’re making this difficult.”
Javier recognized this kind of conversation. Terri used to hate talking to him about serious things while he sat in front of the computer. “Give me a second,” Javier said. He logged out of his project and shut down her computer. Then he swiveled the desk chair to face her and folded his hands in his lap like a schoolboy. “You have my attention.”
Appreciation flashed through her eyes. She moved a shopping bag out of the way and sat on the couch, much too far away in his opinion. Her hands mirrored his. “I’m getting stonewalled looking for your brother. No one wants to talk about it.”
“That doesn’t bother me.”
“I think I really need to find him.”
He stiffened. He’d thought she understood him, and the way his feelings of loyalty worked. How much did she want from him? “What are you asking?”
“I need you to help me do it, Javier.”
“Didn’t I already tell you—”
“I know what you said. Hear me out.” She closed her eyes. Tense wrinkles formed over the bridge of her nose. She rubbed at them, then fixed him with a wide-open blue stare that took his breath away. “No contact associated with the Bonavitas would give me any kind of clue where he is.”
“I did help him prepare for this sort of thing, Emily,” Javier said, frowning. “There shouldn’t be anyone who knows where he is. I’ve drilled him to be careful of the kinds of tactics people use when they’re searching for someone.” Again, he thought of Carolina but couldn’t believe Fernando would break cover over a woman, no matter how special she seemed to be. Fernando had always been far too cold to let his emotions interfere with prudent behavior.
Emily shook her head emphatically. “That’s not what I’m saying. It’s not that they don’t know where he is—it’s worth a shot to ask, but I understand that some people cover their tracks well. What I’m worried about is that people are scared. I finally got someone to tell me why, though it wasn’t easy.”
“Aren’t people scared of you all the time?” Javier smiled with the joke, but the attempt fell to the floor like lead.
“Believe me, it’s not me they’re worried about. Have you heard of Sergio Aristone?”
Javier’s body went rigid, preventing the short nod he wanted to give in response.
“Okay, I saw that,” Emily murmured. “Which of us is going to talk about him first?”
“You.” The word cracked sharply from his mouth.
“Fair enough. The word is guys from his gang have been all over anyone associated with the Bonavitas, looking for Fernando. If I didn’t have you, I’m sure you’d have gotten several visits by now. They’ve been scaring people, roughing people up.”
Javier’s throat tightened. He scratched the scar beneath his chin, then forced himself to drop his hand away from it. “I know what they do.” He needed to tell her some of his history with them, but not yet. He gestured for her to continue. Emily stared at him, waiting for something he wasn’t ready to give. Finally she nodded and cleared her throat.
“After I heard that, I went to talk to some of Sergio’s people.”
“You did.” Javier’s fists clenched. The thought of Emily in Sergio’s hands made his pulse pound from the tips of his toes to the tops of his ears.
“Don’t go Neanderthal on me, Javier. This is my job, and I have a reasonable ability to protect myself.”
“We’ll talk about that later. Go on.”
By the way she glared, he knew he’d struck a nerve in her. Just then, he didn’t care if she didn’t like what he said. Emily turned and stared at the wall, shutting him out of the emotion roiling through her big blue eyes. “They tried to hire me, Javier. They say they have another agent on the job but he’s dragging his feet.”
“Hire you for what?”
She shrugged sharply. “I didn’t let them explain very much. To share information with them and I guess to take him to them instead of jail. I don’t know exactly what they wanted me to do, I just know they’re not the people I’d want getting hold of your brother.” She snapped her gaze back to Javier. “I don’t want to kill him, Javier. I just want to take him to jail. I think he’ll be safer if I’m the one who gets to him.”
“Do they know how to find you? Do they know you have me?”
She grunted and stood, folding her arms across her chest. “How stupid do you think I am?”
“You should let me protect you. You don’t even have a password on this computer.”
“That’s a nice offer, Javier, but you have to remember this is just one job to me—a big one, but only one. If someone wanted to come after me, that could happen any time. It’s nice for you to offer to protect me for a couple weeks, but it doesn’t make sense for you to set up a bunch of stuff I’m not going to be able to maintain.”
Javier opened his mouth to protest. He knew he could help her for however long she would allow it. Then he realized what he was about to say and bit the words back. He rubbed the heels of his palms against his eyes. She’d been right to accuse him of acting like a Neanderthal. This whole situation had become such a mess. He couldn’t afford to act like a hormone-crazed teenager on top of everything else.
Slowly, Javier tipped his head back, revealing the ugly scar that snaked across his throat.
“You showed me that before,” Emily said, but anxiety in her voice belied her words.
“Let me tell you where it came from,” Javier said. “When I was seventeen, a few of Sergio’s guys came to pick me up from high school. I knew better than to go with them, but let’s say they were…persuasive. They wanted me to call my brother and help them set up a trap for him. I refused. They kept me there for hours, threatening me.” Despite the horror of the memory, a wave of pride rose in his chest. “They kept trying to use my phone to get Fernando’s private number, but couldn’t figure out how to access it.”
“They gave you that scar. When you were just a kid.”
“If you think seventeen is a kid.”
“I do.”
“Well, then, yes. When they realized I wasn’t going to give them anything, they cut me here, took a picture and blasted it to everyone who might know Fernando. I thought I was going to die.”
Emily’s dark honey skin had turned pale. “Why didn’t you die? After a cut like that, you wouldn’t have had long.”
“Even then, I was thinking through scenarios, protecting us. After what happened to our sister—”
“Your sister?”
“Not yet.” Javier took a deep breath, his guts twisting. “I can’t talk about that yet. For now, let’s just say it had occurred to me that someone might try to get to my brother by hurting me. I’d hacked my phone so it would send a message to him in response to certain strange behavior. Like
someone repeatedly trying to access it without success.”
“So they’d tipped him off before they hurt you.”
“Exactly.” He glanced down at his hands. They gripped each other so tightly that the tiny scars on his knuckles stood out lividly. Javier relaxed them with a mental effort. “He and a whole army of guys were already on the way. Luckily, they’d almost made it to where Sergio’s people had me.”
“And then what?”
It was Javier’s turn to shrug. “A lot of people died that day. I don’t really remember. I couldn’t move much by that point, and my memory of the whole thing is weird.” He shuddered. He remembered the event as a series of bloody images. He shoved them out of his mind whenever they presented themselves. “It’s why he trusts me. I didn’t give him up then. He knows there’s nothing in the world that could make me betray him. I’ve been tried and tested.”
Emily didn’t seem impressed. She bit her lip. “It sounds like everyone involved should have been arrested.”
Javier gave a bitter laugh. “For a lady who works so close to the criminal justice system, you don’t understand much about how it works.”
“I know how it’s supposed to work.”
“Well, there are entire parts of town where it doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to work. They care more about deporting illegals than about arresting people who hurt children.”
“You’re not talking about what happened to you.”
Javier clenched his jaw to prevent it from chattering. “No. I’m not.”
“Your sister.”
He could not meet her eyes. “Her name was Sabi.”
“That’s why it bothered you so much when I told you what Fernando is accused of.”
“If he did it…I’ll never forgive him.”
He heard her move toward him but he still didn’t look at her. He couldn’t stand to see pity. He expected a gentle touch and steeled himself. He didn’t want to take this out on Emily.
Instead of her hand, a manila folder touched his skin. He brought up his head, startled. “What’s that?”
TheFugitivesSexyBrother Page 11