“I don’t usually give out my name in bars.”
He smiled. “I don’t blame you.”
Her heart did a little flutter—something about his smile. Or maybe her system was responding to having an attractive man in her kitchen.
“How’d you find me?” she asked.
“Ran your license plate.”
“Try again,” she said. She’d borrowed that tag from the ’86 Chevy Celebrity her grandfather kept under a tarp in his garage.
He watched her silently until she started to get irritated. “I need to know about your interest in Shay Hardin,” he said.
“What interest?”
His eyes didn’t change—they stayed locked on hers. “You interviewed no fewer than twelve people about him over the course of three days,” he said.
“Interviewed?”
“Asked questions about him.”
“So what? I can ask questions about whatever I want. It’s none of your business.”
He rested his hands on the countertop. “Actually, it is. My team’s been conducting an undercover investigation of Hardin for the past four months.”
She didn’t say anything. She was aware of Hardin’s background—he’d been arrested a few times on minor charges, mostly fighting in bars, but he’d never been convicted of anything. She was aware that he lived with some friends, including her brother, at Lost Creek Ranch outside Maverick. She was not aware until this moment that he was the subject of an FBI investigation.
She watched the agent’s face and wondered if he knew that her brother had recently joined Hardin’s little commune. Gavin’s previous stint there had lasted an entire summer and would have been longer if Andrea hadn’t found him and persuaded him to go back to school.
She adjusted her strategy now. If she stonewalled, he’d probably get more interested, not less.
“So what’s your question, exactly?”
“I want to know why an Austin homicide detective is poking around my suspect,” he said. “I don’t need him getting spooked.”
Andrea reached for the cabinet beside him and took down a glass. She filled it with water from the tap and took a long sip as North watched her.
She’d known right away that he didn’t fit the profile of an ICE agent. Those guys tended to be bulkier and rougher around the edges. The ones in West Texas spent a lot of time hotshotting around the desert in their 4x4s.
North had the height. And he’d clearly spent time outdoors recently. But he looked different from the typical border cowboy. He seemed smoother, smarter. And he looked comfortable in a suit.
He was still watching her steadily, waiting for an answer.
“It’s not police-related,” she told him. “My interest is personal.”
His brow furrowed. “You two have a history?”
“Something like that.”
He seemed surprised. And maybe a little disappointed.
But it wasn’t a bad concept. If he thought she had a relationship with Shay Hardin, that kept her brother out of it.
“So what did he say? I assume you tried to contact him while you were out there?”
“He wasn’t really communicative,” she said vaguely. “We’re not on good terms.”
“Any chance you could change that?”
“Doubtful.” And that was the truth. “I tried to reach out to him, and I got nowhere.”
“Did you visit the ranch?”
“Didn’t get past the gate.”
“Did you try calling him?”
“No luck.” She shrugged. “Anyway, I hear he keeps to himself now. That’s what everyone in town says.”
North’s look was intent, and the ball of dread that had been sitting in her stomach for the last five days grew heavier. Andrea had never liked Hardin. What was he mixed up in? And what was Gavin mixed up in by association?
“What’s this about, anyway?” she asked. “Why’s he under investigation?”
“I’m not at liberty to say.”
She glared at him across the kitchen. Typical fed. Swoop in wanting a quid pro quo with none of the quid.
He stepped forward and gazed down at her. She noticed his eyes again and remembered how they’d looked back at the bar. She’d seen something else in his expression then, but right now he was all business. “A little friendly advice.”
She glared harder.
“Leave Shay Hardin alone. I can’t think of an easier way to ruin a promising career.”
What the hell did that mean? She got the distinct impression he was taking a jab at her.
He set his mug in the sink. Then he crossed to the door and glanced back as he opened it.
“Trust me on this, Detective. He’s a problem you don’t need.”
♦
Jon slid his truck between some mesquite bushes and tossed a camo net over it. The night air was cold and brisk as he made the trek out to the meeting point. Nothing out here was a short distance away. At first, he’d been put off by the vastness of it, but it had grown on him. He’d come to appreciate the honesty of the desert, the hardworking people with their callused hands and skin as parched and cracked as the land. He crossed the field to a slight rise beside the dried-up riverbed—the Lost Creek for which the nearby ranch was named. Torres was right where he’d said he’d be, about half a mile south of the house.
“Hey, thanks for stopping by,” he said.
Jon ignored the sarcasm as he settled in beside him. He stretched out prone and lifted the night-vision binoculars to his face.
“What do we got?”
“A coyote moved across the highway ’bout an hour ago,” Torres said.
“You call it in?”
“CBP took it.”
Jon glanced at him. “You in your truck?”
“Nah, Whitfield dropped me off.”
Jon settled himself against the cold, hard dirt. He peered through the binocs and did a slow 180-degree scan east to west. It was flat country, only a low ridge running north-south to break up the landscape. The ridge would have been a better vantage point, but it was too obvious. Hardin had trained at Fort Benning. He would have spotted it in a minute.
Overnight surveillance of the ranch had been a priority ever since the eavesdropping crew had picked up a snippet from an outdoor conversation: meeting us . . . oh-two-hundred hours. They’d had a team stationed out here for the past three nights, but no one had entered or left the property, and Jon was convinced they’d missed something.
Still, he scoured the landscape for anyone coming or going. He listened for the crunch of footsteps or the low hum of an approaching engine. He listened for coyotes—either the furry or the human variety. He listened for rattlesnakes. This land was inhabited by things that would bite, sting, and stab—not to mention shoot—when threatened. Hardin had a sign hooked to the game fence that surrounded his land: NO TRESPASSING. WE DON’T CALL 911.
Torres rolled onto his back. He untwisted the lid from his thermos, and the aroma of hot cocoa wafted over. Most agents on surveillance downed coffee by the gallon. Torres was a Swiss Miss addict.
“Thought you were coming back yesterday.”
Jon lowered the binocs. “Got tied up.”
“How was the office?”
“Same. Jane says hi.”
A flash of white teeth in the darkness. “No kidding?”
This assignment had been a dry spell in more ways than one, and Jon knew Torres was ready to be done with it. Jon wasn’t so eager. In the four months since he’d come out here, his work had slowly turned into an obsession. Eight years with the Bureau, and Jon had never had a case grab hold of him like this one. After months of undercover work, after countless hours of painstaking digging, he was long on theories and short on evidence. Coincidence after coincidence had piled up, but he couldn’t find a way to fit everything into a coherent picture.
He checked his watch again. Twenty more minutes.
“How’d it go in Austin?” Torres asked.
“Fine.”
&nbs
p; “So what’s her story?”
Jon thought of Andrea Finch outside her apartment, her face slick with rain and sweat, her T-shirt plastered to her body.
“She said it was personal, not business.”
Torres grunted. “Yeah, right.”
“Said she has a history with Hardin.”
“I don’t buy it. She took what, three days off work? To come out here? I bet money she’s on some kind of task force. DEA’s fucking with us again, I’m telling you.”
“She didn’t take off,” Jon said. “She’s on the beach.”
“She’s what?”
“Suspended. Administrative leave, pending an investigation. She was in an officer-involved shooting. An eighteen-year-old died.”
“No shit, she killed a kid?”
Jon pictured her face again. He wondered whether the shooting was the reason for that edgy look in her eyes. Or maybe she always looked that way.
“What’s the verdict with Maxwell?” Torres asked. “He in or out?”
Jon peered through the binocs again and thought about their boss in San Antonio, who’d never really been on board with this operation. “We’ve got one more week. If we don’t have a warrant in hand by that point, he wants to pull the plug.”
Torres muttered a curse.
“Said we’re needed on the Saledo case.”
“We’ve already got ten agents staffed to that thing.”
Jon shifted his gaze to the ridge, and his attention caught on a faint green glow behind some scrub trees. He adjusted the lenses. “What time’d you get here?” he asked Torres.
“ ’Bout ninety minutes ago.”
“And where’s Whitfield?”
“Off the highway near the gate, like we planned. Why?” Torres lifted his binoculars and tried to zero in on what Jon was seeing.
“Heat signature.”
“Faint, but it’s there,” Jon agreed.
“It’s not moving.”
“I’m thinking it’s a vehicle. Engine hasn’t totally cooled down yet.”
“Can’t believe I missed it.”
A flash of movement caught Jon’s eye. He aimed the binocs west, where a much brighter green glow was now moving through the bushes.
Torres tensed beside him. He saw it, too, and it was right on time. Jon checked his watch to make sure. After so many nights of nothing, he’d all but written off this meeting.
The shape moved stealthily through the low scrub brush. The figure was small and hunched over but not sure-footed like many of the drug and human traffickers who slipped through the region. It progressed slowly up the incline and neared the clump of mesquite trees. Jon confirmed his first take that the fainter heat signature belonged to a vehicle.
The rumble of an engine disrupted the quiet. But it wasn’t from the vehicle on the ridge. This noise came from the direction of the house.
“Someone’s moving out.” Torres rested his binoculars on the ground and dug for his radio. He used a secure channel to make contact with the third member of their team, who was in an ICE van not far from the highway.
“Yo, we got a pickup heading toward the gate,” Torres told Whitfield. “Looks like Hardin’s. And we’ve got a second vehicle parked up on the ridge.”
The plan was for Whitfield to tail anyone leaving the property. The agent was almost as green as Torres, and Jon hoped he wouldn’t get burned.
“Roger that.” Whitfield’s voice sounded staticky. “Just got a visual on the truck . . . exiting the southwest gate.”
Jon looked at the ridge again. He adjusted his lenses. The stationary vehicle seemed to be waiting to leave until the pickup was gone.
Torres climbed to his feet and silently collected his gear. Jon stayed prone, trying to get a view of the second subject.
“You coming?”
The pickup’s grumble continued to fade. Soon Whitfield would be on the tail, with Jon and Torres close behind, hoping to get into position in time to see something wherever this meeting went down.
Torres was on the radio with Whitfield. “Repeat that. You said they’re turning west?”
“Affirmative.”
“Why would they go west?”
“No idea,” Whitfield said. “There’s nothing out there—at least, not on the map I’m looking at.”
“Okay, we’re on our way.”
Jon watched the ridge as the mystery vehicle eased out from behind the brush and moved slowly down the gentle slope. No headlights. It stopped near the dirt road leading to the highway, and Jon got his first unobstructed view of the car and the driver.
He lowered his binoculars. Un-fucking-believable.
Andrea Finch.
Part of him wasn’t surprised at all.
♦
They were leaving, Shay Hardin behind the wheel and a man Andrea didn’t recognize riding shotgun.
She waited at the base of the ridge as Hardin’s taillights grew smaller. Why on earth were they going west? There was nothing in that direction. He’d have to drive a good twenty minutes just to pick up a highway.
Not her problem. She had the information she’d come for, and it was time to get gone.
Andrea kept the lights off as she moved cautiously down the road. Using only the moon for guidance was unnerving, but she couldn’t risk headlights yet, so her visibility was limited to about ten feet beyond her front bumper. She eased over the uneven terrain, careful to avoid trees and cacti and boulders as she neared the dirt road that bisected Lost Creek Ranch.
The ride smoothed as her tires found hard-packed earth. She eased into the middle of the road and headed due east, toward the gate that linked the property with an adjacent ranch. She kept a careful eye on the odometer. In the light of the moon, she spotted the high line of the game fence and the eight-foot posts on either side of the gate.
It was closed.
She rolled to a stop and checked her surroundings. She’d propped that gate open with a rock, but it was shut now. How had it come to be that way? They’d had some gusts in the last hour, so maybe the wind had moved it.
Or maybe the landowner had.
She looked around, hyperalert for any sign of someone lurking nearby. In the dimness, she spotted the loop of baling wire that had been used to secure the gate. It lay in the dirt near the fence post, exactly where she’d left it.
Andrea climbed out. She paused beside her SUV and listened for a full minute before trudging over to the post. She hauled the gate open, then slid behind the wheel and rattled over the cattle guard that separated Lost Creek from its neighbor. Again, she returned to the gate. She reattached the baling wire and let out a sigh. Home free.
A force slammed into her, plowing her face-first into the dirt. Her breath disappeared with an oomph! She bucked and tried to scream, but the weight crushed her lungs. Fire lanced up her back as the barrel of her own pistol dug into her spine.
Something clamped around her wrists. Her arms were wrenched back at an impossible angle. She sucked in a breath but got a mouthful of dirt, and panic set in as she struggled for air.
Then the weight disappeared. She rolled. She scrambled for her knees, and a bolt of pain seared through her abdomen. She convulsed into a tight ball. Another kick landed like a sledgehammer. The third time, she reacted, grabbing the boot and yanking with all her might, but it tore from her hands. Muffled curses as her attacker tripped backward.
She rolled away into something prickly. Cactus! Choking and gasping for air, she groped for her gun and got it out of her holster just as an engine roared to life nearby. She pushed to her knees and finally caught a breath—and a nose full of exhaust fumes—as the truck sped away.
♦
“Where the hell’s he going?” Torres adjusted the screen on their navigation system. “There’s nothing out here.”
Jon picked up his radio. “Give us an update.”
“Subject is still moving due west,” Whitfield reported.
“Copy that. What’s your speed?”
“We’re doing about thirty. He seems to know the area pretty good.”
Torres worked the GPS, trying to determine their destination. “Nothing on the map.”
Jon tried to rein in his frustration as he steered over the bumpy ground. What did Andrea Finch think she was doing creeping around Hardin’s property in the middle of the night?
“Think I remember a dirt road back here, when we did that first flyover.” Torres looked out the window, but the rugged countryside was devoid of lights. “You remember anything else?”
“No.”
“Okay, now he’s changing course,” Whitfield said over the radio. “He’s heading northwest.”
“Keep on him,” Jon ordered. “He know you’re back there?”
“Negative. I’m driving blind, using the NVGs.”
Jon made headway through the desert brush, plowing over the low stuff but veering around any sizable rocks. Whitfield was doing the same but using night-vision goggles instead of headlights. The tactic would help him close the distance without being seen, but noise could still be a problem. Sound traveled pretty well out here.
They hit a rut, and Torres braced his hand on the dash as he reached for his radio again.
“Whitfield, any sign of a second vehicle?”
No answer.
“Whitfield?”
“Got an un-ID’d”—static—“west.”
“Repeat?”
“I got an un-ID’d vehicle moving in from the west, maybe a mile out.”
“Roger that.”
Jon rolled to a stop and killed his lights. The terrain was flatter here, and he needed to avoid being seen by both parties.
“We’re in the middle of nowhere,” Torres said, looking around.
“Maybe that’s the point.” Jon got on the radio. “What do you see?”
“Looks like a white Tahoe,” Whitfield responded. “They’re parking near a low canyon that runs east-west. I’m pulling over. I’ve got the listening equipment. Lemme set up and see what I can get.”
“We need tags on that Tahoe,” Jon said. “You got your scope?”
“I’m working on it.”
Torres looked at him. “He needs help. Want to try and get there on foot?”
Jon went still. He buzzed down the windows. “Hear that?”
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