Deception in Calusa Cove (The Aegis Network: The Everglades Division #3)

Prologue

Bogotá, eight years earlier…

The rain had stopped an hour ago, but the panadería's awning still wept onto the sidewalk in slow, irregular drops.

Three drops in eleven seconds. Then five. Then nothing for a minute and a half. CIA agent, Sterling Fox, counted. He did this because if he didn't, he'd lose his focus, and if he did that, he'd put the mission at risk.

The water gathered along the green canvas, beaded, fattened, let go, and where it hit the concrete it carved a small, dark line that ran toward the storm drain as if it were being chased.

He sat with his back against a cold cinder block wall, three stories up in a half-finished apartment building that wouldn't see another worker for months, watching the panadería through the gap in the unfinished wall. He didn't need the rifle scope. What he needed was patience, and patience he had.

Six hours in this position.

The cold pushed through, dry and thin. Andean air, at altitude, surprised people who thought South America meant heat.

Sterling's mind logged the cold along with the rest of his surroundings. His shoulders ached where they'd locked into the same angle for hours, but moving meant losing the read on the street, so he didn't move.

The rain had quit at 1842 leaving the sidewalk dark and steaming. Colombian music drifted from a radio two buildings over. The panadería's grate complained every forty minutes when the owner came out to check the street.

She was due in seven.

"Bravo One, comms check," Marlow said, low and even in Sterling's ear. Marlow was Air Force. He held overwatch and ran comms from a rooftop two blocks east.

"Bravo One, good copy," Sterling said.

"Bravo Two, good copy," Nick answered. Nick held the rear perimeter and was the other CIA man on the op—a Langley guy, too. He and Sterling had collaborated a few times in the field. If Sterling wanted a guy to have his six, Nick was the man.

"Bravo Three, copy," Doyle said. The Green Beret had a face that fit anywhere. If he shaved and put on a golf shirt, he could stroll into a country club like he owned it. If he let his beard and hair grow, dress him in jeans, flannel, and a Stetson, and he could blend in with the cowboys.

"Bravo Four, copy," Nelson Snow, Delta Force and the breacher, said. Sterling had worked with him twice before, and Nelson was about as solid as they came.

"Bravo Five, copy," Driscoll said. He was a SEAL. He sat in a stripped-down delivery van in the alley behind the panadería stand and never made noise over comms unless he had to. Those three words were a lot for him.

The line cleared.

Sterling let his eyes adjust back to the street and tracked the third-floor window above the panadería.

Curtains drawn. Dim light from a lamp instead of an overhead.

Mateo Restrepo was up there. Forty-three years old, mid-shift coordinator at a freight company that moved cargo through El Dorado. His name appeared on three bills of lading a week that didn't match the manifests they should've.

He'd been on Sterling's board for eight months. Pattern-of-life mapped down to the brand of cigarettes Mateo bought on Tuesdays. The man washed his shirts in cold water and hung them on the railing of the small interior courtyard because the dryer in his building never worked right.

Sterling knew the shirts. Three of them. White, light purple, pale blue. Always in that order, left to right.

He also knew Restrepo had a sister.

The brief hadn't included her because she hadn't mattered—until she did.

She was Sterling's leverage and addition.

He'd moved her three days ago. A quiet pickup from her apartment six blocks south into a safe house outside the city, no one the wiser.

Sterling had pitched it to the COS (Chief of Station) as a non-negotiable.

Without it, Restrepo wasn't ever going to talk.

And Sterling wouldn’t pull a man out and leave his sister behind as the lever someone yanked to make the guy recant. The COS had grunted his permission and asked Sterling to keep the paper thin.

There were a lot of things regarding this op that were "thin" or only registered in Sterling's brain. That made him nervous. It meant the government could leverage Sterling.

Wasn't the first time, and it sure as shit wouldn't be the last.

The window above the panadería went dark.

Sterling watched the curtain settle as the warm light vanished. Restrepo went to bed at 2230 most nights. It was 2228.

"He's tucking in. Sticking to routine," Sterling said. "Hold positions. We move at 0300." Restrepo knew they were coming. Knew it was soon. He just didn't know it was tonight—both for his protection and the integrity of the mission.

"Copy, Bravo One," Nick said.

"Copy," Doyle said.

"Copy," Nelson repeated.

Sterling eased back against the cinder block. He thought about the shirts on the railing. It wasn't anything important, but something to keep his mind occupied and alert.

But the buzzing streetlight on the corner kept tugging his focus away from his thoughts.

Or maybe it was the shift in the air. He stiffened.

The litter pattern at the storm drain hadn't moved.

The parked cars along the south curb hadn't moved.

Nothing had changed. That should have settled Sterling's nerves. But it didn't.

A dark Renault came down the street at thirty kilometers an hour.

Sterling lifted his rifle and peered through the scope.

The vehicle was a four-door sedan, nothing special. Though Sterling couldn't pinpoint the narrative, the muddied plates clearly conveyed a story.

There were two men in the front, two in the back. They drove past the panadería without slowing. That wasn’t necessarily significant. Tourists only slowed down if they were unsure of their location or interested in stopping. It was too late for that for the latter.

The Renault turned right at the corner and disappeared.

Sterling noted the time.

"Bravo Two," he said. "Dark Renault sedan with four passengers just passed your location."

"Copy that," Nick said. "It's doing a U-turn."

At forty-three seconds, the Renault came back around the block in the opposite direction, slower this time.

Shit. Sterling had spent eight months gathering intel not just on Restrepo, but on the organization.

The CIA needed information, and Sterling had been at a standstill until Restrepo landed in his lap through a backdoor.

His sister needed out of a bad situation, and the American government could help with that.

Sterling had been successful in getting Restrepo to agree to giving intel, and in return, he and his sister got to start a new life in America. All Sterling had to do was make it look like Restrepo had been abducted and murdered. That was actually the easy part.

Unfortunately, someone else's clock was running on Restrepo. Someone else had either figured out Restrepo had turned or wanted him for something else. And whoever they were, they were going to be inside that apartment in the next ten minutes.

"All Bravo, all Bravo," Sterling said. "Audible. We move now. Repeat, we move now. Three-mike collapse. Stack on the door."

"Copy, moving," Doyle said.

"Copy, moving," Nelson said.

"On it," Nick said.

"Pulling forward," Driscoll said.

Sterling broke position. The rifle came up and slung tight to his chest. For six hours, he’d kept his legs folded under him, and the first three strides down the rough stairwell sent a hot bloom of pins and needles up the back of his thighs.

He took the flights two at a time, boots quiet on poured concrete and one hand on the unfinished railing for balance.

He busted through the side door and raced across the street.

The pavement was still wet from the rain. He kept low and his rifle ready, tight to his chest.

Nelson beat him to the front door. The breaching tool was pressed against his thigh. Nelson had done this in a dozen worse places.

Doyle came in from the east, scanning as he approached the door.

"Nick, position," Sterling said.

"Coming up the alley. Thirty seconds."

"Driscoll." Sterling's breath floated out of his mouth like fog.

"Rear perimeter. Got the south alley sighted."

"Marlow, where's that Renault?"

A pause. Sterling didn't like the pause. Pauses often meant something bad happened. "Mar—"

"Stopped at the end of the block," Marlow said. "Lights off. Four out. Moving toward you on foot. South side of the street."

"Distance," Doyle asked.

"Hundred meters. Closing."

A hundred meters was thirty seconds at a walk, fifteen at a jog. Sterling did the math and the math told him they had ninety seconds to get inside the building before the wet team was in the stairwell with them.

"Let's do this."

Everyone took a step back.

Nelson smiled. He always did. He hit the door with the breaching tool.

A heavy, hollow boom followed by splintering wood seconds later. Wood pulp sprayed against Sterling's cheek. The door swung inward and banged against the interior wall.

Nelson led the charge.

Sterling followed.

The stairwell smelled like old cooking oil, fried rice, and burnt eggs. The lighting was dull. A single bulb on the second-floor landing threw a yellow hue onto cracked tile. Everything looked like it had a film of dust.

Sterling glanced over his shoulder as Nick crossed the threshold. "Two flights, and Restrepo's the first door on the right. Nelson, you're with me. Nick, you've got lookout on middle floor. Doyle you've got the door. I've got lead."

Nelson stepped aside.

Sterling took the first flight in five strides. He kept his rifle up, swept, and tracked. He trusted that Nelson and Doyle had his back.

"Got two charging the door," Doyle said.

Pop! Pop!

Pop! Pop! Pop!

"One down, but I'm hit," Doyle said. "One hiding behind a vehicle."

"Shit," Sterling mumbled. "Someone help Doyle."

Pop!

"I'm good," Doyle said. "Got the second one in the leg. He's retreating. I'll take cover."

"Contact rear," Driscoll said, calm as a man reading a menu.

Bang! Bang!