Chapter Fourteen
Bitterroot Falls
His family was safe and so was Christina. Jackson took comfort in that, even though there was no way to know how long that certainty would last.
Aguilar’s threat was real. That cold-blooded killer posed a clear and present danger that couldn’t be ignored.
On the hour-long drive back to Bitterroot Falls, Jackson had contacted Logan and explained while Winter made the same phone call to Summer.
Time was of the essence since Aguilar was in Bozeman and could be in Bitterroot Falls within hours.
His brother took the news that he and Summer needed to lie low for a few days well. Far better than his parents did.
It had been impossible for Jackson to keep Christina’s name out of the discussion with his parents, since the manhunt for them had made the national news.
Both wanted. Jackson had made it clear the onus for this mess was on the FBI.
On his task force. On him. His mother, who was a pillar of strength, cried on the phone while his father grumbled, but to their credit, neither uttered a negative word about Christina.
Probably fearful Jackson would subject them to another decade of permafrost. No calls. No visits. No connection.
After twelve years, this thing with Christina was coming full circle, but he still had no idea where they would end up.
In the guest bedroom, he glanced out a window that afforded him a sweeping view of the Lady Luck Ranch, which was more of a compound.
Chance had his ranch hands running patrols of the property.
They were all armed, working in teams, with dogs at their sides.
The ranch was on lockdown until it was time to leave for the raid on the depots.
The faucet in the en suite bathroom stopped and the door opened.
Christina came out of the bathroom, her face clean, her curls loose around her shoulders, and sat beside him on the bed.
Chance’s house was massive, with plenty of bedrooms, but the entire team was here, with more people coming.
Lockwood was sending additional personnel to help with the raid and neutralize the threat of Alvaro Aguilar. It was going to be a full house.
“What time do we leave to raid the depots?” she asked.
“Waylon Wright, a former detective who is in charge of the IPS Laramie office, should be here with more personnel within the hour. We’ll brief everyone and head out. Should hit the depots right before sunrise.” His gaze fell to the cut on her lip. Someone had hit her. “Did Aguilar do that to you?”
She shook her head. “Hector Ibarra. But I let him.”
He didn’t hide the alarm or confusion from his face.
“Don’t ask why.” She put a hand on his thigh. “Please.”
He took a deep breath, letting that question go. Running his hand down her arm, he noticed she was wearing a different outfit. Expensive. Better suited for her, fitting her like a glove. “You changed your clothes.”
Shuttering her gaze, she bit her lower lip. “Alvaro made me.”
Pure rage burned in his belly. “Did he—”
“No, he didn’t.” She pulled her hand away from him and rubbed her palms over her thighs. “He’s never…” Pursing her lips, she kept looking down at her lap. “Alvaro is sick and twisted. Cruel. But he wields his power in a different way.”
Jackson clutched her shoulder, wondering what she had endured over the last several hours. That monster, Aguilar, had had her within his grasp. He might not have hit her or forced himself on her, but something had happened. Jackson was sure of it.
“You’re not all right,” he said. “You can tell me what happened. Whatever it is, I’m on your side. Okay.”
She nodded. “I’m fine. Really. Thanks to you and everyone else.
” Scooting closer to him until their legs touched, she gave him a small smile, but concern wrinkled her brow and fatigue clouded her eyes.
“Aguilar didn’t hurt me. He just talked to me.
” She shivered as she pressed her hand to the base of her throat.
“After I saw the chaos in the tent, I imagined the worst.”
“We had a little tussle at the camp. But it was just sport for him. He was having fun. I was in the woods with him when you showed up at the tent with a bowl of stew. I heard you apologize.”
“You were still there?” he asked. “That close?”
“Yeah, I was. I wanted to call out to you, but he would’ve killed you.”
“If only I had been two minutes earlier—”
“Then you’d be dead, and I would still be handcuffed to the rail in his bathroom.” Lowering her head, she clutched her knees. “That would have been more than I could bear, if he’d gotten to you.”
“I’m just glad he didn’t torture you.” He put a hand on her back. “I thought he would’ve put you through the wringer to get information.”
“He was only interested in one thing—video footage I’ve recorded over the years of meetings and parties.
Kehoe gave me a couple of devices hidden in necklaces.
In case I ever met Rio Estrada, or he popped up unannounced.
Everything was stored on a hard drive and backed up in the cloud.
He didn’t have to torture me to get it. His threat to hurt you was enough to get me to cooperate. ”
Jackson took her hand in his. “Aguilar didn’t say anything about the depots?”
“No.” Christina shook her head. “Maybe he’s not aware that I know what they’re being used to store.”
“How do you know about them?”
“I took care of a lot of legal business for the cartel. Like buying guns wholesale directly from weapons manufacturers rather than the piecemeal way they were going about before. Or setting up a charity for them, which was legitimate and stayed that way for a while. But now they’re using the tax-exempt organization to launder money.
There was no way for me to tell Kirk about it without it leading back to me as the leak.
As for the depots, I found the properties.
When I pushed Hector to give me an idea of how they’d be used so I could pick the right ones, he let too much information slip.
Any time I followed up with him about how they were working out, he’d tell me more.
Later I started getting updates from his guys, discreetly.
Then Kehoe was worried about a mole in the task force and started talking about pulling me.
Soon. So, I found out when the depots are usually full.
There’s always stuff flowing in and out, but for some reason, once a quarter, all three have full stockpiles worth millions.
The time is right now, but I don’t know how long before they begin distribution. ”
“But Aguilar was more concerned about the video footage?”
“That was his main focus,” she said in a way that told him it wasn’t Aguilar’s only focus, making Jackson worry again if she was okay.
“Did that have something to do with why he was going to Bozeman?”
“To collect the hard drive from my place. He also erased it from my cloud.”
Jackson swore, wishing they could catch a bigger break. “If that was Aguilar’s priority, then it’s a good bet that Rio Estrada is on that footage somewhere. I wish he didn’t have the hard drive and hadn’t wiped what was stored in your cloud.”
“But I have a backup to the backup. A second cloud. We still have it.”
How he wanted to kiss her. “Good thinking.” Beautiful. Brilliant. Full of boundless bravery.
She was his greatest temptation.
His only love.
Years ago, he’d been na?ve, thinking he could have his cake and eat it, too. Christina’s words had really hit him hard. Now he realized sacrifices had had to be made. For the right reasons. In the right ways. This time, he wanted Christina enough to give her his all.
“Jackson,” she said. “There’s something I haven’t had a chance to tell you. Kirk never looked at most of the footage, since we’re talking about hundreds of hours, and the goal was to capture Rio Estrada on video. Right before my cover was blown, Kirk got permission to use Odin’s Eye.”
“The facial recognition program?” he asked.
“Yeah. Kirk had the idea of running all the footage through Odin’s Eye and thought we might be able to pinpoint Rio that way. Maybe he was there at one of those meetings or parties and I wasn’t aware of it, since only a few people know who he is and what he looks like.”
“To access a high-level program like Odin’s Eye, Kehoe would’ve needed permission from someone above his pay grade. And he would’ve needed a very good reason to justify it. Like having an undercover asset with hundreds of hours of video footage that needed to be screened and filtered.”
“Maybe whoever gave him access, or at least pretended that they would, is the person who blew my cover.”
If the request had been made through official channels, there would be a log of it. Not that he could get into any systems as a wanted fugitive. And knowing Kehoe, the request had probably been made unofficially.
Once the raids were completed, and hopefully successful, he would reach out to the task force and speak to whoever was in charge. Take it one step at a time from there.
“I’m sorry that I gave you such a hard time about being undercover. The compromises you had to make to survive. To do Kehoe’s bidding.” He sighed. “The lies you had to keep track of and the stories you must’ve needed to create on the fly. How did you do it?” He hoped he didn’t sound judgmental.
Jackson only wanted to understand what she’d gone through and sympathize.
“I WINGED IT,” Christina said with a shrug, “made stuff up and pretended a lot.” She got up from the bed and moved to the window. “When you’re undercover for so long like I was, the truth becomes a matter of circumstance. It wasn’t all things, to all people, all the time. Neither was I.”
He rose and strode over to her. “That sounds like a tough way to live.”
“It was a good way not to die, though.”
“It’s kind of hard to trust someone when you don’t know who that someone really is.”
Her chin jerked up and her body locked. “Yeah.” Was the cloud of distrust still hanging over their heads? “Do you not know who I am? Do you still have doubts about me?”