Chapter 1 #2
Maren gasped, the sound bouncing through the vehicle.
Her own face had just stared back at her.
Opal. Her twin was alive.
The woman disappeared inside the clinic.
Adrenaline fueling her actions, Maren popped open the driver’s-side door and hopped out while depressing the button on her key fob that would release the hatch on the canine compartment door. Haven jumped out and stood waiting for a command.
Quickly leashing up her partner again, Maren hustled back toward the building.
Her head buzzed with questions and her heart hammered against her ribs beneath the green Kevlar vest, which she always wore when working, hidden by her blouse and blazer.
The June heat made her sweat, yet cold seeped into her bones.
A shiver of dread raced along her limbs.
This can’t be happening.
Yet…as twins, Maren and Opal had often shared a strange sensory connection.
A connection that had Maren questioning from the beginning if her sister was truly dead.
After having searched the riverbank for miles, trying to find any sign of Opal but coming up empty, she was sure she’d have physically felt the loss of her twin.
As she approached the clinic door with Haven at her side, an uneasy feeling shifted through her, causing the hairs at her nape to lift with alarm. As she reached for the door handle, Haven spun, faced the street and let out a series of frantic barks.
Having worked with Haven for over two years, Maren knew the tone of her partner’s bark.
Haven was alerting to danger.
But from where? And who?
Before Maren could formulate an action plan, gunfire rang out. Bullets pelted the building around her, coming within inches of slamming into her or Haven. The clinic doors exploded in a shower of glass. Terrified screams echoed from within.
Acting quickly, Maren crouched and reined in Haven’s leash. She hustled them both toward the nearest parked car to use as cover as more bullets peppered the front of the clinic and sidewalk.
Using the wheel well of a luxury vehicle parked at the curb in front of the building, and keeping Haven out of the line of fire, Maren reached for her cell phone.
She called for backup and asked the dispatcher to alert her task force boss, FBI Special Agent Emmett Dane, that she was in trouble at the Barren Valley Clinic location. She was trapped and under fire.
Drawing her weapon, she debated returning fire. She wasn’t sure where the shots were coming from.
Why was someone shooting? Was she the target? Did this have to do with the illegal baby adoption ring? Or was she just in the wrong place and the wrong time? Could the onslaught of firepower be aimed at the clinic itself?
Aggravation chomped through her veins. She hadn’t been able to catch the woman who looked like her twin, maybe even was her twin, before she’d entered the clinic. Could she have actually been her sister? Was she the shooter’s target?
Or was her mind so fatigued that she’d imagined the resemblance?
Crouched behind the car for cover, she prayed backup arrived soon and braced herself for the shooter to strike again.
* * *
DEA Agent Colt Dawson and his K-9 partner, a German shorthaired pointer named Rusk, raced toward the woman, who was an exact replica of the suspect he’d been trailing.
She and her dog were hunkered down behind a parked sedan.
The woman had an arm around the Doberman, but he could also see she’d drawn a weapon.
Who was she? Some sort of law enforcement, obviously, if the vest on her K-9 was real. But which agency and why was she here? The woman he was trailing, Opal Anderson, definitely wasn’t law enforcement.
But he’d learned the hard way that people could be deceptive and sometimes the truth was difficult to discern. He’d made the mistake of trusting the wrong woman once before, but never again.
Confusion warred within his brain now as he assessed the situation. He’d been following the associate of the drug kingpin known as Shadow, hoping she’d lead him to the man responsible for so many illegal drug overdoses in the state of Colorado.
He had a personal interest in stopping the flow. After his own cousin OD’d, he’d spent most of his professional life in law enforcement on a quest to bring an end to the poison.
A tip from one of the DEA’s informants had alleged that the supposedly dead Opal Anderson was actually alive and hiding out in Barren Valley, Colorado, and would be able to give a location for Shadow. Could she identify the criminal?
Colt was counting on it.
Needing to follow the lead, Colt had hightailed it from Colorado Springs, where he’d been pounding the pavement trying to shake loose information on Shadow, to the flea-bitten motel on the edge of Barren Valley’s main drag.
For two days, he’d staked out the motel, waiting for some sign of the woman. He’d just about given up, thinking the break he’d been hoping for was turning into a dead end, when this morning, Opal Anderson had emerged from one of the rooms and caught the bus into town.
Colt had trailed her, and when the woman had disembarked at the stop near the clinic and approached the building, he’d parked and planned to follow her inside. He’d intended to corner her with the hope of flipping her to help them find Shadow.
He’d been momentarily distracted when he’d seen the other woman climb out of a brown-and-black Bronco.
The woman looked eerily like Opal Anderson. Only where Opal was gaunt, with hollowed-out cheeks and stringy hair, this officer looked healthy and agile as she and her K-9 partner had hurried after Opal.
But then, the world had turned to chaos seconds after Opal entered the clinic. The unknown woman was being shot at.
Keeping Rusk at his heels, Colt aimed his own firearm to where the shots had originated. A brick, four-story building across the street from the clinic.
He needed to find out what was happening.
* * *
The sound of footsteps running toward Maren had her tensing. Still crouched, she pivoted on the balls of her feet with her sidearm gripped now in both hands. Was the shooter coming for her?
Her gaze snagged on the identifying windbreaker.
A mix of relief and irritation swept through her as a chestnut-haired man with a close-cropped beard and mustache raced to her side with a gun at the ready.
Close at his heels was a brown-and-white German shorthaired pointer.
Haven’s ears twitched, the only sign she was aware of the other dog.
If not for the emblem of the drug enforcement agency on the breast pocket of his jacket, Maren would have defended herself. Why was the DEA here?
She had no great love for the federal agency that hadn’t been able to stop the influx of drugs coming into the state. If the DEA had done a better job, maybe Opal wouldn’t have been able to so easily get a hold of the various drugs that she used to numb herself.
Maren had half a mind to break cover and run to the clinic, but she knew her boss would want her to wait for backup.
Plus, with Haven in the line of fire, she couldn’t risk her dog’s safety.
Haven was her constant companion, the one who helped her get through the dark days of overwhelming grief after receiving the news of her twin sister’s death.
But now, did she dare hope? No. It would hurt too much if she were wrong. And it would hurt if she was right, because that would mean her sister had faked her death and deliberately allowed Maren to suffer.
Meeting the green eyes of the DEA agent grounded Maren’s thoughts to the moment.
“Who are you? Why are you here?” she demanded to know of the agent crouched beside her, who popped up to returned fire toward the building across the street. “Did dispatch send you?”
“I could ask you the same thing,” he said in a terse voice as he ducked back down to avoid another volley of bullets raging from the brick building. “What branch of law enforcement are you?”
Tucking her chin, Maren exclaimed, “How do you know—”
He arched an eyebrow, his gaze going to Haven and her police vest.
Grunting, she said, “Colorado Springs PD. On loan to the Colorado K-9 Unit task force and deputized as a federal agent.” She added that last bit to make it clear they were equals as the drug enforcement agency also fell under federal jurisdiction. “You are…?”
“Agent Colt Dawson,” he said and tapped his chest where the letters proclaimed which agency he was with.
“You didn’t answer my question.” She frowned. “Why are you here?”
“Neither did you,” he said. “Are you in league with Opal Anderson?”
Maren’s lungs squeezed tight at the mention of her sister’s name. Then outrage infused her brain. “In league with? What are you talking about?”
“If you’re helping her,” Colt said between gritted teeth, “I will make sure you go down.”
Maren curled her lip at the man. “I’m here on an assignment. Why are you looking for Opal?”
“Why are you?”
“I’m not,” Maren ground out. The agent had to be mistaken.
That wasn’t Opal. It couldn’t be. It was some weird coincidence that the woman looked like her twin.
After all, she’d only caught a quick glimpse of the woman before the clinic was shot up.
And her grief over her sister had her seeing Opal everywhere.
“I don’t know who that woman was who walked into the clinic. But I’m going to find out.”
She moved to stand, but a firm hand on her shoulder kept her in place.
“First, we have to find out who’s using the clinic as a shooting gallery,” he said. “And if you’re the intended target.”
Her stomach twisted. Why would someone want her dead? She had to find out if the woman was her sister or not. And was she in danger, too? Why was the DEA after her?
Another barrage of gunfire pinged off the car and had Maren ducking, while Colt popped up to shoot back at the brick building across the street. The shrill sound of sirens punctuated the air, announcing the arrival of backup.