Chapter 12
THOMAS
TEN YEARS AGO
Thomas watched Nadia through James and Aimee’s kitchen window from the truck he’d rented.
Was he worried she’d tell Aimee about James?
No, he was terrified. Nadia didn’t realize the power she held over him now.
He would give her anything she asked for—do anything she asked—as long as she kept her word. James’s existence stayed between them.
So far, he didn’t think she’d said anything, otherwise he’d have heard from Aimee. Though it had only been forty-eight hours since Nadia showed up at the funeral home. There was always tomorrow. Or next week. Still plenty of time for her to confide the truth, and not just to Aimee. To anyone.
He hated that she knew. He couldn’t stand how much trust he’d been forced to place in her. Most of all, he regretted she had to share yet another burden of his. This truth would destroy him. It was a matter of when. He couldn’t let it destroy her too.
Thomas tapped the door ledge where his arm rested and glanced at the time.
Kristen had left a couple of hours ago. Nadia was cleaning James’s kitchen.
She’d been there with Aimee likely since yesterday after James’s burial.
It was after 11:00 p.m., and he hadn’t seen Aimee in over twenty minutes.
He thought she’d gone to bed. He was hoping she was in bed.
He was counting on her being asleep while he did what needed to be done.
Nadia glanced out the window, and not for the first time. She knew he was there, parked just outside the edge of the streetlamp’s glow. She dried her hands with a dish towel and dropped the blinds right after she flipped him off through the window.
Two minutes later he picked up his phone to text her to come outside when the front door opened.
He sat up in his seat, his bone-weary back complaining, his left leg having gone numb.
He’d been sitting there for hours. Nadia cut across the yard and the street to where he waited in the dark.
She rounded the truck to the passenger side and leaned into the open window.
“What are you doing here?”
“Get in,” he said. He didn’t want Aimee to look out the window and see her.
“Our deal doesn’t include you spying on me,” she said, heated. “Or ordering me around.”
“Get in the fucking car, Nadia.”
She glared at him and yanked open the door, settling in the front seat. Thankfully, she didn’t slam it closed.
“Thank you,” he said when she angled her body toward him.
“What do you want?”
“You’re angry.”
“Angry?” She huffed a guttural laugh. “I’m furious. Do you know how hard it is to not tell her this is all a lie?” He knew firsthand exactly how hard it was, but she didn’t wait for his answer. She thumped her chest above her heart. “It’s killing me.”
“If it helps, I’m sorry. I’ve never regretted anything more than having to get you involved.” He’d only asked anything of her twice in his life. Both were huge asks.
“Then uninvolve me,” she spat. “You want to help? Tell her the truth. Tell everyone.”
Thomas met her cold, hard eyes. “You know I can’t.”
She held his gaze then sank back into the seat. “That’s what I hate most. That you’re right.” She crossed her arms and glared out the windshield. “I hate it. I hate you. I hate that I saw and heard what I did. I wish I didn’t know.”
He stared into the darkness beyond his windshield and loosened a long sigh.
“James told me he had proof Phil was laundering and I ordered him to back off. What I should have done was tell him I was working with the DEA, and that I was under strict orders to let Phil do his thing. Phil’s cell and office phones are tapped because their sources said he has a direct connection to the Hidalgos’ second-in-command.
That’s the guy the DEA wants, not Phil. Capturing him leads them to their leader Ruiz, then they’re one step closer to dismantling one of the most brutal cartels in existence.
Leave it to James to piece it all together.
“I shouldn’t have been surprised.” Thomas looked at her.
“He’s brilliant. Phil’s the rotting idiot.
He’s doing it all. Over-invoicing, phantom shipments, smuggling cash over the border inside our furniture.
James was our CFO. I was stupid to think Phil’s transactions would fly under his radar.
Phil is trying to take Donato down and us along with him, and James thought I shrugged it off.
He went after Phil himself.” Thomas pinched the inside corners of his eyes and sighed into his cupped palm, regretting for the millionth time he’d listened to Kane and hadn’t brought James up to speed.
“There’s an agent I report to at the DEA.
I called him as soon as I heard James went to Mexico.
I knew he was going after Phil, and that he was walking straight into a hornet’s nest. My handler called me two days later to say they’d located him.
A woman had found James wandering the beach and took him to the hospital.
The cartel had dumped him in the ocean, expecting him to drown.
His body was a mess, still is. And he has no memory. ”
“Jesus. Where is he?” Nadia interrupted.
“I can’t tell you. Not because I don’t want to.” His eyes met hers. “I can’t.”
Her mouth pursed and she shook her head. “No, you have to give me something. If I’m in this with you—”
“He’s in witness protection, Nadia. I legally can’t tell anyone anything. You already know more than you should. Word gets back to the DEA or FBI and they have every right to arrest us both.”
Her eyes widened. There was a catch in her breath. Thomas hated her reaction, but he was glad she was scared. He needed her to be afraid. It would keep her alive, and she’d keep their secret.
“Why are you telling me then? Obviously, other than because I asked.”
“Beats me. I’m barely holding my shit together.” He smacked the steering wheel with both hands. Nadia flinched. He ground his teeth. He couldn’t shut up around her. She was the only person who made him feel safe enough to be reckless with the truth.
He looked at her and she stared right back. She reached for the door handle. “I have to get back.”
“Is Aimee asleep?”
“Yes, why?”
“How asleep?”
“Asleep, asleep. I gave her a Lunesta. Knocked her out. Why do you care, and what does that have to do with you sitting out here like a creeper?”
“I need your help.” She was already shaking her head before he finished asking. “James’s paintings still in the garage?” He knew they were boxed and ready to be transported to the art gallery he’d wanted to open.
“Yes,” she answered, wary.
“I need them.”
“Then ask Aimee.” She opened her door.
“She’ll ask me why I want them. Would you wait a sec? Nadia, stop.” But she was already out of the truck.
She shut the door and leaned into the window. “You don’t think she’d notice they were gone?”
“Of course she’ll notice. But I can’t have their disappearance traced back to me.”
“She’ll think they were stolen. She’ll file a police report. You leave any prints and the police will trace them back to you. And you’ll lead them right to James.”
“Which is why I need you to open the garage door. I’m not touching anything but the boxes I’m taking.”
Nadia’s hands closed abruptly on the door ledge and she gave him a thinly veiled smile. “Haven’t you hurt Aimee enough? I won’t let you take his art.”
“I wouldn’t if I didn’t have a very good reason to.”
“No, you can’t ask that of me.” Her body went rigid.
He lunged across the seat and snatched her wrist before she left. “You will because you owe me.”
Her pupils dilated, making her eyes appear darker and more intense. She knew exactly what he meant and Thomas kicked himself for playing that card. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t. But times were desperate.
Nadia snatched her wrist back. “Good. Night.”
Long strides took her across the street and into James’s house.
He stomped the footwell. “Fuck me.” Those paintings needed to be shipped to Puerto Escondido for there to be any chance of James believing he had history in that town.
For him to believe he was Carlos. That he was a painter.
Thomas didn’t want to break into his house, but if it was his only option to retrieve the art, he would.
A metallic, cranking noise broke through his thoughts.
Across the road, James’s garage door slowly lifted on its tracks.
Thomas was standing just outside the garage by the time it fully opened.
Nadia stood on the small step of the door leading into the house, arms crossed.
Their gazes met over Aimee’s VW New Beetle.
Her face hardened when she noticed the relief and gratitude on his.
“I’m not touching anything. This is on you. She wakes and I’m calling you out. I will not take the blame for this.”
His jaw tightened. “Noted.”
She watched from her side of the garage as he hefted a box and carried it to the truck bed. He returned for a second box, then a third. When he came back for the fourth box, she stood by the stacks waiting for him. Arms crossed, expression guarded.
“It’s true then. You convinced your dad to hire my mom.”
He drew back a fraction. That had been so long ago. But the question had been waiting to be asked. He’d brought up their past. You owe me.
He was a certifiable bastard for manipulating her that way.
“Well?”
His tongue clicked, mouth slightly parting. He rolled his lips over his teeth and nodded.
“I didn’t ask you to.”
“I know you didn’t.”
“Why, Tom?” Her face softened with something he couldn’t quite discern, and frankly, was too hesitant to hope for.
Because I love you.
The confession sat on the tip of his tongue like a squatter in a trailer park.
“Why wouldn’t I? You were going to lose your house.”
She shifted her weight, looking uncomfortable. He decided to let her off the hook and lifted another box, taking it to the truck. When he picked up the last one, Nadia followed him to the truck. He set down the box in the bed and quietly closed the tailgate.
He turned to her. “Why did you open the garage?”
“For James.” She scratched her nape, ruffling her long hair. “If there’s the off-chance he makes it home to Aimee—”
She stopped when he started shaking his head. “I don’t think he can come back. You need to move on. We all do.”
She glanced away, lips twitching as if she was holding in her emotions. When she turned back, her gaze roamed over him.
“When was the last time you ate?”
He blinked at her unexpected concern. “I don’t think about food these days.”
“Wait here.”
“I have to go.” He already had his key fob out.
She held up her hand. “Wait. Two minutes.” She ran into the house, and in less time than she’d asked for, she was back outside, softly closing the front door behind her. She jogged across the street. “Here. We had lasagna tonight. There was a lot left over.”
With a tightness in his chest, Thomas took the disposable container.
Inside was a large, thick square slice of lasagna.
His mouth watered at what he dreamed it would smell like when he heated it up at home.
Their role reversal wasn’t lost on him. How many nights his high school senior year had he bought her dinner at Joe’s because he knew she hadn’t eaten, because she’d had no food at home.
His dinner would have to wait, though. He had to get these boxes and himself on a plane.
He touched her cheek. She surprisingly didn’t flinch. “Thank you.”
To his amazement, she closed her eyes and leaned into his touch.
“You’re shattering me,” she whispered.
“No, I’ll break for both of us.” His thumb caressed her cheek.
He was toeing their line of friendship and dropped his hand before he was tempted to cross over into uncharted territory.
She’d only ever thought of him as an older brother.
He wasn’t short of blackmailing her to get her cooperation with James.
And he was already manipulating both of their emotions.
But as much as he wanted to kiss her, he’d never physically take advantage of her.
She was too important to him. Everyone he loved was.
“I’ll be traveling for a while. Text if you need me.”
Gaze on the ground, she nodded and turned back for the house. He opened the door and stepped up on the foot rail.
“I forgot.” Nadia snapped her fingers and turned back to him. “Remember that woman I told you about, Lacy-something-or-other, who tracked Aimee down in the parking lot after the funeral?”
He froze, half inside the truck, half out. That name. Lacy. It just now registered where he’d heard it before, and it wasn’t from Nadia.
“What about her?” His question carried an unintended sharpness.
“I’m about to tell you, so back off.” Her words gained volume as her palms pushed against the air.
“Keep it down.” He motioned, tossing the lasagna into the truck as he stepped off the foot rail and closed the short distance between them, forcing her to look up at him. “Tell me EXACTLY what this woman said to Aimee.”
“I told you. I don’t know. I wasn’t there. She’d left by the time Kristen and I caught up to her. But whatever that woman had said really upset her because she puked in the parking lot. She was crying.”
“Any idea where she came from, what she wanted?” He was getting a very bad feeling about this. Yet something else he’d have to look into. One more loose end to tie up.
Nadia shook her head. “She gave Aimee the card I showed you. Anyways, I had it but I lost it. I couldn’t find it in my purse where I’d left it. I wanted you to know that I was going to look her up, see if I could find anything about her.” Her eyes searched his. “I take it this is bad?”
“Very.” Because he was remembering who exactly this woman was. Whose friend she was. Imelda Rodriguez. The one woman who could yank the curtain from his charade and ruin him.
He got in the truck and started the engine. Shut the door.
“How long will you be out of the country?” Nadia asked through the window.
He shook his head, unclear. But it would be however long it took to ensure James stayed where he was and didn’t get himself killed should someone connected to the Hidalgos realize they’d botched his murder. Even if he had to risk putting himself in the line of fire to make sure it happened.