15. Her Shadow
Her Shadow
Chris knew the meeting was going badly when nobody made a joke.Not Logan.Not Ruiz.
Not even Parker.The operations room was silent when Chris Walker walked in at seven fifteen that morning.He had left the Vargas estate forty minutes earlier.Left Camila asleep in his bed.Again.She’d slipped into the guesthouse sometime after midnight wearing sleep shorts, one of his T-shirts she’d apparently decided belonged to her now, and a smile that told him she had absolutely no intention of returning to her own room.Chris had barely slept.Again.Yet somehow, standing in the FBI field office felt more exhausting.Director Mercer stood at the head of the conference table.Sloan sat to his right.Logan sat across from her.Photographs covered the screens behind them.Mateo.Diego.Warehouses.Vehicles.
Known associates.The damaged SUV from the attack.Chris took one look around.“Why does this feel like an intervention?”Nobody smiled.Chris pulled out a chair.“Fantastic.”
Mercer didn’t sit.“We need to discuss extraction.”Chris stopped.“What extraction?”
“Yours.”
“No.”
“Walker—”
“No.”Mercer’s expression hardened.“That wasn’t a question.”Chris leaned back.“Then you brought me here for nothing.”Sloan closed her eyes briefly.Logan looked down at the table.Mercer planted both hands on the back of a chair.“Your position is becoming unstable.”
“My position has never been stronger.”
“You were attacked.”
“So was Camila.”
“Exactly.”Chris’s jaw tightened.Mercer continued.“We still don’t know who ordered it.”
“We’re working on it.”
“You are not working on that. Your assignment is Mateo Vargas.”
“I know my assignment.”
“Do you?”Chris looked at him.The room changed.“Careful.”Mercer stared right back.“That’s exactly the problem.”
“What is?”
“You’ve become emotionally compromised.”Chris laughed once.“No.”Sloan finally spoke.
“Chris.”He looked at her.Not helping.Her expression said she wasn’t going to.Mercer continued.
“You’ve been inside longer than anticipated.
Mateo has moved you closer to his family.
There was an uncontrolled attack. You were injured.
Your cover behavior is becoming increasingly difficult to separate from your actual behavior. ”
“My cover is intact.”
“We don’t know that.”
“Mateo promoted me.”
“That doesn’t mean he trusts you.”
“He trusts Roman more today than he did a week ago.”
“And his sister?”Silence.Chris’s eyes hardened.“Camila isn’t part of the investigation.”
Sloan watched him carefully.Mercer noticed immediately.“Interesting.”
“What?”
“You answered that very quickly.”
“Because it’s true.”
“She’s Mateo Vargas’s sister.”
“She has nothing to do with what he does.”
“You can’t know that.”
“I do.”Mercer’s voice sharpened.“No, Walker. You believe it.”Chris pushed back from the table.“I’ve been with her every fucking day.”
“That is exactly my concern.”
“She isn’t involved.”
“You don’t know—”
“I know.”Chris stood.“Camila doesn’t know what Mateo is moving. She doesn’t know who his suppliers are. She doesn’t know his distribution routes. She doesn’t know where the money goes. Half the time she doesn’t even know why Mateo leaves the house.”
Mercer stared at him.Chris continued.“She works with charities. She goes to lunches. Fundraisers. Shops. Visits friends. She argues with her brother about everything. She doesn’t sit in his meetings. She isn’t at the warehouses. She isn’t making calls. She isn’t moving money.”
“Chris,” Sloan warned.
“No.”He pointed toward Mateo’s photograph.
“He is guilty.”His voice lowered.“I know he is.”Nobody interrupted.
“I’ve watched him. I’ve listened to him.
I’ve been inside his businesses. I’ve seen the way Diego handles shipments.
I’ve seen the coded meetings. I’ve heard enough conversations to know we’re standing on top of something huge.
”Mercer folded his arms.“Knowing isn’t evidence. ”
“I know.”
“Suspicion isn’t evidence.”
“I fucking know.”
“Then why are we having this conversation?”
“Because you’re talking about pulling me when I’m finally getting close!
”Chris struck the table with his palm.The sound echoed through the room.
“Pull Roman now and Mateo doesn’t shrug and hire another driver.
He asks why.”Mercer said nothing.“He starts looking.”Chris pointed toward the evidence board.
“He looks at the garage. He looks at the chase. He looks at the background we built. He starts tearing Roman apart.”Sloan’s expression changed slightly.Chris saw it.
“Exactly.”He looked around the room.“Pulling me out is more dangerous than leaving me in.”
“For you?” Mercer asked.
“For everyone.”Chris lowered his voice.“Let me do this.”Mercer studied him.“I can catch him.”
“Walker—”
“I can.”Chris looked at Mateo’s photograph.
“I know he’s guilty.”His jaw flexed.“I know he is.”Then his eyes shifted to the photograph beside Mateo.Camila.Someone had put it back on the board.Chris stared at it.
“Camila has nothing to do with it.”Silence.Sloan watched him.Then asked the question nobody else apparently wanted to. “Are you attached to her?”
Chris’s eyes moved toward Sloan.Nobody breathed.“What?”
“You heard me.”Chris stared at her.Sloan didn’t look away.“Are you attached to Camila?”
“No.”The lie came automatically.Sloan’s expression didn’t change.Chris looked away.Bad move.He knew it immediately.Sloan leaned back.“That’s what I thought.”Chris’s jaw tightened.“Don’t.”
“Chris—”
“Don’t.”
“You’re sleeping with her.”Logan’s eyes closed.Mercer looked toward Chris.
Chris went still.“That has nothing to do with whether she is involved.”
“It has everything to do with whether you’re objective.”
“I am objective.”
“You’re defending her.”
“Because she’s innocent!”
“You’re in love with her.”Silence.Complete.Brutal.Chris stared at Sloan.
Something hot and immediate ripped through him.“Fuck.”He turned away.“Chris.”
“Shit.”He dragged both hands through his short blond hair.“Fuck.”There it was.
Out loud.The thing he’d refused to name.Not attraction.Not sex.Not adrenaline.
Not some stupid forbidden affair that would end when the operation did.
Something worse.Something real.Chris turned toward Sloan.Anger flashed across his face.Not because she was wrong.Because she wasn’t.“Fuck you.”Sloan didn’t react.
“That’s not going to make me wrong.”Chris grabbed his jacket.“Walker,” Mercer snapped.
Chris headed for the door.“Where are you going?”
“To do my fucking job.”
“Chris.”He stopped.Mercer’s voice was quieter now.“If I leave you in, and I mean if, you understand what happens if this compromises the case.”Chris stared at the door.“Yes.”
“You understand what happens if Vargas discovers who you are.”
“Yes.”
“And you understand what happens to Camila when she discovers it.”That one hurt.
Chris looked back.Mercer saw the answer on his face.“That’s what concerns me.”
Chris opened the door.“Then let me finish this before any of us have to find out.”
He walked out.
By ten thirty, Chris Roman was back behind the wheel.And Camila Vargas was stealing his sunglasses.Again.“Give them back.”
“No.”
“Camila.”
“They look better on me.”
“They’re mine.”
“Possession is nine-tenths of the law.”Chris glanced over.“You’re quoting laws to a criminal?”She smiled behind his sunglasses.“Apparently.”
“You look ridiculous.”
“I look incredible.”
“You look like an insect.”Camila gasped.“Take that back.”
“No.”She slapped his arm.Chris laughed.A real laugh.Not Roman’s carefully manufactured charm.His.And that was the problem.He’d spent the entire drive back from the FBI office telling himself Sloan was wrong.Then Camila had climbed into the front seat carrying his coffee and immediately stolen his sunglasses.And he’d smiled before she’d even said hello.Chris Roman was supposed to be driving Mateo Vargas’s sister.Instead, Chris Walker was looking forward to seeing her.Every damn day.The back seat had become obsolete.Camila refused to use it. “I’m not being chauffeured.”
“You literally are.”
“I’m sitting up front.”
“Then you’re a front-seat chauffeured person.”
“That’s not a thing.”
“It is now.”She sat beside him everywhere.Her coffee in one cup holder.His in the other.
Her phone connected to the stereo despite his repeated objections.“Absolutely not.”
Camila ignored him.The song changed.Chris stared at the dashboard.“What is this?”
“Music.”
“This isn’t music.”
“You have terrible taste.”
“I have excellent taste.”
“You listen to the same six songs.”
“They’re good songs.”
“They’re depressing.”
“They’re classics.”
“They make me want to drive into traffic.”Chris glanced over.“Considering the last week, don’t joke about that.”Camila’s expression softened.“Sorry.”He immediately regretted saying it.“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Get serious.”
“You’re the one who got serious.”
“Terrible mistake.”She smiled.Then reached across and took his sunglasses off his face.
Again.“Camila.”
“What?”
“I need those.”
“The sun is behind us.”
“That’s irrelevant.”
“They look better on me.”
“We’ve discussed this.”
“And I was right then too.”Chris shook his head.She smiled.And he realized he knew that smile now.There were different ones.The polite smile she gave donors.The sarcastic smile she gave Mateo.The dangerous little smile she gave Chris right before doing something she knew would drive him insane.The quiet one she gave him when they were alone.