Make Them Pay Page 3

  Eighteen hours of traveling and she couldn’t send Sean a message that she was on her way? Lucy wasn’t buying it, not completely.

  That’s when Lucy saw it, the tension under Eden’s perfect makeup. She was a stunning woman—beautiful, really. But there were fine lines around her eyes, which were a little too bright. Either fatigue or fear or both. Lucy had a little sympathy for her, considering the transatlantic flight. Two years ago she wouldn’t have thought twice about inviting her to stay. But now she hesitated.

  “Where is Sean?” Eden asked. “He’s never been one for sleeping in.”

  “He had to leave early. A case he’s working on.”

  And just like that, the tension eased. It was subtle, and if Lucy weren’t so focused on Eden she would have missed it. Was Eden relieved Sean wasn’t here? Had she thought there would be a confrontation?

  “Well, I’ll be around for a while. I’ll catch him when he gets back,” Eden said. “Would you mind if I stayed here with you this morning? I need to find a hotel for the next two weeks. And truly, I really want to get to know you. I hate that Sean and I have been out of touch, but weddings are new beginnings.”

  “Stay with us,” Lucy said. It just came out, and it was probably a bad idea. “At least for a day or two. My sister and her family won’t be here until Sunday, we have plenty of room.”

  Lucy hoped Sean wouldn’t be upset at her spontaneous invitation. But Eden was his sister. He hadn’t seen her in years, and when he was nostalgic he talked about the time when he was young, before Liam and Eden went to Europe, where they’d lived since college. When Sean sent them wedding invitations he’d said they wouldn’t come, but he wanted to reach out anyway … maybe this was Eden’s way of trying to fix their relationship.

  Yet, spontaneously flying halfway across the world and dropping by unannounced? Something was up.

  Lucy wanted to talk to Sean about this, but he’d turned off his phone. He wouldn’t turn it back on until after he left Jesse. Maybe not until he arrived back in San Antonio. She’d send him a message that he’d get as soon as he turned on his phone so he wouldn’t be blindsided when he got home.

  “Are you sure?” Eden asked. “Call Sean, please, make sure it’s okay with him. It has been a long time. But he sent the invite, and I thought…” Her voice trailed off and she looked nervous.

  “He’s traveling, I won’t be able to reach him until tonight. Let me show you around.” Lucy gave Eden a quick tour of the downstairs—the living room, dining room, kitchen, family room. She skipped the other rooms—like Sean’s office—and led Eden down the hall to the guest rooms. There were two on the main floor, each with its own bathroom. Next week, Carina and her family would have one and Lucy’s brother Dillon and his wife would have the other. Upstairs was another guest suite, and Sean had partially finished the large space above the garage. It wasn’t fancy but had a working bathroom. Lucy wished she could put Eden there because then she could secure the house—the garage apartment was on its own security system with its own entrance. The pool house was Kane’s when he visited—he liked being separate from the house with his own space—and he’d been coming and going a lot over the last month. It was one of the reasons Sean started renovating the garage apartment—he wanted to offer Kane a permanent place. But for the wedding they needed it for family.

  Just two days ago, Sean had treated her to breakfast in bed and announced, “This is the lull before the storm. We’ll be overrun with Kincaids and Rogans in a week. Enjoy the peace.”

  Lucy had the distinct impression that Eden was the beginning of a hurricane.

  “This place is amazing,” Eden said. “I love it. Thank you so much, Lucy. I won’t be a bother. I’ll be out of your hair tomorrow.”

  Lucy showed Eden the security panel. Eden frowned. “Is something wrong?”

  “Wrong?” Lucy asked.

  “Sean has always loved his toys, but this system is … rather advanced. Overkill.”

  “We’ve both worked cases that have made us cautious,” Lucy said carefully. “I work for the FBI.”

  “Oh, I know,” Eden said with an almost dismissive wave of her hand. “Surprised, though, since Sean has never particularly liked authority. I suppose true love knows no bounds.”

  Though Eden’s tone bordered on snide, Lucy decided to leave the comment alone. She didn’t know Eden, and she didn’t know much about her relationship with the Rogan family, other than there’d been a falling-out and Liam and Eden had left RCK when it was still Rogan-Caruso Protective Services. “Is Liam also coming to the wedding?”

  “I doubt it,” she said. “I really tried, but … well, some things can’t be fixed.”

  Why did Lucy think Eden was lying? Why would she? Eden probably spoke the truth, but there was more to the story. Still, this visit was odd, especially with Sean out of town. She couldn’t possibly have known—Sean didn’t even know he was leaving until last night. Eden would have already been on a flight by the time Sean got the approval from the marshals to visit Jesse.

  Lucy was now really late to work. She said, “I have to go. I’ll try to get off early and take you to dinner. I’m not a very good cook.”

  “I would really love getting to know you better.” Eden smiled and hugged her lightly. “Thank you for letting me stay. I promise, I’ll be gone by tomorrow. There are several nice hotels in the area, and a resort I’ve heard fabulous things about. I’ll find something.”

  “You don’t have to leave so soon. Wait until Sean gets home so you two can catch up.”

  “We’ll play it by ear.”

  Lucy grabbed the rest of her things and hesitated in the kitchen. Maybe she should take the day off. Except … she had no time to take. She’d already taken so much time off this year that she didn’t even have vacation for her honeymoon. She’d told Sean they’d have to postpone, but then her fellow agents on the Violent Crimes Squad had each given up one of their vacation days to her as a wedding present so she could have a honeymoon. She’d almost cried when they’d taken her out to lunch and told her. She hadn’t made the best first impression on her team. She got along with some of them, and others were wary. She didn’t blame them. Trouble followed her and, unfortunately, touched everyone else. But all of them had given her time.

  Eden stepped into the kitchen and said, “I’m just going to take a shower and sleep. I really am exhausted.”

  “Give me your phone number and I’ll call you later, see if you need anything.” Lucy wrote down her cell phone number on a notepad.

  “Great.” Eden rattled off her number for Lucy. “It’s a US number. I have both—comes in handy when traveling.”

  Odd, considering how she said she hadn’t been in the States in years.

  Lucy left after showing Eden once again how to set and reset the alarm and reminding her to keep it engaged even when she was inside.

  From her car, Lucy sent Sean an email asking him to call her when he had an opportunity. She didn’t want him to worry, so added:

  Nothing serious, just have some information for you.

  Then she called FBI headquarters to tell them she was running late. As she drove, she was still apprehensive, so she called Sean’s oldest brother, Kane. He didn’t answer, which was par for the course. She left him a message to call her: “It’s not urgent, just call when you get a chance.”

  Put it out of your head.

  She had a full day ahead of her, and worrying about Sean’s sister wasn’t going to help.

  But she really hoped Kane called her back soon.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Lucy walked into FBI headquarters even later than she’d thought she would. She stepped into the main conference room for the staff briefing they had every Monday morning and leaned against the back wall because there were no more chairs. Temporary Supervisory Special Agent of Violent Crimes Noah Armstrong glanced over at her and frowned, then went back to listening to the SSA of Cyberterrorism give his report.

  Ryan Quiroz
was also standing and he maneuvered over to her. “I got the evil eye, too, for being five minutes late. I had the boys this weekend,” he whispered. “Drove them to school in Austin this morning, traffic sucked coming back.”

  Twenty minutes later Noah stood to give the report for Lucy’s squad. Violent Crimes and Major Offenders was the smallest unit in most FBI regional offices. After 9/11, the FBI had changed priorities, allocating more staff and resources to counterterrorism, cyberterrorism, and white-collar crime. VCMO had been cut drastically, in some offices by more than 75 percent.

  Lucy was already familiar with the cases that the team was working on. Noah went through them quickly, including her own case tracking babies who’d been sold on the black market. Last month she, Noah, and Nate Dunning, another agent on her squad, had uncovered a black-market baby ring. They had the best white-collar crimes agent helping crack the financial records of the organization, but it was slow going. Of seventy-two confirmed babies sold, they’d identified fewer than half. Some people were pleased with the results. Lucy was not one of those people. Forty-one babies and toddlers were still unaccounted for.

  Noah ended with a surprise announcement. “You may not have had a chance to read your email this morning. ASAC Durant and I are conducting interviews this afternoon and tomorrow for anyone who would like a lateral move over to the VCMO Squad. We have two positions to fill, and because we already have two rookies on our squad, we aren’t eligible for a new agent from the current graduating class at Quantico. We’ve put the notice out to other field offices for agents who have already completed their two rookie years to apply, but we want to look in-house first because you all know the area, the people, our staff. Violent Crimes is a demanding but rewarding squad to work for.”

  Two positions? Lucy knew that Barry wasn’t returning after what happened to him in June. He’d nearly died and was still going through intense physical therapy, but who else was leaving?

  Someone from the cyberterrorism squad asked, “When is SSA Casilla returning? Isn’t his paternity leave up?”

  “I don’t have information on that,” Noah said.

  From her seat at the head of the table, Abigail Durant said, “I spoke with Juan last week. He asked for two more weeks and paperwork for a sabbatical. As you know, his wife is still ill, and Juan wants to make sure she’s one hundred percent before he returns. As SSA Armstrong indicated, the VCMO Squad has demanding cases, and because of our mandated structure we find ourselves frequently short-staffed. Noah and I are looking for agents who have advanced training in criminal psychology and forensics and the passion to work on the squad. If we pick someone in office, they’ll be sent for an intensive two-week VCMO program at Quantico to help bring them up to speed. That starts in November.”

  There were a few rumblings, and then Lucy noticed that Elizabeth Cook, an older agent on her squad, wasn’t in the room.

  Lucy glanced at Ryan, but he shrugged, not knowing what was going on any more than she did. “Armstrong is your buddy, I assumed you’d know.”

  She and Noah were friends and had been working closely on the black-market baby case, but he didn’t talk personnel issues with her. He took his job as squad leader seriously.

  If Juan wasn’t returning, did that mean that Noah was staying indefinitely? She wouldn’t mind—she loved working with him; they had a natural rapport and she trusted him explicitly. But she’d also heard rumblings—from her own squad, who thought Noah was a hard-ass and didn’t like that he and Lucy had a history, to other agents who were intimidated because Noah answered to FBI national headquarters, not their own regional office. And then there was the not-so-small situation where Noah brought in the ASAC from Sacramento to take over the white-collar crime investigation that had stemmed from the black-market baby case. It ruffled more feathers than either he or Lucy had thought. Noah seemed to take the adversity in stride, didn’t back down, and did his job. But he hadn’t made a lot of friends.

  After the meeting, Noah approached Ryan and Lucy. “My office.”

  They followed him. He closed the door. “If you were here on time, you would have been here when I told the squad before the staff meeting that Elizabeth Cook is being granted early retirement. There were questions, many that I couldn’t answer because of personnel issues, but to summarize, we need every member of this squad to be capable of working any case we have. We only have eight sworn agents, the SSA, and an analyst, and we’re not going to get more.”

  “I thought,” Ryan said, “that she was going to move over to administration or white-collar.”

  “I don’t have a comment on that,” Noah said, “but we need two agents. We also need an SSA, because I’m leaving at the end of the month, provided we have someone in place. I’ve fulfilled my obligations to AD Stockton, we’ve ensured that this office is squeaky clean, and everyone here has cleared enhanced security checks. The difficult part is that Rick wants someone with experience and most SSAs don’t want to move laterally into another SSA position. It’s generally squad members who want the promotion, so it’s a bit of a sensitive issue. This is a young squad, both in age and in years of service. You, Ryan, were a cop—but you’ve only been in the FBI for five years. Emilio is the oldest on the squad now that Cook is gone, but he’s been on the squad for only three years. Lucy, you and Nate are still rookies.”

  “You don’t want to stay?” Lucy asked.

  He almost smiled. “Other than you, most people don’t trust me. And that’s fine—I didn’t come here to win friends.”

  Ryan opened his mouth, then closed it.

  “Go ahead, Ryan. Tell me what you think.”

  “I’m used to hard-asses,” Ryan said. “You’re not the hardest I’ve worked for. But people like to stir the shit, and consider you the interloper. Makes you easy pickings.”

  Noah laughed, then said, “Now, I know you both called in that you were going to be late, but don’t make it a habit. Especially you, Lucy. I don’t have to tell you that you’ll always be under the microscope. And everyone knows we’re friends, so that makes it awkward for me.”

  Lucy knew everything Noah said was true, but hearing it didn’t help.

  Ryan snorted. “Lucy puts in more hours than anyone else—except maybe you, Armstrong. Everyone else can go pound sand.”

  “Noah’s right—and I’m sorry,” Lucy said. “I had a surprise wedding guest show up at my doorstep this morning, and Sean isn’t home.”

  “Wedding guest two weeks early? I’d have told them to hit the road.” Ryan froze. “Unless it was your mother. Your mother came early?”

  “No—no.” Lucy almost laughed at the thought that her mother would go anywhere without calling multiple times to confirm plans. “Sean’s sister, who lives in Europe. Showed up with a suitcase. I’ve never met her before, didn’t think she was coming because she didn’t respond to the invitation. But I’m putting Eden out of my head for the next eight hours. I have a lead on one of the black-market babies. I want to follow up on it this morning.” She glanced at Noah. He was looking at her, but it was clear his thoughts were a million miles away. “Noah?”

  “Ryan, are you done with assisting the SAPD on the officer-involved shooting?”

  “Yeah, just have to write the reports.”

  “Go with Lucy this morning, do the reports tonight. I have a call, so excuse me.”

  They walked out of Noah’s office. “That was odd,” Lucy said.

  “What? He’s a workhorse and has no life. I suspect you would be, too, if you didn’t have fun boy Sean at home.”

  She walked back to her desk and watched Noah leave his office, say something to Zach, the squad analyst, and walk out.

  Definitely odd.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Eden paced the guest room and realized that her initial excitement that Sean was out of town—and that Lucy had left her alone in his house—was tempered by the fact that he had the best security she’d seen outside of a museum. What she’d thought would be an easy j
ob had turned south real quick.

  Why was she surprised? Her baby brother was brilliant; he always had been. When Sean was six he’d taken apart Daddy’s jeep. He couldn’t put it back together … but Eden would never forget her father’s face when he came out and saw Sean sorting engine pieces. Sean had no idea how the engine worked—but he knew that it “sounded funny” and thought if he took it apart he could figure out why.

  He may not have been able to put the engine back together at the age of six, but he certainly could do it now—and then some. Eden had kept tabs on Sean, and not only because she loved him. He should have been hers, but Duke and Kane put their collective foot down on that.

  Damn them.

  Eden had wanted to come home after their parents were killed, to help take care of Sean, but no. Duke was going to be Sean’s guardian. He’d asked her to come and help, and she knew exactly what helping Duke would have meant. She’d be taking orders from him, because dear old Duke would make all the rules. Where would Eden have been then? No way was she taking orders from her regal, don’t-burn-bridges, perfect brother. Hell no.

  Not that Kane’s dictates would have been much different. Only he burned many bridges and was far, far from perfect.

  Eden couldn’t help but think about why Sean needed so much security. Though she had been cut out of the family loop years ago, she still had many friends in the States and kept tabs on everyone, especially Sean. He’d split from RCK a year ago—not a surprise to her. The only surprise was that it had taken so long for him to get out from under Duke’s dictatorial thumb. And of course she knew about Lucy Kincaid. Not as much as she would have liked, but Lucy’s big brother Jack was close to Kane, and therein lay the problem: Her oldest brother was a damn psychic where his family was concerned. Which was rather ironic, since he had shunned everything that was Rogan years ago to become a fucking saint of the downtrodden in Mexico. Didn’t he realize that for every innocent he saved a hundred more were slaughtered? Talk about tilting at fucking windmills.