A Shot Worth Taking (Bad Karma Special Ops Book 3) Read online

  A muscle in Jake’s jaw twitched.

  While not exactly in the scope of job duties of a linguist, he didn’t know her complete work history, and now wasn’t the time nor the place to explain. “Hopefully, we’ll find something to tie them together or, better yet, lead to al-Shehri. Unless Hakim gets picked up now. Then that’s shot to hell.” She touched her earpiece to clue him in and continued. “We on the same page here?”

  He smiled, and his head bobbed, catching her drift. Smart man.

  “That’s more solid than anything we’ve got. Best to let your plan play out,” he said for her fellow agents to hear.

  “Good. Have your boss talk to Special Agent in Charge Grochowski if you guys want in. We’ve got a mobile surveillance team in the flooring truck a block down. Maybe you can join forces. Special Agent Weiss likes an audience.” She ignored Weiss’s continued protest. “I better get back before Hakim gets antsy.”

  “We’ll get it worked out.”

  “Then, I’ll probably be seeing you.” That idea shouldn’t give her as much of a thrill as catching al-Shehri. Shouldn’t.

  Jake did a quick check of the hallway before he ducked out and left her alone.

  She inhaled and took a second to close her eyes. Her hands trembled a bit as she freshened up her neutral-beige lipstick. Hours ago, Jake invaded her thoughts, and now he appeared like she’d rubbed a genie’s lamp. He certainly stood a chance to make it into the top three on her wish list. Maybe even number two, if they could catch al-Shehri.

  Finding out Jake’s real name would be nice, too. Working clandestinely, it was better not to know things that could break cover. When his Spec Ops team joined her mission working the Coyote motorcycle gang, she stayed in character and didn’t ask questions that could get her or someone on her team killed.

  When that mission wrapped, she had only a few, too brief, minutes with him before his team loaded up the recovered weapons. He’d given her one final sexy smile before he disappeared back into his Black Ops world. Tonight, he wore a wedding ring, which meant he probably went home to his wife, two rambunctious sons, brown-eyed, pig-tailed daughter, and dog—she pictured a Labrador Retriever.

  Damn. She’d tried not to think about that before, though it explained why he hadn’t taken advantage of them sharing a room at the Deluxe Stay Motel back in Texas. Not knowing his relationship status, she’d kept things professional other than a little flirtation—which had been necessary for their cover.

  Not that she hadn’t indulged in a few explicit fantasies starring Jake. That needed to be in the past. It wasn’t right to lust over a married man. Fantasies could be so much easier than real life.

  No time for fantasies or distractions tonight. She pushed Jake into a locked compartment of her brain to refocus. Right now, she was Sabine, and Sabine Deschamps did not know Jake, and he was not her type. Damn. She disliked being Sabine more by the minute.

  Back at the table, she avoided looking in Jake’s direction. No more signals under the table. Nothing to make Hakim suspicious. When the waiter brought their food, she handed him her appetizer plate and seized the opportunity to slip the libido enhancer into Hakim’s tea.

  While they dined, she kept things low-key. The conversation centered on France and their shared passion for art. She prayed the Cialis would kick up his primal urges. “The next artist Nathan plans to showcase is not my style. He’s talented with clean lines and interesting uses of color, but his work is too modern and interpretive for my taste. You robbed me of my favorite piece. I’m glad you’re happy with the painting, but I miss the chance to admire it.” She stuck out her bottom lip, playing her role of the demure widow to the hilt.

  “It looks magnificent with the adjustable lighting I had installed. Would you care to see it in its new location?”

  While Angela refrained from jumping at his suggestion, her pulse got a powerful jumpstart, and her toes curled inside the conservative black pumps. “I—I would like that.” She met his eyes before looking down at her hand and toyed with her fork. Score!

  She didn’t follow the movement when she glimpsed Jake and his boss pass on their way out of the restaurant. Emptiness settled in her chest while she listened to Hakim, and she repressed a shudder when he trailed two fingers down her forearm to her hand. His touch left her feeling tainted—like a sacrificial lamb for “the greater good.” She returned his gentle squeeze, letting her hand remain in his—distancing herself from Angela. She had to be Sabine. To protect herself, she had to keep up the façade.

  Four

  Outside the restaurant, Tony split from Lundgren and walked down the block. The drizzle of rain barely registered. Why was Angela working undercover again? That question rattled around in his brain while he’d watched her and Hakim interact over dinner. Each bashful look and shy smile, each touch the two exchanged, made him want to hurt someone—and his stomach still threatened to expel his dinner all over the sidewalk.

  The two minutes he spent with her inside the bathroom brought back a flood of memories—of how it felt to have her riding behind him on the Harley, her arms wrapped around his torso; of his dread and her calm demeanor when the Coyote’s ringleader held a gun to her head; of her trust in his team’s ability to shoot the bastard dead.

  Afterward, he’d proposed Angela switch from linguistics to a field position. Leave my safe cubicle to have a gun held to my head? No thanks, she’d replied, then given him one of her trademark winks and somewhat-suggestive smiles. Yet here she was, undercover again, this time on one of the highest priorities on Homeland Security’s watch list. Not exactly on par with translating documents in the confines of a cubicle in the Washington, D.C. office.

  He hadn’t seen her since he, Mack, and Dominguez roared away on the FBI’s confiscated Harleys—but he’d thought of her. Even dreamed of her on more than one occasion. When he’d been in D.C. a year ago, he wanted to call her up to see if they could get together. Of course, there wasn’t an Angela Hoffman listed in the phone directory. Something, mostly the probability she was married, made him cop-out rather than call the FBI office to track her down. But now, here she was, and watching her cozy up to a known money-mover for terrorists was not his idea of fun.

  He turned the corner and picked out the rectangular work truck with the name of a flooring company on the side. It was a good setup for the FBI to listen in, especially being a block away and out of sight. It wouldn’t stick out to most people, except the truck was still there at nine thirty at night.

  He scanned the street before he slipped between a parked car and the rear of the truck, then rapped on the door. Silence. He ticked off the seconds in his head. “I can pound on the door, but that might draw unwanted attention,” he said, loud enough that the agents inside should hear. “I’m not going away.” He detected the muffled sound of conversation before the back door cracked open.

  “What can I do you for?” asked a guy with a heavy Brooklyn accent who wore a T-shirt with a logo matching the one on the side of the truck.

  Nice touch. “I want to see if you do Brazilian hardwoods.” Tony yanked open the door and climbed into the truck, forcing the agent to back out of the way.

  “What the …?” the agent blustered.

  Tony pulled the door shut behind him. “Sergeant First Class Anthony Vincenti. Army Special Operations. Which one of you is in charge?”

  The older agent, seated in front of the bank of listening equipment and computer monitors, rolled his shoulders back and looked Tony up and down. “I am. But we have this covered. Besides, there’s not really room for one more in here.”

  You gotta be shitting me. Tony’s jaw clenched to keep from saying it aloud. Despite the smell of pastrami and stale coffee, it was luxurious compared to some of his past assignments.

  “Look, we’re on the same team here. You guys can take all the credit for bagging Hakim and al-Shehri. No one wants them to pull off something we could have prevented but didn’t because of politicking. You going to play nice
, or do I go over your heads to Grochowski, who cleared it?”

  There were only two chairs in the vehicle. Though tempted to pull a power play and slip into the vacant one, it was more important he get their buy-in, so he perched on the corner of the counter holding the equipment. And waited. The two FBI agents exchanged a look. He took the slight tilt of the senior agent’s head as a sign of consent. Good enough.

  Tony loosened his tie and shrugged out of his jacket. “Got another set of headphones?” Apparently, the agents weren’t going to offer anything up freely.

  The senior special agent jerked his head to the younger agent, who took his time retrieving a set of earbuds from a cabinet built into the truck.

  Angela’s sultry voice purred in his ears, speaking fluent French.

  “Jackpot. Hakim offered to take her home to show her the painting and, no doubt, his private collection,” the agent with the heavy New York accent announced.

  Tony snuffed out the impulse to wipe the smirk off the agent’s face. Must be Weiss, the guy she mentioned in the bathroom.

  “So, how did Special Agent Hoffman ID you?” the senior special agent asked.

  “We worked together a while back,” Tony answered in French to see the dumbfounded look on Weiss’s face at the realization he understood what Hakim and Angela were saying—mostly. Man, she sounded like a native speaking at such a rapid clip.

  “What did you guys need our help with?” Weiss wore a patronizing smile.

  “Special Agent in Charge Minton from the Dallas office called us in to assist their investigation locating weapons, including stolen shoulder-launched multipurpose assault weapons.” He wasn’t sure if it was the part about the missiles or that the FBI approached Spec Ops for help, but it was enough to shut Weiss up.

  Though Angela knew her fellow agents were listening in, Tony still felt like a voyeur as he continued to monitor the conversation in the restaurant. When Hakim told the server to keep the change, the senior special agent took off his headset. “Let’s move out.” He slid back a partition to maneuver into the driver’s seat.

  Tony took the vacated seat. Weiss didn’t speak to him while the truck snaked through the ever-present New York City traffic. Angela’s chitchat with Hakim didn’t seem pertinent, but he concentrated on the nuances of their voices, in hopes he’d pick up something useful.

  Hakim used a respectful tone with their cab driver, who spoke with a heavy Middle Eastern accent, but his reply to the night doorman at his building sounded condescending, and though it was only two words, he swore Hakim’s clipped greeting to the concierge bore an air of smugness. He filed away that information.

  After circling a city block, Special Agent “Cal” Calomiris—he finally asked Weiss for his name—parked the truck. Tony stood and relinquished his chair when Cal slid the divider back and squeezed through to rejoin them in the rear of the truck. Before sitting, Cal produced a collapsible stool from the equipment closet and handed it to him.

  Figures. He took the chair, ticked neither agent had the courtesy to offer it up earlier when he balanced on the counter by half a butt cheek. He bit his tongue and accepted it as a peace offering.

  The amount of static from Angela’s audio increased. Calomiris pressed his middle finger against the earpiece, then pulled off the headset.

  “She’s in!” Weiss pulled off his headset, too. “Jackpot! Finally! Anmar Hakim, we are gonna nail your ass.”

  Panic poured into Tony’s chest like quick-set concrete. “What’s up with the signal?”

  “Hakim installed a top-of-the-line security system. The vibration scrambler renders transmitters useless as tin cans on a string,” Calomiris said.

  Should have known that. Only he didn’t have the inside info the agents did. “Guess he doesn’t use a landline, either.”

  “No. He’s paranoid when it comes to security.”

  Tony wanted to be a fly on the wall, or better yet, a spider in a web waiting to catch his prey. “Couldn’t slip the concierge or super enough to get in and disable it?”

  “Why didn’t we think of that? Oh, wait! We did,” Weiss said.

  “System uses a keypad and palm scanner. No one gets in without Hakim,” Calomiris said. “Tried to use our guys to deliver and hang the painting he bought from the gallery Hoffman’s working at, but no go. Hired his own crew to mount it and do the lighting work. Not worth tipping our hand to try and get in another way.”

  “In case you thought you’d rappel down the building and cut a hole in the window to plant a bug or do some peeping GI Joe surveillance,” Weiss added.

  “I could if you need me to.” Tony ran through the possibilities of inserting himself through a window, wall, the ceiling, or even the floor. “What’s the plan once she’s in?”

  “Well, she didn’t give us all the juicy details, but once Hakim’s asleep”—Weiss paused, letting that register, before he continued—“she’s supposed to disable the scrambler, copy his hard drive, clone his cell’s SIM card, and bug the apartment.”

  Tony knew all agents had field training, but they were expecting a helluva lot from a linguist. There was some piece of the puzzle he didn’t have. “Looked like she slipped something into his coffee cup at dinner.” He and Lundgren had watched her closely, but neither was positive—she was that good.

  “She did requisition Cialis. You know, talk of the Louvre and art only go so far toward him wanting to take her home to unveil her masterpiece.”

  The desire to forcibly shut Weiss up tripled. The need to remain professional and not blow this strained cooperation trumped Tony’s personal agenda—barely. He’d hoped she roofied the asshole, not helped him get it up.

  The idea of Angela having no way to communicate left him unsettled to his core. The idea of hearing everything going on inside appealed even less now, though. Bile burned all the way up to his throat. How far would she go? “Is she married?” The question slipped out.

  Weiss shrugged. “Don’t think so.”

  “She have a boyfriend or fiancé?” he asked, more because of his own curiosity.

  “Other than Hakim?”

  He refused to answer Weiss. Angela was smart. Creative. And in a very precarious position. If anyone knew firsthand how a mission could put an operative in a compromising situation, he did. He didn’t want her sleeping with a skeevy terrorist, but it was a better alternative than her being dead. While they waited, he prayed that her plan, whatever it entailed, worked.

  “Can you stop that?” Calomiris stared at Tony’s fingers tapping on the countertop.

  “Sorry.” He stilled his hand. In the thirty-seven minutes since they’d lost Angela’s audio feed, he’d endured Weiss’s litany of questions, until the two found something to bond over—the lousy performance of the Buffalo Bills the past few seasons. But that only distracted him to an extent. He’d chewed the inside of his cheek raw. What the hell was going on in there, and how long would this take? He blew out a breath, which drew another pained look from Calomiris. This could take hours, and he’d better find a way to chill before Calomiris kicked him out or killed him.

  Both men jolted when the cell phone lying on the counter vibrated. A smile broke across Calomiris’ stressed face when he saw the display.

  “Talk to me. Great.”

  “Put it on speaker.” Weiss nearly tipped off the stool as he leaned closer to hear.

  Tony’s muscles relaxed when Calomiris punched the speaker button.

  “Systems are linked now,” an unfamiliar voice broadcast, likely an FBI computer tech. “I’ll run the list of possible passwords based on your data before it begins the full decryption—”

  “Shit! Gotta go!” Angela’s words rushed out before the call disconnected.

  In the truck, silence loomed.

  Five

  The contents of Tony’s stomach churned. Damn. This was worse than the waiting earlier. He’d abandoned the back of the truck to sit in the driver’s seat, where he could watch the building’s windows f
or a flash of gunfire. Nothing—thankfully. And, so far, no sirens from a neighbor’s call to report a woman screaming or—

  Stop letting your imagination go worst case!

  She was probably being cautious. It’s not like she’d said, “Help. He’s going to kill me.”

  Hakim was a businessman. He laundered and moved money. Probably didn’t own a gun. However, Tony could envision the guy with a deadly looking ceremonial dagger.

  He shook his head to dispel those visions. Somehow, he couldn’t shake this deep-seated compulsion to protect Angela. Maybe because, as a linguist, she wasn’t trained to handle someone like Hakim. Though it could be that he was already thinking ahead to when this mission ended—when things didn’t have to be all business.

  The phone finally rang. Tony whirled.

  “Everything okay? You had us worried.” Calomiris asked.

  Weiss motioned, and Calomiris put the phone on speaker.

  “Sorry,” she spoke softly. “Hakim was throwing up again. I didn’t want him to find me with his phone, hacking his computer. Get anything yet, Singh?”

  Throwing up? Her apparent ingenuity let Tony breathe easier.

  “Hoffman, it scares me how deep you are in Hakim’s head. Hit his password in under two minutes. Who’s Fatima?” Singh, the tech, asked.

  “A cousin, but I think there’s more to it. Might want to see what info you can dig up on her.”

  “We’ll do it.” Calomiris scribbled on a notepad.

  “We’re set for you to plug in the drive. It might take a while depending on how much is on there,” Singh instructed.

  “His hard drive is near capacity, plus he has two backup drives. Okay, I’m going to make the adjustments to the security system, now. Ready, Weiss?”

  “Always.”

  Weiss brought up the security system’s schematics on the monitor. Tony reclaimed his stool and observed.