A Covert Affair (Deadly Ops #5)(5)

Wesley nodded once. “This is good work.”

“There’s more.” Her tone was dark. “Your contact is right, they’re all connected to Bayside Community Center one way or another, but there are other connections including the owner of a couple local restaurants. Twelve of the missing women have worked for the owner, Amelia Rios, at one time over the last year. She has a background similar to the women’s and according to what I’ve dug up so far, she’s worked very hard to get to where she is. It appears she might have had some dealings with a local loan shark when she started her first business, but she doesn’t have a record. With her similar history and the connection, I wanted to note her too. Oh, and she changed her last name when she turned eighteen, which could be for any number of reasons, but again, I found it interesting.

“This is just the tip of what I’ve found, but after researching I’m convinced your friend is right. Fifty women, all living in Miami at the time they disappeared—that we’ve found so far—all leave their lives under the same circumstances. They’re all basically alone in the world, so no one will miss them, and they’re young and beautiful—and a legal age.”

They were easy prey was what it boiled down to. To hell with that. This wasn’t the type of case he normally worked on, but he was going to make an exception for his friend and because it was the right thing to do. He simply couldn’t look the other way, and he wasn’t letting another agency take over.

It would be tricky, but he was going to reach out to the local PD and set up a small task force in Miami to figure out what the hell was going on. He had enough discretionary funds to make this happen. It was possible someone thought they could step into Paul Hill’s shoes, a man who had run the skin trade in Miami for a long time. A man the NSA and other agencies had brought down—though he’d ended up getting killed in prison not long after. The thought made Wesley smile. He was glad that bastard was dead. “Will you shut the door?” he asked, earning a surprised look from Karen.

But she stood and shut the door before returning to her seat.

He had the perfect agent in mind for this op. “I know you’re friends with Ortiz.”

She nodded. “Yes.”

Nathan Ortiz had been injured in a Metro bomb blast in D.C. months before. He’d recently been cleared for active duty, but Wesley didn’t want to make the mistake of sending him into the field too soon. Wesley was the one who’d recruited him as a Black Death 9 agent. Ortiz was now a member of the NSA’s elite group who took on covert, off-the-books operations, but this would be his biggest op to date, since he was so new. And he was just coming off bed rest and physical therapy. Still, he was from Miami and familiar with the city in a way that would help him blend with the locals. Not to mention that one of his cover IDs was perfect for what Wesley was contemplating.

“How’s he been doing?” Wesley knew what went on under his purview, but Karen likely knew more about the day-to-day workings of their people.

She lifted her shoulders slightly. “He’s more than competent, but you need to put him back in the field. He does all his work without complaint and he does it well. While he has the skills of an analyst, he doesn’t love it the way Elliott or I do. And if you keep him here too long, you’ll burn him out. I think he’s starting to feel stagnant.”

Surprise flickered through him, but he didn’t show it. “He told you this?”

“No, but we’re friends. Tucker and I had him over for dinner last week and he said something about wanting to get back in the field. It was the way he said it. He’s ready.”

Wesley nodded, glad her instinct was the same as his. In the end he’d make the decision he thought was best, but he valued Karen’s insight. “Thanks. Clear your schedule and hand off anything that isn’t a priority.”

“We’re going to find these women?” There was a trace of surprise in her voice, probably because she knew as well as he did that finding missing women wasn’t what they did.

“Women are often used in the sex slave trade, and profits from their sales go to funding terrorism.” That was the angle he’d use for getting this operation off the ground. Because he was already involved and simply couldn’t walk away. Not when Matias had asked him for this favor and not when all these women were just disappearing without a trace. No one was looking for them.

Until now.





Chapter 2


Blown: discovery of an agent’s true identity or a clandestine activity’s true purpose.





Two weeks later

Amelia Rios took the tulip-shaped champagne glass from her date, Iker Mercado, with a smile. At forty-five, he was seventeen years older than her and definitely the oldest man she’d ever been on a date with. Not that she dated much, not with her schedule. But Mercado was interesting, charming, handsome, and he didn’t have a reputation as a man-whore. If he had, she would have declined his invitation. In her experience, playboy types tended to have little respect for her gender. No, thank you.

If anything, the man had practically lived like a saint for the last twenty-five years. She knew from gossip that his wife had died at nineteen during childbirth. He’d only been twenty, yet had raised his daughter and had never gotten remarried or really even dated. If gossip was to be believed, of course. In this case, she believed it.