UNDERCOVER TWIN (3 page)

“How can I help?” Rafe asked.

“Answer me a question. If you were heading up a task force whose sole goal was to catch a drug dealer with ties to Heather and Lily, what would you do right now?”

“If I was dumb enough to waste my talents as a DEA agent, you mean?”

Nick grinned. “Yeah. That’s what I mean.”

“If I believed the girls were a lead to a major drug dealer, I’d keep my distance. I’d wait for the dealer or some of his lackeys to show up.” His gaze shot to Nick. “I’d use the girls as bait.”

“Exactly.”

Rafe groaned. “Ah, hell. You want me to keep an eye on your girlfriend for you.”

“Ex-girlfriend. And I want more than that. I need you to keep her alive.”

* * *

H
EATHER
FINISHED
CLEANING
the kitchen and stood with her hands braced on the edge of the sink. She stared through the cutout into the family room and shook her head. To say her apartment was a disaster was an understatement. Lily had always been incredibly messy, but this was the worst Heather had ever seen. Lily usually tried to confine her piles of dirty clothes and discarded items to her bedroom. This morning, Heather’s entire apartment looked as if a tornado had gone through it.

Probably Lily’s way of paying her back for flushing the cocaine.

Heather’s shoulders slumped. She slogged her way through the mess to the short hallway that led to the two bedrooms. She paused outside the guest bedroom door and tried the knob. Still locked, like when Heather had first gotten home. She hadn’t even seen Lily yet, because her sister was acting like a spoiled brat, hiding behind a locked door with classic rock blasting from the room. Heather banged her fist against the door. Still no answer.

“Come on, Lily. You can’t ignore me forever. Open up. We need to talk.”

Heather rested her forehead against the door. Maybe she should give up on her sister for now and get that shower she’d been longing for since she’d gotten home. The only reason she hadn’t taken a shower already was because when she’d walked into her apartment the smell of rotting garbage coming from the kitchen had nearly knocked her over. How Lily could have ignored that smell was beyond her. It had permeated the entire apartment.

After taking out the garbage, Heather had started setting the rest of the kitchen to rights and one thing had led to another until she’d ended up scrubbing the entire room. Now the thought of a hot shower sounded like heaven. She might even soak her aching, tired muscles in that bubble bath she’d been wanting since Friday. She hurried into her bedroom, shut the door and took off her clothes.

* * *

N
ICK
PAUSED
IN
the opening to the conference room, surprised to see an assistant district attorney sitting at the table, along with another man Nick had never met. His boss, Zack Waverly, was at the head of the table and motioned for Nick to come in.

Nick shut the door and took a seat beside his boss.

“Nick,” Waverly said, “you already know ADA Tom Hicks. He only has an hour window before his next court appointment next door. That’s why we met over here instead of at the DEA office.”

Nick leaned over the table and shook Hicks’s hand.

“And this,” Waverly said, motioning to the man sitting at the other end of the table, “this is Special Agent Michael Rickloff. He works out of the Miami office and is heading up the Key West Task Force. He’s the one who called and asked us to perform the sting on the club Friday night.”

Nick shook Rickloff’s hand. “Miami? You’re not from Key West?”

“Miami native, born and raised. Key West is my current target, thus the name of the task force I put together. A major drug pipeline is coming up from the Keys into my city, and as you found out, even as far north as Saint Augustine. I want it stopped. And I need your help to do it.”

Nick turned to Waverly. “My help? Is my suspension lifted?”

“Assuming you agree to Rickloff’s plan, yes.”

“But the internal investigation will continue,” Hicks said. “And if we find anything that concerns us, you’ll be pulled from the operation.”

So that was why the ADA was here? To warn Nick to be a good boy? If it weren’t for the carrot of having his suspension lifted, he would have gotten up right then and walked out.

Ignoring Hicks, he focused on Rickloff. “What plan? What operation?”

“When you raided the club for us, we were obviously hoping you’d find more than a knapsack with four kilos of cocaine. We were hoping you’d catch Lily Bannon meeting her contact here in north Florida. I wanted a bigger fish than Miss Bannon, to ultimately lead me to the head of the pipeline. Since that didn’t happen, I need another way to bring my target down. That’s where you come in.”

Nick crossed his arms and sat back. “I’m listening.”

* * *

A
FTER
PAMPERING
HERSELF
with a shower
and
a long soak in the tub, Heather was finally starting to feel normal again. She’d clipped her nails short the way she liked them and filed them smooth. She’d styled her hair into long curly waves that hung down her back, and she was wearing one of her favorite pairs of slacks—the soft, copper-colored chinos, with an exquisite pair of Italian leather sandals cushioning her feet—clothes she rarely got to wear because she was usually working.

Her typical work clothes consisted of T-shirts and jeans, things she didn’t mind getting dirty or torn if she had to duck behind a Dumpster to avoid her mark catching her with her camera.

Thinking about work reminded her of the disastrous phone call with her client she’d made a few minutes ago—correction,
former
client. He’d been furious that she hadn’t called him Saturday, and no amount of apologizing or telling him there was an emergency had soothed him. Now she’d have to work extra hard to be even more frugal until she could get another big case lined up.

Determined not to think about her business and financial woes for now, she straightened the bathroom and went to work on her bedroom. Lily must have searched through all of Heather’s drawers hoping to find some hidden money, because every single one of them was hanging open. Heather sighed and straightened the mess, then headed into the living room to tackle the mess in there.

She stood in indecision, not sure where to start. Not only were there piles of laundry, papers and DVDs lying around wherever Lily had chosen to drop them, but some of the drawers and doors in the entertainment center on the far wall were hanging open.

She blinked and studied the room more carefully. Was it a coincidence that her apartment was so horribly trashed, after everything that had happened? This wasn’t a typical “Lily mess.” It was far worse. The apartment looked like it had been...searched. She’d worried about Greary and his “employer” finding out about the fate of the drugs. Had they broken into her apartment and searched it? She gasped as an even worse thought occurred to her. What if Lily had been home when they broke in?

Her entire body started shaking. She whirled around and rushed back into the hall. She twisted the knob on Lily’s door. Still locked. She pounded on the door, praying the awful, sinking feeling inside of her was because she was overtired and overreacting.

“Open up, Lily! Please. I need to know you’re okay.” She pounded on the door again. No answer. “Are...are you in there?”

Nothing except for the beat of the music, the same music that had been playing earlier, as if it was on a constant loop playing over and over.

Oh, no.

She ran to the kitchen, her gaze darting to every corner, as if someone might be hiding, ready to pounce on her. She yanked the junk drawer open beside the stove and grabbed the skeleton key before running back to her sister’s room. She shoved the key in the lock and pushed the door open.

Shock had her frozen, pressing her hand against her throat. Everything in the room was shredded, as if someone had taken a razor-sharp knife and gone on a rampage. Nothing was spared. Not the drapes on the windows, the clothes in the closet that was standing wide open or even the comforter on top of the bed. Everything had been destroyed with a violence that sent a wave of fear crashing through her. And there, on the bed, was a small white piece of paper. A note.

When Heather read what it said, she whirled around and fled from the apartment.

Chapter Three

“You’ve been building an undercover presence in the Keys for quite some time,” Rickloff said.

Nick shrugged. “About eight months, off and on, in preparation for a major op next year. We’ve been coordinating with the Key West office on that.”

Rickloff waved his hand as though that was inconsequential. “That operation is a long ways off. My need is more immediate. I need you to use your cover now, on my task force.”

“The Key West office is okay with this?”

Rickloff exchanged a glance with Waverly. “I haven’t notified them yet, but I will. That’s not for you to worry about. And I’m not asking much here. I just want you to help me draw out the big fish.”

A gnawing suspicion started in Nick’s mind, the suspicion that Rickloff wasn’t being honest with him. Why would a task force out of Miami operate in the Keys without coordinating with the head of the Key West office?

“All right,” Nick said. “I’ll bite. Who’s the big fish?”

“Jose Gonzalez.”

“
The
Jose Gonzalez? The top of the food chain in the Keys?”

Rickloff nodded.

Nick snorted and shook his head. “Exactly how do you plan to get Gonzalez? The man has never even had a speeding ticket. Everyone knows he’s dirty, that he’s the biggest dealer around, but no one can ever get any evidence against him.”

Rickloff leaned forward, his dark eyes blazing with excitement. “That’s because they’ve never had the right bait. We’ve got his girlfriend up on charges that could put her in prison for years. If we make a deal with her in exchange for her cooperation, I think we’ll be able to finally get enough evidence on Gonzalez to bring him down.”

Nick had feared this would be Rickloff’s angle. He’d expected it. But that was before he knew Gonzalez was involved. Using the girls as bait with someone like that was unthinkable, far too dangerous.

He looked at his boss, expecting him to speak up, but Waverly remained silent.

Nick cleared his throat and forced himself to speak in a reasonable tone of voice. “Let me get this straight. Are you saying Lily Bannon is Gonzalez’s girlfriend? And that you want to somehow use her to bring Gonzalez down?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying. The two of them met about six months ago on a trip up here in north Florida. They’ve been a hot item ever since. Our CIs tell us Gonzalez actually thinks he’s in love with Miss Bannon. We want to use that against him.”

“Are these confidential informants people you’ve been working with for a long time? You trust them?”

“Absolutely.”

“Then tell me how, exactly, you think you can use Gonzalez’s affection for Lily Bannon against him?”

“Simple. We want you to be her contact in Key West. We’ll make a deal with her. We’ll drop the drug charges if she gathers incriminating evidence against Gonzalez and gives it to you. As soon as we have enough evidence to make a case against him, you’ll pull Miss Bannon out. In return for
your
cooperation, we drop your suspension.”

Nick turned to Waverly. “You do realize this is insane?”

Waverly turned a dull red. “It’s risky, yes, but I think it could work.”

Nick shook his head. “The problem here is that neither of you fully understand who you’re dealing with. Gonzalez is a twisted psychopath. All the other dealers fear him. If anyone crosses him, in any way, he kills them. I don’t care how much you think he may care about Lily Bannon. If he suspects for one second that she turned on him, that she’s providing evidence to the DEA, she’s dead. And exactly what makes you think you can trust an alcoholic and a junkie to hold herself together for this kind of operation? She’ll crack under the pressure. And when she does, Gonzalez will pounce. There’s only one outcome from this. Disaster. And I want no part of it.”

He scooted his chair back from the table and stood. “I’d rather stay suspended than risk a woman’s life. I’ll take the paid vacation while Internal Affairs investigates me. And I assure you I’ll be contacting Lily Bannon to advise her not to help you. It’s far too dangerous.”

Rickloff shot up from his chair. “You’ll do no such thing. We need Miss Bannon’s cooperation.”

“Don’t count on it.” Nick strode to the door and yanked it open. He froze when he saw who was walking through the squad room toward him.

Rafe. And Heather.

Heather looked so pale the freckles on her face stood out in stark relief.

Nick met them halfway. “What happened? Are you okay, Heather?”

She shook her head but didn’t say anything.

Rafe reached into his pocket and pulled out a clear evidence bag with a piece of paper inside. “Lily Bannon has been abducted.”

* * *

T
HE
CONFERENCE
ROOM
quickly filled with a mix of DEA agents and police officers. Captain Buresh—Rafe’s boss—barked out orders, along with Waverly and Rickloff.

Nick stared at the note through the plastic bag.

I’ve got what you want. You’ve got what I want. Let’s trade.

The most obvious interpretation was that Gonzalez had abducted Lily and wanted to trade her for his kilos of cocaine.

So much for Rickloff’s theory that Gonzalez was in love with Lily.

The second line of the note gave the location for the trade—Skeleton’s Misery, a bar in Key West, along with tomorrow’s date and the time of 9:00 p.m.

He glanced at his watch. It was eleven o’clock in the morning. That didn’t give them much time to come up with a plan to save Lily. As soon as he’d seen the note, he’d run out to his truck to grab his map of the Keys. But when he’d returned, the conference room was in chaos. He’d tried several times to get everyone to be quiet, but no one was paying him any attention.

Rafe was leaning against the far wall, shaking his head, obviously as disgusted as Nick was.

Screw it. Lily didn’t have time for this. And neither did Heather. She was sitting as still as a statue in her chair at the far end of the table, so ghostly pale she looked as if she might collapse at any moment.

Enough was enough. Nick raked his hand across the conference room table, sending folders, pads of paper and pens flying. The room went silent and everyone stared at him in shock.

“Now that I have your attention,” Nick said, “I want everyone out except essential personnel.” He plopped his rolled-up map onto the table. When nobody moved, he glanced at his brother. “Rafe, want to help me explain to everyone who the nonessential people are?”

Rafe grinned. Between him and Nick, they went around the room directing people out the door.

Nick finally closed the door and turned around to a much more orderly, and quiet, conference room. The only remaining people were the same ones Nick had been talking to earlier, plus Heather, Rafe and Captain Buresh.

“You’ve got a bit of an ego to order all those people out, don’t you, son?” Rickloff said.

“Lily Bannon’s life is on the line. And we don’t have a lot of time to figure out how we’re going to save her.”

He unrolled the map. Rafe grabbed some of the pads of paper off the floor and helped Nick weigh down the corners so the map would lie flat. Everyone except Heather gathered around the end of the table, leaning over the map while Nick drew a circle.

“That’s Skeleton’s Misery,” he said, pointing to the circle on the western edge of Key West. “It’s a new bar that opened up this year. That’s where Gonzalez wants to make the trade.”

“Tell me about the location,” Rickloff said.

Nick pointed to the street running out front. “It’s one of the more isolated bars, at the end of the tourist strip. The street is narrow, more for walkers than cars. The nearest cross streets are a mile south, here―” he pointed to another spot on the map and marked an X “―and two miles north.” He marked another X. “The only other access is from the ocean. There’s a dock right behind it, again, fairly new. The bar caters more to locals than to tourists, so it won’t be as crowded as some of the others, and there shouldn’t be a lot of boats at the dock.”

“What do you mean it caters to locals?” Waverly asked.

Nick glanced at Heather. Some of the color had returned to her face, and she was watching him intently.

“Heather, would you like some water or a bite to eat?” Nick asked. “Rafe could take you outside, get you something.”

Rafe was already heading to Heather’s side when she raised her hand to stop him.

“I’m not going anywhere. I want to hear this. I want to know how you’re going to help Lily.” Her voice broke on the last word and she clasped her hands tightly on the table in front of her.

Nick belatedly wished he hadn’t allowed Heather to stay in the conference room when he’d ushered everyone else out, but he didn’t have time to argue with her.

“When I say the bar caters to locals,” he continued, answering Waverly’s question, “I mean it’s raw. It’s little more than a shanty with loud music. No fancy menus, no live bands, and the people who run the place are ex-cons.”

Heather seemed to withdraw into herself and sank farther back in her chair. She was probably imagining her sister in that bar.

“I imagine the courts will insist on keeping the kilos we got from the bar as evidence until the case against Lily and Heather is settled. So we’ll need to check some kilos out of the evidence locker to use for the trade,” Nick said to his boss. “Do we have that much on hand?”

Waverly shook his head. “I doubt it. Other than that bar raid, we haven’t made a cocaine bust in quite some time. Any cocaine we’ve confiscated would have already been destroyed.”

“
We’ve
got that much,” Rickloff said. “Not a problem. I can have an agent bring the drugs down to the Keys and meet up with you.”

“Good. We can place a couple of guys up the street here, and down here.” Nick pointed to the map. “Gonzalez chose a good spot. There aren’t a lot of hiding places. Maybe we could bring a few guys in from the water, have them hide out in a boat at the dock behind the bar.”

“All right,” Rickloff said.

“We’ll have to pick an undercover agent who can pass for Heather in dim light.” Nick glanced at Heather. “Five-two, small build, long, curly brown hair, blue eyes. Do you have any agents like that in your Miami office?”

Rickloff shook his head. “I don’t have any women in my office.”

Why did that not surprise him? Nick shook his head. He was less and less impressed with Rickloff the more he learned about him.

“I know the Keys office has some women, several of whom might be good candidates,” Nick said.

Rickloff shook his head again. “I’m not ready to involve that office just yet.”

Nick’s suspicion that Rickloff might be trying to hide his operation from the Key West office had just been confirmed. But since neither his nor Rafe’s boss were saying anything, he decided to let it go. For now.

“All right. There are five women in our unit here in Saint Augustine,” Nick said. “But they’re all taller than Heather.” He glanced at Rafe. “Do you have any policewomen who could pass for Heather?”

Rafe shook his head. “I don’t know anyone that small in stature here.”

“There has to be someone we could use,” Nick said. “We’ve got a state trooper headquarters down State Road 16. And the Saint Johns County Sheriff’s Office isn’t far from here. Or we could even ask for help from Jacksonville. Rafe, could you contact the other offices, see if they have someone available who fits the physical profile? The eye color may not matter. They could wear colored contacts.”

Rafe nodded and pulled out his phone, but Rickloff shook his head.

“This is too important to risk using a look-alike when we’ve got an exact match for Heather Bannon sitting right in this room.”

Nick swore under his breath. “You want to use Heather as bait.”

“What I want, Special Agent Morgan,” Rickloff snapped, “is to ensure that nothing goes wrong with this operation. We have a unique opportunity here. No matter what I’ve tried over the years, when it comes to Gonzalez, nothing sticks. I would have rather gone with my original plan to use Lily so I could get Gonzalez on drug charges. But they caught Capone for tax evasion. If I have to settle with getting Gonzalez for kidnapping, so be it. As long as I can put him away, that’s what matters.”

Nick stared at him in disbelief. “What matters is that we catch the bad guys without risking the lives of civilians. And please tell me you didn’t just categorize a woman’s abduction as a ‘unique opportunity.’”

Rickloff’s face flushed. “Poor choice of words.”

“You think?” Nick crossed his arms. “You have the note. You have the time and location to make the trade. All you have to do is send in a team with an undercover policewoman and four kilos. If Gonzalez or his men show up, great. You save Lily.” He thumped his fist on the table. “And you don’t risk the life of another innocent civilian by using her as bait.”

Rickloff shook his head. “Gonzalez and his men know Lily too well. They’ll expect her identical twin to look just like her. They won’t fall for a stand-in.”

“She’ll keep to the shadows. Wear the same clothes, a wig. It will work,” Nick insisted.

“If Gonzalez realizes we tried to trick him, he’ll kill his hostage.”

“You don’t know that,” Nick said.

“I’ll do it.” Heather’s soft voice broke through the argument and everyone looked at her. She swallowed hard and fisted her hands on the table. “I’ll be the bait. I don’t want to risk my sister’s life by using some other woman to pretend to be me. I’ll do it.”

Nick braced his hands on the table. “You are not getting anywhere near Gonzalez.”

“Tom,” Rickloff said, addressing the ADA. “Are you willing to give Heather Bannon the same deal we were proposing for her sister earlier?”

Tom nodded. “We are. Her full cooperation in exchange for dropping the charges.”

Heather glanced at Tom. “Drop the charges against my sister, too.”

“Done.”

“Then it’s settled.” Rickloff rubbed his hands back and forth. “Agent Morgan, you’ll escort Miss Bannon into the bar. I’m not sending a civilian in there alone.”

“Right, because you’re so worried about her safety,” Nick said, not bothering to hide his sarcasm.