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“I’m sorry,” Vince said to Champ. “That was when I… when I realized things had gone way too far.”
Champ didn’t seem moved at all by his apology, and I could imagine he was thinking about what Vince had done to Quinn. I knew nothing Vince could say or do would make up for that because I felt the same way about Anomaly.
“So you approached the FBI for a deal,” Champ sneered, still pinning Vince with laser eyes. “Do I even want to know how the fuck you got involved in illegal money movement in the first place?”
I’d known he wouldn’t let that part of the story slide. Champ would hate to know he’d almost married a criminal.
Buck was the one who answered. “Vince here skimmed a little off the top of a couple projects he was assigned to in the Middle East.” He wiggled his bushy eyebrows and belched lightly. “Ain’t that right, Vincey boy?”
Vince’s cheeks flamed, and his jaw worked, but he neither confirmed nor denied.
“How the hell do you know?” Champ asked, turning his stare on Buck.
“I had a lot of downtime in the compound in Venezuela before you two arrived. And I’m a good listener.” He shrugged. “I learned a lot. And I wrote it all down and saved it in my Horn.”
Kev and I exchanged a glance. We had not seen any notes on the smuggled Horn.
Laurel’s lip curled up with a knowing smirk. “Not that Horn,” she said. “His personal Horn.”
I shook my head. Buck Nutter had smuggled two Horns out of Venezuela on the hijacked flight from hell? Not only the sparkly peach first-gen one but his everyday one too? How? Why?
“Two Horns are always better than one, am I right, boys?” Buck pronounced solemnly like he could read my thoughts.
He went on to explain that when he’d disappeared from the Thicket, he’d headed for Hawaii—hence the shirt. Not fully understanding how government alphabet agencies worked, Buck had approached a local FBI field office to inform them that he had information about two rogue DEA agents, along with a list of suspected American citizens associated with the Cartel de la Luna.
“And that’s how I got myself put into protective custody in Hawaii,” Buck said with satisfaction.
No wonder we hadn’t been able to find the man if the FBI had been blocking our attempts.
Champ’s gears were turning, and if he was anything like me, he was having a hard time giving Buck credit for anything productive or good. “Why steal the sparkle-Horn if you already had the data on your own Horn?”
Buck shrugged. “I knew the cartel would come looking for me, and I wasn’t sure who to trust. I figured if I left the valuable one behind with a little stolen data on it, the cartel folks’d think that was all there was.”
Laurel gave him an approving smile. “When in reality, he had much, much more.”
Buck grinned. “Heap loads.”
Laurel’s smile disappeared, and she was all business once more. “We have enough to take down Linus right now, but Linus is small potatoes. We want Gustavo Santiago. In addition to crippling the drug supply he’s flooding into the United States, we need to know if he has other assets in the US government.”
Riggs was keyed up, the way he got when he was building up a head of steam. “Gustavo is a ghost. He owns even more government assets in Venezuela than he does in the United States, and he lives in a guarded compound—”
Vince shook his head. “Except when he leaves the compound under the care of his brother and comes to the United States for medical treatment… plus a little business on the side. He’s meeting with Linus here in Vegas.”
Laurel corrected him. “Not in Vegas. He’s not stupid enough to risk coming into the city with CCTV everywhere. In the past, they’ve met in remote desert locations. He’ll message Linus the GPS coordinates shortly before the meeting.”
It was all starting to come together now. Kev must have realized it at the same time I did because he asked the question. “So you want to get the data off Anomaly—I mean, Linus’s—Horn to figure out where and when they’re meeting so you can arrest Gustavo?”
Laurel nodded. “That’s the goal. Unfortunately for us, Linus’s record is spotless. Not so much as a parking ticket. In fact, he has several commendations for his excellent work on behalf of the DEA. No judge is gonna sign off on a warrant to obtain his Horn on the basis of a cartel-informant testimony, even if he was a DEA agent.” She tilted her head to indicate Vince. “We were hoping Linus would trust Vince enough to give him access to his Horn, but Linus has made it pretty clear that Vince is a loose end he’d prefer to tie up. So if you people have a plan…” She lifted one meticulously groomed eyebrow. “Now would be the time to share it.”
