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She had to save herself.
She grabbed the memory card and slid it into the concealed pocket in her jacket sleeve.
She didn’t dare look at the contents of it. Not here. Not now.
She needed to wait until she got home tonight. She paid her electric bill, then her phone bill. Her father had taught his daughters from a young age how to manage their money and balance a checkbook. Anna no longer used one, but she remembered his advice:It is important to pay your bills on time—it is an act of integrity. Never owe anyone anything.
Her father had been talking about money, but it was a good motto for life.
And if Anna worked with Jackson, she’d owe him something. That was a position she couldn’t risk being in, she realized with startling clarity.
She’d come this far alone, and she’d finish this alone.
She logged off, her eyes dropping to the rug under her feet as she stood. She was right on top of the trap door.
She wanted to ask Damon about it, but for now she had the gut feeling that it was better if he didn’t know she knew.
She trusted Damon, trusted him as much as she’d trust her own father.
The less he knew, the better—because she would not put his life at risk.
Anna closed the office door behind her without another look. She’d gotten what she needed, and she’d survived.
She went to the bar, asked for a double, and went in search of Becky. Light-hearted, innocent Becky.
Oh, how Anna envied her.
DIAZ
Diaz checked his phone as he walked toward the bar, but there was no update. He sent a quick text:
Diaz: Any movement outside?
Rowan: No, all looks good out here.
He exhaled a long breath as he nodded to Damon, who poured him a drink.
Diaz didn’t like the locked door; then again, there were a lot of things he didn’t like lately.
He smoothed out the creases of his forehead with his fingers.
Maybe Anna was right. He was losing it.
The betrayal with the Feds had rattled him because it had taken him so long to know about it. He’d been betrayed in the past—before Alex. It was destined to happen in his world, where drugs, ambition, and greed were shaken together to create a cocktail of looking after oneself. But he’d had no idea about Alex until Ryley gave him the information. Information he’d almost ignored. He’d actually laughed at it when he’d received it.
But there was nothing funny about it now.
He tucked his phone into his pocket and took a seat at the bar.
His eyes swept over the crowd. Nothing looked unusual; nothing seemed out of place.
The problem was, he no longer knew what he was looking at.
The Feds were getting better at infiltrating groups like his. Alex hadn’t made a single mistake. If not for Ryley’s information, Diaz still wouldn’t have known.
And that was the thing that scared him most.
Anna walked into the bar area, spotted him, then looked to Damon.
