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“He says he’ll be docking in about thirty minutes,” Emily declared after a moment or two. “That means he’ll be at the house within the hour.”
“Great, I can’t wait to see him.”
“When we get home we can have a nice cup of coffee. I’d love to hear about your work.”
“He told you what I do?” Elizabeth asked, surprised Scott had talked about her.
“Oh, yes, he thinks very highly of you, and apparently the feeling’s mutual.”
“It’s that obvious?”
“To me it is, but I can read people.”
“Another of your specialties?” Elizabeth inquired with a grin.
“Indeed it is. As a matter of fact, I was once known as a human lie detector. I used to win quite a lot of money playing poker.”
“I bet you did,” Elizabeth quipped, laughing out loud, “just like a female James Bond.”
“I must admit, I did have a few of my own Casino Royale moments.”
“Will you tell me about some of them?”
“You won’t be able to shut me up,” Emily replied happily as they neared the house.
“Uh, Emily, there’s something I need to take care of in the security room.”
“I’ll start the coffee and make us something to eat.”
“That would be terrific. I had a bowl of cereal, but I’m hungry again.”
“Cereal is nothing but reprocessed sawdust. I’ll whip up a tomato and cheese omelet.”
Entering the house, Emily continued on to the kitchen as Elizabeth stopped at the security room. Hurrying to the plantation doors, she returned the gun to its case and let out a relieved sigh.
She’d had a near miss with a trip wire—a horrifying thought—and suddenly borrowing the gun seemed like a terrible idea. Moving across to the windows and looking down at the tranquil water lapping on the pristine beach, no one would ever suspect the blissful island had been invaded by nefarious criminals.
The memory of Manny’s death flashed through her head.
Unexpected heat burned the back of her throat.
“I’ll have my revenge,” she muttered under her breath. “I’ll get Dan and Jim, and somehow I’ll get Conchello too.”
Gliding through the calm, clear water on Jack’s yacht, Scott approached the island and sailed close to the beach. There were no speedboats in the area, and the small cove looked tranquil, but hidden behind palm trees and exotic plants, Conchello’s soldiers had almost finished setting up a new base of operations.
Scott had no doubt Elizabeth had left the house on a reconnaissance mission. She was a skilled, trained undercover agent whose partner had been killed in her arms. He understood her desperate need for justice, and her thirst to do everything in her power to hunt down the men responsible, but emotion was clouding her judgment.
It was something he needed to deal with before she became another of Conchello’s victims.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Deciding to jog back to the safe house from the small dock, Scott powered up the steep track to the top of the island. In each hand he held a plastic bag containing weights. One also contained the wad of money with the disabled tracker, a small towel, swimming trunks, and his phone. Reaching the peak and pausing to catch his breath, he scanned the water in search of approaching speedboats.
Earlier that morning, Frank had called. The drone had returned surveillance footage of three cigarette boats traveling at high speed from an island Scott had pointed out to Elizabeth six months before. The men had unloaded on the small beach below the safehouse, and carried the crates into the tropical forest. Continuing its fly over, the drone’s sophisticated imaging equipment identified the encampment in spite of efforts to hide it under camouflage nets. Adding to the valuable intel, David Clark had started to offer up detailed information about the new base.
In an ironic twist of fate, the ruthless drug lord had set up his new camp under Scott’s nose.
Operation Justice was suddenly breaking wide open.
