nodded. If all went well, at one point tomorrow Rafe and she would see to it that Sonya Botero was freed from her captors, whomever they might work for. She hoped and prayed the woman was still alive when they got there.
“They’ll keep her around for a while yet,” he said, his thoughts apparently running along the same line. “For the money and because of Juan. She’s just a tool to hurt him, to distract him from his political agenda. If his young, beautiful fiancée died now, think of the headlines. Think of the outpouring of sympathy he’d get, the votes. No.”
She nodded. It made sense that whoever Juan’s enemies were, they would go for total destruction—messing up both his career and personal life. Distract him with the kidnapping to make sure his bills fail, then finish him off by murdering the woman he loves. The plan seemed diabolically thorough. She could definitely see Maggie, year after year in the insane asylum, plotting her revenge. “The fury of a woman scorned.”
“Somebody wants to go, you’ve got to let them. If that’s how they feel, no sense in them staying, is there?” he asked. “I never understood jealousy.”
“You might have to be in an actual relationship, you know, with feelings, to experience it.”
“Ouch,” he said, but grinned.
“Sorry.” She took a deep breath. What on earth was wrong with her? When had she sunk to petty needling? Rafe Montoya’s private life was none of her business. And it was certainly not her place to judge. She was an intelligent woman, she ought to be able to find a better way of dealing with her unwanted attraction toward him.
She refocused on the task at hand. “I’m concerned about how they are treating her.” If they planned to kill her all along, they wouldn’t worry about minor damage along the way, would they?
He nodded, sober now. He knew the criminal mind as well as she did, maybe better—from both sides of the law.
From what she’d heard when they’d worked for the DEA, he had left a rather dark past behind him when he’d moved to Miami from Ladera, although she didn’t know the details. They hadn’t known each other back then, worked different territories, but Rafe’s busts were legendary. Then they both left the agency, he a year sooner than she had, and by chance both ended up recruited by Miami Confidential, an undercover division of the Department of Public Safety.
“How long before the vote on Juan’s bills?” he asked.
“Seven days, I think.” A comfortable margin. They would have Sonya out of the country long before then and safely back in Miami.
“Do you think the kidnappers will try for the money again?”
She thought for a moment. “Fuentes had shown up for it twice.” And was fatally wounded by Rafe during the second handover attempt. “I’m not sure if the real mastermind who’s behind all this cares that much about the money, though. If it’s Juan he or she wants, then the fact that the kidnapping took place in the U.S. and that there was a ransom note to Botero—it might be all just to throw the police off the scent.”
“There might not be any of the kidnappers left in Miami, except for the ones who are in custody.” Two men who’d been with Fuentes had been apprehended the day he was shot. They hadn’t turned out to be all that useful. Isabelle had questioned them and was fairly convinced they weren’t lying when they’d claimed that they knew little of Fuentes’s plan other than day-to-day instructions and had no idea whether there was a boss above Fuentes or who had Sonya in Ladera and how big the home team was here.
Her gaze strayed to the half-eaten power bar in her hand that she’d forgotten as they talked. She had packed dozens of them in preparation for the trip. She finished this one now and washed it down with a few gulps of bottled water, then lay on her back and looked up. The stars were coming out. “We better get some rest.”
Rafe’s backpack rustled. He was probably going for his own supper.
She stared at the night sky but could not make the feeling of endlessness and peace settle into her tense body. Was Sonya looking up at the same stars? Probably not. She’d be hidden out of sight. But her kidnappers… How many were they? She figured on a handful of men. More than that would draw attention. There might even be just one at a time. They could be guarding her in shifts.
Would they hurt her?
Her jaw tightened at the question that kept her up at night. Because she knew they might. There were a lot of things they could do to her while still keeping her in a condition good enough that, when her father demanded to hear her voice, she could say a few words over the phone.
The strong smell of spices made her glance over at Rafe. He was chewing on some smoked meat he had bought at a local market before they’d begun their hike two days ago.
“God, I missed this.” He just about moaned with pleasure.
His joy seemed so complete, she couldn’t help but smile. “How long has it been since you visited?”
“Too long and not long enough.” He gave her a rueful grin.
“Is there— Would you be in trouble if we ran into…” She half voiced the question that had popped into her mind from time to time since they’d landed, then stopped. She didn’t want to offend him.
“Is there a warrant out for my arrest?” He drew up a black eyebrow, humor playing at the corner of his mouth. “No. Even in my most stupid younger years, I was always smart enough not to get caught.” He took another bite, chewed and swallowed.
“And your old…um…associates?”
His face turned serious. “We are nowhere near them.” He seemed lost in thought for a moment, then shook off whatever memories her questions had brought forth. “I’m not saying I won’t be happy to be back in Miami, though.”
Back to the parties, back to his women, no doubt. Oh, what did she care? “What do you tell your girlfriends when you have to leave at a moment’s notice like this?” She put forward another question she’d been successfully swallowing until now.
“Family emergency,” he said. “No girlfriend at the moment, if that’s what you’re getting at. I am conveniently available.”
Her polite upbringing didn’t allow her to snort or produce any other rude sound, despite the four brothers she’d grown up with—her grandmother had been a Southern belle.
As far as she could tell, Rafe was always “conveniently available” even when he did have a girlfriend, although that was a strong term for one of his temporary liaisons. Girlfriend implied commitment and some kind of semipermanence.
“Gone through the whole city already? I suppose you’re going to have to move.” She meant to sound humorous and winced at how bitchy her words came out.
“Very funny.”
“Not really.” It was sad that despite the type of man he was, she was still more attracted to him than to anyone she’d ever dated. But if they got involved and then split up, working in the same office would be murder. So she wasn’t going to go there.
“I’m hoping you’ll change your mind about me,” he said after a while.
At thirty-four,
