a snowy evening on the Black Mountain reservation while investigating a meth ring. And again in court when her attorneys succeeded in delaying the process for challenging her daughter’s adoption.
Cassidy saw a medic first, who decided that her ribs were bruised. The slug that they dug from her vest appeared to be a thirty caliber. She declined transport and borrowed an FBI T-shirt from Pauling that was still miles too big for her. The navy blue T said FBI in bold yellow lettering across the front and back. She covered what she could with the blazer.
Her people had already found the location of the shooter, now long gone. He’d left at least one rifle cartridge behind, despite taking two shots.
“He was on the roof of the adjacent hotel,” said Tully. Her new boss peered at her with striking blue eyes. His hairline had receded to the point that it was now only a pale fringe clipped short at the sides of his head, but his face was thin and angular with a strong jaw and eyes that reminded her of a bird of prey.
She knew from his previous comments that he liked running their unit and didn’t like that she wanted out. He took it as some kind of black mark that she was not satisfied to bake out in this godforsaken pile of sand called Arizona. But Cassidy wanted to join a team that chased the big fish, not the endless flow of traffickers and illegals that ebbed and flowed over the boarder like a tide.
Tully plopped her down before a computer and made her write her report. While the others moved out to investigate; she sat in the control room. The reporting didn’t take long. After she finished, she went over the footage of the event with one of the techs, watching her movements when the vase exploded from the first blast and then the proceeding mayhem. They had not stationed on the roofs because the threat was not deemed great enough to warrant the added security. If they had, her people might have been in place when the shooter arrived.
Her partner returned. Luke Forrest was Black Mountain Apache and Clyne’s uncle, though as she understood it, he was Clyne’s father’s half brother and born of a different father and clan, though she didn’t understand the clan system very well. Luke had not applied to the Bureau, but had been recruited right out of the US marines.
“How you feeling?” he asked.
“Bored,” she said.
He laughed, his generous smile coming easily on his broad mouth.
“Well, there’s worse things,” said Luke.
His hair was short, his frame was athletic and slim and he only vaguely resembled Clyne around the eyes and brows.
Cassidy stared at Luke and wondered what Clyne’s mother had looked like because she was Amanda’s biological mother, too.
“What?” said Luke.
“Did you know Clyne’s mother?”
“Of course.”
“What was she like?”
He gave her an odd look, but answered. “Beautiful. Strong. Protective of her kids.”
Cassidy nodded. Strong and beautiful, just like Clyne, she realized.
Why was she comparing everyone to Clyne Cosen? With any luck she wouldn’t have to see him again. Her stomach twisted, knowing from her attorney that she would lose. Clinging to the only loophole allowed in the Indian Child Welfare Act. Thank God her daughter had turned twelve last June. Of course neither had known her real birthday until recently and had always celebrated on her adoption day on February 19.
“Where’ve you been?” she asked.
His eyes did that thing, the quick narrowing before his face returned to a congenial expression.
“Luke?”
He chuckled. “I must be losing my edge. I was with Tully and with Gabe Cosen. They’re both on the joint task force.”
She knew that Gabe had been invited belatedly to the joint drug enforcement task force that had been behind the operation to find the mobile meth lab and precursor needed to make the drugs. They had done an end run around Gabe, the chief of the tribal police force, and her partner because they were both Black Mountain Apache and therefore also suspects. Reasonable precaution, she had thought at the time. Now she felt differently.
“Listen, I’m sorry they left you out of the loop,” she said.
“Yeah. Me, too.” He gave her a long look. “You sure you’re okay? You had a close call today.”
“Yeah.” Cassidy waved away his concerns as if they were smoke.
She refused to think about it, refused to consider that her daughter might have been left without a mother, again. Would Amanda then be turned over to her birth family?
She focused on what Luke had said. “So does Tully think this has to do with the bust on Black Mountain?”
“It might. Might be someone after Obella Chemicals. Hell, it might be someone from Obella Chemicals.”
“In other words, they have no leads.”
Forrest shook his head.
“Tully said that he thinks Clyne Cosen was the target. Gabe Cosen agrees and wants his brother to have added security detail when off the rez.”
“Reasonable,” said Cassidy.
Forrest rubbed his chin and Cassidy knew he was holding back.
“Spill it.”
“Your name came up as a possibility, too.” He gave an apologetic shrug.
Her first reaction was indignation but she reined that in. “They figure how I shot myself in the back?”
Forrest chuckled. “Yeah, that did put a chink in their theory.”
“Anyway, we’re trying to get Clyne to accept protection. He’s resisting,” said Forrest.
“You think Tully will pick you?” Luke Forrest would make sense. He spoke Apache, knew the culture and the tribe. He’d blend in while the other agents would stick out like flies on rice.
“Don’t know. Doesn’t matter if Clyne won’t take us up on the offer. Plus we’re still on cleanup with the Raggar case.”
Which was proving much easier now that Gabe Cosen was on board. They had the meth lab and the precursor and were working on shutting down the distribution ring, run by mob boss Cesaro Raggar, currently in federal prison. She knew this because she’d been pissed not to get that assignment herself, when she was the one who’d responded to Gabe Cosen’s call for backup once the precursor had been located. “How’s the youngest brother doing?”
“Kino?” Luke rubbed his neck reflexively in the place his youngest nephew had taken a bullet. “Healing. And back to work on the tribal force.”
As a tribal police officer, she knew. He’d also been a Shadow Wolf working on the border, tracking smugglers with his brother Clay. The Shadow Wolves were an elite team of Native American trackers working under Immigration and Customs Enforcement to hunt and apprehend drug traffickers on the Arizona border.
