Incriminating Evidence (10 page)

“You’re right. I’m worn-out. Let’s get some rest and we can get a full day’s work in tomorrow.”

* * *

Jessica had given it a lot of thought, and she wanted to make sure that she was getting to the bottom of this maze of organized crime. Yeah, Ford gave his FBI orders, but she didn’t work for the bureau. She intended to work both cases and find the truth. There was still a nagging feeling deep within her that something was off. That Luke was being set up. But she was clearly in the minority in that belief. And she couldn’t make her opinion known too loudly or else they might cut her out altogether. No, she just needed some time to look into everything herself.

Dressed and ready to go, she walked into the kitchen to find that Zach was also up and drinking coffee.

“Good morning,” he said.

“I’ve been thinking,” she countered.

“Uh-oh.” He smiled. “What’s on your mind?”

“I want to go down to the harbor today and check it out. Remember what Will said. There’s still a chance that something is going on this weekend with Ana’s drug operation. And I don’t want to lose that opportunity. Something could be happening right now.”

“I don’t think you’ll see anything in broad daylight at the marina or at the dock. Unless we have actionable evidence to open up those shipping containers and carts, we might as well be looking at crates full of legal materials. Without a warrant, it would be a futile exercise.”

She poured coffee for herself and looked into Zach’s eyes. “What’s your suggestion, then? We’ve been given the green light to keep up our work.”

“If you’re totally set on looking to see what is happening at the harbor, then we should at least wait until nightfall and then do some recon. The tip from Will was vague. We don’t know the location of this supposed event that’s going to go down. It could be at one their front businesses and not at the harbor.”

“If you think the harbor trip isn’t worthwhile, then I’d like to scope out her establishments. We don’t have to wait until tonight to do that, do we?”

“No. We can do that now if you’d like. But we can only accomplish so much.”

“I haven’t even seen these two places. I’d like to at least survey the scene and check for anything suspicious. It can’t hurt to take a look.”

“All right. You ready?” he asked.

“Yes. I’m eager to get to work,” she answered.

By the time they had reached the area of town where Ana’s dry cleaning business was, Jessica had become anxious. Yes, it was her idea to do this, but she started to get a little worried that Mick might have his men on the lookout for her.

“The dry cleaner’s is a few blocks away. I’ll park in this public lot and we can walk around.”

She took in her surroundings. “I don’t know what I expected, but this isn’t really it,” she said.

“Yeah, a bit more upscale than what you would assume for a criminal enterprise. But that’s the way for the Hernandez family,” Zach said. “We’ll look around here, and then we can take it from there. Mainly I just want to get the lay of the land.”

“I got it.”

“And stay close to me. Even though Mick seems to have called a mini-truce so that you can take down Luke doesn’t mean Ana or Simon feel the same way.”

“I know there’s going to be risks involved here. I’ve come to terms with that, and I’m not afraid. Anxious maybe but not scared.”

“Because God has your back.”

“Yes. He’s got both of our backs. That doesn’t mean I’m going to be careless, but I’m also not going to live in fear.” She stuck close by his side as they walked in silence for three blocks. Jessica remained vigilant and aware of her surroundings, and she could tell that Zach was, as well. They were both focused on the job they needed to get done. She wasn’t naive enough to think that she was totally in the clear from threats.

“It’s going to be up ahead on the right,” he said.

She looked up toward where the dry cleaner’s was, and then she suddenly stopped short and took his hand in hers, squeezing hard. “Wait.”

“What’s wrong?” he asked. He immediately stopped walking.

“That’s Ana Hernandez right there, walking out of the store and headed this way. Straight toward us. We can’t let her see that we’re down here.”

“Come on,” he said. He grabbed tightly on to her arm. They crossed the street and started walking away from Ana.

“That was close,” she said. Her heartbeat thumped wildly.

“Yeah, we’ll do a loop and then come back.”

She tried to focus on steadying her breathing. “Do you think she saw us?”

He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

They were walking at a rapid pace, and she didn’t want to turn around and look to see where Ana was. “I guess that means she’s actually an active business owner and doesn’t just operate from afar.”

“There isn’t any doubt that she’s operating a legitimate business. The issue is what else is she running through there and how do we get proof of it.”

Suddenly an idea struck her. “What if we could befriend someone who works in the dry cleaner’s?”

“It’s a good idea, but that would mean one of Ana’s workers turning on her. I’d say there’s zero chance of that happening.”

“We’d have to offer them something that would make it worth it.”

“I don’t know, Jess. Given the reputation of the family, I can’t imagine it would be that feasible to turn someone unless they had something major and we could give them a new life. I doubt either of those things would be possible for one of her employees.”

“Well, there’s already one CI. Why not develop another source? Especially since I’m in the dark on the details of the one that’s in play.”

“As I explained before, it normally takes years of working for the family before you’d get access to any actionable evidence that would be worth something to us to be a legal case.”

“Okay, but what about if it’s not someone who is a CI or turns on Ana? What if we just try to look for an inside source that we can work for information? Maybe not hard evidence per se that we’d use to make our case, but general intel on the operations that could lead us to a bust. It’s possible that one of Ana’s employees might know something without even realizing it. If we ask the right questions, we might just find something that could help us out.”

“I think that idea is much more workable. But the two of us can’t just stroll in there together and start asking questions. And for all we know, Ana has the place under surveillance.”

“How about we stand watch until one of the people who works there leaves for lunch or at the end of their shift?”

“I like that thought, but I still think only one of us should talk to them. And only if the opportunity presents itself where it would make sense. There are a lot of variables at play here.”

As they made their way back around the extended loop and toward the store, Jessica was feeling as though they had a solid plan. “I’m feeling good about this. Like we actually have something we can start working on in addition to trying to build a case from the paper records that the FBI has accumulated.”

“I do, too. Now we’ll just need to hone in on the right person and hope for the best.”

They walked toward the dry cleaner’s and then paused at the stoplight, waiting for it to change so they could cross the street.

When the white walk sign lit up, Jessica started to cross the street with Zach close by her side.

She was startled by the sound of screeching tires. When she looked up, Jessica saw that a dark SUV was plowing ahead through the red light and headed straight for them.

TEN

Z
ach saw the oncoming SUV and acted on pure instinct as he grabbed Jessica into his arms, ran a few steps and then rolled to the safety of the sidewalk.

He let out a breath as he saw the vehicle fly by, missing them by only a few steps.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

She looked at him with wide eyes but didn’t speak. Her breathing was ragged, and he could feel her taking breaths as her shoulders rose and fell. A few people gathered around the area, but surprisingly they hadn’t drawn that much attention to themselves.

“Jessica,” he said. “Are you hurt? Speak to me.”

“I...” she stuttered. “I don’t know.”

He realized that she might be going into shock. They had hit the ground hard. His top priority had been trying to save Jessica’s life. But that had been entirely too close. Thank the Lord that he’d been able to react. “Jess, I’m going to help you up off the sidewalk. Can you try to stand?”

“I think so,” she said softly.

He didn’t think she had major physical injuries, but was more affected emotionally from what had just happened. He couldn’t blame her. But he had to be strong enough for the both of them right now.

Slowly he helped lift her off the sidewalk and onto her feet. “How are you feeling now?”

“Wow,” she said. “That was surreal. Like out of a movie.”

“Much too close if you ask me. Are you able to walk?”

She took a step and nodded. “Yes. Nothing feels like it’s broken. But that was a hard fall. Will probably be a bit sore.”

He took her hand in his. “I’m so sorry about that.”

“Don’t apologize. If you hadn’t acted, I’d be much worse off. Probably dead.”

He didn’t even want to think about that. “All right. This recon session is over for now. I need to get you back to the safe house so we can figure out what in the world is going on.”

“Why would Mick send someone after me so soon? He wants me working the case against Luke.”

“Maybe it wasn’t directly from Mick. It could’ve come from Simon or Ana. Or Mick could’ve already been tipped off that you were nosing around down here in Ana’s territory and sent someone.”

“I still can’t believe that if you hadn’t acted so quickly...”

“That’s why I’m here.” He was thankful that he had been able to act. There was always that piece of doubt inside him as to whether he was truly ready after he finished Quantico.

“Thank God you were.”

“I’m just glad you’re okay.”

“I’ll feel a lot better once we get back to the safe house.” She squeezed his hand tightly. He felt a fierce need to protect her at all costs.

On the drive back, he gave her a few minutes to calm down and get her head around what had happened. “This was too dangerous,” he said. “I miscalculated the threat, thinking it would be fine to do the recon near Ana’s place. Obviously I was wrong about that.”

“You couldn’t have known.”

“I should have, though. Another rookie mistake.” He gripped the wheel, upset that he’d taken an unnecessary risk with Jessica. “They’re starting to add up on me.”

“Don’t be too hard on yourself, Zach. I think we all thought that Mick was going to lay off me and that he’s the one ultimately calling the shots. We didn’t place enough weight on what Ana and Simon might do if left to their own devices.”

“We’ll need to let everyone know what happened. I’ll have to deal with the fallout of my decision to take you down there in the first place. This might get me removed from the case.”

She reached over and touched his arm lightly. “Zach, you literally just saved my life. I think you should give yourself a break. We still don’t know exactly what is going on and who tried to take me out. And we were told to continue our investigation. How were we expected to do that unless we got out there and tried to run down leads?”

“After this attack, the uncertainty just fuels my thinking that we have to go back into more of a lockdown mode.”

“But once again, how can we investigate out of the safe house?”

“I know you’re upset, but we can still do a lot from there. And I’m not saying we can’t do other things, but going back into the hornets’ nest probably isn’t the best thing. The whole block could be covered with Hernandez cameras.”

Jessica didn’t respond, and he watched as she leaned her head back against the seat and closed her eyes. He didn’t know whether she was resting or thinking or praying. So he just let her be.

When they arrived back to the safe house, Jessica said she needed a few minutes alone. And he totally got that. This attempt on her life had been far too close of a call. They’d let down their guards an inch, and this was the result. He wouldn’t make that mistake again—that was for sure.

He’d texted Brodie to stop by. When his supervisor got there, Zach recounted the entire series of events to him.

“Why did you think it was a good idea to go down to the dry cleaner’s? What did you hope to gain?” Brodie frowned.

Before Zach could respond, Brodie kept on talking.

“I guess sometimes I have to remind myself that you’re the new kid. You’ve handled so much up to this point—even the mishap in the courtroom really was understandable to me. But I need to be more involved to help prevent you from making these kinds of errors. I don’t have to tell you how costly this could’ve been.”

“I deserve all of this,” Zach said. “I get that. But we also need to think about the nature of the threat, and how it fits within the bigger puzzle.”

“Where’s Jessica?” Brodie asked.

“She’s in her room. This really shook her up. We took quite a tumble out there. It was the only way to save her life.”

“I don’t know what Ian and Ford will want to do, but my guess is that they’ll want Jessica to stay here until we know more of what’s going on.”

“Yeah. Do you think that Mick would come after her again this soon even if he realized she was down there by Ana’s business?”

“I can see him sending out a warning shot, but this sounds more like a direct hit to me. I doubt Mick would’ve gone through this whole song and dance with Jessica just to turn around and order her to be taken out. If I had to say, I’d think it’s more likely someone working for Ana because the woman has to know that she’s the next one on Jessica’s list. And yeah, Mick runs the show, but nothing stops his kids from making their own decisions. Especially if Ana feels like no one has her back here and that Jessica is on her trail. But if Mick knew that you two were snooping around down there, he wouldn’t be happy. We need to tighten this up before it’s too late.”

“I agree with you,” Zach said.

“What are you guys talking about?” Jessica slowly entered the kitchen. It was obvious to him that she was in a bit of pain given her awkward steps. But thankfully the color had come back to her cheeks. She was one tough woman.

“Jessica, I’m so glad that you’re okay,” Brodie told her.

“Thank you. It’s all because of Zach though. If it wasn’t for his quick thinking, I wouldn’t be standing here talking to you right now.”

She looked over at him, and he felt his heart constrict just a bit. “Thank you,” he said. There was no doubt in his mind that Jessica was much more to him than just his assignment. He cared for this woman. Keeping her safe meant everything to him. He wouldn’t let her down again by allowing her to be in the crosshairs.

“Zach and I were talking about who could’ve been behind this attack today,” Brodie said. “It doesn’t really matter because as far as I’m concerned the FBI position will be that you need to lay low, Jessica. There’s still a target on your back, and the threats could be coming from multiple fronts.”

She looked at Brodie. “I still need to be able to do my job, though. To be able to put together cases, just like I was tasked to do.”

“No one is saying you can’t work your cases,” Brodie said. “But we have to have some stronger ground rules for what kind of work you should be doing outside the safety of this place. Today could’ve gone a totally different direction as you very well know.”

She nodded. “I just hate to feel like I’m on the sidelines if I could do something more.”

“You’re far from the sidelines, Jessica,” Zach said. “But going directly into enemy territory is something else entirely.”

“I also think we’re about ready to move you to a new safe house. There’s been plenty of activity here lately. I’d be more comfortable with another move,” Brodie said.

“Have you heard anything else about Luke?” Jessica asked.

“Nothing,” Brodie answered. “They’re doing their best to track him down, but right now the trail is cold. That’s the thing with someone like Luke. He’s a cop, so he knows every trick in the book.”

“I know you two don’t want to hear this, but I still wonder if he’s fled because he knows he’s in danger—from all fronts.”

“Hopefully, we can find him and he can answer all of those questions and more for us,” Brodie said. “Before it’s too late.”

* * *

Jessica had accepted changing safe houses again. Although it seemed that just when she’d get comfortable in one place, they’d want to move. But after what had happened yesterday, she couldn’t really blame the FBI for being more cautious. If she was being honest with herself, that attempt on her life had totally shaken her up. It wasn’t the first time they’d come after her, but if Zach hadn’t been on top of his game, she’d be dead.

She had no doubt that the Lord was protecting her. Yes, Zach had done his part, but God had been watching over both of them yesterday. If they needed to take more precautions for the sake of safety, she wasn’t in a position to complain. This was deadly serious, and there was no turning back. She was in far too deep.

Because of the quasi lockdown, she was determined to make a lot of progress going through the electronic evidence records she had, including all the financials they had gathered so far in the investigation into Ana’s businesses. If she couldn’t work the cases on the ground, she could do what she did best—analyze evidence and make legal arguments to build a case.

Zach walked into the big living room that they had set up as a workroom with a large wooden table and multiple chairs. She sat there now and looked at him as he took a seat.

“How’s it going?” he asked.

“I’m reviewing all the current financial records that we were able to obtain from the subpoena.”

“I think I have some news that will make you happy.”

She looked up at him. “What is it?”

“Two things actually. First, I know you wanted us to try to talk to the workers at the dry cleaner’s. Obviously, you and I can’t do that now. But I’ve talked to Brodie and we’re going to send in a couple of undercover agents to sniff around and see if they can get any of Ana’s employees talking.”

“That is good news.”

“And there’s more.” He pulled an envelope out of his pocket and handed it to her.

“What’s this?”

“In there is another electronic file that was just dropped off here by one of our agents. I’m told it’s a treasure trove of documents from our confidential informant.”

Now that was something to get excited about. “I can’t wait to review all the documents and see what kind of case we can really start building.” She started putting together possible scenarios in her mind before she even popped the drive into the laptop to start looking.

“Any preliminary thoughts on charges?” he asked.

“Obviously the drug-trafficking charge would be huge if we could get enough evidence. If we have better evidence this time, then the same charges we brought against Simon could be brought against Ana with regard to the money laundering. But I need to be able to make the drug charges stick, or this case won’t have real legs. I don’t know if Ian would be on board with bringing another money laundering case so soon against the Hernandez family. If we go in, we want to bring something big to the table.”

“Hit them with everything we have,” Zach said.

“Yeah, but I don’t want to jump to any conclusions about what will happen. Ideally, I’d like to examine all the evidence we have and then start making determinations about what type of charges are appropriate. We can’t afford another not-guilty verdict. I know Ian doesn’t want the prosecutor’s office to look incompetent. It would be a bad reflection on me, of course, but also him and everyone else in the office. With Simon, at least we could provide the explanation about Denise’s murder after the fact. But the public will expect something better from us next time.”

“That makes total sense to me. You want to go out strong this time because last time you felt you were in an uphill battle.”

“That’s an understatement.”

He reached out and touched her forearm. “How are you really doing, Jess?”

As she looked into his eyes she understood that he wanted to see how she was holding up. “I’m pushing through.”

“You don’t have to shoulder this by yourself. I’m here, too.” He moved his hand down her arm and took her hand. “It hit me that you could’ve been killed, and I didn’t really even know how to think about a world without you in it.”

Her heart hurt hearing his tender words. Because deep down she was still worried that she may not be the woman that he needed. “Zach, I feel like you’re putting me up on some pedestal, and I’m worried that I won’t ever live up to your expectations.”

“Why would you say something like that?” He squeezed her hand.

“Because I want you to be happy, and I’m not sure I’m capable of being the person to bring that to you. I don’t know if you fully comprehend how deep my bruises go.”

“I can’t pretend to know what you went through as a child, but I can say that the woman who is sitting in front of me now isn’t weak. She’s a strong and independent person who is fulfilling her goals and not backing down to any threat—no matter how large.”

“I may put on a brave face, but there are times when I am anything but.”

“Jess, don’t you realize that’s just part of being human? We all have doubts and fears. Insecurities and hang-ups.”

She shook her head. “Yes, but those feelings don’t totally define most people. I sometimes feel trapped by everything that has happened to me. It’s almost suffocating.” She couldn’t believe that she was baring her deepest fears and thoughts with this man. That scared her.