A Covert Affair (Deadly Ops #5)(18)
He might have told Burkhart there was no way Amelia would have sold him out to Mercado, but what if after meeting with Maria she’d changed her mind? What if she was involved in all this after all?
She could blow his cover, a cover the NSA had spent years building. Not only that, but she could tip off whoever had taken the women that someone was looking into them. If the kidnappers got spooked, they might decide it was easier to kill the women they’d taken and close up shop. Since the NSA didn’t know what their end game was, it was impossible to narrow down the many possibilities of what could happen.
The one thing he did know, if Amelia was involved with taking and hurting women, he’d bring her in himself.
Chapter 5
Classified information: information held back from universal circulation for reasons of national security.
As the gate to Bayside closed behind Amelia, she pulled her phone from her clutch. Certain no one was following her as she steered out onto the street, she felt her hand still trembling slightly as she dialed Detective Joel Sinclair. The shaking was from the culmination of the night’s events: from seeing Nathan, to being randomly rammed on the road, and now not knowing what was going on with a woman she considered a friend. It was all too much to handle. She turned on her Jeep’s Bluetooth system so she’d be hands-free as the phone started to ring.
When she realized it was close to one in the morning, she cringed. Crap, Sinclair was probably asleep—or with someone. The handsome detective would never want for female company, she was sure. Feeling guilty, she started to end the call when he picked up.
“Amelia?” His voice was raspy, but not groggy. “What’s up? You okay?”
“Yeah, listen, I’m sorry—I just realized the time. I shouldn’t have called. We can talk in a few hours—”
“Nah, I’m up. Seriously, I’m on a stakeout, bored out of my mind, sitting in an unmarked right now drinking stale coffee.”
She laughed lightly. “You’re such a liar.”
“But a handsome one.”
Her lips curved up. He’d been just as cocky the first time she met him years ago. He and some other detectives came into Plátanos Maduros a couple of times a week and she’d formed a friendship with him. “That’s true. And so humble.”
He snorted. “So, why are you calling this early?” Now it was all business.
She was thankful because she didn’t think she had the energy for more small talk. Feeling paranoid, she glanced in the rearview mirror. “I . . . God, I don’t even know where to start.”
“Try the beginning.”
She sighed, not sure where that was. So she decided to start with the auction tonight—leaving out any mention of Nathan/Miguel—and how Maria asked her to meet her at Bayside. Sinclair was familiar with Bayside, as many of the local police were. As she drove, she told him about their meeting in Maria’s office, all the paperwork Maria had shown her, and her claim that Cade was part of the FBI.
When she was done, he let out a low whistle. “That’s a whole lot of information.”
“I know.” Amelia took another random turn, not wanting to go directly home just yet. She wanted to be certain she wasn’t being followed.
“And you say twelve of these women worked for you?”
“Yeah. Can you look into them? I want to see if what Maria is telling me is the truth and I also want to know if her husband is who he says.”
“You think they might be lying?”
“I don’t know. I can’t imagine why they would. Unless they wanted to see how much I knew about the missing women because . . .” She left the thought hanging in space, not wanting to voice any more when Sinclair could draw his own conclusion.
He was silent for a moment and she could hear him scribbling on paper. They’d been friends long enough that she knew he was writing down everything she’d told him, probably using bullet points. He had an interesting shorthand.
Finally he spoke. “This is tricky, since these women are of legal age and haven’t actually been reported missing by anyone—at least according to Maria. You know the full names of your twelve offhand?”
Amelia quickly rattled them off, also listing other information she remembered about the women off the top of her head. “I’ll get you more information later today once I get a chance to look at my employee records.”
“This is good for now, but yeah, get me everything you have. I’ve got a serious caseload at the moment, but I’ll make time for this. Give me a day to enter this information into various databases and I’ll see what pops up.”
Relief slid through her. “Thank you for this. And I’m sorry for calling you so late.”
“No worries, I’m glad you came to me.” There was no trace of his sleep in his voice now. The workaholic detective was firmly in place.
“Listen, something else happened on my way to meet Maria. I thought it was possibly random, but now I don’t know. I mean, it might be, but—”
“Amelia, just spit it out.”
She relayed the “incident,” as she’d started to think about it, for the third time that night. Thankfully Sinclair agreed to make a report for her—that she’d simply have to read and sign—and see if he could tag the license plate of the driver who’d attacked her using a traffic cam. Now she felt stupid for not thinking about that before. There were so many traffic cams that of course the police would be able to find something. Or at least look, especially since she’d run a red light. The cameras automatically took pictures of people who ran red lights. She hadn’t been thinking earlier, though, just reacting.