Chapter 1
“Deming? Are you insane?” Special Agent Vincent Modena was in the back of the FBI’s surveillance van, kneeling knee to knee with Special Agent Cynthia Deming, the task force’s profiler. It wasn’t Deming who was the problem; it was the five-pound flounder she held by the gills. It was staring at him, and smelled hideous.
“Your cover is a week-long fishing trip. You’re too clean.” Deming narrowed her blue eyes, and then slapped the fish against Vincent’s chest.
“Stop!” He grabbed her wrist, processing the moment. Rich, blond, gorgeous Cynthia Deming, in a black Dolce & Gabbana suit and heels, was on her knees swinging a fish. Nope. He was living it and still didn’t believe his eyes. Meanwhile, the flounder hung limp in the air between them. “I’m supposed to keep Avery Coppola in the diner, Deming. Hit me with that again, and the smell will chase her out.” She broke his grip, seemingly teetering between agreeing and having another go at him with the fish.
Special Agent Jack Benton, FBI task force team leader, jumped from the van’s passenger seat into the back. “What the hell?” He grimaced, glaring at the profiler and Vincent, as if Vincent had anything to do with the fish. He didn’t.
“Exactly,” Vincent said. “What the hell, Deming?”
“What’s with the fish?” Benton’s black hair hung in his face, obscuring the intensity in his blue-eyed gaze. His year-long deep embed with Dante Coppola’s syndicate crashed and burned yesterday, requiring the task force to extract him. His split lip hinted at the bruises and abrasions hidden beneath his conservative black suit and tie, but it was the banked rage that made his team nervous. Benton hadn’t taken time off to shake his role of gunrunner, and some deep embeds needed more recovery time than others, but he’d escaped with a lead, so Benton wasn’t going anywhere. The lead was, Coppola hired contract killers to find and kill his ex-wife and her little sister. Rumor had it, when she’d divorced him three years ago, the ex-wife left with incriminating files. Now, Coppola knew where the ex-wife was, and so did Benton. It appeared as if the task force lucked out and got here first.
“The fish is necessary for authenticity,” Deming said. “Modena’s too…” She waved a hand at him. “Handsome.”
“Hey, Benton.” Vincent held Deming gaze and then winked. “Deming thinks I’m handsome.”
She shook her head, barely paying attention to Vincent. “Maybe clean is a better word. After a week of backcountry camping, he wouldn’t be this clean.” She used the back of her wrist to nudge a blond lock off her cheek. “No one sleeps outside for a week, lives off fresh catch of the day, and doesn’t suffer from puffy face and bad hair. Avery’s clever and distrustful. She’s had to be to escape detection for three years with a sister in tow. With contract killers on her scent, she’ll smell a rat if Modena doesn’t commit to his backstory.”
“She’ll smell something.” Special Agent Harris Gilroy was the task force’s official driver. Blond hair cropped to his head, brown eyes, mid-thirties, he looked like an Irish bare-knuckle fighter, crooked nose and all.
“His backpack is enough of a prop,” Benton said. “Get rid of the fish, Deming.”
“Fine.” She tossed it into a Styrofoam cooler, and then stripped off her latex gloves, throwing them inside, too. She seemed on edge. Yesterday’s violent extraction of Benton had notably rattled her, rattled them all, as did the dead bodies the team left behind. And when Deming was rattled, she distracted herself with details—like Vincent’s backstory and a fish—so Vincent tried not to take the fish assault personally.
“Our warrant is to surveil Avery Coppola’s apartment,” Benton said. “Unfortunately, I couldn’t convince the judge that rumored files containing alleged evidence is grounds for a search warrant, so we watch and wait for Coppola’s men to make their move. If the files are in her apartment, she either surrenders them, or we need probable cause to take them. If Coppola’s men find her, maybe make a move on her at the apartment, we’ve got them and our probable cause, so cross your fingers. Modena, you keep an eye on her at the diner while we set up the cameras outside of her apartment. I want any potential attack on video. Let a judge and jury see who these monsters are, and if we’re forced to bust into her apartment to save her, and happen to find evidence, they’ll be forced to make our findings admissible in court. Time is short, folks. We have no idea when Coppola’s men will show, but this isn’t rocket science. If she has files, which my contact assured me she does, it’s probably hidden in her apartment. Coppola’s men have to know that.”
“Yeah, about that, Benton,” Deming said. “I think I should go in the diner instead of Modena. Look at him. He looks dangerous. She’ll think he’s a contract killer, maybe run, and ruin the whole operation. We can think of a different backstory for me.”
“Deming, you’d be walking into a backwoods diner wearing Dolce & Gabbana,” Vincent said. “Do you really think you’ll get anywhere near her without making her suspicious? And Benton knows I have advantages you don’t have.” He allowed a slow smile to crack his lips. “Leave the ex-wife to me.”
She shook her head, still not convinced. “But—”
“I know. I know. I’m handsome, clean, and dangerous.” Vincent winked, trying not to enjoy Deming’s annoyance too much. Being on the sidelines was twisting her in knots. She wanted in on the action, and he didn’t blame her, but he’d waited too long to meet Avery Coppola to just give this moment away. “I think you’re crushing on me.”
“Blow me, Modena.” She turned toward Benton, waiting for his decision.
“We stick with the plan,” Benton said. “Modena, go.”
Gilroy reached into a console between the two front seats and produced a bottle of Febreze. He aimed it into the back of the van and sprayed with no concern for whom he doused. Between the fish smell, and being gassed by Gilroy, Vincent found it a relief to spill out into the parking lot, backpack slung over his shoulder.
As the task force sped off in the van, heading down the street toward Avery Coppola’s apartment, Vincent walked toward the diner, passing a multitude of beat up SUVs and trucks, listening to his hiking boots crunch gravel underfoot. The chirping of birds, the breezes rustling through maple and oak leaves, it was a nice change from the city. August in the North Country of New Hampshire, mountainous. Vincent was enjoying himself, and the diner’s aromas wafting through the air. His stomach growled as he approached the door, but his thoughts were all on the woman inside.
Avery Coppola. Damn. Her name had been popping up in the Coppola case for a year now, but Vincent had only actively studied her for the last few months. He was a little ashamed to be this excited about meeting her…Dante Coppola’s one vulnerability. Avery was the crime lord’s ex-wife, so probably poison, without conscience. Totally his type. Vincent’s ex-wife taught him a thing or two about women like that. On his second tour in Afghanistan, she’d sent him a Dear John letter paper clipped to divorce papers. It had a way of changing a man’s paradigm real quick. It certainly forced Vincent to see things more clearly. Women were mercurial at best, self-serving at worst. It was weird to know he had something in common with a murderous crime lord. Both he and Coppola married women who’d betrayed them.
He’d memorized Avery’s pictures. She had the look of an innocent, red-headed imp, and seemed younger than her years. She certainly didn’t look like someone who could inspired an ex-husband to hire contract killers to off her. Not a sterling personal recommendation, and yet, the contradiction tickled Vincent’s curiosity. What would she be like? Or rather, how best to bend her to his will?
Benton wanted to try and flip her, see if they could convince her to give up the goods on her ex, rather than make the Feds slog for the evidence, but they didn’t have enough intel to know how best to approach her. Deming, the task force’s profiler, suggested they feel her out with some casual conversation. Benton had tapped Vincent, and he’d report back to the team after they’d finished installing security cameras around her apartment.
Just meeting her would probably answer most of the questions his team had. Then, if all went as planned, they’d find the leverage they needed to flip her, and she’d help break open the task force’s RICO case against her ex-husband. If that went south, she’d either face jail time or risk a bullet between the eyes. Dante Coppola wasn’t pulling his hit on her anytime soon, and now that he knew where she was, she had a target on her back. The FBI would offer her protection, if she was willing to deal, but they couldn’t make her accept their help. No, that would take persuasion. And that was where Vincent came in.
He smiled as he opened the diner’s door. A bell chimed overhead, announcing his arrival. It was old-fashioned and kitschy, and he liked it. As he stepped inside, he finally admitted to himself that he’d been anticipating this meeting with Avery Coppola since he’d first seen her photo nearly a year ago. He was excited, and when his gaze zeroed in on her behind the diner’s counter, his chest tightened because he knew… This was going to be fun. Lots and lots of fun.