Operation Christmas Contraband, Super Agent Romantic Suspense Series, Book 6 Read online

  The children played tag and ran circles around Conrad, laughing and knocking into him as they tried to smack each other. He watched, feigning amusement and keeping his focus on the woman.

  She was definitely waiting for him. Her eyes kept darting to the striped band of his hat. So what had happened to good ol’ Ramon?

  The shit radar ratcheted up more in his head, but Con shut it down. A change in plans was annoying, but missions never went according to plan. Why would this be the exception?

  Extracting himself from the playful kids, he ran contingency strategies through his brain. First, he had to find Ramon. Then he’d figure out Plan B.

  He stepped in the woman’s direction, but before he made it to her, someone bumped into his right arm. Hard. Another woman, smaller, Caucasian, and swinging a massive blue tote bag piled past him, knocking him out of the way.

  A woman with nice legs.

  Goddammit.

  Julia hustled up to the table of statues and smiled at the young woman and the stall owner, acting all enthralled with the goods for sale and trying to engage them in her halting Spanish. Strands of hair had come loose from her ponytail and blew across the back of her neck.

  The owner smiled sweetly at her and patiently listed the prices of the various souvenirs. Julia thanked her and began examining the Virgin Marys.

  How had she found him and what the hell was she doing?

  She lifted a statue and looked at the young woman, whose attention was still locked on Conrad. “Another day in paradise, huh?”

  Paradise. Jesus. How did she know his code word for Ramon?

  The woman’s gaze did a quick shift to Julia’s smiling puss, her brown eyes rounding before they double-checked Con and went back to Julia. The code word meant something to her.

  Ramon, you cad. Sending this gal in his place in case things got ugly.

  At the same time, he mentally gave the guy a high five. Ramon had sent a cutout in his place. Smart…and not in the mad scientist way.

  Which explained how he’d eluded Cuba’s intelligence service the past three weeks and gotten in touch with the CIA.

  “Paradise,” the young woman said in English, her voice heavy with a French accent, “is highly overrated.”

  Correct coded response? Check.

  And Julia knew it. She peeked at Conrad and gave him a wink.

  Seriously. Going. To. Kill. Her.

  Finally reaching the stall, he pretended interest in a pile of colorful Guayabera shirts and forced himself not to reach out and strangle his wife.

  She paid for a statue and stuck it in her bag. “Are you familiar with the island?” she asked the woman. “I’m afraid I’ve ventured off the vacation property looking for this historical church…”

  Rustling through her bag, Julia pulled a map from the seemingly bottomless tote and pointed to a spot on it. “It’s the one with the black saints? I know it’s around here somewhere and I want to get a picture of it for my mom—she’s a nut about Catholic stuff—but I’m totally lost. Can you show me where it is?”

  From the corner of his eye, Conrad saw the woman give him one last hesitant glance before nodding at Julia. “Come with me. I’ll take you to it.”

  Con let them get ahead by a hundred yards, watching Julia and those sexy legs walk away.

  Gonna be some ’splainin to do.

  On both their parts.

  The stalls didn’t have a solid end point, they sort of trailed haphazardly out from the center like a dog’s tail. He paid for the shirt, slipped behind the booth, and changed into it. Tossed his hat and the other shirt, and donned the new sunglasses. Then he followed, palming his encrypted phone and making a call, as he surreptitiously watched Julia and the cutout hoof it on a dirt trail and disappear around a bend.

  When Smitty picked up, Conrad lowered his voice. “You sold me out.”

  A pregnant pause. “She was going to blow the mission.”

  “Goddamn woman makes me crazy. She just stole my mark.”

  “Stole him?”

  “His cutout. He sent someone in his place.”

  Another silent beat as Smitty considered the reason. “He’s either very smart or you’re walking into a setup.”

  “Nothing to gain by screwing over Sam.” As in Uncle Sam. “But other benefactors may have offered him a deal. He might want us to sweeten the pot.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  Dreadlocks stepped out from behind a group of palm trees and headed up the footpath on the women’s trail.

  Con’s gut went Code Red. Who was that goddamn bastard? “I’m going to save my wife’s ass, then kill her.”

  Smitty snorted. “Good luck with that.”

  Seven

  Dreadlocks was too obvious to be an operative. Con shadowed him covertly without any trouble. The guy stalled out ten yards from the church and stood in the shadows of a cluster of fig trees, eyeing the place and pacing as if raging some internal war over whether to enter.

  He’d been surveilling Con, then switched to tailing the women. Why?

  It was a one-room relic from a previous era, and all but deserted, even this time of year. Hence, the reason Stone had picked it for the exchange of information. Con had to be sure Cabrera could come through on the formula.

  His mission was already off track and Team Pegasus was waiting for his go-ahead. It sucked they were waiting three klicks off the island, risking their lives to save a defector on Christmas Eve instead of being at home with their families. Conrad had a soft spot for their leader, Lt. Commander Lawson Vaughn, who happened to have saved Con’s most valuable operative a while back and was now the father of her unborn child. If this was blown—if Cabrera was playing games or had been captured by the commies—there was no reason for Vaughn and the others to tread water in the Caribbean.

  Nor for Conrad’s wife to be risking her backside.

  Man, she’d loved being a spy, as evidenced by this hot mess she’d dove into head first. He couldn’t understand why she’d thrown in the towel and defected to the FBI. She lived and breathed this shit as much as he did.

  But whatever, as Zara, his favorite operative and Vaughn’s pregnant girlfriend, liked to say. It was time to find out what Dreadlocks wanted and what the woman inside with Julia had to do with Ramon.

  Palming the small-caliber gun he’d purchased from a different kind of street vendor the previous night, Conrad left his hiding place and snuck up behind the guy.

  Dreadlocks had stopped pacing, but his body language still said he was dying to follow the women. Conrad stopped four feet back—just out of reach of the guy’s hands—and aimed at his chest. “Hands behind your head.”

  Though already tense, Dreadlocks stiffened another notch. His hands, small for his size and lacking even the slightest trace of dirt or calluses, rose slowly. “Kill me and you will lose the information you seek.”

  English, layered with a healthy Cuban accent and a boatload of Ivy League pomp.

  “Down on your knees.”

  After he reluctantly complied, Conrad removed a military issued knife from the man’s back waistband and circled him.

  The single photo Stone had showed him was of a Latino-skinned, clean-shaven male with the requisite scholarly eyeglasses. The man in front of him had the high cheekbones and intelligent air, but the dreadlocks and facial hair gave his features a completely different look.

  And where was the mole?

  The guy had covered it with makeup.

  Con tossed the knife into the bushes. “Where are your glasses?”

  Ramon Cabrera lowered his eyes and stared at the ground. “Broken in a scuffle with the police a few nights ago.”

  “The dreads are a nice touch.”

  The virologist’s gaze rose, suspicious and full of animosity. “You are the man sent to help me?”

  His tone suggested he doubted Conrad’s competence. Nothing like a hostile defector.

  He motioned with his chin. “Who’s that?”
/>   The fire went out of Cabrera. Just whoosh, all gone. His shoulders sagged, his body suddenly exhausted. “My girlfriend.”

  Greaaat. That made things so much easier. “You sent her in your place? Why?”

  A smidge of defiance returned to Ramon’s face. “I am wanted! It is dangerous for me to be out in public.”

  No shit. “Then why were you tailing me at the market? Why are you here at all?”

  “Marguerite insisted she make the initial contact, but I feared for her safety, so I stayed in the shadows. I had to make sure you weren’t going to hurt her.”

  His methods may have lacked finesse, but his intentions were honorable. Con motioned for him to stand. “Inside.”

  The church’s interior was dark and dusty. Julia and Marguerite stood near one of the few windows, Marguerite with her back to Jules and her shirt lifted.

  Black squiggles lined her skin. “What the hell is that?” Conrad asked as he neared them.

  “Pieces of the formula.” Julia didn’t even look up as she spoke. “The key is knowing how to put them together.”

  Since when did she know anything about scientific formulas?

  Cabrera caught his girlfriend’s eye and some heavy duty silent communication passed between them. The kind that came from being together a long time and knowing each other well. As Con glanced at Julia, he discovered she was sending him a similar message.

  Cabrera undid the tie at the waistband of his pants and—whoa, big fella— let them fall to the floor. His upper thighs were covered in similar coma-inducing squiggles. “Permanent marker. I had to write down what I could from memory. This was the only way I was sure I wouldn’t lose the vital parts of the formula.”

  Julia lowered Marguerite’s shirt. “We’re taking both of them.”

  “What?” Conrad shook his head. “Nothing doin’. Cabrera only.”

  Julia glared at him. “She’s pregnant.”

  Double—make that triple—shit.

  Cabrera hiked up his pants and grabbed Marguerite’s hand. “I will not leave without her.”

  If it had only been the defector, Conrad would have argued.

  But there stood Julia, hands on hips and that look in her eye that said he was screwed.

  Cabrera and his pregnant girlfriend. Package deal. How was he going to sell that to Stone?

  Con sighed, already running a new Plan B in his head. He wasn’t selling jack shit to Stone. He was simply going to do what he always did…cut his loses, save the good guys, and flip the bird at the commies.

  Taking out his phone, he texted a three-digit number to Vaughn.

  Just like that, Operation Christmas Contraband was back on.

  Eight

  2250 hours.

  Conrad followed his wife, staying hidden in the shadows, watching her back and listening for anything unexpected. Ramon was already at the meet site. Conrad had deposited him there earlier and established a communication unit link with Vaughn.

  The comm was secured in Conrad’s ear as Julia and Marguerite strolled the boardwalk under twinkling Christmas lights strung in the palm trees. They talked and laughed like old friends, Marguerite’s arm through Julia’s and Julia’s big blue tote bag, outfitted with several weapons, hanging from her other shoulder.

  Behind them, at the hotel, tourists and staff were busy celebrating, many preparing for midnight mass. On the beach, others did as well, just in a less formal manner, lighting bonfires and setting off fireworks.

  Perfect cover for the exfiltration.

  In the dark, Conrad checked his watch, keeping the lighted display covered with one hand. Go time was 2300 hours, rather than midnight. His gut had told him to take advantage of the drunken revelry consuming the island and get his package—or rather, packages—out as soon as possible.

  Team Pegasus had confirmed they could meet at the rendezvous point one hour earlier than originally instructed. Another thing Conrad admired about Vaughn. The man knew how to flow with the tide—sometimes literally, as in this case with a rescue at sea—and still get the job done. Pegasus and the sub they were coming in on would be at the meet point at 2300 to pick up their precious cargo.

  The package came with a bonus. Michael Stone would be pissed Conrad had brought Marguerite along until he found out she was a French nuclear scientist who’d been working on the Frenchie’s Iter—a fusion reactor set up to generate the next great category of non-fossil-fuel energy. While Marguerite had a valid passport and wasn’t on the run from anyone, she wanted her child to be born in America. And the Iter project had experienced mountains of delays and problems from the European community.

  Of course, Julia had promised the woman whatever she wanted, but his wife wasn’t in charge of this mission, no matter how much she tried. Conrad had cut a deal with Marguerite…the CIA would take her with Ramon, but in return, she had to agree to share her knowledge on cold fusion and work with U.S. scientists in whatever capacity Uncle Sam deemed necessary for at least five years.

  He didn’t know a damn thing about her job or how the French would respond to him stealing a valuable scientist from under their noses, and he didn’t care. What he did know was how to manipulate people into a win-win situation.

  Julia thought he was a cad to blackmail a woman who was in love and wanting a better life for her child, but Marguerite and Ramon were getting a damn good deal in return.

  Marguerite had known it, too. She hadn’t even blinked at his proposal before saying yes.

  The boat dock was a mile north of the hotel. Not a short jaunt, but an important one. The place was a crazy mix of commercial vessels, small, private yachts, and common crafts. The vessel of choice Conrad would be stealing was a handy little go-fast. Speedy, powerful and compact, they were often used by smugglers to outrun the Coast Guard.

  Ramon was already tucked in the silver boat’s cargo hold, the owners tied up with a legal matter Conrad had created to be sure they didn’t decide to spend Christmas on the water.

  Every few yards, he double-checked the area, making sure Julia and Marguerite weren’t being followed. With the exception of running children and locals headed to town for the festivities, the women didn’t encounter many. In the shadows, he cataloged everyone they did. None dinged his oh-shit meter. No military, cops, or home-grown bounty hunters looking for a score tonight.

  Still, he didn’t relax. He wouldn’t until he and Julia were home.

  The dock came into sight. A few partiers on various boats, some docked, others floating in the warm waters under a sliver of moon. Another plus…not a full one to spotlight the exfil.

  Keeping the strolling women in his field of vision, he sped up and reached the go-fast before they hit the first slip. It was docked in the shadow of the owner’s second vessel, a medium-sized yacht at the end. A last check assured him no one was watching him or following Julia.

  Abandoning his guard dog stance and using the yacht for cover, he snuck over to his desired destination. As expected, the windows were dark and no sounds emerged from it. The water surrounding the go-fast was dark and quiet, tiny waves lapping against the hull.

  It would be a straight shot out to the SS Seawolf’s coordinates and Team Pegasus. Estimated time from dock to submarine: five minutes, twenty-seven seconds.

  Mission accomplished, country served, wife happy.

  Merry Christmas to me.

  Conrad slid behind the wheel, gave the cargo door two swift taps to let Ramon know he was there and hotwired the engine.

  The power boat roared to life and hummed under his ass as he confirmed the weapons secured on his body and counted the seconds until Julia and Marguerite appeared. When they did, he motioned at Julia to unhitch the rope anchoring them to the dock. She complied as Marguerite hopped in, the French woman’s face showing obvious strain even in the shadows.

  Julia was wrestling with the rope when Con heard the distinct call of voices over the noise of the engine. Marguerite and Julia heard them as well, both women’s heads snappin
g toward the dock they couldn’t see on the other side of the yacht.

  Con’s gut tightened. The shouts were not from holiday revelers. As Julia’s gaze swung to his, he made a sharp motion at her. Get in.

  She complied, falling slightly as Con gunned the engine. They shot out of the slip just as a group of men rounded the yacht and gunfire rained down.

  Nine

  Julia yelped—being the total FBI professional she was—and fell smack into Conrad’s chest, a bullet whizzing by her ear and shattering the speedboat’s windshield.

  Adrenaline and training kicked in and her Beretta was in her hand before she straightened, facing backwards so she could aim at the dock. One, two, three, she fired at the figures standing there. Wait. Was that…?

  The waiter from the hotel. She could just make out his features in the scant moonlight.

  That bastard.

  Her shots hit the wooden dock, the yacht, and something else, but still had the desired effect. All three shooters ducked for cover.

  The seating area had little room. Marguerite tucked herself into a ball on one of the cushions. Ramon was half in, half out of the cargo hold. And Conrad…

  The sky was inky black, the water, too. The only illumination came from the waning moon and a few bare bulbs strung along the dock. The latter bounced and swayed from the commotion, throwing odd shadows over Conrad as they sped deeper into the night.

  But the black silhouette on Conrad’s neck was unmistakable. A dark stain was spreading quickly down to his shoulder and soaking into his cotton shirt. Blood.

  Marguerite chose that moment to raise her head and reach for Ramon, who was still struggling to get out of the cargo hold. Julia shoved Marguerite’s back down, fired off an insurance round, then turned to Conrad. “You’re hit.”

  His focus was on steering and continuing to evade bullets. Pretending he hadn’t heard her, even though she’d yelled over the engine noise, he touched the comm in his ear. “Pegasus, this is Solomon. We’re coming in hot. I repeat, this is a hot extraction.”