“The smugglers?” He’d mentioned it before, on one of their walks. Drug shipments had been coming through Aldea Viejo, out of range of the Mexican Federal Police, the
federales,
in La Paz. Ernesto was determined to bring the smugglers to justice, but they’d been as slippery as reef eels so far.
“They are very dangerous, these men,” Ernesto said.
“But not stupid. I doubt very much they’d crash this party.”
Ernesto’s eyes narrowed fractionally. “One never knows what the criminal mind will think of doing.” Ernesto smiled, nabbed another glass of champagne from a passing tray and toasted Olivia cordially before taking a sip. “Does one?”
Rafael Camayo crept through the house, using the clamor of the party on the floor below to cover what little noise he made. Though his mother would be shocked to know it, this was hardly the first time he’d broken into someone’s home and searched through every room like a bandit.
It was, however, the first time it had ever been so important to him.
Rafe skirted a lighted doorway. A fussy little powder room, he noted with disdain, wondering how many of the ladies and gentlemen using the elaborate, gold-plated facilities knew how Cervantes had paid for them.
He smiled grimly. Probably more than a few. Rafe knew from years of tracking Cervantes that many of the man’s friends were actually more like associates; partners in crime, so to speak. Not that Rafe’s employers—the United States Drug Enforcement Agency—or their associates in the Mexican government had ever been able to get the goods on any of them. Lesser men fell, swept up in routine drug raids, while Cervantes and his swanky pals held lavish dinner parties and toasted each other’s cleverness.
He and his partner, Bobby, had been in Baja California for months now, trying to change all that. They’d been methodically stealing drug shipments from Cervantes’s men and slipping them surreptitiously into the hands of DEA agents across the border in Mexico. They made no arrests, busted neither the men at the drop site nor the runners who brought the stuff over from mainland Mexico. They simply swept in—or snuck in, depending upon the situation and the likelihood one of them would be shot through the head—and stole what Ernesto Cervantes firmly believed was his.
It was a last-ditch effort, a plan devised by Rafe and Bobby alone, and one that neither the
federales
nor Rafe’s superior officers at the DEA thought likely to succeed. But Rafe and Bobby were determined.
They knew Cervantes—knew him inside and out—though neither of them had ever been within fifty feet of the man. They knew he could outwait the authorities and their traditional methods forever, keeping his minions on the front line while he led his respectable, lawful life.
But he would never tolerate being ripped off by a couple of filthy, low-class
bandidos.
It was driving the big man crazy, Rafe thought with an unprofessional smirk, just as they’d hoped it would. Cervantes was a canny kingpin, but a kingpin nonetheless, and with the ego to go along with the title. It wouldn’t be long—
couldn’t
be long, according to Rafe’s superiors back in San Diego—before he showed up at one of the shipment sites himself. Rafe could almost smell Cervantes’s frustration, could almost touch it.
It was certainly evident by all the thugs he had posted at this little soiree.
Rafe had easily slipped past them all, of course. Another thing that would have shocked his mother. Ten years as an undercover DEA agent was excellent training, but it was nothing to the years in the San Diego
barrio
of his youth. A boy who spoke no English learned how to fade into any background in the border towns of San Diego, or he risked being picked up by cruising immigration officers looking for his illegally “immigrated” parents.
Rafe searched the next room he came to, wincing slightly as the heavy carved door creaked atmospherically on its iron hinges. The four men the Mexican
federales
had inside Cervantes’s organization had already been through every scrap of paper in Cervantes’s office, but had yet to find anything incriminating. The party tonight had given Rafe the first opportunity since he’d come to Baja to get inside the rest of the house and do a little snooping of his own.
Nothing in this room; not that he’d expected much. Cervantes was unlikely to keep records of his illegal activities in an upstairs guest room. Still, procedure dictated a thorough search. He closed the door behind him and stood absolutely still in the gloomy hallway, listening, waiting.
Rafe cocked his head at a small sound, separate from the cacophony coming from downstairs.
Well, hell. Someone was coming up the second stairway.
He looked quickly around and decided the best he could do on such short notice was try to melt into the wide, darkened doorway behind him. If he tried to get back into the room he’d just left, the damn door would give him away. He cursed old houses and all their charm. Give him a nice, quiet apartment with brand-new vinyl doors any day.
He stood perfectly still and let the person walk past him.
A woman.
Before he could make out her face or shape, he could hear the seductive swish of a skirt, smell the faint scent of perfume. She had a beautiful scent, this woman. She smelled like the sea.
Lord, it had been a long time since he’d been so close to a woman.
Against his better judgment, Rafe lifted his eyes. He knew that people seemed to sense when they were being watched, and the last thing he needed right now was for one of Cervantes’s snotty dinner guests to start screaming about bandits in the upstairs hallways.
But he couldn’t resist. He was partially aroused from the scent of her alone.
Oh, yeah,
he thought ruefully, shifting his weight slightly. Way too many months on the job.
The woman passed by him on her way to the bathroom.
Rafe nearly snarled out loud as he recognized her.
The princess.
Cervantes’s princess. The woman, he knew from his informants on the inside, that Cervantes planned to marry. Dr. Olivia Galpas. He’d made it a point to find out her name the day Cervantes first visited her on the beach. He’d had her investigated, of course. Anyone Cervantes spent that much time with, American or not, female or male, had to be checked out.
She’d been clean, as far as the DEA was concerned, but that didn’t make her any more likable in Rafe’s mind.
She was a
princesa,
from one of the oldest and finest Latino families in San Diego. Her mother was some famous artist, her father was a physician. She was a doctor herself, born with a silver spoon in her mouth, and handed every opportunity. While he’d been picking avocados to get through junior college, the
princesa
had been whiling away her time at Stanford and then MIT.
Apparently, all the expensive education hadn’t made her any smarter, Rafe thought sourly as he watched her flick on the light in the small room and close the door behind her. She was keeping very dangerous company, and seemed to be enjoying herself doing it. Rafe’s eyes narrowed in the darkness. Money and power were vigorous aphrodisiacs to a woman who was accustomed to having both in her life.
Like was always attracted to like.
Olivia Galpas was here in Cervantes’s house, upstairs even, where guests did not usually go. So, there was more to this relationship than he’d thought, was there? He’d have to keep that in mind. Maybe the pretty little doctor knew exactly what kind of dirty drug money paid for the gold-plated fixtures in the bathroom she was using.
Rafe shook his head slightly.
Settle down, there, Rafael.
A rather intense reaction to one glimpse of a woman in a hallway, he had to admit. And jumping to conclusions was not his style, either. He was a very deliberate sort of cop.
But Olivia Galpas was everything in a woman Rafael Camayo naturally resented, everything he instinctively despised. He liked women with heart, with passion, with guts. He didn’t like pampered, overeducated, rich girls who slept with any drug runner with a woman’s soft hands and a big house. Especially one they’d known just three weeks.
Only, God, she smelled good. It was indefinable, that scent of the beach and woman she left in her wake. He’d never smelled anything like it. Not perfume, but…essence. If he could have dragged enough of it into his lungs, he thought, he could live on it alone for a week. No food, no water—just that smell.
He knew he needed to move on through the house, use every opportunity the party was giving him to find what he could and then get the hell out. But something about the woman behind that powder room door—aside from her scent, he told himself firmly—kept him rooted to the spot. Maybe she’d come back out and he’d give her a little talking-to, American to American. Let her in on the secrets behind Ernesto Cervantes’s “family” wealth. Haul her gorgeous little rear end right out of this house and get her on the next plane Stateside. As any good American law enforcement agent would do.
Only, he couldn’t. And wouldn’t.
Ernesto Cervantes had killed his brother almost twenty years ago. He and Bobby—who in addition to being his partner was his
carnal,
his blood brother from childhood, his cousin, and the godson of Rafe’s dead brother—had spent those twenty years plotting, planning the kind of revenge that would have made George proud. They’d joined the local police force, then the DEA; had worked their way up the ladder in all the ways that mattered—for this one bust. He wasn’t about to give up those years, those plans, for one amazing-smelling woman, American or not.
Besides, he mused, she may not even want to be saved. His informants had told him how cozy the couple had become. How long the walks, how intense the talks, how delicate and intimate and revolting the whole relationship had become. Maybe Olivia Galpas was in exactly the hot spot she wanted to be in. Maybe she knew everything.
Olivia stepped out into the darkened hallway, flicking off the light behind her. She’d used the facilities, washed her hands, put lotion on, checked her hair, washed her hands again, straightened all the lovely linen guest towels then sat on the edge of the vanity for five minutes, considering the merits of a hot wax treatment to smooth out her sea-coarsened hands. No woman should have rougher hands than her boyfriend, she thought.
But there was no getting around the fact that she had to go back downstairs. Eventually. Even now, Ernesto was probably wondering if she’d eaten some bad shrimp.
She smiled slightly to herself, rolled her eyes. She couldn’t imagine Ernesto Cervantes ever wondering about her digestive health. He was so polished and dignified, she didn’t think he’d be able to bring himself to admit women
had
digestive systems, much less to talk about them.
She started down the hall, grateful that for the first time since she’d entered the house she wasn’t being stared at by some glowering, khaki-covered baboon. This hallway was obviously in a private portion of the house, where guests were not expected to wander. Well, she’d wandered, and she could hardly see the harm in it. She personally thought Ernesto was carrying the whole protection thing to the limits of high drama. What kind of criminal would break into a man’s house while two hundred people were drinking and dancing downstairs?
She stopped before she reached the stairs. That itch on the back of her neck was really driving her crazy. If she didn’t know herself any better, she’d think she was having some sort of woman’s intuition. But that was ridiculous. She didn’t have woman’s intuition. She was a scientist.
She turned very slowly and looked right into the face of the man watching her.
Olivia felt as though every ounce of blood drained from her head and leaked out her toes. She had never been so unnerved in all her life. The itch at the back of her neck slithered around her throat and clutched at her jugular. Adrenaline pumped through her like a drug. She didn’t know this man, didn’t know why he watched her with such intensity, such malice, but she knew she should be afraid of him. And by God, she was.
They stared at each other for what seemed to Olivia like hours, though, of course, it couldn’t have been more than a few seconds. He was partially shadowed, but Olivia glimpsed a rough, unshaved Latino face, all planes and angles, with cheekbones that looked sharp enough to cut glass. He had a starved look to him, as though he’d never quite had enough to eat. She sucked in a reflexive breath, unaware she’d stopped breathing.
Rafe’s heart thundered in his chest at the sound of that deep breath. He was ready to bolt if she screamed. He’d be no good to this operation—or to George’s memory—with a bullet through his heart.
But she didn’t scream. She just watched him, calm except for the breathlessness. He respected that even as it occurred to him that perhaps she didn’t scream because she was a
princesa
and thought herself impervious to strange men in dark hallways. He ought to disabuse her of that notion, Rafe thought. He worked up a sneer but could manage nothing more menacing than that. Olivia Galpas was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. And frankly, he’d never had much stomach for threatening women, pretty or not.
She was small, no more than five foot four. Rafe was taller than most of the men in his family by several inches, and this woman’s head would hit below his chin. Her hair was plaited down her straight spine in a heavy braid that reached the curve of her bottom. He wondered about the texture of all that braided hair, wondered what it would feel like if he ran his thumb down the length of it.
Her breasts were discreetly camouflaged by the peasant blouse she wore, but they looked small enough for each to fit whole into his mouth. Rafe swallowed hard at that ridiculous idea. This was Cervantes’s woman. He no more wanted to touch her than he wanted to put his hand in a basket of rattlesnakes.
Her face was flushed from fear or the sun—he could see the color high on her classic cheekbones even in the dim light of the hallway. She had a small, full mouth that she’d set into a brave and stubborn line he had to admire.