Aztec Treasure

Frank Donovan’s POV

University of Colorado Hospital Trauma Center

I was running on autopilot, and I gratefully accepted the cup of coffee Frank Grimes handed me when he arrived at the waiting room. I’d given my statement to the local FBI and law enforcement already; the Office of Professional Responsibility agent placed me on administrative leave, taking my gun and badge. It was standard procedure for an agent-involved shooting, and this was a doozy.

I’d had a chance to thank Karl Steiner when the staff moved him from Recovery to a room upstairs. He was lucky; the bullet deflected off his humerus bone, cracking it, before exiting out his tricep. He got lucky; two rounds hit the transformer he was resting his gun arm on, saving his life. “I’m sorry, Frank,” he told me. “I dropped my pistol, and that’s when Claire got hit.”

“Claire got hit because I sent her back there alone,” I said. “It’s my responsibility, and I told them that. Three men opened up on Claire, and she’s still alive. We put two in the ground, and they found a blood trail from the third. We’ll get that piece of shit. Count on it.”

The aura surrounding Frank Grimes, the DEA man who took down the Sons, now a Homeland Security agent and Werewolf, meant that others in the room left us alone to talk. I told him about Claire and my feelings for her. “I can’t leave her alone, Frank. I’ll be staying here until she can leave the hospital. I’m going to try to talk her into rehabbing with me in Los Angeles. She will need the help.” I’d seen the wounds, and it would not be an easy road back for her.

“What about her family? Will she go home?”

“I don’t know. Commander Lindstrom called her parents, and her mom is flying out as soon as she can. I don’t think that Claire wants to go to North Dakota, and she doesn’t have family in the DC area.”

Commander Lindstrom arrived an hour later, with Claire in her fourth hour of surgery. “How is she doing,” she asked me as she sat on the other side from Frank Grimes.

I let out a breath. “As of fifty-two minutes ago, Agent Bennington was stable, and they were using pins and screws to put the jigsaw puzzle back together that makes up her left pelvis. The bullet wound to her left thigh nicked her femoral artery. They were able to stop the bleeding, and she pulled through despite needing seven units of blood. It was that close,” I told her. “I was told it might be several more hours before they close.”

“Jesus,” Irene said. “And you never even talked to the lawyer?”

“Nope,” I said. “We caught the guys as they were leaving, and Portman was already dead.”

I hadn’t seen Frank since he changed, but I could see having a wolf had changed him. He seemed more powerful and more dominant than before, and his body was practically shaking with anger. “We need to talk, and we need to do it NOW,” he told us. “In private.”

“I’m not leaving this room until I know Claire is all right,” I replied.

“Fine,” Frank said as he looked over to Irene. “Clear these people out, and we can talk here and now.”

Irene stood up and looked at the twenty or so other agents and police in the room. “Leave us,” she said. “Go get coffee or take a walk, but nobody comes back until I clear you to return.” There was grumbling, but the room emptied quickly as people headed back to the lobby. When they were gone, Irene turned to Frank. “What do you know, Grimes, and don’t bullshit me.”

“Your team is fatally compromised,” I told her. “The men who did this wanted to find out where Maria and Maritza are, but they got here before Frank and Claire arrived.”

“How? Only a half-dozen people in the Task Force even knew about Christian Portman.”

Frank just shook his head. “The whole office knew that Maria and Maritza were jaguar shifters, Irene. You want to talk to her to find out what she knows about the Sons, but others for nefarious reasons. The people who did this are the same people who grabbed Julio, and for the same reason. They want to study and turn shifters to their advantage, and for that, they need them in secure facilities to do their experiments.”

Irene was shocked. “The CIA is behind this? And you have proof?”

“No proof, but we both know it is the truth. The team that took Julio was professional, well funded, and well supported. I’ll bet you a case of your favorite adult beverage that the guys Frank shot last night don’t show up in any government database. They’ll be ghosts, and that means CIA. No other agency has the black sites and the money to do this.”

“No wonder Al Perkins wanted in on the search for Maria,” Irene said. “I thought it was because of the Mexican connection.”

I shook my head. “Al Perkins never knew about Christian Portman because we never told him. Claire and Sofia called me over, and we went directly to the Commander with it.”

Frank Grimes leaned forward and spoke even softer. “You used the computer, and the Task Force server had the information on the title searches and the lawyer. My computer people found that information and warned me about it. I was on my way here to ask you to leave the search to us; it wasn’t until after I landed I found out about the shootout.”

Irene’s eyes got wide. “You hacked our server?”

“My people have been monitoring the Task Force since its inception. The Pack didn’t trust you, and too many events have borne that out, Irene. If we have access, what are the chances the CIA does, especially with their agents embedded in your office? And if not them, what about the NSA, DIA, or the Cartels?” He shook his head. “There probably is more. I would bet you ANOTHER case of your favorite adult beverage that you find bugs in your office, phones, or computers.”

“I’ll order a sweep right now,” Irene said. “And I need my computer people to fix their security issues NOW.”

“Listen to me first, please. I didn’t want to admit the hack, but there are innocent lives at stake here. Maria Meztli is no threat to anyone and knows nothing, yet the CIA sent a team to get her and did not hesitate to kill a civilian and shoot two of your people.”

Frank made too much sense. “The jaguars don’t have your treaty status,” I observed.

“Exactly. The CIA can’t get what they want from werewolves without the Council and Alphas agreeing to help, and we already told them that we weren’t doing their dirty work overseas for them. The jaguar shifters? Julio is a criminal, and Maria is the daughter and sole heir of a criminal. Ask yourself how much the CIA would spend to get people under their control with shifter abilities. Imagine CIA agents that could shift into a big cat, see at night, smell threats a mile away, and infiltrate the hardest of targets. Maybe they do it voluntarily, maybe they are coerced, but you KNOW they want it.”

It suddenly hit me why they wanted the girls so bad. I’d been thinking short-term while the CIA was looking at decades. “Fuck. They want Maria and Maritza for a captive breeding program!”

Irene looked shocked, while Frank just nodded his head. “That was our conclusion, too. That is why you need to let the Packs handle this. The CIA has their hooks everywhere in government, but the Packs they can’t subvert. The best thing for Maria and Maritza is for the Task Force to stop looking for them. Let my people find her and bring her in; I swear we will protect them like our own children. We don’t target innocents, Irene. We can find her faster than you, and the CIA will never know.”

“What do I say to the Task Force?”

I jumped in at this. “Maria isn’t a suspect, and she hasn’t done anything illegal other than making a border crossing into the United States outside a border crossing,” I said. “I agree; the more we try to find her, the more likely it is the wrong people find her first. Putting out a BOLO or warrant on her could be deadly; we couldn’t keep Julio safe in Federal Prison, for Christ’s sake.”

Frank Grimes added his part. “You know you can’t go around accusing the CIA without proof, and if you get proof, what happens to Julio or Maria if they have them at a black site?”

“They disappear,” Irene said softly.

“Exactly. Let the Marshal Service investigate the prison break; it’s not a Task Force issue anymore. Focus on finding and arresting the fugitive members of the Sons. I’ll let you know personally when the girls are safe.”

Irene let out a breath. “You’re right,” she said. “If the CIA has the President’s authority for the operation, I’m truly fucked if I pursue it. I have work to do.” We all stood up, and Irene shook Frank’s hand. “Thank you for coming directly to me with this. Protect the girls, and we never had this conversation.”

“Of course not, Commander. Good luck with your bug problem.” She was on her phone before she left the room, and I felt bad for the IT staff who were about to work the weekend. If they were good at their jobs, they might even find Spider Monkey’s backdoor. I doubted it, though.

“I should be going too,” Grimes said.

“Wait.” I opened up my phone, finding the information in a note I’d put down. “She’s going to bolt once she hears her lawyer is dead if the CIA doesn’t find her first. Your computer people might be able to mine the NLPRI database. Here’s my password.” I jotted down the information on a piece of paper and handed it to him.

The NLPRI was the National License Plate Recognition Initiative. It started in the Southwest back in 2010, with computer technology able to read the license plates and store them in a file with timestamps. The idea was to collect license plate information near the border and watch where they went, looking for patterns that would indicate drug mules. In the past decade, the program had expanded nationwide, plus the DEA opened the database up to our partners in Customs, State Patrols, and other state and local agencies. We’d even worked with the manufacturer of those trailer-mounted radar speed warning systems, so they included cameras linked to the system for us. It wasn’t just the interstates anymore; the database was immense. “If my people haven’t looked there, I’ll pass it along.” He stood up, so I did too. “Thanks, Frank. If there’s anything you need, let me know.”

“I appreciate it, Boss.” We shook hands, and he left me alone in the room again. It didn’t last long; the room filled up with agents waiting for news. It was almost two in the morning before the surgeon came out to see us.

Commander Lindstrom spoke first. “How is she?”

“She came through well, especially considering the blood loss. The damage to her pelvis was extensive, and she faces a long recovery. We can’t allow her to put any stress on her hip until the bones have regained some strength, so she’s got a long hospital stay ahead of her.”

“Will she make a full recovery,” I asked.

“Recovery in these cases is a qualified thing,” the surgeon replied. “Will she walk again? Yes, in a few months. In a year, she might even be able to jog on a treadmill. If you are asking about a return to duty status, that’s a long way off if ever.” He looked around at the sad faces in the room; everyone knew what that meant. Her law enforcement career ended in the shrubbery outside a suburban Denver office building. The Bureau would keep her on while she healed, then give her a medical retirement.

An entire life changed due to my decision to send her around the back alone.

I vowed to be there with her as she recovered, as long as she would let me. I just prayed she wouldn’t blame me like I blamed myself.