Page 63 of Fast Fury

He wasn’t sure how much of her story he could swallow. Her body language and reactions rang true enough. But Manny Nieto’s daughter fleeing a life of luxury in Mexico and running straight to DEA headquarters for protection? And willing to give them insider info against her father in exchange for it?

Excuse him if he was skeptical.

As for Rowan, she was cool and sophisticated as ever in that tailored skirt suit that hugged every line of her trim curves, her silky black hair pulled up into an elegant twist. It was hard as hell to sit here across from her and ignore his awareness of her. He thought he’d shut all his feelings off for her a long time ago, but apparently not. The sight of her still made him ache deep inside, yet she’d barely reacted at all when she’d walked into Taggart’s office and seen him sitting there.

It drove him crazy to think she’d just moved on and gotten over him so fast when he couldn’t do the same with her. Did she ever think about him now? Did she ever regret walking away? Wish she’d given them more of a chance?

The conference room door opened. They all looked over as Taggart strode back into the room.

The team commander took the seat beside Mal and faced Rowan. “So what have I missed?”

Rowan set her pen down and faced him with the cool professionalism that had been drilled into her since she was a little girl. “I’ve advised Ms. Nieto about the legal ramifications regarding her situation,” she said in her southern belle Georgia accent. “She would like protection in exchange for information, but is still undecided about whether WITSEC is a good choice for her and her mother.” She looked at Ms. Nieto for clarification.

“I don’t want to be separated from my mother,” the woman said. “We’re really close and she needs me more than ever. I’ve left her in a secure location with our private security members who we know are loyal to us. I don’t trust anyone else.”

Well then WITSEC wasn’t going to be an option, was it? Malcolm felt obligated to educate her a little. “Given who you are, and what you’re proposing, WITSEC is the only way you would both be protected.”

Those blue-gray eyes flashed to his. “I can’t be separated from my mother.”

“If you want to be safe, then you’ll have to be.” Sorry, but there it was.

Taggart folded his arms. “But all that aside,” he said to the woman, “you’re willing to give us intel on your father and his inner circle, in exchange for asylum and protection for you and your mother. Have I got that right?”

She swallowed hard. “Y-yes.” She whispered it and lowered her gaze, almost as if she was ashamed. Or possibly scared. Mal didn’t blame her if it was the latter. TheVenenoshad a reputation for carrying out hideous killings on those who crossed them.

“Why?” Taggart pressed.

She lifted her gaze from the table to meet his. “Because I love my mother, and I want her to be safe. And because if all the things I’ve heard about my father are true, then…” She drew a deep breath. “Then I want to stop him from doing any more.”

Mal barely kept from raising his eyebrows in surprise. That was noble of her, but a hell of a risk to take considering what she was offering.

“You think your father will just let the two of you go?” Taggart asked.

At that, she paled. “He might have done or ordered terrible things, but he would never harm us.” She sounded certain of that. “His rivals would, though. They’d use us to get to him in an instant.”

Taggart looked unconvinced. “You don’t think he’d come after you even if you were helping us target him?”

She didn’t respond to that. Taggart opened his mouth to say something else, but his phone rang. He checked the screen and stood. “She’s here.”

“Who?” Mal asked.

“Insider source.” He crossed the room. The door opened just before he got there.

Hamilton walked in, held the door and looked over his shoulder at someone. A woman with jaw-length dark brown hair stepped inside the room and stopped, her wary gaze surveying the room.

It took Mal a few moments to realize who it was.

The change in her was startling, but then, the last time he’d seen her she’d been huddled beneath a blanket in the back of an ambulance when they’d raided Ruiz’s hideout near Biloxi. She wore a scarf wrapped around her neck, even though it was humid and in the low eighties outside. Probably to hide the scarring where the slave collar they’d locked around her throat had dug into her skin.

Her anxious gaze flicked to Hamilton and stopped. The moment it did, her vigilant posture relaxed, and she walked over to stand at his side.

“This is Victoria Gomez,” Hamilton announced as he took her elbow, standing like a sentinel beside her. His gaze zeroed in on Ms. Nieto at the far end of the table.

Victoria stared at the other woman with an almost hostile intensity, her body eerily still.

“Do you recognize her?” Hamilton asked her in low voice.

Victoria nodded, never looking away from her. “Oceane. Manny Nieto’s illegitimate daughter.”

---