Hard To Forget

In addition, she was being assigned to get close to Joseph Sanchez, who was suspected of drug smuggling, to find out all his secrets and betray him.

How ironic was that?

Finally Wilder said, “Okay, that should take care of everything I wanted to cover during this meeting.” He glanced at her and said, “Elena, I need to speak with you for a few minutes.”

After the last agent left the room, Wilder closed the door and turned to her. “Sorry to spring this one on you like that.” He sat down in the chair that Chris had vacated and faced her. “I would have discussed it with you last night when I called, but I couldn’t take a chance that someone might get wind of my decision to use you in the field and try to get around it. I know this is a dangerous assignment, but I also believe from everything I’ve heard about you that you can handle it. I hope you agree.”

Elena pushed her chair away from the table so that she was facing him. She nodded to him and said, “Yes, sir. I do. I appreciate your faith in my abilities.”

“I want to stress that no one outside our group will know you’re working with us. No other agency will have your name. We’re doing everything we can to protect you.”

“I appreciate that.”

“We noted that one of the suspects graduated from Santiago High School with you. Is that correct?”

“Yes, sir.”

“How well did you know him?”

She thought of several responses to that, but chose to be circumspect. “It was a relatively small school. I knew everyone in the class.”

He nodded. “Then you don’t think you’ll have any trouble making contact with him?”

Trouble? That wasn’t the word that came to mind. “I don’t think so.”

Wilder stood and Elena followed his lead. “How soon can you leave?” he asked.

She rubbed her forehead, where a steady pulsating throb was already working itself into a full-fledged headache. “Probably tomorrow. Possibly the day after. I’ll need to contact my mother and prepare her for my moving back home.” She glanced at Wilder. “Do you really think this will take months?”

“At the very least.”

She sighed, kneading her temples.

“Is this going to present personal problems for you?”

Her mind flashed to Joseph Sanchez, ex-military.

“No, sir,” she lied without a qualm. She would deal with the situation because she was a professional.

Wilder held out his hand and she shook it. “Good luck,” he said gravely.

“Thank you, sir.”

They left the conference room together.

She needed to go pack. She needed to contact her mother. And yes, she needed all the good luck she could get.

In the coming months she would use all her skills to investigate the man who had caused her so much pain. If what was suspected about him was true, she would be a part of the team that brought him down.

Several sayings flew through her mind as she retraced her steps down the hallway and returned to her own department. Two in particular kept circling.

Revenge is sweet.

Paybacks are hell.

Well, she and ex-army major Joe Sanchez were about to find out if those sayings were true.

Two

A week later Elena sat at the end of the bar in a small smoke-filled cantina in Santiago, Texas, watching the locals at the other end of the bar indulge in their daily ritual of drinking and discussing their day with friends and neighbors.

She’d arrived in town five days ago, and already she was suffering from serious signs of emotional claustrophobia.

Elena had forgotten what life was like in a small town, where everybody knew everything about you and your family and didn’t mind asking personal questions. No matter how she might attempt to sidestep such questions, she found it impossible without appearing to be rude or disrespectful.

Her mother kept reminding her that people asked about her life because they cared.

Elena could do without so much caring.

In the days since she’d arrived, she must have explained to every resident of the town, all fifteen hundred or so…

Why she was back in town visiting her mother.

Why she had chosen to return home after losing her job.

What she’d been doing all these years.

Why she wasn’t married.

And whether she intended her return home to be permanent.

As if that wasn’t enough, after five days of putting up with intensive interrogations from her mother’s friends, who made law-enforcement officials appear timid and soft, she’d seen no sign of Joe Sanchez.

However, she’d heard about the new factories that had been opened right across the border from Santiago and how the economy of the town had been helped by residents of Mexico crossing the border to shop in Santiago stores.

She’d sat in the local café and listened as town members complained about the big trucks rumbling through the town at all hours of the night, moving product northward.

This was the second night in a row she’d sat in the bar, watching and listening. Once the locals had placed her, they had pretty much ignored her presence, which was exactly what she—and Wilder—had counted on.

What she didn’t hear was anything about illegal trafficking along the border. Wilder had been right. This case wasn’t going to be handled quickly.

She’d traded in her tailored slacks for well-worn jeans, her silk blouses and jackets for T-shirts, her dark leather shoes for sandals. She’d been forced to carry her weapon in her purse because she could not conceal it on her body unless she wore a jacket, and even in May, the weather didn’t call for any kind of jacket.

She’d lucked out last night when she walked into the cantina for the first time since she’d come to Texas to discover Chico Morales tending bar. She’d gone to school with Chico. So far he offered her the best opportunity she’d had since she’d arrived in Santiago to ask casually about other former classmates, including Joe Sanchez.

Chico had been embarrassingly excited to see her, going on and on about how good she looked and how no one would guess she would be thirty on her next birthday.

She couldn’t really say the same about Chico. He’d obviously married a good cook. Either that or he’d spent the past few years knocking back several bottles of his favorite brew on a daily basis.

He’d pulled out photos of his children, three boys and a little girl who was a real cutie. She must take after her mother, Elena thought.

After listening to him reminisce about his life since high school, she had gradually eased the conversation around to other class members. He’d been obliging, filling her in on who had married whom and who was running around with whose wife.

She’d listened and smiled, joked about her own lack of a love life and encouraged him to fill her in on what had been happening in Santiago since she’d left school.

Eventually Chico mentioned Joe and how surprised everyone was when he left the military and moved back to Santiago a few months ago.

Exactly her reaction. He must have had a strong reason to come back here after getting a chance to see how the rest of the world lived. Elena gave no indication that Joe was the person she’d been waiting for. She had nodded and made comments similar to the ones she’d made about others they had known way back when.

She felt she’d made definite progress when Chico mentioned that Joe came into the cantina once in a while, but he wasn’t a regular like the group at the other end of the bar. Most of them came in every night after work, sometimes forgetting to go home until the place closed down.

According to Chico, Joe traveled a lot, but he couldn’t quite remember what it was Joe did when he was away. When he was in town, he worked out of his garage on people’s cars. Folks were surprised to discover he was such a good mechanic.

Then he reminisced about what a great wide receiver Joe had been in high school, what an outstanding team they’d had their senior year when they went to the finals before losing out to some school up north. Up north in Texas, that is. Few people in their circle ever left Texas.

While Chico had been pouring her second beer the previous evening, he’d asked, “So whatever happened to you, Elena? You seemed to disappear as soon as we graduated. Now you say you’ve been working in Maryland?” He made the place sound as though it was located on an asteroid in another galaxy.

She shrugged. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. But it didn’t really work out.”

Most of her classmates had been content to stay in Santiago once they finished school. She, on the other hand, had counted first the years, then the months and finally the days until she could leave the dusty streets of the small border town. Once gone, she’d never looked back. To paraphrase the title of an old country song, happiness to her was seeing Santiago, Texas, in the rearview mirror.

Elena would have been content never to return here for more than brief visits with her mother. So where was she sent for her first and probably only field assignment?

Santiago, Texas.

The irony of the situation was inescapable.

Elena glanced at her watch. It was after ten o’clock. She supposed she had gathered enough information for one day. She wondered how Chris and the other men were doing with their assignments. She was supposed to meet Chris in San Antonio the day after tomorrow for her first debriefing. She hadn’t done badly in gathering general information, but she had nothing specific to report, which irked her.

Oh, well. She might as well go home, visit with her mom for a while and get to bed. Another exciting day in Santiago was drawing to a close.

A couple of the men at the bar said their goodbyes and headed toward the front door. When it swung open, a man stepped inside, moving out of their way and greeting them with a smile and a few words.

Elena glanced up, her glass halfway to her mouth, then stared.

She recognized him immediately. She straightened on the barstool and watched as he sauntered across the small area cleared for dancing as if he owned the place.

Joe Sanchez, as I live and breathe, she thought sarcastically. Her next thought was, It’s about time.

Thank God he’d shown up. Her patience had been rewarded. She hadn’t been forced to go looking for him. At least now their meeting would be construed as accidental.

Oh, if the powers that be only knew how much she hated having to pretend to be friendly toward this guy, they would nominate her for a medal for serving her country above and beyond the call of duty. Much, much beyond.

She watched him in the mirror mounted behind the bar.

Joe paused at the jukebox at the other end of the bar and made several selections before walking to the middle of the bar and ordering a drink. Several of the men clustered at the other end turned and greeted him, keeping him in conversation. Now she had to decide how to handle this first encounter.

She’d studied his file and looked at his photo until she had it memorized, but she still wasn’t prepared to see how the added inches in height and the extra pounds that were part of his vital statistics made him even more attractive than he had been eleven years ago.

Whatever he’d done in the army had given him a physique most women would sigh for.

Not her, of course.

She knew the person inside. She knew him for the piece of cow dung he was, but she had to admit that he managed to fill out a pair of jeans just fine.

Oh, my, yes. He certainly did.

She hadn’t missed the glances he’d received from the other women in the place as soon as he walked in and while he’d studied the titles on the jukebox. In those snug jeans he wore, he was a walking advertisement for buns of steel. His feminine audience was definitely appreciative. She could practically hear the lip smacking going on.

She sipped her beer and mentally made a face at the taste. Maybe tonight would be the last time she would have to order that particular beverage. A good white wine was her drink of choice, but she shuddered to think what she might have been served if she’d dared to order wine here.

Elena knew that her thoughts were going in six different directions. What difference did it make what she was drinking or what the other women thought of Joe Sanchez? She had to focus on what was important, why she was here. She had to figure out a way to cause him to notice her without making it obvious.

Eventually he glanced into the mirror and caught her gaze.

Oh, that’s not obvious, Maldonado. Staring at the guy like some lovelorn soul until he catches you.

Rather than pretend he hadn’t caught her staring at him, she held his gaze for a long moment before she tilted her glass toward him in a slight—a very slight—salute. She took a sip without dropping her gaze.

He turned his head and looked squarely at her, his forearms resting on the bar so that his carefully sculpted butt stood out in relief. She had no doubt he knew exactly the effect he had on most women.

Just not her.

Never her.

She put her suddenly racing pulse down to the fact that she had finally made contact with her quarry.

She deliberately glanced at her watch, then drank some more from her beer without looking directly at him again. From the corner of her eye she watched as he called Chico over and said something to him. Between the music blaring from the jukebox and the lively discussions going on around her, she couldn’t hear what he said. However, it didn’t take a brain surgeon to guess that he was asking Chico about her.

She saw the shocked look on his face when Chico answered him and almost smiled. Yeah, Sanchez, I imagine I’m the last person you’d expect to find here in Santiago.

He straightened without taking his eyes off her. After tilting the bottle to his mouth and letting the golden liquid flow down his throat, Joe ambled along the bar until he came to the short arm of the L where she sat.

He leaned his elbow on the bar as he continued to look at her.

She didn’t move, but kept her hand lightly wrapped around her almost empty glass.

Up close she could see the lines that bracketed his mouth, as well as the sun lines radiating from the corners of his eyes. The dent in his chin appeared to be more pronounced. She’d grown used to looking at the photograph of him staring at the camera without expression. Now his eyes showed their shock and a warmth that surprised her.

“I don’t believe it,” he said softly, his gaze taking in each of her features as though mentally comparing them with earlier memories. He spoke below the blaring music and boisterous conversations so that she heard his words as clearly as if he’d whispered them in her ear. “I’m out of town for a few days and look who I find is here when I return.”

She suppressed the shiver that ran through her body. She’d forgotten how his deep voice had always had such a strong effect on her. In a flash she was that shy teenager again, reacting to his good looks and blatant charm.

Somebody help me, I’m drowning in memories here, she thought in panic.

“Hello, Joe,” she said quietly, then quickly picked up her glass and drained it.

He immediately signaled Chico to bring her another as he sat down on the stool at the elbow of the bar, so that they were almost facing each other. She was thankful she’d chosen to sit next to the wall. Now she turned on the stool and casually braced herself against the wall, hoping to look relaxed and totally at ease with this meeting, thankful for the three barstools that separated them.

“Elena Maldonado,” he let the syllables of her name roll off his tongue as though savoring each one. “I would never have recognized you if Chico hadn’t told me it was you hiding over here in the shadows.” His voice was filled with admiration and pleasure.

Chico arrived with her drink, wearing a grin. “What do you say, man? She’s looking pretty good, don’t you think?”

Chico’s presence gave her the time she needed to get a grip on her emotions. She’d known for a week that her ultimate goal was to make contact with Joe in a believable manner.

So far, so good.

Elena gave each of them a slow sensuous smile. “Thank you both,” she replied. Once Chico left, she tilted her glass and carefully refilled it from the new bottle before she glanced at Joe and said, “I believe Chico mentioned that you still lived around here. It is Joe Sanchez, isn’t it?” she asked casually, determined not to let him know how much she was affected by this encounter.

She was a professional. She could do this.

His smile flashed white in his darkly tanned face. “That’s right. I’m surprised you remembered.”

She lifted one shoulder. “Oh, you really haven’t changed all that much since you were our high-school football hero.” She fluttered her lashes at him mockingly and sipped from her full glass.

Interesting. He actually flushed.

“What did you do after we finished high school?” she asked, as though she couldn’t recite to him everything she’d found in his dossier about the past eleven years. At least what he had done legally. He had no criminal record. Yet. She hoped to change that before all this was over.

He looked down at his drink as though surprised to see it in front of him. “I got that scholarship to go to A & M. Opted to go into the army once I graduated.” He paused, then cleared his throat. “I was discharged three months ago.”

She lifted an eyebrow and smiled. “Decided not to reenlist?”

He looked away and her gaze followed his to two couples dancing. She thought he wasn’t going to answer her before he finally turned back to her and said, “I needed to come home.”

I just bet you did.

He leaned forward. “No kidding, I can’t believe how great you look these days. No glasses, that long hair cut off—” he leaned to the side so that he could see more of her “—and you’ve filled out in all the right places.”

She could have said the same thing about him.

But she didn’t.

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