been a miscommunication. Whoever instructed us to come here wasn’t aware Agent Devereux was assisting on the case.”
I throw my hands in the air. “What case? She’s not even from here.”
In a quick monotone voice, he answers, “We can’t answer that.”
I scrape my hand through my hair and jerk aside, mumbling, “Of course you can’t.” I throw the door open and storm inside.
Motherfucker.
Red tape bullshit. Why can’t they see that something is amiss? Hopefully, Max can get more info from the guys. He’s worked with them before. I’m just some overpaid jock to them. Shit, to most people. I stop pacing when the door opens. Max walks in with a grim look and shakes his head.
“They’re being tight-lipped on this one.”
I drop my chin and close my eyes, guilt weighing me down. If she didn’t already hate me for acting like a total asshole, I’m sure she does now. I can’t stay here and do nothing. Max grabs my arm as I stalk past him, ripping my keys out of my pocket.
“Where the hell do you think you’re going?”
“I’ll go find her myself.”
Max barks out a humorless laugh. “Ryker, sit the fuck down. This is the CIA. You aren’t finding her until they’re ready to bring her back.” I pin my glare on him, clenching my hand. “How much do you know this girl? Is she worth all this bullshit?”
My fist cocks back and swings. Max ducks, grabbing my arm and twisting it behind my back.
“Quarterback, you might be fast on the draw with a ball, but don’t try to hit me again,” he chuckles under his breath, shoving me away. I flip him off when I adjust my skewered shirt.
“She is worth it,” I clip, walking away with my bruised ego. I’ve never felt this way about a woman before and I can’t explain our connection, but I owe it to her to help. She’s here because of me. And I’ll be damned if I don’t return her home safe.
“Okay,” he says. “And just because they’re not giving me anything doesn’t mean I’m giving up on finding out what the hell is happening.”
Relief, yet irritation fuels my body. “You could have said that from the beginning, asshole.”
Stomping to the couch, I fall into it and lean back, waiting for Max to spit out his game plan. His eyes jump to my bouncing knee. Every nerve inside me is racing to go. Do something.
“She’s with Richard so I’m not too worried. He’s a respectable guy.”
I narrow my eyes and lean my elbows on my knees. “Then why did he take her without his people knowing?”
“Not sure.” He blinks. “But he used to be the Head of Security for President Malone and we’ve worked together on a few cases. He could be protecting her,” he says with an unsettled tone, doing nothing to calm my nerves.
Max and I both stand tall as the front door opens. “Found something,” Stone, Max’s right-hand man and the computer genius on his team, declares as he struts through the front door. “Well, at least I think I did.” We follow him into the kitchen where he sets his laptop down on the island. “First, I pulled Aspen’s information. Her passport and birth certificate. That looked clean… until I dug deeper. When I pulled the hospital records where it’s stated she was born, there was zip about her. She wasn’t born there, or they deleted her records. But that’s more than I found on her parents. I couldn’t find info on them anywhere. I located a couple people with those names, but either they were dead or close to it because they were in their nineties.”
None of this makes sense. I met her dad, and he wasn’t in his nineties.
“We don’t know anything then?” I snap.
Stone holds up his finger, his smile growing. Leave it to the computer geek to find this amusing. “I didn’t say that. Max told me Richard called her Gabriella when he first saw her. I did a search typing in Richard Devereux and the name Gabriella.” He turns his computer around to face us. “This pulled up.”
Max and I both read the article’s title. “President Malone’s one-year-old daughter, Gabriella Malone, was found deceased.”
My head jerks up, confused more than ever. “I don’t understand. What does this have to do with Aspen?”
“Keep reading,” Stone presses, pointing to the computer.
My eyes roam over the article. Most of it, I’ve read before. We learned about it in history in high school and then again