Andie spent Sunday morning coloring her hair. Luckily, raven black looked best all one shade, no highlights, so it was easy enough to do it herself, given the time constraints. Losing the blond was for Jack, but she also hoped her boss would like it. Or more precisely, Lisa Horne’s boss. Danilo Bahena was the principal reason that the FBI had arranged for Andie’s crash course in male fetishes at Capital Pleasures. Andie caught up with Bahena at a private heliport in northern Virginia. Bahena took her inside the executive waiting room, away from the noise of the company’s Agusta AW-139, where they could talk in private.
“Black is more… authoritative,” Andie said. “A good thing, don’t you agree?”
Bahena stepped closer for a better look. As usual, his expression was about as easy to read as tea leaves in a windstorm.
Bahena’s official title was vice president of training and recruitment for Vortex Inc., and Andie-Lisa-was a trainee on the cusp of what Vortex referred to as “activation.” Vortex was a privately held company, a subsidiary of a foreign corporation of obscure ownership, which made it impossible to know what the real business of Vortex was and who was actually running it. Bahena was equally enigmatic. He claimed to be from Los Angeles, California, but Andie and the FBI knew better. His closer ties were to Angeles, Pampanga, in the Philippines-a hotspot for human trafficking and sex trade. The skinny on Bahena was that, before he’d moved to Pentagon City and become such a friend to the U.S. government, the Japanese Yakuza and Chinese Triad had paid him a small fortune to feed their insatiable appetite for young prostitutes. He was built more like a wrestler than a businessman, and Andie could easily have envisioned him standing up to any element of organized crime. He was also a man of few words, which made him a tough study.
“I like it,” he said finally.
“I thought you would,” said Andie.
Bahena went to the coffee machine and poured himself a cup. He didn’t offer Andie anything.
“Now for the bad news,” said Andie. “I need a week off. Family emergency.”
“No,” he said.
“Sorry, maybe you didn’t hear. It’s an emergency.”
“I heard you fine. I said no.”
Andie disliked Bahena more than anyone she’d ever worked for-which was saying something, since in actuality she didn’t even work for him. “Look, I wouldn’t ask, but it’s my mother. She needs-”
“I don’t give a shit about your mother. We’ve got too much invested in you, and we’re on a strict timetable.”
“I’m only asking for a week.”
“I said strict. If your mother’s sick, hire a home health-care nurse.”
“It’s not a medical emergency.”
“Then call your sister.”
“My sister-”
Andie stopped herself. She’d never spoken of a sister to Bahena, and in her FBI undercover profile, she was an only child.
Did Bahena just bait me?
“My stepsister, I mean,” said Andie, her heart pounding and her mind racing as she backpedaled her way out of blowing her own cover. “I have a stepsister who is useless. So unless you’re planning to put me in handcuffs and drag me to the airport, I’ll see you in a week.”
Bahena unleashed his patented stare of intimidation, but Andie gave it right back to him. She had him pegged for the kind of man who didn’t respect any woman who wasn’t prepared to spit in his eye, and it was time to turn on the attitude.
“Have a nice flight,” she said as she started for the door.
“Lisa,” said Bahena.
She stopped and turned quickly-quickly enough to disabuse him of the notion that her real name was anything but Lisa.
“I’ll give you till Friday,” he said.
Andie didn’t nod her agreement, and she sure as hell didn’t thank him. She opened the door and left the heliport without another word, kicking herself for the lapse about a sister. And wondering if she could ever come back.