Page 1 of Snowbound Threat

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Lisa Phillips

Chapter One

Outskirts of Guatemala City

Six weeks ago

DEA Special Agent Caleb Rourke shoved his door open and climbed out, vest already on. Sidearm ready. This would be the night they finally brought that traitor in.

The rest of the team, a female and two other men, were agents he’d worked with for months. Didn’t mean he fully trusted them.

Caleb didn’t plan to be part of this team long enough to find out if he could—or not. No, he’d rather secure a transfer back state side. All this international work was taking its toll. He missed the Montana mountains he grew up in. The snow in winter. Warm summer days, and cool evenings. Running across grass fields with his twin brother, Noah—currently AWOL somewhere across the other side of the world chasing bad guys in his own way. With boots and a helmet.

Caleb didn’t want to bethatguy, but the humidity down here was getting to him. Scrambling his brains so he was lookingeverywhere for a threat that didn’t exist. A traitor in his team, or in the DEA office down here.

I want out.

Maybe it was the holidays coming up, making him jones for home, and Christmas like it should be. But Caleb was tired.

“Let’s do this.” He turned to the others and caught them checking their pistols. Walters shoved a ball cap on backward. Caleb had let his hair grow out and had it secured behind his head with a hair tie even though that barely kept it contained.

The female agent, Rawlins, strode between Caleb and Walters like Caleb hadn’t seen the look shared between her and Barts. “Last one in buys the first round tonight.”

Caleb followed her toward the rundown apartment building at the edge of the city in a rundown neighborhood.

The kind of place where dealers ran the area and the police were paid to look the other way. “Good people” or “innocents” was a misnomer where folks did what they had to just so they could survive.

Rawlins stood to the side of the door someone had propped open with a concrete block.

Caleb held his gun by his leg and grabbed the door with the other hand. Rawlins nodded and he swung the door open.

She ducked inside, gun first, sweeping the hallway. “Clear.”

They made their way along the dank hall to the stairs at the end. Someone had left a bag of trash in the corner on the second floor. Third floor, down at the end, apartment thirteen had been a CIA safehouse for decades after World War 2. Right up until budget cuts meant it was sold off, only to be bought thirty years ago by an investor who seemed to have a habit of purchasing assets formerly the property of the US government.

“Kessler had better be here.”

Rawlins snorted, shifted back and kicked the door beside the handle.

Caleb wasn’t sure he’d have gone in that hard, given this guy’s tendency to wire places and blow whoever came after him to kingdom come. But there wasn’t time to contemplate that when his job was to be right behind Rawlins as she entered, clearing the house as they went.

He scanned the entry, then to the right and the living room. No occupants. Kitchen vacant. No dishes. No mail. Hallway clear.

The guys behind him would check the closets and places someone might hide while they cleared the larger areas.

Rawlins kicked a door and he stayed in the hall, covering her. Bathroom. No shower curtain, rusty tub and sink. “Gross.”

He backed up a step and she came out, moving to the next door.

She shoved it open. “Empty.”

Caleb didn’t like this. “There has to be something here.”

But he stuck to his duty, and she headed for the last room. “Whoa.”

“What is it?” Caleb entered the empty bedroom, no furniture. The decor consisted of photos and papers taped across one wall. A closet in the corner was open, empty racks that would’ve held armaments years ago.