Page 35 of The Perfect Illusion (Jessie Hunt #39)

Kat was about to pack it in for the night when she got the call on the same burner phone she’d used to speak with Dalton Tepper earlier today. She answered it immediately.

“I didn’t want to jump to conclusions.”

“Always a good policy,” he said. “But since everything I’m about to tell you is off book, I’m going to share what happened as fast as I can.

Even using secure lines and burner phones, this is radioactive.

I don’t have to tell you that using CIA resources for a private civilian request, even one that serves the public good, is iffy at best.”

“I’m all ears,” Kat told him.

“I didn’t want to risk exposing assets in-country.

So rather than using undercover agents in Quito, I had a SAC strike team based here in Buenos Aires follow up on the information you gave me,” he said, diving right in.

“The team arrived at the Guayaquil address you provided at 7:16 local time. They showed the security footage of your suspect to the hostel manager, who gave them her room number. They breached the unit at 7:22. Ash Pierce wasn’t there. ”

“Dammit!” Kat blurted out.

“We did find evidence that she had been there,” Tepp continued, unruffled by her outburst. “And that she had left pretty recently. My people don’t think she’s going back though.”

“Why not?”

“They did a quick and dirty fingerprint sweep and collected anything that might offer DNA,” he explained.

“The place was wiped down pretty thoroughly, which suggested that Pierce was leaving for good and didn’t want to leave a trace.

Plus, the manager said that when she left this morning, she paid her outstanding bill in full, with cash. ”

“She didn’t want to flake on payment and have the hostel manager call the authorities,” Kat mused. “Nothing to draw attention to herself.

“Exactly,” Tepp agreed. “Having said that, they did find one partial print that matched Pierce’s.”

“Why didn’t you lead with that?” Kat demanded.

“I just wanted to give you context,” he answered.

“Any indication of where she might have gone next?” Kat asked, moving on.

“Maybe,” he said. “The team reviewed surveillance camera footage in the neighborhood for the last 24 hours. One bit led to an internet café a block over from the hostel. The café’s interior cameras showed her arriving there yesterday afternoon, timestamped at 4:04 P.M. One of our tech guys searched the computer terminal she used, checking all search activity around that time.

Everything was anonymous, but because of security features on the computer, she couldn’t clear her cache, so we know what searches she did. ”

“And?”

“There were several involving cargo ship departure dates and times for today,” he told her.

“Going where?”

“Multiple options were searched,” he replied. “She spent the most time on Managua, Nicaragua and both La Paz and Ensenada in Mexico.”

Kat went quiet, as a lump lodged in her throat.

“What is it?” Tepp asked, clearly sensing the change in her.

Kat swallowed hard before replying.

“From Ensenada, it’s just a short boat trip back to the U.S.,” she said quietly.

“You really think she’d risk that?” Tepp wondered.

“I think she loves the risk,” Kat told him. “Ash Pierce is done hiding. She’s coming back here.”

She was about to ask what else he could do to help her track Pierce down when her regular cell phone rang. It was Ryan Hernandez. She almost let it go to voicemail, but Ryan rarely called her, even though she was living with him and Jessie, at least for a few more days. He almost always texted.

Something about the ringing phone gave her pause, though she couldn’t say why.

“Hold on, Tepp,” she said. “I just have to answer this call.”

She pushed “accept,” picked up her cell phone, and apprehensively put it to her ear.