Chapter One
The slice across his flesh took him by surprise. Pain seared through subcutaneous layers with such speed that Special Agent Asher Cameron Blackwell—Ash to his family and Cameron to his colleagues—flicked his hand hard in a futile attempt to stop the flow of torture.
“Dammit.” He slammed the cabinet door shut on the deadly manilla file folder and stuffed the pad of his injured thumb into his mouth. The metallic taste of blood spread across his tongue.
Better there than on the paperwork he’d just completed.
He hated paperwork.
With. A. Passion.
Eileen Tao, the new FBI director, seemed to equate the quantity of forms, reports, and daily logs to an agent’s level of productivity. What she did with all the data, he didn’t know. But he would have liked to tell her where she could shove her new procedures.
He’d much rather be out in the field, tracking down leads, talking to his confidential informants, or being undercover. Hell, he’d even swap a night surveillance in twenty-degree weather for logging phone calls.
A quick tap against the metal frame of his cubicle brought his head around.
Senior Resident Agent Mitch Lawson stood at the opening, a blond eyebrow lifted at the sight of one of his agents with his thumb stuck in his mouth.
If Cameron had still been stationed at the Charlotte field office, his supervisor there would have made a joke about him regressing, and he would have responded in kind. Tit for- tat. Since relocating to the much smaller resident agency in Asheville six months ago, he hadn’t yet crossed that line from no-nonsense professionalism to friendly banter with Lawson.
Maybe he never would.
He lowered his thumb. “Can I help you, sir?”
“I need you to follow up on an unofficial complaint the Bureau received.”
Lawson’s use of unofficial caught his attention, but he let it ride for now.
“Anonymous?”
“No, the complainant is a member of the Engel County School Board.” Lawson shifted on his feet. “She believes another board member is going to sell her vote on an upcoming agenda item in exchange for a piece of artwork.”
Cameron’s interest sparked. After Special Agent Olivia Westcott left the Bureau to work for his brother at Blackwell Asset Recovery Services, aka BARS, he’d jumped at the opportunity to slide into the vacancy she’d left behind in Asheville. Partly because it was the opportunity he’d been waiting for since joining the Bureau five years ago and partly because it would put him closer to Steele Ridge.
Home.
Or what used to be home. Didn’t much feel like it anymore. Not with the unending tension between him and his brother Zeke.
A situation he intended to remedy. Soon.
If he could get his hardheaded brother on board.
Due to Cameron and Liv’s success with recovering stolen art over the past couple of years, Special Agent in Charge Shanice Williams had decided North Carolina could use its own art crime squad. Now, he and two other agents could prioritize art and cultural cases over others that might cross their desks.
But someone using artwork to swing a school board vote didn’t seem like a job for the FBI, let alone his team.
“Isn’t that an issue for the Board’s superintendent to sort out?” he asked.
“Under normal circumstances, yes.”
He lifted a brow. “And these aren’t?”
“The complainant believes the offending member and the superintendent are having an affair.”
“What about the sheriff?”
A look of exasperation crossed the SRA’s features, as if he’d already run through the gamut of FBI-alternatives. Which he probably had.
The verdict on whether or not he liked Lawson as an individual was still out. But there was no denying the man’s keen intelligence and agenting skills.
“According to the complainant, the sheriff and super have been best friends since high school.”
Too bad this incident wasn’t in Haywood County. Sheriff Maggie Kingston was friends, friendly, or related to most of the folks under her jurisdiction. She’d figured out how to navigate sticky relational issues and still get the job done.
“Who’s being accused of buying the board member’s vote?”
The SRA consulted a document inside the folder he held. “Krowne. Kayla Krowne. Owns a lobbying firm by the name of Krowne and Associates.”
Cameron’s heart whipped the blood in his body into a frenzy, giving him an insta-headache. He fought to keep his gaze steady, his muscles loose, when all he wanted to do was explode into violence.
He forced himself to draw in a slow breath, once, twice. When the urge to break things passed and his heart rate returned to normal, he was left feeling cold and unsteady.
“Know her?” Lawson asked, eyeing him closely.
He shrugged. “Not really. We’ve exchanged a few words.” Verbal barbs, heated glances. “She’s friends with my brother’s fiancée.”
A long heartbeat stretched out before Lawson asked, “Liv?”
Only years of conditioning kept the cringe off his face. One of the reasons Olivia Westcott had traded her FBI badge for a position with BARS, as their provenance expert, was because of Lawson’s growing romantic interest in her.
To his credit, the SRA had never acted upon his feelings, but Liv, a single mom, had worried that her boss’s iron will would eventually corrode and break. And where would that leave them when she said no?
Rather than gamble, she’d left on her own terms and couldn’t be happier, especially since the new gig allowed her to spend more time with her son Brodie.
“Yes,” he said, confirming the SRA’s suspicion.
The skin over Lawson’s cheekbones whitened a moment before he asked, “Is Zeke still pissed at you about your role in the Lederman-St. Martin case?”
The Lederman-St. Martin case had forced a tenuous alliance between the Bureau and BARS in order to stop a huge shipment of nasty drugs from being dumped into small towns across Western North Carolina, including Steele Ridge.
He hesitated in answering Lawson’s question, not wanting to air out his family’s dirty laundry. Zeke had been ticked off at him long before his involvement in the case. “Hard to say.”
“I’ll take that as a no, which means you shouldn’t run into any familial obstacles while investigating this complaint.”
He wasn’t so sure. If Zeke found out about him nosing around in Kayla’s business—and he would—his brother would have one more reason to believe he’d written off his family.
Kayla had been instrumental in a couple of recent asset recoveries. In Zeke’s eyes, she was practically family. Plus, Liv and Kayla were best friends and Phin did work for the lobbyist. Neither of them would ever forgive him if his involvement led to her arrest.
“Might be best if you take this one,” he said.
“Why’s that?”
“I have another connection to Ms. Krowne. My youngest brother, Phin, works part-time for her lobbying firm.”
“Fucking small towns.” Lawson tapped the file folder against his thigh as he considered options. “I can’t. The complainant is my cousin.”
Guess that explained the unofficial part of the complaint.
“I’ll have Gomez or Finch look into it.” The other two members of his art crime squad.
“Aren’t they headed to Quantico for some training?”
Shit.
He nodded. “Slipped my mind.”
Short straw.
Lawson eyed him. “You can be objective?”
If his family hadn’t been involved, he would’ve jumped on the opportunity to go toe-to-toe with Kayla Krowne. But she’d rooted herself in with the Blackwells now, which would make investigating her challenging for him on a personal level. But not impossible.
“Of course.” His headache intensified, as he held out his hand. Lawson slapped the file folder into his palm. “I’d like to say keep me updated, but given the circumstances, it might be best to stick to highlights only. I’d prefer not to have to lie to my cousin.”
Cameron nodded, and Lawson left.
He pinched the bridge of his nose and squeezed his eyes shut. “Shit, shit, shit.”
“Having a bad day, hon?” a female voice asked.
He dropped his hand and looked up to find the happiest, most energetic person he knew standing in the opening of his cubicle. Liv had dubbed her Peppy Patsy. It fit.
Some might find the office assistant’s constant positivity and casual manner grating. Liv confessed as much to him, even though she liked the older woman. But Cameron appreciated Patsy’s happy countenance and distinctive laugh for the blessings they were.
He produced a smile. “Not anymore.”
“Now, aren’t you sweet.” Her hazel eyes lit with excitement. “I have someone here who’ll perk up your day.”
Wariness made him sit straighter. He rarely got visitors, and those who did come here were generally invited by him.
“Who?”
Patsy glanced to her left as she stepped aside. A tall, broad-shouldered man came into view. “Morning, Ash.”
With those two words, Zeke Blackwell sucked every square inch of air out of the office. Cameron didn’t even have the breath to correct his brother’s use of his first name.
He could think of only one reason why Zeke had entered enemy territory.
To deliver bad news.