Collecting a carrier was a big step up—a way to get closer to Anton’s inner circle and, hopefully, discover the names of the big players, maybe even the names of what they called the “blood barons”—the actual heads of the blood cartels. She felt excitement—and some apprehension, too.

“One of ours?” Ellie asked, referring to the pair of undercover agents posing as carriers.

Roland shook his head. “Don’t know the target’s name yet,” he said, “but it’s a guy.”

She didn’t ask how he’d come across this information, because she knew Roland had bugged Anton’s condo and his car. The FBI couldn’t bug his phone, because it was encrypted, and Roland wasn’t about to try to go the legal route and secure a wiretap, because the Feds didn’t know if Anton had any judges or cops on his payroll.

Roland drank slowly from his bottle. She’d been told he’d run a ton of successful undercover ops over his nearly thirty-year federal career, and everyone spoke about him with mystical reverence—Yoda dressed in Dockers, sockless in boat shoes, and the type of bland polo shirts and button-downs you bought at buy-one-get-one-free sales at Target. Ellie thought he deliberately picked out the clothes so he’d blend into the background, look, with his rimless eyeglasses and shaved head, like a middle-aged accountant. Get up close, though, and you could see the wiry strength in his torso and the steel in his eyes.

“It’s going down tonight,” Roland said, placing his empty bottle on the bar.

“How are you going to track this guy?”

“I’m working on that. You up for this?”

“Absolutely.”

“Might not be able to extract you in case shit goes sideways.” He took out his wallet and went through his bills, still not looking at her.

“I’m ready,” Ellie said.

Roland turned his head to her. When she met his gaze, Ellie thought he seemed disturbed, maybe even sad, as if he had glimpsed into the future and had seen tonight’s outcome.

* * *

The carrier’s name was Mackenzie Reynolds. He was twenty-three years old, a Silicon Valley brat who had been born and raised Los Angeles. Anton had supplied her with pictures and his destination. Tonight, Mackenzie was supposedly meeting up with some friends at a trendy bar in Beverly Hills called Viva, home of the fifty-dollar martini.

Ellie worked her way through the bar, searching for her target.

Not only was the place a total sausage fest, but the guys in here, most of them in their forties and fifties, judging by the looks of them, were smug corporate types really interested in rattling off their list of financial successes, where they lived, and what kinds of cars they drove, as if laying out all these details was their ticket to getting laid. Ellie supposed it worked, though, because she saw a lot of women around her age actually reacting to this bullshit, giggling and fawning and flirting, looking to trade their bodies and youth for a lifetime free of financial worry.