Chapter 458 Camping = Appreciating the Sights of Our Homeland?
Catherine found that strange and stuck her head out of the kitchen. “Camping? Where?”
Luke said, “The mountains close to grandpa’s place. I want a bit of peace and quiet.”
Catherine gave an “oh” of surprise. “Alright, you can take dinner with you.”
Luke had often gone camping in middle school, but most of the time, that had been with Jimena. Now that Jimena was at college, the question was who Luke was going camping with.
But Catherine could ask that later; there was no need to immediately be a nag about it. She simply told Luke to be careful. Accepting dinner from Catherine, Luke hugged her and said goodbye before he left in his car.
Standing in front of the house, Catherine watched his car disappear down the road.
She was about to go back inside, when a car drove up and a head stuck out. “Hello, Catherine. Is Luke here?” Catherine smiled and shook her head. “Hello, Selina. He just left to go camping. He went in that direction.”
Selina said, “Thanks, Catherine.” She didn’t even get out of the car and simply sped off to catch up with Luke.
Catherine smiled inwardly. “Those two are pretty good at acting. Are they too embarrassed to let us know?”
Luke converted the files into audio format and listened to them as he drove so that he didn’t waste time.
Suddenly, his phone rang. He glanced at it and picked up. “What’s up? Are you having fun?”
Selina said over the phone, “You’re going camping?”
Luke was stumped. “You… went to my place?” He instantly realized what had happened.
Selina said, “If you slow down a little, I’ll probably catch up in a minute.”
Utterly speechless, Luke pulled his car over in a vacant area.
Like Selina said, she caught up in no time.
After she got out, she didn’t ask any questions but said right away, “Palmer called me and wanted me to persuade you.”
Luke smiled. “So you’re here to persuade
me?”
Selina nodded. “That’s right, I specially came to persuade you to stay away from this gigantic mess. I was afraid you wouldn’t be able to resist being coaxed by that beautiful DEA agent.”
Stumped for a moment, Luke then smiled. “Then why did you come after me?”
Selina glared at him angrily. “If I didn’t come, you would probably go camping in Mexico tonight, right?”
She couldn’t be bothered to state the obvious.
If Luke really was going out to have fun, he would’ve told her. The fact that he snuck off surreptitiously was clearly a problem.
Luke scratched his head. Who knew that Palmer would actually get Selina to persuade him?
Was that necessary?
He just didn’t want to go to Mexico under his real identity, that was all.
As expected, big beauties weren’t dependable at all!
Cursing Palmer silently, he sighed. “Well, Martin is our colleague in the Major Crimes Division anyway, so I want to check up on him. As long as nothing happens, I won’t take any action.”
Unsurprised, Selina nodded. “Okay. I’m coming with you.”
Luke: “…I don’t think that’s necessary, right?”
Selina gave him a sidelong glance. “I’m afraid that after hearing Palmer’s pleas, you’ll charge in recklessly with guns blazing to take on hundreds of dealers.”
Luke smiled wryly. “Am I that stupid?”
Selina narrowed her eyes at him. “I didn’t think so before, but right now… hehe.”
Luke made a last-ditch effort. “But it’s your birthday…”
“That was yesterday.” Selina cut him off.
“You’ve always wanted to rest…” Luke continued searching for other reasons.
“I’ve had enough rest; now, my bones are all itchy.” Selina cracked her knuckles.
Luke nodded helplessly. “Fine, we’ll go together. But we need to drive Sandra’s car back, and I’ll let Catherine know.”
Selina nodded.
Ten minutes later, Luke went over to Selina’s house after grabbing a big bag from his place. Under Sandra’s complicated gaze, they asserted that they were going camping in the mountains together.
Watching the car drive off, Sandra mumbled, “I wonder if Selina brought any condoms. I should’ve asked her.”
She was then amused. “Forget it. She’s old enough to make me a grandmother anyway.” On the other side, Luke gave the files to Selina.
Closing her eyes, Selina listened to the files and memorized the information.
“There are more than two million residents in Tijuana. How are you going to find Martin?” she asked.
Luke asked, “What do you think?” Selina said, “We look for Dito Flores since Martin is gunning for him.”
Luke hummed in agreement.
“Do you have Dito’s address?”
Luke hummed in acknowledgement again.
The intelligence he had collected was mostly focused on the L.A. gangs but one part covered the big syndicates in Mexico.
Luke had already been planning to go hunting in Mexico on this trip back to Texas.
The Carlos family from before had just been a small gang but had given him abundant experience and credit points. Bigger gangs meant bigger rewards.
He would’ve set off the next morning even if Palmer hadn’t called him.
He was doing nothing more than simply moving his trip forward, so after taking care of Martin’s matter, he might even have time for another job.
Would it be inconvenient with Selina around? Of course not.
With the excuse of helping Martin out, it wouldn’t matter even if he went on a killing spree.
In any case… there was Martin to take the blame! In this way, the two of them headed southwest.
With Selina around, Luke didn’t have to take the trouble of listening to the files; he only needed to listen to Selina highlight the main points.
At midnight, Luke stopped the car and Selina immediately opened her eyes. “Where are we?”
She hadn’t been sleeping, but had been listening to the files.
Luke smiled and got out. “Let’s go. We said we were going camping.”
Selina rolled her eyes. “It doesn’t take seven hours to drive to your grandpa’s ranch.”
Following Luke, she got out and looked around. “What is this place?”
The quiet wilderness around her was even more desolate at night. There weren’t any lights as far as the eye could see.
“Big Bend National Park,” Luke replied. He took out the big bag from the trunk and said, “Let’s go. There’s still a long way to go.” Following him, Selina couldn’t help but ask, “Are we really… going to go camping?” Big Bend National Park was quite remote, but was a scenic spot famous for its mix of barren land, greenery, canyons and rivers.
But such an outstanding scenic location wasn’t crowded even during the holidays.
Luke said with a smile, “Of course. We’ll camp here for a few days and feast our eyes upon the majestic natural wonders of our great motherland…”
Detecting the contempt in Selina’s eyes, Luke dropped the pompous act. “Fine. Actually, we’ll be taking a covert ‘trip’ into Mexico. This way, there won’t be any records of us crossing the border.”