“None of your business.” He shouldered his bag and side-stepped her.
Two SWAT units were congregating around the white dry-erase board, half in partial states of dress, like him, while the others were ready.
“Are you shadowing me for a reason?” he asked Becca.
“You look like a raging rhino. Just wondering what’s up,” she replied. “Is it your wife still?”
He glanced away. Thanks to his drowning his sorrows in a bottle, everyone knew what was going on with his personal life. He’d have done himself a favor if he just drank at home alone like any sensible officer did. But no, he’d had to go out to do it.
“I’ll take that as a yes.” She headed away from him.
“Becca, wait.”
“Hmm?” She pivoted and paused for him to catch up.
“Yes, it’s Nicole.”
She nodded.
“Do you—would you have any suggestions on how to, I don’t know, show her I’m up for change? Or whatever it is she wants?”
“I’m pretty sure you have to know what she wants in order to get it for her.”
“Okay, she wants me to be there for her, but she won’t let me be around her. How do I fight that?”
“Don’t fight it. If you push her, you’ll lose. I’m going to make a lot of assumptions here, but something bad happened between you two, right? Like a while ago?” Becca stared at him and damn if he didn’t want to be anywhere else. Her piercing gaze had even him fidgeting.
“Yeah, something bad.”
“And then I’m guessing, since you were here all the time and never home, you just sort of swept it under the rug and pretended to forget about it?”
“Yeah.” When she said it like that, he was a fucking looser.
“My suggestion? Listen to her. She’s probably got an awful lot of stuff to say you’ve never heard before. Once you know what she’s upset about you can fix it. Girls are easy. We want someone to hold us, listen to us and be with us. Except when we don’t. That’s when you leave a box of wine and a bag of chocolate on the doorstep and get the fuck away.”
“Hey, gossip girls, care to join us?” Aaron shouted across the garage.
“Fuck you,” Jake yelled back for lack of anything else to say.
He and Becca joined the group around the whiteboard as the last stragglers. Jake did a double take. In the middle of their huddle, with Cole, was the narc officer he’d met at the farmhouse scene.
“Welcome back, everyone,” Cole said, pulling in the attention on him. “We have been assigned to work with Narcotics on these busts. Today we’re going to do another bust. I’ll give the floor to Officer Tatum to explain the background here.”
Officer Tatum stepped forward. “Thanks for joining us on this mission. According to the intel we gathered from our dealer friends picked up yesterday, Felipe Rios, one of David Alvarez and Jose Garza’s former business associates, runs a prescription pill mill out of this gas station at Bell Ave and New York Street.” He paused to pin a few surveillance pictures to the top of the whiteboard.
Jake’s stomach churned. Again? This was too much coincidence.
“The plan is to enter the store from the front, which is the only access. We’re going to get power cut so it takes down their security cameras and we can access the back rooms where Rios has his operation set up. Several sources have confirmed that every Thursday at one he comes in to check the stock and have a meeting with a guy who was widely referred to as the Pharmacist, who handles the day-to-day running of their supply. Our goal here is to apprehend both the Pharmacist and Rios, take into possession any computers or information on site and move on it as soon as possible.”
The pieces fit together too cleanly. It was way too neat. He’d worked so many angles and leads to even get Diego Cruz behind bars, and in a string of chance they were potentially going to bag three members of the old gang at once?
Officer Tatum wrapped up the explanation of the mission and the teams began to disperse to the unmarked vans as the vehicles of choice. Both vans sported magnetic decals of major snack food companies to further the disguise.
“Hey, Tatum,” Jake said, approaching the officer and Cole.
“Vant, glad to see you’re with us today.” Tatum offered his hand and shook Jake’s.
“Yeah, me too. Have we had any leads on why this is so easy?”
Tatum shrugged. “No, man, but we can’t sit around with our thumbs up our asses and ignore the golden opportunity.”
“What about Diego Cruz?”
Tatum’s brows drew down in a line. “What about him?”
“How much longer is he in for?”
“Wait—you didn’t know?” Tatum’s eyes opened wide.
“Know what?”
“He got out early. Good behavior and all that shit. They didn’t call you?”
Procedure dictated that the detective on the case would be notified when a criminal got out early, for any reason. In the case of a homicide the family was also informed. With Diego, there were many families who would be hurt and traumatized knowing the man was out from behind bars.
“Are you shitting me? I never heard.” He couldn’t believe it. All the work to take the bastard off the streets and he was out again.
“We’ve had eyes on him. He’s set up house and doesn’t get out much. Let’s look into this when we get back.” Tatum glanced at Cole. “I’d like Vant on point. He knows what Rios looks like and is familiar with this case. Is that okay with you, Sergeant?”
“Fine by me.” Cole shrugged. “You okay with it?”
Jake nodded. “Hell yeah.”
He’d like to do a little damage after that bomb.
“Let’s load up,” Cole said.
“We’ll be at the staging point,” Tatum said and headed out of the garage.
“I cannot fucking believe that,” Jake muttered.
“Hey.” Cole grabbed his arm, stopping him in his tracks. “Can you do this and have a clear head?”
“Yeah, I’m good. Just pissed. That piece of trash killed people like animals. Straight up butchered them. The families, I just hope they told them.” The nightmares that criminal must have inspired, the children who’d been left without a parent. Jake had met them all, even attended a few funerals and promised to see Cruz behind bars. Too bad the system let him out early.
“Okay, let’s do this.”
* * * * *
Jake wiped the sweat off his brow and blew out a breath. One of the awful things about the unmarked vans was the complete lack of ventilation. They were quite effectively roasted alive as they drove from the garage to the site of the mission.
He had to stop thinking about Cruz or he was going to drive himself crazy. The mission details were straightforward enough that they didn’t hold his attention. What else?
Nicole.
Her tears had broken him that morning. One of the worst things about this job was how it constantly interfered with his home life. Being called out at odd hours, inevitably in the middle of something like sex or a fight, was a given. But this morning was one of the worst. He could take her anger, her silence or her rage, but not her tears.
Becca suggested listening to her, but Jake wasn’t so sure Nicole would talk to him. She’d been practically silent for months.
What if she needed to hear him speak?
He had a good idea what she wanted to hear from him. At least now he did. Before this week he’d been walking in the dark. It was pretty horrible that it took her leaving him to shed some light on the whole matter.
“Approaching the gas station. Power has been cut,” a voice said in his headset.
“Look alive, people.” Cole stood, grabbing the pole that ran horizontal to the ceiling for balance.
Jake was at the back of the van, nearest the only exit.
The vehicle braked, then took a hard right and squealed to a stop.
Jake stood and twisted the door handle, pushing it open and jumping down. Aaron was next to
him as they hunched and jogged to the front of the gas station.
Glass shattered.
“Shots fired, shots fired,” Jake roared into his comm.
“Take cover,” Cole called behind him.
Jake crouched behind a bank of newspaper machines just under the store window. Bullets hit the van and bounced off the reinforced sides.
The other van pulled up alongside the gas station where there weren’t any windows.
“Team two, hold your position,” Cole commanded from behind the ice machine.
More shots took out the remaining pane of glass. Someone or something had given them up. So much for having the element of surprise.
“There are no civilians inside,” Tatum said into his ear.
“What about the clerk?” Cole shouted.
“The clerk is the shooter,” Tatum replied.
“Well, fuck,” Jake muttered.
The shooter paused for a moment. Jake twisted to get his rifle into a better placement, only to jerk down farther as bullets hit the sidewalk not three feet from him.
“Shooter is aiming for Vant,” Aaron announced.
“I’ve got him,” Becca replied.
Two blasts came from the direction of their van. A man’s scream sounded from inside the gas station.
Jake ducked under the broken-out glass of the door and advanced into the building.
“Clerk is down,” he said.
Two others followed close on his heels, one going to the clerk and securing the suspect.
“I’m going to the pill mill.”
“Griffith with Vant,” Aaron said right behind him.
Jake kept low between the rows of snack foods and candy. They reached a metal door labeled Employees Only without incident.
Aaron took two swift steps and hit the door with his twenty-pound door ram.
It barely moved.
“Aw, hell,” Jake muttered.
The door had to be some sort of reinforced metal, steel perhaps. A bitch to get through, but they would.
Voices and the sound of boots on tile echoed behind them.
Aaron hit the door again.
An indentation about the size of a dinner plate marked their progress. The hinges were loose, the screws straining to do their job.
Aaron stood back and kicked the door, once, twice.
“One more time with the ram,” Jake said. He could see space between the door and the frame. Maybe a flash of movement.
Aaron backed up to the other side of the hall, took two long strides and hit the door with the ram. It buckled inward, struggling to hang on by the top and bottom hinges. Aaron kicked it again and the bottom hinge gave way.
Jake stepped into the breach, gun at the ready.
The room was L-shaped. The door was at the short part of the L, where a little desk or receiving area was kept almost completely clean. The long portion of the L was rows upon rows of industrial shelving stocked with pill boxes and bottles. Some pharmacies didn’t even have such a large inventory.
He progressed past the first few rows without sight of anyone. Not the Pharmacist or Felipe Rios. Jake made it all the way to the other end of the storage area without seeing anyone.
“Clear,” he yelled out, frustration lacing his voice.
“Clear,” Aaron echoed from the other side of the room.
“Where the fuck are they?” Jake stalked the width of the room, taking in the new equipment, the packaging areas.
There didn’t appear to be any other entrance or exit from the room save the one through the gas station proper.
“Tatum here,” the narcotics officer said over the headset. “Are you sure you don’t see them?”
“Not at all,” Jake replied.
“Sweep the place again,” Cole ordered.
Four other officers started at one end and went to the other, but they also didn’t find anything Jake had missed.
Where the fuck was Rios?
Jake stalked back through the gas station. The two vans plus a couple patrol cars had the area roped off and a small audience was beginning to gather. He ignored them and circled the building.
“Hey, Vant. Where are you going?” Becca jogged to catch up with him.
“I don’t fucking know.” But he needed to do something.
Together they circled the building, finding nothing but enough evidence to attest to plenty of junkies pausing for a fix after picking up their product.
They stopped on the far side of the building and Jake turned back to survey the scene.
“That’s odd,” Becca muttered.
“What?”
“The pill mill has its own air-conditioner unit, I guess.” She pointed to a silver metal box he’d passed by without a second glance.
“That’s not an A/C unit. There’s no vents.” He jogged back to the questionable silver unit.
“That’s not a good idea,” Becca called after him.
Becca was prone to being overly cautious, not that he blamed her, but she did run the robot unit, which they used to detonate explosives or peek into potentially dangerous situations without risking an officer. She was probably right that this was not a great hands-on situation, but he couldn’t wait.
Jake pulled on a leather glove and ran his hand along a metal seam along the top of the unit. It didn’t budge, so he began tugging at the sides.
One panel slid free, leaving a three-by-three crawl space that led into the pill mill and down.
“I’ll be damned. I found a tunnel. Going in.” Jake slipped in, grasping blindly for ladder rungs.
“Vant, wait for backup,” Cole said into the comm.
“I’m here too,” Becca replied, filling the space above Jake as he lowered to the bottom of the tunnel. He had to hunch over to fit inside.
“We’re right behind you two,” Cole replied, sounding none too pleased.
Jake pressed the flashlight button that was mounted alongside the barrel of his rifle.
The tunnel was nothing more than a three-, maybe three-and-a-half-foot-wide space of packed earth. It couldn’t have been more than five and a half feet tall.
He tucked lower and began edging his way down the tunnel. Becca was a silent presence at his back. She didn’t even turn on her light, not that they needed it with how smooth the hard-packed floor was.
An unintelligible shout from ahead froze Jake in his tracks. He let the light go and they plunged into darkness. The sound of scuffling and more yelling had the hair on the back of his neck rising.
He started forward again with haste but without the light. His sight adjusted slowly. The scent of damp earth filled his nostrils and he had the vague impression of a changing space.
Jake reached out and found that the wall to his right was gone. He pivoted and caught a flash of light ahead.
He picked up the pace, gaining on the bobbing light.
The closer he got, the more he could make out the form of a person. He couldn’t tell if there was more than one, but one was enough. One he could get to talk.
Jake came up on the person as quietly as he could.
“You’re dead, do you hear me? Dead,” the man yelled.
Jake shoved the muzzle of his rifle into the man’s back. “Get on the ground.”
The man froze, twisted slightly and Jake’s world tilted again.
Felipe Rios was his.
Chapter Eight
Nicole heard the rumble of an engine, the squeal of brakes and that was all it took. She jumped off the bed and ran to the front door, peering through the frosted glass. Lights flipped off and the glass went dark. She pulled the door open and breathed a sigh of relief.
Jake stepped out of his truck, grabbed his bag of gear and a brown paper bag. His face was smudged with dirt and his shoulders slumped, probably from exhaustion. He stopped at the welcome mat, his gaze finally landing on her.
“Hi.” Everything in her wanted to hug him, tell herself he was all right.
It was just another mission. He’d bee
n on hundreds. She’d eaten her way through dinners, gone to movies and snoozed while he was off playing hero. But it was different now. There were things unsaid, their lives were unresolved. What if tonight was the night something bad happened and he didn’t come home? What if they never got to say the things they needed to get out?
“Hi.” They stared at each other for a moment. “May I come in?”
“Of course.” She stepped back and held the door.
She followed him into the living room, through the kitchen and hovered in the doorway to the laundry room. Jake pulled out his dirty uniform and some other clothes and put them in the washing machine. She didn’t even complain about the dirt he was dropping on the floors. Just watching him do something so normal comforted her.
“Have you eaten?” Shit. Did she even have anything on hand to make for dinner?
“Yeah, I ate on the way back to the station.” He poured in the detergent and started the cycle.
Jake turned to face her and leaned against the washer, hands braced on the machine behind him.
“Hi,” he said again, cracking a smile.
“Hi.” She smiled back and her heart fluttered.
“Did you eat?”
“Yeah.”
“Good.” He walked toward her, cupping her shoulders, and pressed a kiss to her forehead. He urged her to back up and went to the paper bag he’d left on the kitchen counter.
She followed, curious about what he was doing.
Jake produced another box of her favorite chocolates. She didn’t know what she’d been expecting, but this wasn’t it.
“You can’t buy me back with chocolates and flowers, Jake. I appreciate all the gifts you’ve been leaving me, but this isn’t—
“I know. I know.” He pushed the gold box into her hands. “Just, take it, okay?”
She took the box but placed it on the counter next to her.
Jake reached into the bag and pulled out something she wasn’t expecting.
A wooden unicorn on rollers.
Jake had made the toy in his father’s workshop while his mother helped her stitch together the doll. Later, his mother had even painted it before they’d left. Between Jake and her, it was obvious which of them had more skill, but it had been such a wonderful, fulfilling moment.
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