Trouble (B-Squad 2.75)

"Isaac and Tamara there yet?" Lexie asked. "I'm showing they should be."

A set of headlights appeared on his darkened street. A second later, a nondescript car pulled into his drive. Isaac and an icy blonde got out.

"They’re here."

"Good. I'm shooting you the addresses and building layout specs of each target right now," Lexie said. "Bring her home."

As if failure was even an option.

"I'll be doing that," he said. "No matter what."

Leah

The kitchen was pitch dark, but the metallic scent of fresh blood penciled in every detail she couldn't see of Curtis's dead body only a few feet from her. This wasn't a place she ever saw herself going. If she was going to die in Catfish Creek, she'd always figured it would have been one of The Hamburger Shack greasy burgers that would do her in. The panicked giggle that escaped was muffled by the Duct tape across her mouth.

She tested the tape securing her forearm to the chair. Despite her pulling, tugging, and yanking, it hadn't budged.

There was no way Warren was going to let her or anyone else walk away tomorrow even if he got the diamond—his killing Curtis without even blinking showed just how far over the line Warren had gone. There was no coming back. And if she didn't do something, he'd take out Drew. She wouldn’t—couldn’t—let that happen. Even the thought of it made all the air disappear from the room and there was only one explanation for that, the kind you came to when you could count the rest of your life in minutes and everything else that seemed so important before slipped away.

For someone who's supposed to be a brainiac, you sure can be stupid.

She loved Drew. She'd loved him since she was six years old and as much as he'd broken her heart, all the jagged pieces were still meant for only one man and she wasn't about to let some psycho hurt him.

Drew

The deputies in the unmarked mobile command unit were four blocks down. Drew stood at the halfway point between Lexie's top two possibilities and right in the middle of Isaac Camacho's glare zone. The fuck yous had gone unspoken so far. As former military special forces, Isaac knew as well as Drew did that they didn't have time for that now. Later? They'd probably both walk away with black eyes and bruises—but just because Drew knew he deserved them didn't mean he was going to take his medicine without hitting back.

"I don't like splitting up," Isaac grumbled, shoving a hand through his shaggy brown hair.

"Too bad," Drew said. "We have two possible locations and one could simply be a decoy. We can't take that chance with Leah's life on the line."

Isaac puffed up his chest and took a step toward him. "Wonder who in the hell let that happen."

Pound for pound, inch for inch they were evenly matched. Add to that the fact that they were both pissed off at the same person and it could go explosive fast.

"It's not the time or the place," Tamara said, a harsh enough blast of frigid cold in her tone to stop Drew in his tracks.

"You're right." Drew nodded at the woman who looked every inch like the bitchy ex-beauty queen she was. "Won't happen again."

"Oh yes it will," Isaac countered. "But not until after we have my sister back."

"Then let's get to it. We're all patched into the SWAT command center." He tapped the communicator that looked like an earbud but worked for ingoing and outgoing voice traffic, not to mention the ability to go old school and talk in tapped code to communicate when talking wasn't an option. "You take the communal living place and I'll check out the extended stay hotel."

"What, no backup?" Isaac asked with a snarl.

Already amped up, Drew reached deep for the calm he needed to get through this. "I can handle it. Anyway, my extra guys are out looking for the other FBI agent, Ritter, and manning the command center so this doesn't go pear shaped. This is Catfish Creek, in case you forgot it, it's not like we've got an unending supply of deputies."

After a curt nod from Isaac, Drew continued. “Anyway, it's recon only. When we locate her, we call in the others before attempting to exfil. Are we clear?"

Isaac nodded. "Crystal."

With a nod, he took off at a jog, sticking close to the shadows toward the Metroplex Extended Stay Hotel. John Smith was staying in room four eighteen. There wasn't anyone in the rooms above, below or beside him, according to what Lexie was able to bring up—all of which made his gut twitch considering how hard it was to get a hotel room in Catfish Creek this week.

Getting through the front door of the hotel when he was in full black tactical clothing, wearing a bulletproof vest, and carrying enough firepower to take out the building got him a panicked look from the hotel clerk. He stopped long enough to show his badge and to warn the clerk to stay low and safe if trouble came her way. Then he was sprinting up four flights of stairs, his only mental image that of Leah like he'd last seen her with that smart ass smile that twisted him up inside. Picturing her any other way could fuck up his ability to get the job done.

Still breathing steady he walked through the stairwell door and out into the carpeted hallway that would muffle his steps as he approached the door for room four eighteen.

He fished out the reverse scope from his gear bag and lined it up on the door's peephole. All he saw was black. Not a solid black as if someone had taped over the peephole but some serious darkness. Willing himself not to jump the gun and pick the door lock before he knew the situation, he stared through the scope trying to pick out any variations in lighting. Just as he was about to give up and pop the door lock, a soft beam of light appeared, drawing his attention. The light silhouetted a man with a medium build but that wasn't what made his blood freeze in his veins. It was the unmistakable splatter of gray matter on the wall of a kitchenette and Leah Duct taped to a chair.