Kyle was the loudmouth of the team. He’d say what he thought when it was on his mind, and not give a shit what people thought about it. He was honest to a fault, and it got him in trouble more times than not.
I closed the door behind me, the metal clanging on metal alerting the others that I was here, and all conversation stopped. We’d stripped the inside of the downstairs, leaving one giant room with a table and a station set up toward the back corner. It always made me laugh in cop shows when they showed people sitting in the middle of the room, working away with a board covered in suspects next to them.
That wasn’t reality.
Why would you situate yourself in the middle of the room, open to be shot at from all sides—you’d be too exposed. It didn’t make logical sense. At least in a corner, you were covered by two sides and could see the door clearly.
Three heads swung my way, all their focus entirely on me.
I hadn’t managed to get away for three weeks now, which meant all they had were messages from me. It was the
longest any of us had gone without having direct contact, but it was to be expected with this case.
This was what we did, we specialized in putting the people who ran drugs in prison. We weren’t your normal beat cops or detectives who did what we could when it was placed directly under our noses. No, we were special agents in the DEA—we went out looking for them before it had a chance to get to that stage. We weren’t interested in the guy selling baggies on the corner. We wanted the person at the top, the one funneling out to the streets and rolling in both money and drugs.
“Look who finally decides to show up,” Kyle shouted, leaning against one of the desks with a smirk on his face. Out of the three of them, he was the one who I’d known the longest. We’d grown up in the same area, dealt with the same shit, and managed to come out on the other side.
“Yeah, yeah, I’ve been busy, unlike some people.” I sauntered over to where they were set up and crossed my arms over my chest. “Got any new intel?”
“Nope,” Jordan said, pushing his chair away from the computer he’d gotten set up. He was our resident computer guy, but he hated it. He’d much rather be chasing people down the street than tapping away at a keyboard, but someone had to do the job, and Jordan was one of the best hackers the DEA had ever seen. “We lost your watch tracker last night.”
I raised a brow and let my arms drop at my sides. “What? What time?”
“Around eleven. It didn’t come back on until two this morning.”
“Shit.” I started to pace in front of the desks. “They must have some kind of blocker in the area.”
“Blocker?” Ryan asked, pushing forward. When I wasn’t here, he was head of the team. We may all have the same badge, but that didn’t mean we were on the same level. Every team needed a leader, and I was ours.
We were effective, and our conviction rate was one of the highest in the country. Other states requested that we come and train the local cops and other units, but you couldn't teach life. We’d all lived in it, breathed it, begged to get out of it, which meant going back into those situations made it not only easier but gave us an insight into how bad we wanted to make things better.
“Fuck.” I dug my fingers into my temple, feeling a lack of sleep headache coming on. “Let me just process this for a second.” I yanked the closest chair toward me and sat down, trying to figure everything out so I could tell them.
“Why don’t you fill us in on what’s happened since we last saw you?” Ryan asked, sitting in a chair to my right, his blue eyes focused on me.
“I met the girl.”
“The pretty one?” Kyle asked, his grin wide. Only he would ask that.
“Yeah.” I shook my head. “The pretty one.”
“What’s she like?” Kyle was all sorts of interested.
“I dunno, want me to find out what her favorite color is? Maybe her favorite movie? Jesus, Kyle, will you let me talk for once?” They knew that the one thing I hated more than most was to be interrupted, especially when I only had a limited amount of time here.
Kyle held his hands up. “You got it.”
My nostrils flared, but I tried to keep my cool. “I think she may be my in, but I need to find out more. Hut strangled her on Friday at his party which made—”
“Jesus,” Jordan spat. “Ain’t she meant to be his sister?” He shook his head, his fists clenched on his thighs.
“Yeah,” I growled, remembering Hut’s hand around her throat and the look in her eyes as she stared at me, begging for me to step in. “Let’s just say that it took strength I didn’t know I had not to blow my cover then and there.” I ran my hand through my hair, making a mental note to get it cut. “I’m gonna work on her more and see if we can use her, but in the meantime, I got more intel.”
I told them about the warehouse Hut had taken me to yesterday and gave them directions, telling Jordan and Ryan to scope it out. “Just log everything and everyone who comes in and out, we may be able to turn one of them into an informant. The more eyes we got, the better.”
“On it,” Ryan replied, standing up and packing up some gear.
“Kyle, I need you to follow Hut. Don’t take your eyes off him. Rotate out with Jord and Ryan. We need eyes on him at all times.” I leaned back in my seat. “When I’m not with him, I’ll try to take a shift watching him. There’s more than he’s letting on.”