“Flynn … we need you there. We can’t do this without you.”
“You can count on me.”
I disconnected the call and went into my closet, dressing in tactical gear. I ensured each tie was bound and every strap was pulled tightly, and I spent a good amount of time brushing my teeth before I grabbed my wallet and keys and rushed out the door.
When I got into my car, my hands on the steering wheel, only one thought was in my mind.
The next time I was behind this wheel, those motherfuckers were going to be in custody.
I wanted nothing more than to put bullets through both of their heads. But a punishment far worse was having them sent to a supermax facility, where seeing the sun for an hour a day would be the only privilege those bastards got.
“Police,” my team yelled as they kicked in the front door of the house we’d been assigned. “Hands up where we can see them.”
Several different police forces, the FBI, SWAT, and National Guard had been divided into a twenty-block area, as the brothers were suspected to be hiding somewhere in those borders.
As I stepped into the home, there was a man sitting on the couch in the living room, the TV on, his hands raised in the air, one clenching the remote.
Helicopters were circling above in the air, and blue lights were flashing through the windows.
The newscasters were covering every second of this manhunt.
There wasn’t a fucking person in this state who didn’t know what was going on right now.
“Don’t move,” one of my team members yelled at him. “Are you alone? Who else is in this house?”
“Just me,” he replied.
The team split—half running upstairs to scour the second floor, the other staying on the main level—dividing to cover each room.
I approached the man, showing him a photograph of the bombers. “Are you housing these men?”
“No,” he answered. “You’re not going to find them in here.”
“We’ll be the judge of that,” I told him.
As I entered the kitchen, there wasn’t anything in the sink, the counters were mostly bare, and nothing was underneath the small table. Everything in here had a place.
“Clear,” I yelled and went back to the living room, a cat weaving between my feet as I gripped my rifle with both hands.
“Clear,” one of my guys yelled from the back of the house.
“All clear,” an agent said from the front.
Once we had been assigned areas, we had been given blueprints to review each home, so going in, we would know the layout, how many floors, whether the house had a basement or attic.
This house only had the latter.
While we waited for the team upstairs to report back, my training caused me to study the living room. There were framed photos sitting on the TV stand, a few more on the end table by the couch. Several peculiar, abstract art pieces were on the walls, which I had a hard time dissecting. I stepped closer to the television to get a better look at the pictures and the faces that were in each one.
“When was the last time you were outside?” one of my team members asked the homeowner.
He continued to hold his hands in the air. “When I came home from work.”
“Has your doorbell rung this evening? And have you answered it?”
He shook his head. “No.”
The man’s chest was rising and falling rather fast, his eyes darting to each of the agents, his foot bouncing on the floor. With his shoes still on, the heel made a noise each time it landed.
All very normal movements, given the situation.
“Where do you work?”
He used his head to point behind him, as though he were giving us directions. “L & S Accounting in Watertown.”
“What do you do there?”
One of the agents who had been on the second floor just reached the bottom of the staircase when the man answered, “I’m an accountant and the owner.”
The same agent stepped in closer and said, “Then why do you have an engineering degree from Wentworth in your office?”
No question was off-limits, not when every clue had the capability of leading to something much larger.
“Answer the question,” I said to the man.
His arms dropped a few inches, and I sensed he was getting lazy. “I got bored of surveying land, decided to shift gears into something more profitable.”
“When was the last time you—”
The agent’s voice was cut off when, “Black down, black down,” was shouted from the street.
Hearing the name of the mission—code that the suspects might have been located—caused every agent in this room to freeze. We all glanced at one another, needing a third announcement that would serve as confirmation before any of us moved a goddamn inch.
Anxiousness pounded through my fucking chest, my feet ready to rush out the door as we waited.
“Black down!” was finally screamed from the road.
My hands squeezed the butt of the rifle, relief flooding my body.
They got the motherfuckers.
“Clear out,” I shouted.
Once we were down the front steps of the house, the agent running next to me said, “That guy was a fucking freak.”
“Yeah?”
“We weren’t able to finish searching upstairs because there was so much shit to look through.”
“Do I want to know?”
He shook his head as we came to a stop in the center of the road. “No way, man.” His eyes went wide. “Some people are into some weird shit, and I’m not one of them.”
I didn’t respond as we joined the large team of law enforcement, the director of the FBI at the head. As he detailed the plan of attack, my ears were buzzing, my fingers shaking.
A hand clamped down on my shoulder, and I glanced behind me to see Rivera standing there.
His grip tightened as he leaned into my ear and said, “For Dylan.”
I released my gun just long enough to pound my hand on top of his, glancing up at the dark sky. “For Dylan.”
Forty-Nine
Before
Ashe
“Gorgeous …” I groaned as Pearl walked into my apartment, the shorts she had on showing those delicious legs. “Did you get it?” Even though the bag on her shoulder told me what I was asking about was more than likely inside, the excitement on her face also giving it away, I’d still had to ask.
She hurried over, locking our lips, the cinnamon so profound that I licked my mouth after she pulled away, just to taste her again.
“Yep.” She giggled. “I still can’t believe it. The whole thing is honestly so surreal.” She reached inside the bag and pulled out her cap and gown, holding it against her body to show me what it would look like, the stole she had achieved for magna cum laude resting over the shoulders. “Now that we’re only a week away from graduation …” She shrugged, breathing heavy. “I don’t know. It’s a lot to take in and process.”
“Nothing to process.” I pulled her into my arms. “You’ve crushed the last four years; you’ve gotten sick grades and every lead in the play. You’ve teased the patrons who have come into the bar when you run around there in your see-through tank tops.” I tickled her waist, kissing both cheeks and behind her neck, listening to her laugh the whole time. A sound so contagious and satisfying that I hated that I was mostly only going to hear it over the phone now. “It’s time for you to crush the next best thing, and that’s New York, baby.”