This book is dedicated to all the Athena Ladies and a terrific editor, Natashya Wilson—a true bombshell!
Kayla Ryan eased her Jeep Cherokee into the alley between two long rows of U-Store-It buildings. She lowered the driver’s side window and cut the engine.
For a full thirty seconds she sat very still, utilized all her senses to estimate the threat level.
The cool December air felt thick with tension in spite of the utter silence enveloping the deserted storage facility. Nothing moved.
They waited. Listening. Anticipating her move…her risk level. At least two men. Maybe three.
Now or never.
Ten seconds more and she’d be made.
No way backup would arrive in time.
Her partner would be pissed.
It wouldn’t be the first time. She doubted it would be the last.
Her heart rate ramming into overdrive, Kayla opened her door and got out. She strode straight over to the nearest storage unit, number forty-two, and reached for the lock. Though she had no key, only a couple quick flicks with the lock pick she carried were required before the mechanism disengaged, falling open in her palm.
She removed the lock and raised the four-foot-wide overhead door. The grind of metal on metal screeched, shattering the silence and sending a clear message to the men about ten units down and on the next row who would be listening.
Nothing to worry about. Just someone adding to or taking from her storage unit.
Her gaze roving left and right, Kayla slipped into the shadows of the ten-by-twelve cinder-block unit. Whatever the boxes stacked nearly to the ceiling contained was of no significance. This wasn’t about unit forty-two or its contents.
Keeping her attention fixed on the vacant alleyway, she relayed a text message to Jim Harkey, her partner, from her cellular phone. The message was simple. SOS…UStoreIt.
She’d sent it once already. He hadn’t responded. Today was his day off. Hers too. But some things couldn’t wait.
With the phone clipped back on her utility belt, she wrapped her fingers around the butt of her weapon. The hiss of cool steel sliding from her leather holster prompted a sense of calm that instantly neutralized the negative effects of the adrenaline pumping through her veins.
She might be off duty but she never went anywhere, not even to bed, without her weapon. To a cop, being unarmed was the equivalent of being naked on stage in front of a jam-packed stadium. Not a good thing—unless you’re a part of a living art exhibit.
The muted sound of voices reached her position. She’d been right. Three. All male. All comfortable with continuing business since her presence had obviously been assessed as insignificant.
That kind of carelessness told her something else about her targets. They had grown complacent. Risky business for criminals.
Adopting a battle-ready stance, she eased out into the light of day. Her rubber-soled shoes made no sound on the concrete that formed the drive through the alley between the rows of storage units.
Four more units…three…she moved toward the end of the long row…two more. When she reached the final one she halted, held absolutely still and listened.
The voices were clear now.
“Twenty of the best,” one man bragged. “I can get you as many as you require.”
Kayla didn’t have to see the product to know what the man was hawking. High-end bikes. Valued at upwards of hundreds, even thousands, of dollars each. The goods were stolen from tourists who preferred to bicycle their way around Arizona’s trails and from university students who considered the designer bikes to be “all that” and more. The more expensive the product, the better the students from wealthy families liked it. Titanium frames, leather seats…top-end bikes came just about any way a customer wanted them.
Though the consumer might have to work hours, days or even weeks to earn the cost, it only took the average thief about eight seconds to cut a lock and scarcely a few moments more to ride off. Especially on campus, where the thieves easily blended into the student population, likely wearing backpacks filled with the tools of their trade.
The risk proved minimal in most cases, the reward more than sufficient. At one time a thief could only hope to turn a twenty-five or thirty-dollar profit on a three-hundred-dollar bike, but now was a different story. The better ones went for hundreds or even thousands a pop. Considering the risk and the slap on the wrist thieves got if caught, it was a far more desirable business than running drugs.
No middleman required. No recipes to concoct. No dangerous chemicals to dispose of. Just simple bolt cutters or lock picks and a backpack. Well, and the physical endurance to ride the stolen bike to wherever your pickup contact waited.
This particular group of thieves had been eluding law enforcement for months now. No one could determine where and how they disposed of the stolen bikes. Serial numbers were apparently changed, since the few registered ones stolen never surfaced. These guys would get more than a mere slap on the wrist. Petty larceny was one thing, but this was considerably bigger. Estimates put these guys at a six-figure business annually.
Athens was the perfect location. Situated close to Phoenix, a big college town, Athens offered a quick, neutral place for storage and distribution. Far enough away from the scene of the crime for comfort and yet close enough to facilitate the job.
But this was her town.
Criminals were not going to be allowed to operate under her jurisdiction as long as she could help it.
With one final deep breath, she braced herself for moving around the end of the building. If she waited for backup, chances were the deal would be done. She wanted the buyers as well as the seller.
When she would have swung around the corner, the sound of a car braking to a stop thirty or forty yards behind her drew her up short.
She swore softly. All she needed was the owner of storage unit number forty-two showing up and throwing a fit. Distraction was not a good thing, nor was being made by the bad guys because of an unfortunate twist of fate.
Her gaze narrowed on the dark sedan that parked behind her Jeep. She frowned. The vehicle looked familiar.
When a tall guy wearing jeans, a sweatshirt and a baseball cap strode up to one of the units and proceeded to tinker with the lock she let go the breath she’d been holding. Nobody.
Now, if he would just stay put and not come nosing around the corner in the event the next few moments got out of hand….
As the new arrival pushed the door of his unit upward Kayla turned her attention back to the voices on the other side of the narrow block buildings.
The deal had been made.
She had to move in now.
Hesitation stalled her. Something still didn’t feel right. She didn’t like having company show up at the last minute like this. She glanced toward the man in the ball cap one last time. He’d disappeared into the unit he’d opened. Just like she had when she first arrived. Too coincidental for comfort.
The voices around the corner snagged her attention once more.
She couldn’t wait any longer.
As she prepared to advance around the end of the building, a vague sort of recognition clicked in the back of her mind and she hesitated once more. She couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something important about the guy in the baseball cap that she’d missed here.
Then she knew.
She whipped around just in time to come face-to-face with the man in question.
“You still going after the bad guys all alone,” he commented quietly, for her ears only.
She glared up at Detective Peter Hadden. “What the hell are you doing here?” Her demand came out a whisper but there was no mistaking the ferocity. Ire roared through her, boosting the adrenaline already searing through her veins.
Hadden was with Homicide and Robbery in Tucson. This damn sure wasn’t his jurisdiction. Not to mention she was still irritated with him after their last chance meeting, which she realized now hadn’t been any more inadvertent than this one.
He was following her. She’d experienced that sensation far too often lately.
The shift in the tone of the exchange on the other side of the building drew her attention back in that direction and alerted Kayla to her new status.
She’d been made…at the very least deemed a possible threat.
The perps would scatter.
She had to act now.
Another curse hissed past her lips as she swung around the end of the building and lunged forward. She paused at the final corner that stood between her and the perps doing their dirty business.
A gunshot whizzed past as she stole a look around that corner.
She jerked back. Gritted her teeth and readied to swing around and return fire.
In a blur of unexpected motion Hadden charged past her.
What the hell was he doing now?
Gunfire erupted. Hadden’s as well as the enemies’.
She dived for the ground, rolled into the open and fired. One man was down, writhing and howling in pain. Hadden and another were entangled in a savage, rolling-on-the-ground hand-to-hand battle.
She fired once more. Her target stumbled when the shot tore through his thigh. But he didn’t stop. He headed straight for one of two vehicles waiting nearby.
She scrambled up and burst into a dead run. “Stop! Police! Drop your weapon!”
He glanced back, fired twice. Sent her ducking behind one of the vehicles.
So much for negotiations.
If he got away…
Her feet were moving even before the decision fully penetrated her brain. She dashed from her cover and made a dive for the passenger side door of the second vehicle at the same time her perp went for the driver’s side.
Weapons drawn, barrels levelled, they slid into the front seat simultaneously.
“You got a death wish, bitch?” he growled.
Pain glittered in his eyes. Kayla didn’t have to look to know that blood pulsed from the wound like a mini-geyser. It was possible he hadn’t noticed or that he just wasn’t ready to give up.
“Maybe,” she said, her voice dead calm. “But I’m not the one bleeding to death.”
He flinched. Didn’t look down. Damn, she mused. A real tough guy.
“I don’t want to have to shoot a cop,” he warned, his face already growing paler.
She wondered at that. Why would a bike thief, even a well-connected one making six figures, risk this level of jeopardy? It didn’t make sense.
No time to worry about that now. The black, sombre barrel of his weapon remained aimed directly at her.
“Do you know how long it takes the average human to bleed out?” She cocked her head, peered around the lethal barrel and deliberately assessed him for a second or two. “Not very long when an artery is involved. After you lose that first litre it all goes downhill from there. It takes only minutes to reach a point where no amount of medical care will make a difference.”
He swallowed hard, the difficulty clear in the workings of his throat muscles.
“Do you really want to die over a bunch of overpriced bikes?” A line of sweat had already formed on his brow and upper lip. She took a risk, glanced at the leg. “Damn, it’s pumping out pretty fast. You feel dizzy yet? Cold?”
His hand shook—once, twice—before he lowered his weapon. “Call me an ambulance,” he choked out.
Kayla confiscated his weapon, called for the paramedics then made a makeshift tourniquet with his shirt when she couldn’t stop the flow of blood any other way.
Hadden had the guy he’d been tangoing with cuffed and was attending to the one he’d been forced to shoot. A shoulder wound involving mostly soft tissue, but the guy was crying like a baby. The buyer, Kayla surmised. He looked a little pudgy and had that fluorescent-lighting pallor of the skin—definitely not the type to be out pirating bikes.
“Ouch,” Hadden said as he looked over her handiwork on the guy with the femoral artery injury. “That’ll leave a mark.”
“He’ll live.” As long as the ambulance gets here in a hurry, she added silently. She’d have to keep a close watch on the jerk until then. Inflicting a lethal wound hadn’t been her intent, but she’d done what she had to in order to stop the perp from fleeing the scene and to protect herself…which might not have been necessary at all had she not been interrupted. She scrubbed her bloody palms over her jeans and eyed her uninvited backup. “What the hell are you doing here, Hadden?”
He lifted one broad shoulder in a negligent shrug. “Just driving by, thought you might need some help.”
“Bullshit,” she tossed right back. If he thought she was that naive he’d better get a grip.
Before she could pursue the point, two Pinal County cruisers arrived along with the ambulance.
“Hell, Ryan,” one of the deputies said as he surveyed the aftermath. “Why didn’t you just kill ’em all and save the taxpayers the cost of a trial?”
“Funny,” she muttered as she started walking toward the vehicles. She glanced over her shoulder at Hadden. “Don’t you go disappearing on me, we’re not finished yet.”
Two hours later, with two of the perps in the OR for surgery and the other in county lockup, Kayla had finished going over the scene with Steve Devon, the best county investigator in the Sheriff’s Department.
“I’ll need your report on my desk first thing in the morning,” Devon told her before letting her go. He flicked a sour look at Hadden. “Yours too, Detective.”
Devon didn’t have to spell out what that meant. A report was SOP, standard operating procedure. The urgency, however, was related to two wounded perps. Anytime shots were fired, the department flinched.
The investigator’s stern questions only added to Kayla’s building annoyance at Hadden. She glared at him as they walked toward their abandoned vehicles.
“This should have gone down without any shots fired.” If his arrival hadn’t set her targets on alert, a good portion of what transpired could have been prevented. She prided herself on doing her job with the least excessive force possible.
“You just keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better, Ryan,” he snorted. “But those guys had no intention of being rounded up today, otherwise they wouldn’t have been armed. Or willing to shoot at a cop,” he added.
That part was true. She’d been surprised briefly by the unexpected exchange. But she still didn’t like him horning in on her bust.
She went around to the back of her Jeep and opened the hatch. After pawing through a dozen items that she didn’t know why she hauled around, she finally found the antibacterial wipes. For the good they would do. She had that scumbag’s blood all over her.
Hadden, playing it smart, kept his mouth shut as she cleaned herself up. By the time she’d gone through half the container of thin wipes her hands felt reasonably clean. There was nothing to be done about her clothes. The jeans and sweater were ruined.
She closed the hatch and settled her renewed fury on Hadden. “Now tell me what you were really doing here. This is my jurisdiction,” she added. “You have no business nosing around here without giving someone at the Sheriff’s Department a courtesy call.”
He grinned. A spear of warmth went through her. She looked away. She hated that he so easily turned the tide of her emotions. That was one reason she’d avoided him the past couple of months. Getting involved with another cop wouldn’t be smart. And she could see that coming a mile off. She knew Hadden’s type—nice guy, the kind who made lonely women fall in love all too easily.
“Now we’re even,” he said jokingly, but she knew that whatever his motivation, it was no joking matter.
“Don’t even go there,” she cautioned. Tucson was his jurisdiction, but her friend Rainy Carrington’s murder was her jurisdiction, no matter what the invisible boundary lines said. She would not give up on finding the whole truth. Not now…not ever. Hadden might as well get used to it. This had been a bad year for Kayla. First she’d lost her grandmother. Then, a few months later, one of her best friends had been murdered.
“I’ve been watching you the past couple of days,” he admitted, surprising her all over again.
She schooled her expression and planted her hands on her hips. “What for?” Every instinct told her she wasn’t going to like his answer. He’d been hiding things from her all along. But, so far, she’d had no reason to complain. God knew she was hiding plenty from him. That was another reason she’d steered clear of him the past couple of months.
“Why don’t we go someplace where we can talk?” The suggestion was accompanied by a long, searching look from those piercing blue eyes.
A shiver chased over her skin. Kayla gritted her teeth and would have liked nothing better than to chalk the reaction up to the weather, but, unfortunately, in southern Arizona that wasn’t likely. Even with only two weeks left before Christmas the temperature hung around fifty to fifty-five degrees Fahrenheit. Not cold enough to bring on the shivers.
It was him. There was no denying that reality. She’d been pretending for months now. Keeping him at a distance for more than one reason.
Though instinct warned her yet again that letting him too close would be a mistake, she just couldn’t help herself. For Rainy, she reasoned. If Detective Peter Hadden had discovered something related to Rainy’s murder, Kayla needed to know. The Cipher, the assassin who’d killed Kayla’s best friend, was dead. Samantha St. John, another friend and schoolmate, had taken care of him. But whoever had sent him was still out there, the motivation a puzzle of bits of information that didn’t yet connect.
If it was the last thing she did, Kayla intended to solve that mystery. She wouldn’t rest until those responsible for Rainy’s death were brought to justice…or were six feet under. And she had to keep searching for Rainy’s child—or children—until she found them or proved none existed. That was the part that hurt the most. Rainy had wanted children so badly and all along she might have had at least one. The bastards who had mined her eggs when she was young herself had robbed her of her ability to conceive and also deprived her of knowing whatever offspring had resulted. And when Rainy had discovered what they’d done and tried to find them, they’d had her killed. Kayla would find the truth.
The Promise.
She and her closest friends had made that promise to each other all those years ago while students at Athena Academy. Each year the class was divided into small groups of students who worked together all year long to become the best they could be in all aspects of their academic lives. Kayla’s group had been called the Cassandras. Headed by Rainy, their senior mentor, the seven of them, including Sam St. John, had become extremely close and had ultimately promised to come if any of them needed help—no questions asked.
Rainy had called them together. Now she was dead. Murdered. Kayla and the rest of the Cassandras had a new promise to keep—solving the enigma of Rainy’s death and ensuring that all involved paid dearly.
For that single reason she would do whatever it took. Like risk getting close to a man who reached her on a level beyond the professional.
She realized Hadden was waiting for her to answer his question. Should they talk? Kayla glanced at her watch. “I don’t know, Hadden.” She shrugged indifferently. “It’s my day off and I actually have plans.” It was a lie but he didn’t know that. Well, there was one little thing she had to do—smooth things over with her partner. As she’d suspected, Jim had called during the middle of the wrap-up with the county investigator. He wasn’t happy. “I should probably get a move on.”
Hadden angled his head sceptically, clearly struggling to keep another grin off those nice lips. God. She resisted the urge to shake her head. Why did she have to notice his every damned asset?
“You expect me to believe that you just happened to be driving by this morning?” He gestured to the rows of storage units. “And discovered a deal going down involving a group of felons you, among others, have been tracking for months?” He was the one shaking his head now. “Give me a break here, Lieutenant Ryan.”
“I got a tip, all right?” It was true. She’d received an anonymous call just after she’d dropped Jazz off at school and headed for the gym—her plans for the morning. For a single mom with a career in law enforcement, free time was at a premium. Most of what little she had was either spent as quality time with her eleven-year-old daughter or in physical training.
Just another thing she’d already lived to regret—never taking the time she should for friends and family. Rainy was dead. And Kayla barely remembered the last time they’d gotten together before that tragedy.
“So, are we having coffee or what?” Hadden pressed.
Kayla looked straight at him, assessed what she saw in those intense blue eyes. He needed to share something with her. Anticipation and an underlying urgency radiated from his every feature.
“Sure, why not.” She shrugged again, as if whatever he had to say didn’t matter. “As long as you’re buying.”
Kayla climbed into her Jeep without looking back. When she heard Hadden pull out onto the road she backed up her vehicle, pulled forward and followed him. Attempting to guess what was on his mind would be a supreme waste of time so she didn’t bother.
He drove to a coffee shop on Olympus Road, the main drag in Athens, and parked in the lot. Kayla’s little community wasn’t that large, a few shops, a bank, a post office, and a supermarket. The only reason the tiny spot in the road had actually developed into a town was because the Athena Academy, the all-girls school Kayla had attended from seventh through twelfth grades, was nearby. Luke Air Force base was also close by, but there wasn’t much else around. Most folks around Athens went to Phoenix for major shopping and medical care.
Still, the town had amassed a population of about five thousand, and the powers that be had managed to wrangle a satellite station for the town from the Sheriff’s Department. The small law enforcement office was manned by two sheriff’s deputies at all times. With its continued growth Athens would no doubt be incorporating and forming its own city government in the next couple of years. So far members of the community had been in no hurry to take the formal steps. But that would soon change.
Nothing stayed the same.
Hadn’t she learned that the hard way?
Hadden emerged from his car and strode toward Kayla’s Jeep. She took her time getting out, turning her attention once more to consideration of his motivation for keeping her under surveillance. Professionally speaking, the only thing they had in common was the murder of Lorraine Carrington. Kayla flinched at the memory of that Saturday night back in late August. More unpleasant thoughts tumbled in on the heels of that memory.
Somehow Athena Academy was involved in Rainy’s death. Kayla didn’t want to believe it. She’d reasoned that the involvement only went as deep as certain personnel, but she couldn’t be sure.
That suspicion was just one of the secrets she couldn’t share with Peter Hadden. Was the primary reason she’d backed off from her original plan to work fairly closely with him. This was Cassandra business, to be shared on a need-to-know basis only.
His gaze locked with hers at precisely that moment, as if he’d read her mind and somehow summoned her full attention.
Keep this on the surface, in neutral territory, Kayla. You don’t know all the facts and Athena Academy certainly doesn’t need the bad publicity.
Shannon Conner, a TV news reporter and the only person ever to be expelled from Athena, had already done enough damage in that department. In the early months after Rainy’s death, the vengeful woman had done all within her power to make the school look bad. She’d showed up at Rainy’s funeral and implied that Athena Academy used its students for scientific experiments. More recently she’d tried to compromise Kayla’s fellow Cassandra Josie Lockworth, a captain in the Air Force. She’d reported on Josie’s fast rise in the force; but had tried to win her career by implying Josie was involved with a fellow officer. It hadn’t worked.
Victoria Patton, better known as Tory, another of the Cassandras and a top TV news reporter, had worked overtime to put the right spin on Conner’s negative reporting. But there were others out there who would like nothing better than to bring down the unusual preparatory school. Just another factor to consider in all this. Perhaps someone wanted Kayla to believe that the school was responsible for what had happened to Rainy. But the evidence continued to mount…there was no denying that.
When she and Hadden had settled at a small table in the farthest corner of the shop, away from the few other customers, he didn’t waste any time.
“There’s a new development in the Carrington case.”
Anticipation raced through Kayla. She’d been right. “What kind of development?”
Before he could respond the waitress arrived and took their order. Two black coffees. Kayla considered having a pastry but this wasn’t a social meeting. Even though there were times when she would kill for a chocolate-filled croissant, this wasn’t the time. She needed to focus.
“What kind of development?” The question was out of her mouth the instant the waitress moved away.
“As you well know, we’ve exhausted all avenues in an attempt to determine exactly what happened to Lorraine Carrington.”
The one thing she did know well was that she and the other Cassandras were the real ones who made up the we he spoke of. As far as Hadden and his department were concerned, there was no overwhelming evidence to prove Rainy’s death was anything more than an accident. Another reason Kayla couldn’t help being suspicious of Hadden’s continued interest in the case. A seat belt malfunction and a driver dozing off and running off the road was hardly the stuff murder investigations hinged on.
But Kayla knew the real facts. Rainy hadn’t simply fallen asleep at the wheel. Her sudden collapse into slumber had been brought on by the Cipher and a gadget he’d used on Alex—Alexandra Forsythe, another of Kayla’s Cassandra sisters—as well as on Kayla herself. On separate occasions in totally different locations, both she and Alex had fainted for no apparent reason during the weeks after Rainy’s death. Like Rainy, Alex’s incident had occurred while she was driving. It was a miracle she hadn’t been badly injured…or worse.
The Cipher had paid for his part in Rainy’s death. CIA agent Sam had tracked him down and had been forced to kill him in a standoff. But they were still no closer to finding whoever had sent the assassin than they had been weeks ago.
“In pursuing this investigation,” Hadden went on, “we’ve uncovered a number of details that don’t add up where Marshall Carrington is concerned.”
Kayla’s hackles rose instantly. “Look, Hadden, I know it’s SOP to suspect the spouse first and foremost when someone dies, but I can vouch for Marshall Carrington. There is no way he would have killed his wife. He loved Rainy.” Kayla blinked back the emotion that stung her eyes. “I know Marshall. He would never have hurt her. Never.” She couldn’t tell Hadden about the Cipher or anything else she and her Cassandra sisters had discovered. Not yet anyway.
The waitress set two cups of steaming dark brew on the table. “Anything else?”
Hadden lifted his hand in a negative signal and the young woman scurried off to help another customer who’d just arrived.
“I don’t doubt Carrington’s character as a husband,” Hadden said, some indefinable emotion filtering into his tone. “This is about his business dealings.”
Confusion lined Kayla’s brow. Hadden’s tone as well as his statement bewildered her. “Marshall is an archaeology professor. Outside his occasional jaunt to search for some ancient relic, what on earth could you find questionable about his profession?”
Hadden’s expression closed then, like a bank vault door slamming shut to fend off trespassers. The abrupt change set Kayla on edge. Whatever he intended to share with her, there was a great deal more he planned to keep to himself. Somehow it related to Marshall. And she knew before he spoke that it was not good.
“We have reason to suspect your friend Marshall is eyeball deep in a smuggling ring.”
...
renee2010