Snatched (24 page)

"She was pretty persistent. Kept calling me even after men had been dispatched. I was able to finally trace her, pick her up. Got some details from her. But you can thank her for the save. She gave us enough information to track down
one of
Corrall
's men
.
We had info on their various houses, managed to close in on the parakeet who sang us a song about a killing field. Seems Rez or Richard Langley the name his mama gave him, talked a little too much, put the word on the street how he was going to take down Corrall's gang. Corrall got wind, had someone provide "information" on the Jamaican's supposed stomping ground. Man, what an idiot. Who goes into the Valley at night with hardly any light."

"They saw
us
,"
Dele wheezed
but couldn't get any more words out. Jud understood and nodded.

"Some of them were wearing night goggles
, man
.
They set y'all up good.
That's basically
why the Demons got squa
shed like a bug."

The word "bug" brought up another problem.

"Roach…"

Jud was ahead of him. He nodded. "At the coroner's. Government name is Larry Smithers. Guess you're going to have to give
some report on how that ca
me to be another one of your kills."

Dele nodded. Yes, Roach would remain his kill, not Nailah's. Hopefully
, she hadn't said anything.

Another effort to talk cost him energy but he managed to ask, "Where is she?"

"She's safe man. We put her up at another hotel
, a little ritzier
.
Before we settled her in, w
e
brought her in, got
some of the story out
about what you neglected to tell me
. By the way, she only knows you as Dele. We didn't tell her the real deal. Thought you'd like to inform the lady. By the way, she's smoking hot. Wish I could make friends like that."

Dele felt tired, wanted to close his eyes. Realized that he had indeed closed his eyes.  Sleep was pulling him down into nirvana.

But before he went fully under, he heard Jud say,

"She really did save your life man. We wouldn't have found you without her call. You're one of the lucky ones. Body count, nearly fifty Demons, just twenty or so of Corrall's crew. The only reason you
are alive is that the Jamaican
s probably took you for dead when you passed out. That's what they called in when the
responders
initially found you. For a second or two you had me worried. Then word got out that you were alive but barely. Have to admit I said a prayer or two and you know I'm an agnostic. But thought it couldn't hurt under the circumstances.

Dele entered his first of several dreams that night. Jud stood over him trying to lift him up off the Valley floor. Rez's body morphed into a cockroach. And somewhere in the distance Nailah stood watching. She was dressed in something sheer and white, like an angel. Like a guardian angel.
His guardian angel.

###

It felt strange to be wearing blues again.
Eric
McIntyre aka
Dele
formerly of the Demons
sat outside the captain's office sporting
a
full uniform ready to sit down with Judson as the liaison
ATF
agent,
Eric's supervisor
as well as
a couple of
brass from the ATF
. He'd filed his report weeks ago but he guessed some of the holes in the report had raised flags. Most of all, he was in trouble for not getting word back on the gang war. Men had died unnecessarily.

And there was the issue of Nailah. The hot water he was in was especially boiling about exposing a civilian to dangerous circumstances.

There would be reprimands that would go on record. He wasn't certain they wouldn
't kick him off the force altogether.

After waiting an excruciating fifteen minutes or more, he was finally summoned into the inner sanctum.

An hour later, he exited
,
fully censored and sanctioned
up to his neck
, but he still had a job, at least.

###

He hated desk duty. Hated how the hours dragged.

But most of all, he hated that he hadn't seen Nailah since he dropped her off at the hotel. He hadn't been allowed to speak with her during her questioning by the police.

He had orders not to contact her. It was basically a PR save. And there was the pesky possibility that she might bring a suit.

He didn't care about any of that.

She hadn't even called to check in on him. He almost died, partly because he wanted to protect her and she couldn't spare him even a couple of minutes on the phone.

He got it. She was angry and she had reason to be. She'd been through hell. And throughout it all he had basically lied to her about his identity.

She probably felt foolish that she'd trusted him. Had turned to him as a friend. Had taken him as a lover, no matter how briefly.

That was something that she'd kept to herself otherwise he would definitely have been fired.

He twiddled a pencil between his thumb and forefinger, then looked up to see a familiar figure heading his way. The pencil twirling paused as he uttered an expletive beneath his breath. She was one of the last people he'd expected to see walk into the precinct.

Caroly
n spotted him from the doorway
.

Obviously at least she had gotten word about his true identity otherwise she wouldn't be here.

She was another
sore
point he'd left out of his report. She was his one true failing, his
true
shame.
He'd let the life take over instead of keeping
to
protocol. The two of them
should have never happened.

Just like he and Nailah shouldn't have happened.

She headed to his desk
walking through the office maze of officers and perps,
never
once
taking her
gaze
off him.

Her eye was fully healed and had no sign of the injury Skeet had inflicted.

Skeet was dead, that bit was confirmed by the coroner. Given name Steven Blaque.

Why was she here?

"Carolyn," he said as she sat down in the seat opposite his desk. Unlike her previous outfits, she wore a conservative shirt and a pair of jeans. The most demure he had ever seen her.

He owed her an apology but he didn't know how to get the words out. So he let her begin the conversation.

"So, it's true what Sid told me."

Sid. His first thought was how the hell had Sid found out, but then he realized that
surviving
members
were being
pulled in
for questioning
regarding the slaughter.
And the drugs.
There was no longer any reason to shield "Dele" since Eric had been
fully
resurrected.

Probably why Carolyn was here, but she would hardly know anything about that night. Or the trafficking or anything else.

Kismet had a funny way of working itself as a coincidence because at that moment Carolyn said something pivotal.

"I know about the bodies, about the girl…"

Eric stiffened, sat up, not sure what he was about to hear.

"What girl?"

"That Leanne
girl," she said diffidently, her voice hardly audible. She shifted her eyes downward.

Eric felt himself blinking rapidly. How in the hell had he missed this? Because of course, men talked to their old ladies, bragged even.

"Tell me, Carolyn," he gently prodded her.

He was right. Skeet had laid out the horror for Carolyn, in some ways braggadocio but also to intimidate her, to make her cower.

But Skeet was dead.

Just as dead as he had made Leanne Strauss.

I
n a few sentences,
Carolyn related tales of horror, confirming at least one of his theories. He'd had his suspicions about Skeet
but
had
no
evidence to prove it.

And here was Carolyn
with evidence,
seeking her freedom
from the gang
.
From her life. The defense would argue hearsay but that was up to the prosecutor to get it in. At least he could now go to the Strauss' and give them some closure.

"If I tell you all I know, I want a new identity
in exchange
. I want to leave
California
, start over
."

He nodded and then proceeded to write down her statement.

She gave him names and
dates about the Mojave killings
, victims and specific gang members, some of them killed
several
month
s
ago
.
Surprisingly, she
even
provided some
more
information
about some of the Demons' other dealings.

Yes, they would definitely need to hide her…before and after trial.

And she could finally leave this life behind.

Maybe one day that would assuage his guilt about how he had misused her. Maybe, but not likely.

It was going to take more than that to get his life together.

An
unbidden
memory
popped into
his head. A memory of a kiss and a promise.
He immediately shook it away.
It had
obviously
meant nothing to her, it meant even less to him.

Nailah
moved the vacuum over the edge of the carpet
trying to get at
a stubborn piece of
lint
. Despite her concerted
efforts
,
the irritating speck refused to be sucked in
to the machine
.
Defeated, s
he
cursed
beneath
her breath,
clicked the
vacuum off and st
ooped to pick it up,
cursing again.

She'd been cursing a lot lately. Had been in a sour mood for days. Actually,
for
weeks.

She refused to
think about the reason why. Instead, she walked the lint to the garbage pail in the kitchenette. A bottle of Merlot rested on the kitchen counter and she thought about making a pitcher of
sangria
then stopped the idea mid-thought.

Damn bad idea. As it were, she considered never making
sangria
again.

Or buying another order of Ruby's rib tips.

Lord knows that combo had gotten her into more trouble than she could ever have anticipated.

She was trying to get back to normal. To the way things were.

Only a month ago, she would have welcomed an afternoon of indulging in some
Sangria
, sitting back and relaxing.

But she couldn't seem to relax here. Everything seemed strange; actually she was the one who was strange, a stranger in her own home.

So she'd become a cleaning machine, dusting, mopping, vacuuming, moving furniture around. She'd started projects: painting the walls a cool shade of beige, refurbishing some wood pieces…anything to keep busy and not think too hard.

She'd begun working on putting together a site offering financial counseling and had even gotten some nibbles in the last couple of days.

As for friends, she'd lied and said she'd dropped out of sight on a possible business venture.

There was no way she could tell them the things that had happened to her. Would they even believe her?

She hardly believed it herself, which she preferred.

She had to get back to normal.

And normal didn't include allowing herself to think about certain things, certain…a certain someone.

She'd been able to avoid him even when she'd been called into the police department to relay everything that she knew. And discovered the man whom she had thought to protect hadn't needed her protection after all.

Dele…no, that wasn't his name…and he wasn't a Demon or an informant.

He was a lying piece of shit.

Although she
did have
him to thank for not
being charged
with the Roach killing.