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Peterson looked dejected as he said, “Shit. I was worried you were going to say that.”
“Why?” I asked.
He looked sick to his stomach.
“My wife is having our babies tomorrow, and I was hoping to find someone to cover my shift so I didn’t have to call in sick and leave them in a bind,” he said.
I almost caved, but I knew that with tomorrow being Thanksgiving, it was a likelihood that the entire city would be a ghost town.
“Talk to the chief,” I suggested. “He’ll find something. Good luck, man.”
Peterson offered me his hand. “You’re right.”
I was.
With that parting comment, I turned and hurried back to the locker room.
We’d just gotten a SWAT call that sounded promising.
The city had been a ghost town over the last couple of days, and it almost felt like the calm before the storm.
Hell, even the grocery stores weren’t all that busy.
And that was highly unusual the day before the biggest cooking holiday of the year.
Meaning, was it unsurprising that we get a SWAT call a couple hours later?
Nope.
It was par for the course, honestly.
After loading up, Bennett sat in the back of the truck with us and read over something on his computer screen.
“We’re serving a warrant,” Bennett called out. “Man we’re serving a warrant to is suspected of child sex trafficking. This isn’t going to be an easy, routine one. This man has an eighteen thousand square foot home that’s armored like Fort Knox.”
Saint, who was sitting next to me, touched his hand to the top of his K-9’s head. His K-9, Smoke, flattened his ears in reaction.
Saint was the logical choice for K-9 handler since he’d worked with them in his stint in the military. Only, according to Saint, he was more of a cat person, and it showed when he was with Smoke.
Smoke was a two-and-a-half-year-old male Belgian Malinois that had been donated to the SWAT team via a silent donor. Smoke had been trained by a couple of the most prominent K-9 trainers in the south. The trainers just so happened to belong to The Dixie Wardens MC in Benton, Louisiana. A couple of the members of the Dixie Wardens actually happened to be a part of the Kilgore Police Department, meaning that the silent donor was probably Ford’s father himself.
“Suspected?” Foster snorted from his spot in the front of the armored vehicle. “This isn’t a suspected anything. That motherfucker is as crooked as a fork in the road.”
There were a couple of snickers through the vehicle.
Today we had about half of our SWAT team with us.
Usually the team doubled up when we did big calls like this, but since it was Thanksgiving, or almost, a lot of them had the day off and were either on their way out of town, or preparing for tomorrow.
“Whether he’s suspected or not, this isn’t going to be an easy serve notice. This is going to take us using force to get in there after they realize what’s happening,” Bennett murmured as he looked at each of us. “We’re pairing with another area SWAT team, Longview, to do this. Now, study the map I just sent to your phones and tell me if you have any questions.”
Everyone took their time on the way to the call to look at the maps Bennett had sent out to familiarize themselves with the layout.
“We gonna try to just knock on the front door?” Saint asked curiously from my side.
“No,” he said. “Place has eight-foot tall security fencing around the perimeter. I’ve noted a weak spot in the area where I think we might be able to enter. John is back at base also looking to help with the electronic end if we need it.”
John was our computer guru who never much left the offices anymore. He was always there when we needed him, though.
“Sweet,” I sighed. “Just exactly what I needed the day before Thanksgiving. We’ll be home by tomorrow, right?”
Bennett’s amused eyes met mine. “I sure hope so, or my wife won’t be very happy.”
Four hours later, the warrant had been served, we’d all missed lunch, and it was time for me to go home.
Thank God.
Since Sierra was working today, I chose to run by the store before heading home to my place—that I hadn’t so much as stepped foot in since I’d started all this with Sierra—and grab a few changes of clothes.
Just as I was looking out the window at my lawn and contemplating running the lawnmower over it before I headed to my Gran’s place to do the same, I saw my Gran walking up the length of my walk with Bobo in tow.
She looked quite pissed, too.
I opened the door to my place and raised a brow at her. “What’s up?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Where have you been all day, young man?”
