PROLOGUE
RAVEN
The warehouse reeks of gun oil and sunbaked concrete, the kind of heat that never fully leaves a building in El Paso, just sinks into the walls and waits.
I work my way along the side of a shipping container from the west, Glock drawn, breathing slow and measured. My partner, Alex Morrison, is clearing the north side. Agent Ryan Holt is converging from the east entrance. Six months we've been chasing this gun trafficker, and tonight he finally made a mistake. A confidential informant called it in two hours ago: he'd be here, moving a shipment.
We should have waited for backup. ATF protocol is clear on that point, but I made the call. By the time additional units arrived, our target would be in the wind. Morrison and Holt backed me without hesitation. Six months of dead ends and cold trails will do that to a team. It makes you hungry. It makes you stupid.
I'm starting to think it made us both.
The warehouse is wrong. Too quiet. No voices, no movement, no heavy scrape of crates being loaded. Nothing but the faint rustle of my own body armor against my shirt as I move. Myboots find silence on the concrete as I sweep between stacked pallets, muzzle tracking left, then right. Overhead, industrial light fixtures hang dark and dead. The few that still work throw long shadows across the floor, the kind that could swallow a man whole.
I round another corner and find more of the same. Empty space. No vehicles, no people, not so much as a footprint in the dust. This place hasn't seen activity in weeks.
There's a scuff of a shoe behind me that's way too close for comfort.
I spin, my Glock drawn, and find Morrison five feet away. His weapon is raised and steady, but he's not clearing the room and he's not covering a threat.
He's aiming at me.
Our eyes lock. "Alex?"
I see it in his face before my brain can fully process it. No hesitation, no conflict, just the cold, settled look of a man who's already made his decision. This is my partner. Five years of working side by side, of him teaching me how to read a room, how to work a suspect, how to survive this job.
And he's going to kill me.
"Raven, get down!" Holt's voice cuts through from my right.
I drop as Morrison's finger tightens on the trigger. Holt fires twice, the shots punching through the warehouse silence like hammer strikes. Morrison staggers backward, his gun slipping from his fingers and clattering against the concrete. His eyes widen in surprise as he sees blood streaming onto his vest. He raises his hand to the wound in his neck trying to staunch the flow, then he stares back at us. His mouth opens but nothing comes out. His knees buckle and he folds forward, hitting the ground face-first.
The ringing swallows everything. My vision tilts, steadies, then shifts again. Holt moves past me with his weapon stilltrained on Morrison, kicks the gun clear across the floor, and crouches to check for a pulse.
"He's gone." Holt looks at me, his jaw tight. "You okay?"
"He was going to shoot me." My voice sounds like it belongs to someone else, flat and far away, like I'm hearing it through water.
"Yeah. He was." Holt holsters his weapon and keys his radio. "This is Agent Holt. Agent down at the warehouse location. Agent Morrison is deceased. Agent-involved shooting. We need a full response team, immediately."
I lean back against a pallet; the concrete floor cold beneath me. Morrison is fifteen feet away, facedown, still. Holt saved my life. One more second, maybe less, and I'd be the one bleeding out on this floor.
The next several hours blur together in a haze of procedure and fluorescent light. First responders arrive, then local police, then our own people. Evidence techs photograph Morrison's body from every angle, document his weapon and the blood spatter, and bag Holt's service weapon for ballistics. I give my statement three times, each telling identical because the truth is simple: Morrison had his weapon trained on me, and Holt shot him to save my life.
Director Alvarez shows up as they're finishing. He's in his early fifties, graying at the temples, with the kind of steady, authoritative presence that makes people trust him on instinct. He pulls Holt aside first and speaks with him quietly for several minutes while I sit on a crate and try to stop my hands from shaking. Then he comes to me.
"Agent Holt confirmed Morrison drew on you. He saved your life." His hand settles on my shoulder, firm and reassuring. "It's a clear case of justified use of force, Agent Bishop."
I brace myself for what comes next. There should be administrative leave for Holt, an Internal Affairs investigation,mandatory psych evaluations for both of us. That's standard procedure after an agent-involved shooting, no exceptions.
But Alvarez turns back to Holt and says, "You did good work tonight, agent. Take a few days, then come back ready to roll."
Holt nods, though something troubled crosses his face as he walks away.
Alvarez refocuses on me. "You eliminated a dirty agent. Or rather, Holt did. Morrison clearly cracked under the pressure of the job. It happens. Some agents just can't resist the pull of cartel money."
Something about his tone lands wrong, like a note played slightly out of key. How does Alvarez already know Morrison was dirty? We're standing in the middle of an active crime scene and the man's body is barely cold. Unless Morrison had been under investigation long before tonight, and Alvarez already knew exactly what he was.
"Shouldn't we find out why he turned? Who he was working for?"
