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Tension snaked through my body as I stepped toward him. “That’s not good enough.” My face was inches from his. “I need to be there. To protect her. I’m not letting her go alone.”
“She won’t be alone.” Levi’s eyes flashed at me. “But you read the text. You can’t be there, and we’ve already talked about this—”
“Easy. Easy, guys,” Ash said, inserting himself between us as we glared at each other. “We have a limited amount of time to make a plan. Let’s not fuck it up because we’re in-fighting.”
“Fine,” Levi said.
“Fine,” I said, though I was anything but.
Ash held up the phone. “If she’s meeting us in Oakland, there’s a good chance that Hannah’s still in the area. I think we should make our priority trying to find her before Wednesday. If we have to take her from that parking lot, we can, but it would be cleaner to try to get her before.” He looked at Levi. “Any ideas?”
“You already went out on surveillance—you know what we’re up against. She could be anywhere. A hotel. An office that Zhao owns. A condo she’s rented. There’s so much real estate being sold around here to cash buyers these days, she could be anywhere.”
Ash nodded. “I’m going to start looking into the latest batch of stolen vehicles.”
Levi nodded. “Definitely—get going now.”
“What else?” I asked.
“We’re going to get ready for this. I’ll put my best field team together. We’ll go over to the address today and start blocking things out,” Levi said.
I grimaced. “I don’t want Lauren going to the exchange alone. It’s not safe. What if they grab her?” Or worse?
“I’m going to protect her.” Levi looked like he was trying to marshal what remained of his patience. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, okay?”
Lauren said nothing. She just stared out the window, her mind clearly racing. I went and put my arms around her, trying to calm myself and comfort her. I wished I could hold her right in this spot forever, so she wouldn’t try something dangerous.
“I’m not going to fight with you.” Her voice was quiet.
“Good.”
She turned and looked at me. “That doesn’t mean I’m going to do whatever you say.”
“I know.”
She arched an eyebrow and then went back to staring out the window, showcasing her intelligence: she wasn’t going to argue. Not now.
I held her close, wishing I could keep her with me like this forever. And that somehow, we could still manage to bring her sister home.
Four days isn’t a lot of time. Will it be enough?
Chapter 12
Gabe
“I’ll get in touch with the FBI,” Levi said. “I need to let them know that Zhao’s made contact again. They haven’t been good for much, but they’re good enough to back us up.”
I clenched my fists. “But they can’t be there—not if they’re going to try to take over at the site. We can’t do anything to compromise this.”
“Except for you showing up, right?” Levi shot me a look.
Ash looked up from his laptop. “It’s the FBI. I’m pretty sure they can handle themselves.”
“How does that work?” Lauren asked. “Your company and the FBI? The police?”
“We don’t break the law, and they stay out of our way,” Levi explained. “If we have knowledge of illegal activity, we share that information with them. If we come across a person of interest, we turn them in. I’ll call Agent Marks and let him know what’s happening.”
“It’s a symbiotic relationship,” Ash said. “Sometimes they’re actually our client.”
