AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I just watched the surveillance video. You’re lucky it wasn’t you.”
NINE
“What does he mean?” Gage strode toward Clare and his boss’s boss. “What did you do?”
Russ Franklin might be over the whole police department, but the boots-on-the-ground guys saw him as a paper pusher. The mayor’s attempt to put a known guy in the role, someone the blue-collar guys would respect since he’d been a US marshal before he retired. Gage liked the guy, except Russ just went down in his estimation since he was close with Clare.
Not that Gage planned on making people take sides.
McCauley moved to stand by him, and the captain rocked back and forth on his shoes. “She stood up to one of the suspects. Probably kept a whole lot of hostages safe by keeping them focused on her.”
Russ took up where the captain left off. “Unarmed. No vest. You just stand up to three guys with guns like it’s no big deal?”
Clare looked at Russ. “You know it’s never no big deal.”
Russ nodded.
Gage pressed down on his back molars. What was that about? He couldn’t ask or he’d have to admit he knew next to nothing about this woman. He was tempted to take a step to the side and do a web search for her company. Surely there was an “About” page that would list her credentials.
Would that tell him who she was?
He thought she might’ve been a marshal, where she’d have worked with Russ, but there was something about her manner that didn’t say “fugitive taskforce.”
He’d been focused on SWAT, no time for socializing. Or, apparently, realizing what was going on in his hometown. How long had she been back?
Forget it.“SWAT needs a copy of that footage. If we’re going to identify and locate the suspects.”Focus on the case.
Otherwise, he’d only end up with her destroying him all over again. Walking away and taking everything he wanted with her. Leaving him with the nothing he’d always had.
With his luck, she’d take his career with her as well and there’d be no way to stop her ruining everything he’d built.
“Lieutenant Deluca is right,” Russ said. “The PD will cover this. They’ll find these guys before anyone else gets hurt.”
Clare’s jaw flexed. “You’re revoking your offer?”
“It’s not like that,” the commissioner said. “It’s about keeping people safe.”
“What happened?” she asked.
Gage figured she was gearing up to argue about whatever Russ’s offer had been. “A teller was executed in the vault. Wanna tell us about how you followed the suspects up to the roof where you were going to…what—confront them with your bare hands?”
“It’s about gathering intel. That’s my job.” Her eyes flashed gold, the deep brown flaring with life like they did when she dug her heels in. “I wrote up a report already, and my office will forward it over.”
Gage didn’t want to work with her. Nor did he want to be impressed with what she’d accomplished just observing. She’d found the car wreck the same as his team had.
“Thanks for your help.” He turned to Captain McCauley. “SWAT can handle this case.”
Technically, he needed to ask permission to run with it. Instead, he’d slightly demanded it, but McCauley could probably figure out this wasn’t a normal situation. He’d pegged it earlier that Gage and Clare had history. He had no idea.
McCauley was African American, while Gage had always assumed he had some of that in him. He had no idea—he was essentially a mutt. His mom never told him who his father was, and if she’d dated he never knew about it. With that many secrets between them, it was no wonder they weren’t that close.
He lived his life, and she did the same. They just didn’t overlap that much. The cops in the department appreciated there was always someone happy to take their Thanksgiving or Christmas shift who didn’t care they were working a holiday.
McCauley said, “Commissioner?”
He didn’t answer right away, so Gage turned to look. The older man glanced between Gage and Clare. As if there was something to find by assessing them standing nearly side by side. “Let’s give Vanguard a shot to provide resources that would slow down the investigation if SWAT used our traditional routes. How does that sound?”
Clare’s face got that pinched look it always got when she was pleased with herself. “Just as long as no one else gets hurt.”
