Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 63763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 319(@200wpm)___ 255(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 319(@200wpm)___ 255(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
Pritchard stood beside a steel barrel pouring fuel over a duffel while flames crawled along one edge of Stowe’s county-issued maintenance laptop. Pike had a phone on the ground beneath his boot, grinding his heel against the screen as if breaking the glass would erase whatever waited inside the memory. Stowe hovered several feet away with both hands half raised, his face already carrying the terrified understanding that the motorcycles surrounding the pit did not belong to deputies bringing warrants.
“Step away from the barrel,” I ordered, crossing the open ground with Stryker and Hawkeye flanking me while the other brothers spread around the perimeter. “Hands where I can see them.”
Stowe froze immediately, but Pritchard dropped the fuel can and went for the handgun I knew he carried concealed at the back of his waistband. Pike ran toward the open cargo area of his SUV, where our surveillance had already confirmed he kept a licensed pistol inside a lockbox. Neither man reached what he wanted.
Pritchard cleared leather but never got the weapon level. I closed the distance, caught his wrist with both hands, and drove the muzzle into the dirt as his finger clenched around the trigger. The shot punched a dark crater beside my boot, and I twisted through his elbow before slamming his hand against the steel barrel hard enough to loosen the gun and break something.
He tried to recover, reaching with his other hand while rage and panic turned his face red. I stripped the weapon from his grip, drove my knee into his ribs, then planted his dominant hand beneath my boot and came down hard. Bone collapsed under my heel, and his scream tore across the pit as he folded around the ruined fingers.
Across the clearing, Pike reached the SUV and grabbed a tire iron from the cargo area instead of the gun case. Hawkeye caught him at the rear bumper, avoided the first wild swing, then drove one boot through the side of Pike’s knee. The joint bent in a direction it had never been designed to go, dropping him with a howl before Hawkeye took the iron away and used two brutal strikes to make sure the bastard stayed down.
Ghost reached Stowe without needing to hurry. He twisted the technology contractor’s arms behind his back, secured his wrists, and planted him against the side of the van while Stowe babbled, swearing he would cooperate with anything we wanted. Stryker relieved Pritchard of a second weapon and kicked Pike’s pistol case away from the SUV before either man found another poor decision.
Bishop brought an extinguisher from the truck, and I smothered the flames, then pulled Stowe’s laptop from the barrel with insulated gloves, finding the casing scorched along one edge but the internal status light still blinking.
Pike’s phone had a shattered screen, not a destroyed memory module, and Pritchard’s burner remained safe inside the duffel he had been preparing to burn. A second bag held external drives, printed account records, and enough cash to confirm the three men had not gathered there for an evening bonfire.
Stowe began talking while we checked the devices.
“There were six jobs,” he blurted, his words coming too fast as Ghost kept him pressed against the van. “Pike found the clients, Pritchard got the information and patrol gaps, and I handled the systems. That’s all. Six.”
“What information?” I asked, setting the damaged laptop on another overturned, slightly charred barrel and connecting it to a write-blocking bridge.
“Whatever the county already had.” Stowe’s eyes followed my hands as though watching me reach his files frightened him more than Ghost’s grip. “Temporary addresses from case supplements, work locations, vehicle details, vacation-watch records, patrol patterns. Nina was the only Safe at Home participant.”
Stryker’s expression hardened. “How’d you get her address?”
“We didn’t breach Safe at Home.” Stowe shook his head frantically. “After Jeff violated the restraining order last year, the department made a lawful request for Nina’s real location so investigators and emergency personnel could find her if he came back. They stored it in a sealed confidential location addendum inside her restricted case file.”
My gaze shifted to Pritchard, who was kneeling in the dirt cradling his destroyed hand against his chest. His face had gone pale beneath the sweat, and whatever denial he had been assembling died when I looked at him. I closed the distance between us and grabbed the back of his head, yanking it forward as I drove up my knee. His nose crushed, then blood began to pour from the appendage.
“He opened the addendum.” It was a statement, not a question.
But Stowe nodded anyway. “Pritchard photographed it and sent the copy to Pike. Pike went out there to confirm Nina still lived at the house, and I erased the audit event showing Pritchard accessed the file. We never touched the state program.”