by Layla Reyne
No, they weren’t. They were further apart than Chris had realized. And the urgency to close that distance ratcheted up another notch on his priority ladder.
Chapter Nine
Chris hadn’t expected the explosives to be at the auction. Strategically and tactically, it made no sense. Too big a stockpile to transport and too big a risk to take until a deal was made. Close by, though, was a reasonable assumption. That had been his and Wheeler’s assertion to the joint task force yesterday. So when word had come down an hour ago—Holt via Kane—that the auction would take place this evening in one of Potrero Hill’s new mixed-use buildings, Chris had savored a small victory.
Potrero was in the target vicinity if the explosives were at one of the old Hunter’s Point piers on the other side of Highway 101 or in a warehouse just down the peninsula in South City, near where the Madigans had originally stored them. Chris had already sent agents out to both areas, but nothing so far. He radioed for them to step up their searches. Better shot of victory there than at the auction site itself.
Right on the neighborhood’s main drag, the building was six stories high with commercial space on the ground floor and residential units on the five floors above. None of the units had balconies, the windows were irregularly shaped and spaced, and all of the building’s glass was that godforsaken green-tinted shit that was all over the city now.
A bitch to adequately surveil, compounded by the weekday rush hour. Impossible to evacuate or cordon off without alerting the auction organizer. Challenging to identify whether people entering the building were residents, customers, or targets. It was a tactical nightmare and cleverly chosen for precisely that reason.
And because the top floor units were vacant.
There’d been a delay obtaining the materials for the penthouses’ luxury interior finishes. While most of the rest of the building was open and operating, the top floor wasn’t ready for renters yet. Chris was sure the auction organizer knew that too.
“Got one!” Jax called, voice raised over the traffic in the room.
Chris turned from the window he’d been staring out. They were two buildings over from their target, and all they could initially see from here—their makeshift joint task force command in a vacant commercial space—was the sidewalk leading to the target building. Jax, however, had secured them a better view via the camera in the nonoperational sidewalk ATM. It was supposed to go live next week, when the lobby-level bank it was attached to officially opened. Two calls—one to the local FBI, then another to the local US attorney—and Chris had a court order for the bank to partially power on the ATM. To passersby, it looked dead—no lit screens, no cash to dispense—but Jax had accessed the machine’s camera, giving them a view of who was coming and going.
“Who is it?” Wheeler said as he crossed from the far corner where he’d been standing with the tactical team.
One of the monitors on the table they’d set up as Jax’s workstation flickered to life and displayed the face captured from the ATM.
“I’ll take human trafficker for five hundred, Alex,” Jax quipped. Another burst of keystrokes, and a picture of the cartel captain appeared on-screen, together with his mile-long rap sheet.
Glee flashed across Wheeler’s face, swift and ruthless, before he remembered to conceal it. Composed once more, he peppered the tactical team with follow-up questions. A bigger opportunity had presented itself, and Wheeler would pluck all the tail feathers he could.
By contrast, Chris was desperately trying to staunch the wave of bile climbing his throat. Hawes would be devastated if his family’s explosives fell into the cartel’s hands. He was taking the organization in the opposite direction. Hell, he’d been systematically cutting down the cartel over the past few months, not aiding them.
Chris remembered his wall art at home—the “outsider” he’d marked with an X on the right side of the org chart. Was the cartel the outsider player here? Were they trying to remove the threat against them by engineering a coup against Hawes? It made tactical and logical sense, but Chris had a hard time believing Amelia would ally herself with an organization that traded in drugs and flesh. She had her faults, had fallen prey to the temptation of power, but everyone had a redline, and Chris didn’t think she’d cross this one.
“Got another!” called Lance, the ATF agent running the station next to Jax.
Behind them, Wheeler paled and moved a hand toward his sidearm as if on instinct. A face flashed up on the screen next to Lance, and Chris almost lost his battle against the bile. He understood Wheeler’s reaction, understood why every LEO in the room had gone on high alert. Chris didn’t need to see the rap sheet. They all knew this asshole. A white supremacist with a rabid online following, who was connected to half a dozen domestic terrorism incidents, who always managed to slip free of charges, and who was suspected of making threats against immigration offices in sanctuary cities, including San Francisco. And here he was in Chris’s city, bidding on weapons to do just that. Again. Same as he’d tried to do the night Izzy had died. It had been the last report she’d logged before her murder. Was this—today—connected to that night three years ago? Was this more than just an attempted coup?
Chris’s stomach roiled, forcing him to turn away and catch his breath. Splaying a hand on the window, he waited for the cool glass to temper his boiling insides. Slow going, but better than punching a hole through the wall, or worse, outwardly railing while Wheeler was on the horn with Homeland Security.
“This isn’t what they wanted,” Kane said, joining him at the window.
“I know.” If the explosives landing with the cartel captain would devastate Hawes, that much firepower falling into the hands of a dangerous bigot—one who’d use it against their city—would be more than Hawes’s soul could handle. “He’s just trying to protect them,” Chris said as he looked down at the packed sidewalk. “All these people going about their rush-hour business. Oblivious to the threat walking among them. Unaware that if those explosives fall into the wrong hands, they could be dead tomorrow.”
“All this just to fund the takeover.”
Chris glanced over at Kane. “That what this feels like to you?”
The chief didn’t reply.
“Me neither,” Chris said. “Something’s off.”
“Target Alpha sighted,” Lance said, and Chris whirled around, not believing his fucking ears.
No denying his eyes, though. The screen grab from the ATM didn’t lie. Dark, fitted suit, dark dress shirt, blue eyes bright, and light-brown hair ruffling in the breeze. Hawes Madigan. Chin held high, beautiful sharp angles on display, he walked right into the last place on earth he was supposed to be. Imperious, confident, like he owned the place.
“Can you zoom out?” Chris said to Jax.
A few keystrokes later, they had a wider view of Hawes and his surroundings. And of the absence of other operatives. He was alone.
“Fuck!” Chris cursed.
Jax shot him a worried look, while Wheeler shouted new orders to the tactical teams. “Madigan is on-site. Move him to priority one!”
“The explosives are priority one!” Chris insisted. “The stockpile and the seller are our primary targets.”
“And I’m not convinced Hawes Madigan isn’t our seller,” Wheeler countered. “If it turns out you’re right and he’s not, then so be it. But he’s still an agency target. I can get him, the weapons, the seller, plus two other criminals.” That same glee streaked across his face again, too overpowering to contain. “It’s going to be a good day.”
Or one of the worst days of Chris’s life.
“Heat signatures indicate bidders are going to separate units on the top floor. Three total.” Jax didn’t have to raise their voice now that only a handful of people remained. The tactical teams, comprised of ATF agents and SFPD officers, had left command thirty minutes ago, moving into position at or near the auction site. Dressed in plain clothes over fitted tactical gear, they entered the building as if
they were residents or shoppers. They’d hold there until Wheeler ordered them to the next position.
“Any indication of who and where the seller is?” Wheeler asked.
“Don’t know who,” Jax said, “but maybe this room here.” The building was U-shaped, and the penthouse Jax indicated was at the top end of the southeast wing, as far as possible from the other occupied units, which were on the west and north sides of the building.
“The bend to the southeast wing would be guarded against anyone who started up the hall to the isolated unit,” Chris said.
Jax nodded. “And just across the hall is a service elevator. Separate access versus the common area elevator the buyers traveled up.” They pointed to the main bank of elevators at the center of the building, the bottom of the U.
“Anything else?” Kane asked.
“Two other people headed up the north stairwell, but they turned back and exited on five.”
“Probably just residents that were talking and went too far,” Wheeler said. “What about on the top floor? Any other movement?”
“Someone is going back and forth from the isolated room to the other units.”
“Ferrying bids,” Chris surmised.
Wheeler gestured to the heat signature of the person who remained in the presumed seller’s room while the runner went back and forth between it and the others. “That still figure must be Madigan.”
Here we go again.
“Not him,” Chris said. “He’s not the seller.”
“If he’s not the seller, then what the fuck is he doing there?”
Chris jabbed a finger toward the seller’s room. “Trying to figure out who that is, just like us.” Then he gestured at the other rooms. “And trying to figure out if any of them are in on it. He doesn’t do business with people like these anymore.”
“Or he’s the third buyer,” Wheeler said, pointing at the three buyer-occupied rooms. “There to buy back the explosives. I’ve got him, Perri, one way or the other.”
“For fuck’s sake, Scotty, he’s trying to keep them away from the others.”
Kane stepped between them, voice calm and level. “The explosives aren’t here. We’ve gone over this.”
“But someone in that building will take us to the explosives.” Wheeler turned away and raised the comm to his mouth. “Teams, move into second positions.”
Chris cursed again and retreated to the opposite corner. “What the hell are they doing?” he asked when Kane joined him. “This is not eyes only.”
Kane held his phone so Chris could see the log of unanswered calls to Holt. “He’s not answering me or Jax.”
That niggle of doubt in the back of Chris’s mind blew loud as an air horn. Louder still as Wheeler radioed the teams to converge on the fifth floor, one below the penthouses. “If this auction isn’t about funding the coup, then what’s it about?” Chris said.
“Power,” Kane replied. “That’s what it’s always been about. Hawes and his siblings have it. The opposition wants it so they can take the organization in a different direction. Backward.”
Chris picked up the thread. “So assume this auction is about power too. The seller arranged the buyers like that on purpose. Into separate rooms and only communicating through a runner.”
“The seller is keeping each buyer on a string, controlling them,” Kane said. “They can keep the auction going or shut it down.”
Control. Shut it down.
The words, the niggle, resolved into a single sound, a single thought. This auction wasn’t about alliances with outsiders or only wiping Hawes off the map. It was about consolidating power, period. “Fuck! It’s a trap.” As Chris had thought it might be, but not for the reason and person he thought. “Not just for Hawes.”
“They want to take out the buyers,” Kane followed.
Chris nodded. “And with all those agents and officers in there too. “Fuck!” Chris moved to go, but Kane grasped his forearm.
“You stay, I’ll go.”
“Brax.”
Hard hazel eyes clashed with his. “I made a promise.”
“To Hawes?”
“As good as.” He shifted his gaze to Wheeler. “And you need to stay here to convince him to evac. He won’t listen to me, but he might listen to you. You have to get him to pull back.”
Kane didn’t give Chris a chance to argue. He released his arm and sprinted toward the exit. Chris didn’t waste time either, charging toward Wheeler. “Pull back! It’s a trap!”
Jax spun in their chair. “What?”
“They’re going to blow the place.”
“Hawes?” Wheeler said. “The Madigans?”
“No!” Chris shouted. “The person who wants him dead.” He gestured emphatically at the buyer-occupied rooms. Rooms with major underworld players waiting in them like sitting ducks. “And them too. Everyone who might challenge their power.”
Wheeler hesitated. Good. “Do you know that for sure? The bust we could make—”
“Isn’t worth our agents’ or innocent lives.”
“We don’t know—”
“Agent Wheeler,” Jax called. “Seller and runner are on the move.”
He and Chris both whipped around. “Which direction?”
“Down the service elevator.”
“They’re leaving the scene,” Chris said. “Before they put some of those explosives to use.”
A radio crackled and a broken voice came through, resolving after a moment. “Beta team to command.” Wheeler radioed back confirmation, and the team leader continued. “We’ve got a device in the north stairwell.”
Wheeler’s eyes grew wide. “What kind of device?”
“Receiver for a remote detonator.”
“Can you disarm it?”
The service elevator opened on the bottom floor. They had seconds before the seller and runner left the building. And blew it. “There’s no time,” Chris said.
Wheeler didn’t hesitate. “Abort! Pull the alarms, clear the lower floors. Emergency evacuation protocols.” Wheeler shoved a radio into Chris’s hand. “Help me coordinate.”
Sirens rent the air, and residents—and LEOs—began pouring out of the building. All Chris wanted to do was run in there and make sure Hawes got out alive too, but Kane was already on it. Chris had to prioritize getting the residents, agents, and officers out.
“Jax,” he said. “Keep an eye on that service exit. Tap and record nearby footage.” Chris waited for their nod, then returned his attention to where it was needed. He raised the radio to his mouth and worked in tandem with Wheeler to expedite the evac.
Wheeler was doing a sit-rep with his teams when Jax interrupted. “Agent Perri, something you need to see.” He expected footage around the service door, a possible ID on the seller. Instead, they pulled up the heat signatures on the top floor again and rewound the past two minutes. While agents and officers had been busy clearing the lower floors, and the seller and runner had been on their way down the service elevator, the buyers in their rooms had done…nothing. They were perfectly still.
Too still.
“What the fuck?” Chris was still trying to put it together when, behind them, Wheeler confirmed, “Lower floors are clear.”
“What about Kane?” Jax asked. “Where’s the chief?”
Wheeler radioed, to no response. Chris tried as well, to no better.
“Is he up on the top floor?” Wheeler asked. “What’s going on there?”
“Buyers are still in their rooms,” Jax answered vaguely with a flick of their eyes to Chris.
“Can we move on—”
Whatever Wheeler was going to say, the answer was no they couldn’t. Windows shattered, a boom echoed, and one half of the top floor erupted into flames.
With Hawes and Kane still in there.
Chris’s heart stopped, then fell to his feet along with his acid-filled stomach. He grabbed hold of Jax’s chair, struggling to keep the rest of his weight from collapsing at the loss.
Two good men. Gone. A friend and competent law-enforcement officer in Kane. Something infinitely more intriguing, more promising, in Hawes. The chance at something real together was slim—a lawman and a man constantly hunted by the law, that only happened in the books he read—but fuck if that slim possibility hadn’t infiltrated his mind as deeply as he’d infiltrated Hawes’s organization.
And now that puzzle piece was gone. Not just the corners bent and ragged from the past week of shifting truths. Gone, and in that second, Chris tossed out the question of whether Hawes had been a piece of that home puzzle for him. The picture of home—at least the one in Chris’s head—would be incomplete without him. He’d be a third missing piece, like the one lost a decade ago and the Izzy-shaped one three years gone now.
And fuck, if the gaping emptiness in Chris’s chest was enough to steal his breath, he hated to think how Helena and Holt would react when word reached them. After losing Papa Cal to death, then Amelia to prison, could the family come back from a double hit like this?
Chris’s feet—his soul—itched with the need to run. Dive back into his case, into oblivion. But how, when his best leads on Izzy’s killer were gone? Working with Hawes, with the Madigans, with Kane, had been his best shot at the truth. No one else would avenge his partner. Tran had made that clear. Chris had been closer than anyone else, closer than he’d ever managed from afar. And now all that was gone too.
Mission fail.
While Chris fought to keep himself upright, Wheeler paced on the other side of the table, raking a hand through his hair. Not so perfectly coiffed anymore. “Can you get any readings?”
“Fire’s too hot on the top floor,” Jax replied. “Checking the lower… Wait… I’ve got four bodies coming down the service stairwell.”