Twin Tango

by H Q Kingsley

  Twin Tango

  The Cop & The Criminals

  H Q Kingsley

  Contents

  TRIGGERS

  Prologue

  1. Patrick

  2. Paddox

  3. Skylar

  4. Paddox

  5. Patrick

  6. Skylar

  7. Patrick

  8. Paddox

  9. Skyler

  10. Patrick

  11. Paddox

  12. Skylar

  13. Patrick

  14. Skylar

  15. Paddox

  Excerpt of Kinkdom

  Excerpt of Reluctant Mate

  Excerpt of Pledgeling

  The Cabin Fever Series

  The Short & Scorching Collection

  Keep up with HQ

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.

  Copyright ©2018 Sister Publishing, LLC

  All Rights Reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Cover Design by Karma Kingsley

  Editing by Alphabitz Editing

  TRIGGERS

  This story does include cheating, violence, and ends in a cliff-hanger.

  Prologue

  Skylar

  “I knew you could do it,” someone said, coming up behind me and clapping me on the back so hard I nearly spilled my drink all over myself. “You’ve got that drive, you know? That fire. That hunger. Ah, rookies, always so hungry.”

  I turned to see Simon standing there, a grin on his face while he waxed poetic about the virtues of being new to the FBI.

  He was massive, easily over six-feet tall, and built like a tank. Every time he clapped me on the back, I had to fight back a wince. But he was one of the most skilled and well-liked people on the team, and he was welcoming me into the fold, so I couldn’t be too upset about it.

  My whole life, this was what I’d wanted. I’d wanted to do whatever I could to serve my city and the people in it. I’d wanted to work my way up from doing shitty little raids on low-time criminals to making a real difference, and this was the way to do it. This was my time.

  I was proud of myself, and judging from the amount of people who’d stayed for the little party being held in my honor, a good number of them were proud of me, too.

  That felt good.

  I made my rounds, nursing my cup of punch and eating a slice of cake with my name on it in big letters.

  Everyone had something nice to say, congratulating me or pulling me in to warn me about the long hours and lack of a social life that came with being dedicated to the team.

  "I can't remember the last time I had a date," Shannon said, shaking her head with a sigh. "Maybe it was last year? The year before? Either way, I can tell you it didn't go well."

  "Hey, at least you didn't get called in for a huge bust in the middle of your daughter's dance recital," David pointed out. "Try explaining 'Daddy had to go deal with some bad guys who were trying to sell people' to a distraught seven-year-old in a tutu."

  We’d all had a good laugh. It was no secret that when you worked for a team like this, you had to be willing to let some things fall by the wayside. I liked how openly everyone talked about it, though. No one seemed resentful, just tired and amused. It was how life was for them, and they all could commiserate.

  "Oof, having to explain human trafficking to a little kid. I think he wins this one, Shannon," I chimed in, smiling at them both.

  "He always wins," Shannon complained. "He had kids before he even joined the team. I don't even get the chance to have them."

  "You don't want them!" Kain argued, coming over to join the conversation. Like me, he was newer to the team, but he'd been there for almost a year. "Don't listen to these two and their complaining, Skylar. They'd never do any other job but this one, so it can't be all that bad. We look out for each other, you know? I was worried about it when I joined last year, but compared to my last team? This one is so much better."

  Shannon made a show of rolling her eyes, and David smiled. The more I talked to them, the more excited I was to be on the team. I was going to be able to make a difference and really do something to help clean up the city I called home, and it seemed like I was going to be among other people just as dedicated to the cause as I was.

  "Chief Roberts at three o'clock," David said suddenly, gesturing with his eyes to the boss coming over with his own drink.

  Chief Jameson Roberts was exactly the kind of man someone would think of when they thought of someone who'd made his life out of law enforcement.

  Twenty years on the police force and another ten with the FBI, and he had more experience than almost anyone I knew. He was grizzled and loud, exacting and strict, but he inspired loyalty and dedication in the people who worked for him. Which was evident by everyone straightening up as he came over.

  "Monroe, Mcginnis, Clark," he said, nodding at the other three. "And the man of the hour."

  I smiled, trying not to make an idiot of myself. "Good evening, Chief Roberts."

  "Come here for a second. There's something I want to talk to you about."

  I moved to follow him as he walked away, rolling my eyes at the soft whisper of 'Someone's in trouble' from Shannon as we left. I couldn't think of what I'd done to be singled out on my first day, but it was hard to tell with Roberts.

  "Is everything okay, sir?" I asked, going for straightforward and polite.

  "Relax. Everything's fine. Congratulations are in order, of course. Welcome to the team."

  "Thank you," I said, relaxing with a smile. "I'm happy to be here.

  "I'm sure you are. You know, I've gotta say, I'm impressed with your work, Phillips. Your superior officers had nothing but good things to say about you. Model officer, always willing to go the extra mile, good with civilians. I'm especially impressed with how hard you've been working on the problem with the twins."

  The twins, otherwise known as Tik and Tok, were the city's biggest problem. They ran everything from drugs to weapons, and there were even rumors of them dipping their toes into bigger, nastier waters.

  The local police force had been working their asses off for the last few years to try and make something stick to those assholes so they could get taken down, but they were slippery and hard to catch. They had so many lackeys doing the dirty work for them that it was almost impossible to find enough evidence to pin anything on them.

  "They're a problem, sir," I said simply. "The city's rates of violent crimes and drug use have skyrocketed since they came in and started running things. We hauled in forty percent more drug addicts and pushers in my last year as a beat cop than any other year before, and all signs point right back to them being the cause. We can't clean up the streets with them making everything worse."

  Chief Roberts nodded along as I spoke. "Exactly. That's why we can't let this go on for much longer. The longer they go without getting busted, the more they'll expand. I know their type. Greedy, ruthless. What they had will never be enough for them, and they'll keep expanding until there's nothing we can do to stop them. We've got to get in there before that happens."

  I wholeheartedly agreed, but all the years I’d been trying proved it was definitely easier said than done. "How do we do that, sir?" I asked.

  "We think the best way to bring the hammer down on them is to send someone undercover. Get close to them, learn their habits. Get information from the inside. If someone can earn their trust, then we can take them down easier."

  I nodded along. It made se
nse. Nothing else anyone had tried so far had been working, after all. There were too many layers to their operation, and they didn't seem to trust anyone enough to give them the information so it could be spread. Anyone who wanted to get close enough to stop them would have to be in the inner circle.

  "It'll be hard work," Chief Roberts continued. "It'll mean walking away from your life as you know it. You'll have to be in deep. Thinking like them, being one of them. They have to trust you. If one thing goes wrong, you're dead, and we won't be able to back you up."

  I blinked as I realized he was talking like he was giving me the job. Sure, I'd been working on trying to get as much info on Tik and Tok as possible, but I was new. I would have thought a senior agent would've been chosen over me.

  Not that I was going to look that gift horse in the mouth. If he wanted me to do it, then I would do it. No question.

  "I can handle it, sir," I said, standing up straighter and trying to look like someone who could make it happen.

  He eyed me closely. "When I say deep, I mean deep, Phillips. You can't contact anyone and tell them what's going on. Not your friends, not your girlfriend, not even your mom. Nothing can go wrong on this."

  I nodded. "I understand, sir. It won't be a problem. I can do this. I would be honored to do this."

  The chief nodded, a little smile crossing his face. "Good, that's what I wanted to hear. Because you're the person I want on this job. I know we can trust you to do whatever it takes to take these bastards down and help clean up the city from their shit. You're new, but you're bright, and you're what we need on this."

  And there it was, right in front of me. The break I'd been waiting for since I'd put on my first uniform nearly a decade ago. I wanted to do whatever I could to help keep the streets safe and to fulfill my duty to the citizens. If that meant going undercover for a while, then so be it.

  It wasn't like it would be hard to leave my life behind. There wasn't much to hold onto. I was thirty-years-old and I lived alone. I didn't have a partner or a family. My last real relationship was so long ago that I could barely remember what it felt like to not come home to an empty apartment at the end of a long day.

  The few people I'd found to take care of my needs were quickies, at best. They wouldn’t notice if I wasn’t around, and my parents lived on the other side of the country. If they didn't hear from me for a while, it wouldn't be the first time.

  I was the kind of person who threw myself into my work full force. I was married to my job. The friends I’d had once upon a time used to practically chant it. And then I’d proved them right by not coming to enough birthday parties and movie nights that they just...stopped inviting me.

  That was easier. If I didn't have people counting on me, I could focus better. It made me feel less guilty about the late hours and dangerous missions, and it made me perfect for the job Chief Roberts wanted me to do.

  It was a job made for me. There was no question about it. I was doing it. It was fate.

  The Chief slapped me on the back and grinned. "Good man, Phillips. It'll take some time to get things set up. We'll hook you up with a handler for you to report to and put out some leads on places in the city for you to set up shop. Take care of any personal business you need to handle, and we'll get this show on the road."

  "Yes, sir," I said, grinning just as wide. The feeling of pride was warm and bright, and I could feel that this was going to be the beginning of something good.

  I barely recognized myself. In two months, I'd given up my nice, two-bedroom corner apartment and moved into a smaller, much crappier one-bedroom on the lower side of town. I’d been renting in the same place for two years, and the change of scenery was definitely an adjustment.

  It was less than half the size of my old apartment, and the neighbors were horrible. My old neighbors were the type of people who always smelled like cookies and collected your mail for you when you were out of town, not that I ever went anywhere, but they just seemed like the type. But my new neighbors. They would step over my dead body in the hallway without so much as a call to the cops.

  From my grimy apartment window, I could see broken down cars and illicit meetings, and I was pretty sure I'd watched a car-jacking the first night I’d moved in. But if I was going to do this job right, then I had to live the life. I had to be so deep that no one would suspect me.

  I had a new routine, and instead of getting coffee and going into work every day, I made coffee in my apartment and found street corners to push drugs, making friends and connections with the people who knew the streets around that area.

  I gathered information, asked questions in a relaxed way, and then met my handler to check in with what I'd learned. She gave me new information and places to check out, and I struck out to do it, hoping every day I'd find the lead I needed to get me in with Tic and Tok.

  Two months in and I still hadn't even so much as seen the twins. They didn't waste their time with small fry dealers, apparently. They had their fingers on the pulse of everything, but they worked from a distance, ruling over the underground like kings.

  But that didn't mean there wasn't value in what I was learning. There were people, small-time gangsters and drug pushers mostly, who either loved or hated the twins. Some of them had aspirations of working with them directly, and some had plenty to say about how they could take them down and do their jobs better.

  For my part, I just listened and absorbed as much as I could, taking the time to write everything down at the end of the day so I could deliver it all to my handler.

  Most of it was useless, but it all worked together to create a clearer picture of what we were dealing with. The worst thing we could do was go in under-informed.

  And I was learning to think like one of them. After two months, I had my corners that I preferred, and I knew the look of someone who was looking to buy. That hunched, hungry look. A kind of emptiness in their eyes.

  I'd seen it a hundred times in people I picked up off the street when I was a cop, and now it made it easier to know who to target.

  Mike was one of those people, he was always coming to me. It was half for the drugs, half because he wanted someone to talk to, I was pretty sure.

  I bit back a smile as I spotted him, approaching from around a corner, glancing around to make sure he wasn't being followed.

  He wasn't. No one gave a shit in this area. I'd picked it because I knew it wasn't well-patrolled and there was very little chance of anyone getting in our way.

  "Hey, hey, what's up, man?" Mike said coming over, holding out his hand for a fist bump.

  I smiled as I bumped my fist against his. "How's it going?" I asked. "The usual?" I arched a brow as I reached into my pocket.

  "Yeah, yeah,” Mike said, nodding his head way too hard. “You know what I like. Unless you got anything special today?"

  "Nah, not today," I said. "Just the usual stuff. Maybe next week I'll have some treats for you."

  He nodded again, pulling out a wrinkled wad of cash and handing it over with his hands cupped around it. As inconspicuous as Mike always tried to be, he was more than obvious. He was a bit of a puppy; he tried really hard, but in the end, he piddled on the carpet.

  He even had the puppy dog eyes and a wild scruff.

  I took the money from him, giving it a quick count before handing him his product. I tried not to think about where someone like Mike came up with the money to support his habit. He wasn’t exactly rolling in it. His clothes were worn, and in general, he was mostly unkempt. The only thing he had worth anything was his shoes. He was constantly in pristine, new kicks. I couldn’t decide if he was stealing them himself or doing something sketchy to get them...from someone who had likely stolen them. But I wasn’t trying to play Nancy Drew. I had bigger fish to fry.

  "You know what's crazy?" Mike asked, glancing around like he was expecting an ambush any second. Paranoia often went hand-in-hand with his particular drug preference. I patiently waited for him to figure out that no one was ther
e but me.

  "What's crazy?" I finally asked, drawing his attention back to me.

  He shook his head and focused, eyes big. "Fucking Tok, man. Tok's crazy. He's like. Always trying to be 'better' than us or whatever. Like he didn't start out as a nobody just like everybody else.” He opened his baggie and took a quick bump before he met my eyes again. “Worked his way up, for sure, but he's still like. Out of his fucking mind, you know."

  I arched an eyebrow. I didn’t know. I had no idea. But I wanted to.

  "What makes you say that?" I asked, leaning back onto the wall.

  Mike’s eyes went a little crazy. "You know that bitch I was fucking last week? The herpes hoe?”

  I nodded. Mike was a share-er. Most days, I appreciated any information I could get on Tik and Tok, but Mike’s shares weren’t exactly isolated. He told me everything. The kinds of things nobody should ever share.

  “Yeah, I remember,” I said, egging him on. At least this particular bit of information seemed like it was going to circulate back around to the twins.

  “She told me that little fucker thinks he’s like an art critic or something. Going to art shows and shit like he’s some fancy yuppie from upstate.” Mike rolled his eyes. “Someone needs to knock him down a peg. Remind that motherfucker that he’s from the gutter just like the rest of us.”

  Interesting. I listened to Mike get worked up over Tok’s interest in art. It baffled me the things that offended him, but he’d given me new information, something I might be able to use one day. To take down an operation like the Henderson twins, I could use every scrap of info I could get. Even the most mundane of details could be the straw to break the camel’s back, so I would gather up everything I could.