The Rookie Club Thriller series Box Set

by Danielle Girard

  Lau threw the door open and rolled into the room followed by Daley. Cameron came behind, then Kessler. She kept her back to the frame of the door as she hooked around the doorway and into the room. Her back was safe, her gun aimed and ready.

  A string of shots fired from the closet. The angle was steep; the shots made a line of dust as they pierced high on the wall behind them. The shooter was sitting on the floor. Cameron aimed low and shot back. Three quick shots, then she paused. There was no response.

  Cameron kept her aim still on the closet, while Kessler, Daley, and Paules moved past her. Daley took left and Paules right, as Kessler reached for the door. He nodded back to Cameron. She nodded in return. Just try it, you son of a bitch. I’m ready. Kessler slid the door open. A Heckler & Koch MP5 machine gun fell to the floor with a clank. Kessler and Daley pulled the shooter out. Dead.

  “Suspect is down,” Lau reported into his radio. “I repeat, suspect is down.”

  Without looking at the perp’s face, Cameron lowered her weapon and left the room. Diego stood in the doorway smiling. “Nice work, Officer Cruz.”

  “Well, thank you, Ramirez,” she said, trying not to grin like a schoolgirl.

  She followed him out of the house, itching to get him alone.

  Chapter 2

  Diego and Cameron were always careful to leave the station separately. Usually she went first, but tonight, he begged off drinks with the group. “Seeing my girl,” he said without looking at her.

  “When we going to meet this invisible chica?” Paules asked.

  Diego shook his head.

  “You afraid of a little competition?” Kessler joked.

  “That’s it,” Diego responded. “You’re so smooth, I’m afraid she’d fall for one of you bozos.”

  Cameron took her time, packing up her bag and listening to the male banter.

  Sergeant Lavick came in and shed his coat. He stood in front of his locker and stared at the lock.

  Paules and Lau stifled their laughter.

  Lavick spun the knob a few times. “Sixteen.” Cameron folded her belt into her locker. “Twenty-seven,” she said.

  Lavick frowned. “I know my own damn combination.”

  Lau burst out laughing. Lavick picked up a baseball hat off the bench and flicked it at him like a Frisbee. “Watch it, Lau. Quarterlies are coming up.”

  Lavick turned to Cameron.

  “Thirty-six,” she whispered as her phone vibrated in her back pocket. Diego.

  “You sure you don’t want to join tonight?” Kessler asked, leaning against the locker beside hers.

  “Not tonight.”

  She closed the locker and said good night. Only in the car did she read Diego’s text.

  PHNH in twenty.

  Of course. She should have known they would go to the Potrero Hill Neighborhood House. It was one of Diego’s favorite spots. During the day, it was a community center aimed at helping kids make good choices. It had been in use for more than fifty years. Diego had spent many afternoons there as a kid himself, before graduating and becoming a mentor. Now, he spent free afternoons at PHNH, talking with kids, helping with homework or playing basketball behind the house. At night, though, the center was closed, and the views of the city skyline were stunning. Tonight was the perfect night for it. No clouds and the temperature in the low seventies.

  They might walk down the hill and have Cuban food at Fruitlandia. Maybe walk over to the park or climb the hill above the reservoir on the next block to get the extra twenty feet of view. The sun would set over the house, cutting down between the streets of the city and washing everything in pink and orange. And then, they would go home. Where in there did she tell him that he was going to be a father?

  When she parked on De Haro, Diego was already on the porch, legs dangling over the banister exactly the way he told the kids they couldn’t. He appeared lost in thought as she approached. He reached a hand back and helped her climb over the banister. She sat beside him, leaning into his warmth.

  “Nice night,” she said.

  “Gorgeous.” He smiled, but it faltered. Something in his brow was worried. He touched the hair along her face, slowly. Kissed her lips gently.

  “What’s wrong?”

  He stroked her face, running his thumb along her jaw. “Nothing.” He stared at the skyline and went quiet.

  Normally, they would start in on the job, recount the moments from the day. He would talk about her kill shot. The banter before they got quieter, found the intimacy that they couldn’t share at work.

  Diego shook his head. “No, it’s not nothing.”

  Cameron shifted away from him, waiting.

  He didn’t meet her eye as he spoke. “They’re taking me undercover.”

  “What do you mean? Who?”

  “ICE,” he said. When she didn’t respond, he added, “Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”

  She was in shock. “I know what ICE is.”

  “I offered to help with an ongoing investigation. Actually, I put my name in eight months ago. I got the call this morning.”

  “Where will you be?”

  He looked at her without answering.

  “You can’t tell me?”

  He held her gaze.

  She thought about the baby, subconsciously crossed her arms. “How long?”

  “Six weeks, maybe two months. It will seem like forever.”

  “It will.” She thought about all the times her Papa had told her she shouldn’t be training to be a police officer, when Mama pleaded with her to find a safe job. Telling him about the baby would be the same as asking him to stay. Two months from now she would be fifteen or sixteen weeks. It could wait. It would have to.

  Chapter 3

  Three months later

  This was the hardest part of the day at work, the time when she felt Diego’s absence most profoundly. While it used to be a time of celebration, the job accomplished, now it reminded her that she was heading into another night when she couldn’t see Diego, couldn’t even talk to him. Cameron heaved her equipment bag back onto the top shelf of the storage room.

  “Need some help getting it up there?” Daley joked.

  “Mine’s done, but you sure you can reach your spot? I can give you a boost,” she joked back.

  She’d originally been given a spot on the bottom shelf, but since she was one of the tallest members of the team, they eventually moved her to the top shelf.

  Lau laughed out loud. “She’s got a few inches on you, Daley.”

  “And on you,” he sparred back.

  She chuckled at them, more at ease in this environment than in any she’d ever known. As a kid, her brothers told her she could never be a cop. Not a girl, certainly not a gringa so unlike any of the police in her tiny hometown of Bleakwood, Texas. Couldn’t, to her, meant should, and she’d been easily baited. What better way to make a stamp on the world than to make it safer?

  Cameron rubbed her hand across her head. Tonight, she was ready to go home and get a shower. The changes in her body had pushed her to the outside of the group again. Sometimes, before Diego went undercover, she had gone along for the celebratory round of drinks. Careful to sit on the opposite side of the room from Diego, she’d listen as the men spun short tales into tall ones.

  She was always the quiet one. Previous boyfriends had complained about her reticence. Women were supposed to ooze emotion, but that wasn’t Cameron’s style. No one had been worth talking to until Diego. He’d simply drawn her out, and it had felt as natural as exhaling.

  Even after he went undercover, she still participated in some of the team nights out. She went to the bar and ordered a Coke. Mostly, she listened, laughed, and called out the really big lies. These men had no idea how far Cameron had come from the reticent girl she’d been. They called her the shyest tough girl on the force, but she was accustomed to feeling strange about her quiet nature. Being in the middle of the rambunctious group of men was no different from growing up the quiet, wh
ite girl in a raucous Mexican family.

  “You coming out, Cruz?” Lau asked.

  “Not tonight.”

  She caught Kessler eyeing her midsection and quickly pulled on her coat. She had to tell her sergeant. She’d been hoping to tell Diego first, to hold off until she’d heard from him. But, the bump was getting too obvious.

  She grabbed her pack and said good night, heading to the sergeant’s office before she chickened out again. As she passed the captain’s office, she saw Sergeant Lavick sitting across from Captain Margaret Ahrens. Not wanting to interrupt, she kept walking, but Captain Ahrens caught her eye.

  “You have a minute, Officer Cruz?” Captain Ahrens called out.

  Cameron stopped in the doorway. The team had little interaction with Captain Ahrens. She was seldom in her office, as she coordinated the team’s efforts with other departments. This meant she spent most of her time in the main station on Bryant. It felt especially strange since they were the only two women.

  “That was nice work today,” Sergeant Lavick said, taking off his glasses and rubbing the red marks on his nose with long, thin fingers. The skin on his knuckles suddenly seemed too loose, like an old man’s. His face was thinner, too. Maybe he was sick.

  “I heard you did very well,” Captain Ahrens added. Even behind her desk, she was formidable. Taller than Cameron, she had the build of a basketball player.

  “Thank you.”

  “Come on in,” Ahrens said, motioning to the empty seat in front of her desk.

  Ahren’s office was largely sterile. Commendations and diplomas, as well as several pictures of Ahrens, including one with Michelle Obama, hung on the walls. But, the only personal picture was the one framed on her desk, an eight-by-ten of a large German shepherd. Cameron knew that dog was named Kleina, because the dog’s tag hung from Ahrens’ keychain.

  “You okay?” Captain Ahrens asked.

  Cameron didn’t answer at first. It was now or never. She stepped into the office. “I’m going to need some time off.”

  Lavick put his glasses back on. “You mean vacation time?”

  She considered telling them to forget it when she felt the strange gurgling of the baby moving. “More like leave.”

  “Medical leave?” Ahrens asked, folding her hands on her desk and leaning forward.

  Cameron nodded.

  “Are you all right?” Lavick asked.

  “I’m fine. I have a—I’m—” Cameron hadn’t said the words out loud, except to Rosa. Even Mama didn’t know yet, although Cameron knew she had to tell her soon.

  “Lavick,” Ahrens interrupted. “Will you excuse us for a moment?”

  Lavick frowned. “I should probably stay—”

  “Please, Michael,” Ahrens interjected. “I’ll call you back in a few minutes. I would like to talk to Officer Cruz.”

  “Like woman to woman?” Lavick said, nodding.

  Ahrens raised an eyebrow. “Sure.”

  Lavick got up and left.

  “How far along are you?” Ahrens asked as soon as the door had clicked closed.

  Cameron didn’t blink. “Twenty-one weeks.”

  “Wow, you’ve kept it well concealed.”

  Cameron didn’t answer. She felt huge.

  “You’re keeping it.”

  “There was never any question.”

  “And the father?” she asked.

  “I think he’ll be supportive.”

  Ahrens cocked her eyebrow again. “He doesn’t know?”

  “Not yet.”

  Ahrens was quiet before she said, “I have a son.”

  “I had no idea,” Cameron responded as she scanned the room for some evidence of the child. There was none.

  “We’re not in touch,” Ahrens added and Cameron didn’t ask more. Ahrens opened her desk drawer and pulled out a notepad. “Twenty-one weeks,” she said out loud. “You’ve got leave from the state—a portion of it paid and some unpaid. You’ll be okay for money?” She asked this without looking up.

  “Fine.”

  “You can take up to six months after the baby is born without jeopardizing your position. I’ll get the paperwork started and get you in touch with the benefits group. They’ll help arrange a desk position until you deliver.”

  Six months after the baby. A desk job until she delivered. That was twenty more weeks. She might be away for a year. In seven years, she’d never gone more than nine days without shooting. How could she last a year?

  Outside Captain Ahrens’ office, Lavick stood talking to Kessler. “Everything okay?” he asked.

  “Fine.”

  He was heading toward Ahrens’ office when he said, “Oh, you got a letter. It came in the department mail. It’s on my desk. Go ahead and grab it.”

  Cameron went into his office and found the letter. On the front, in Diego’s handwriting, it said her name and the words “Personal and Confidential.” No postmark. No return address. It meant he was close. Maybe coming home. Thank God.

  Kessler filled the doorway. His blonde hair was cropped short, his brown eyes wide. Women stared at him when they were out with the team and friends in the department had asked about him more than once. He was good looking, if in a Nebraska farm boy kind of way. “Hey.” He glanced at the envelope, but she quickly folded it and put it in her jacket pocket.

  “Hi, Brian.”

  “I thought you might want to see a movie this weekend,” he said. “The new Bond is out.”

  “I’m going to have to pass. I’ve got company in town this weekend.”

  “Family?” he asked, hopefully.

  She nodded.

  “Maybe next weekend.”

  She thought about how the captain and sergeant would tell the others about her news. She was glad she wouldn’t be here. “Good night, Brian.”

  “Good night, Cameron. Have a good one.”

  She hurried down the hallway and out the door. As soon as she was in the night air, she tore open the envelope. She flattened the note in her hand, wondering if he knew about the baby. She scanned the page and caught the words “love” and “miss.”

  She tried to calm herself and read the first line.

  If you’re reading this, it means I’m dead.

  Chapter 4

  Seven months later

  Nate was every bit the night owl his father had been. Cameron spent at least three nights a week driving around the city, trying to lull him back to sleep. Most of the time, he was out before she could drive to the Potrero Hill Neighborhood House and back to the house. Home again, she would lift his car seat out of the car and carry him carefully into his room and let him sleep in the chair on the floor. A few times, she had tried to get him back into his crib without waking him, but she’d never succeeded.

  Sometimes, though, they were in the car for hours. Tonight was one of those nights. She tried the freeway down to the airport and back. Then, through the city all the way down Franklin to Crissy Field and back up Van Ness. Around the neighborhood and twice to the Potrero Hill Neighborhood House. She hadn’t been into the PHNH since Diego’s death, but driving by sometimes made her feel a little closer to him. As often, it made her feel worse.

  It felt like a different world now. After his death, she had simply withdrawn. That their relationship spanned all areas of her life only made it harder. Plus, there was the growing person inside her. It was as though he was a shadow always behind her, at work, at home, in her dreams. Every new day had started with a fresh sense of devastation at his death. Worse, she couldn’t talk about it at work because it had taken a month for the news to travel through the proper channels and come out publicly.

  A week later, Diego was given an official department burial. With no wife or mother to claim his flag, she had watched it be carried away. Cameron sat in the third row with the team. None of them cried. Rosa and Mama Cruz were there too, weeping for the three of them only a few rows back.

  Though Diego was gone, she wasn’t without him. She had the baby. The week a
fter Diego was officially reported dead, Cameron went to see Dr. Waterman to confirm the baby’s gender. Originally, she had welcomed the idea of a surprise. But after Diego’s death, she wanted to identify the baby as a boy or a girl, not a thing. When the doctor had pointed out the small penis, Cameron had thought she’d known all along that it was a boy. She imagined the joy Diego would have had at the news and she’d cried right there on the examination table.

  Sometimes, when the ache for Diego became too much, she told herself that this was how it was supposed to be—just her and Nate. She didn’t expect him to fill a void that Diego had left. People expected too much of their children—pressured them to reach unattainable feats, to capture their own missed opportunities. She wanted Nate to be happy—honest and happy.

  Sometimes, when she would sink deeper into her shell, close herself off more completely, Nate was there to pull her out—to force her to be in contact with others—Señora Accosta and Rosa, Mama, even his doctor, who treaded so cautiously across the ground of how Cameron was coping with single parenthood. Maybe not in the way everyone expected, but she was coping.

  Except at the moment, her eyelids were closing on their own. Nate continued to fuss in the backseat. She passed the Neighborhood House and followed De Haro through a neighborhood of small bungalows. Cars lined both sides of the street. She turned on 23rd as Nate cried in earnest. Down Carolina, she spotted the reservoir. Alongside it, the sidewalk was empty. “Okay, cariño. Estoy aquí. Tienes hambre, pobrecito?” She parked and got out of the driver’s seat and climbed into the back beside Nate. She locked the doors, then lifted Nate, who had fat tears rolling down his cheeks, from his car seat. Never an SUV person, Cameron had to admit the tinted windows were handy. Hushing the tiny dark-haired bundle, she lifted her shirt, snapped open her bra, and let the baby find her breast.