Page 24 of Hannah's Truth

Low voices in the hallway approached her door and she smiled. After years of working as an analyst guiding their Special Ops team through dangerous operations in the field, she recognized Rick and Ross before they opened her door.

She blew off the typical greetings, but held out her hand for the extra coffee cup in Rick’s hand.

“Not until you say something nice,” he said, holding it out of reach.

“Good morning. Gimme.”

They both knew he wouldn’t get anything else out of her until she wanted to share, so he handed it over.

Ross shook his head. “I take it you found something on the robbery case?”

“Yes.” She pushed two files across her desk, one toward each man. “Those are the hard copies. Thought we should go over the high points before I send an update to the Greenville P.D.”

Her toes tapped in her boots, but they couldn’t see that and therefore couldn’t give her crap about fidgeting. It was all she could do to wait them out as she moved the mouse to open the window she had set up to show them the real reason she’d called them up here.

Ross closed the file and looked to Rick. “You can spend the weekend in Greenville?”

“Sure.” Rick leaned forward and put the file back on Eva’s desk. “You want me to piggy back the security feeds?”

“Nah. We only need your usual stake out and assessment skills.”

Rick nodded and winked at Eva. “I’ll bring you my receipts.”

“Hooray and glad you approve, et cetera, et cetera.” She turned her monitor to face them. “We have a bigger problem. Or rather, Bart does.”

The details were brief but the gang sign made it obvious that Bart had some problematic association with a Mexican cartel. The preliminary report gave surface details and stopped just shy of speculating as to Bart’s involvement. She watched both faces turn stormy as the implications of Tim Jensen’s murder sank in. Neither man spoke for so long, she couldn’t stand it.

“Well?” She met Ross’s cold, assessing gaze. “What are we going to do about it?”

“Nothing.”

“Wait—” Eva started to protest, tossing her pen to the desk. “You guys knew about this?”

“News to me,” Rick said, earning a glare from Ross.

Shewas the information guru on their team and she scoured the internet for news just like this so they could be prepared to act. If Ross already had information related to the situation up in Virginia it was because there was a bigger op in play.

“We’ve been warned off of it, haven’t we?”

Ross nodded. “Don’t worry about it. No one really believes Bart is guilty of any kind of criminal activity, but the investigation has to run its course.”

“The man took a bullet for me,” she said. “It grates against my every instinct to sit here and do nothing when someone is messing with his business.”

“I understand,” Ross allowed.

“Tell me something useful or I’m likely to go for a long drive.”

“I’m telling you to stay out of it, Eva,” Ross replied in his tactical-leader tone. “If he needs our help, you’ll be the first to know.”

She jerked her chin in the direction of the computer monitor. “You’re saying that’s bogus?” The article looked real enough to her and she knew how to pick apart the source code.

“No, it’s real. But he’s not dealing with it alone.”

She was far from convinced, but she wasn’t going to get any further by arguing with him now. “Promise?”

“I give you my word.”

“Who’s with him?”

---