Page 69 of Viper

Viper: Call me if you need anything. There’s a prospect watching the courthouse and will make sure you get home okay, but I can be there in twenty minutes if you need me.

Eden: I’m starting to realize I need you a lot more than I thought I would. But, yes I promise that I’ll let you know if I need anything.

My heart pounds a little harder in my chest at her words. God, I hope she means it, because I need her just as much. Not just in bed, but in everyday life. We just need to get Vlad off our backs and we’ll be all set.

TWENTY-FIVE

VLAD

If Eden Mercer is in any way attached to the Devil’s Soldiers, she’ll wish she chose a very different path in life.

Anger burns as I listen to yet more incompetence and excuses. “They had a lawyer there, so we couldn’t get the sample, and the judge put in the order that the lawyer was allowed to take the sample to the lab,” the idiot Prosecutor tells me tightly. “It’s out of my hands now.”

“Then you should have fucking killed the lawyer,” I hiss. “Or at least found a way to have him arrested or some shit to get him out of the fucking way. This is only going to delay us.”

“It’s not that simple. I’m trying to make sure that there is no suspicion aroused, and going after a well respected attorney is a sure fire way to put a giant spotlight on everything.”

“And where is the Detective you used to get your warrant?”

He makes a noise that sounds like a half laugh. “Well, he and one other guy ate some cookies or something while they were there and I guess they picked the wrong ones because they’re both shitting their brains out currently.”

“Excuse me?”

“Yeah, the woman at the clubhouse, the President’s Old Lady, was baking when they got there, and she offered them some cookies as a peace offering, trying to say that there are no hard feelings. I guess she’s not as good a cook as she thinks.”

“Or she fucking tried to poison them,” I snarl, infuriated. Are they idiots? You never take something from the people you’re trying to arrest.

“If she was going to poison them, she wouldn’t have only poisoned two, she’d have poisoned the whole batch. Trust me, I’ve been on cases where they’re trying to poison someone, and it’s either a specific person or they do the whole lot so they aren’t incriminated in going after just one person. And honestly, she doesn’t strike me as the type to do something that stupid.”

“Idiots,” I mutter under my breath. “The only other thing I want to hear is how we’re going to get these assholes out of my way. And considering you found nothing, are you certain they weren’t tipped off?”

“According to Wagner they were surprised to see them. Refused to let anyone in until they called the lawyer to verify it was legit. Wagner found a handgun in one room and had some guys run it before he took off for the bathroom, but it’s clean.”

“And you didn’t think to tell them to make it unclean?” Fuck, at this point, I don’t know why I’m bothering with this idiot. He’s certainly not going to help me.

“Couldn’t get to it in time with Wagner shitting his brains out. Got in the hands of someone not on our payroll, and they’re too meticulous for us to slip something past them.”

My fist clenches on the desk as I fight the urge to smash it down on the wood top. If I didn’t need him, I’d kill him, but at this point, it would only dredge up suspicion. So I need to bide my time, but I need to make sure there’s a backup in place, because I can only take so many failures before I take over and handle it all myself.

“Then I suggest you get to work on making sure that the next one you serve sticks,” I bark. I hang up on him and then I yell for Sasha. Smartly, he doesn’t keep me waiting and stands across from me waiting quietly. “Is there evidence that the Devil’s Soldiers were given advanced warning from anyone?”

Sasha doesn’t reply right away, which has me narrowing my eyes at him in warning. Finally, he says, “No, it doesn’t look like they have. There are no indications of any messages on their servers, or on any of their phones.”

“But you don’t believe that?”

He shakes his head. “We saw on one of the courthouse cameras that Judge Brown spoke with the same court reporter that left the building late the night you met with him. Then he called her into his office, but when she was leaving, Detective Wagner and the Prosecutor entered the room to get the warrant signed. She hurried back to her office where she locked the door, so there is a chance she is involved.”

“But there is no evidence of her messaging anyone?”

“No. I spoke with the Judge briefly when I realized that happened, and he said he kept her to check her out, talked to her to make sure that she didn’t overhear anything, but she seemed completely shocked and oblivious. As for her running back to her office, according to him, he kept her as late as possible, and she had very little time to get to her office to drop off the files and notes, before she had to get to the next courtroom.”

“And his opinion on the locked door?”

“Apparently when some orders and notes are hand written for the record and not yet in the system, the reporters lock their doors while they lock them away so that no one can come in and accidentally sees whatever has been written down before it’s a legal document. Precaution for tampering.”

“But you don’t buy that?”

“She was in there a full five minutes. How long does it take to get things filed away? She had plenty of time to message those bastards.”

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