Page 60 of Cocky Secrets

“You’re a cop, Bear. You interrogating us? Do we need a lawyer?”

Honey Badger grunts, “You tellin’ your Captain everything we tell you… because we ain’t talkin’!”

“I’m not telling anyone.” I slash a glance across the four. “They know of a case where some of you captured a pedophile. It’s on the books but a decade old. Other than that…”

Jett asks, “The human trafficking ring?” trying to understand how I know about it if it’s not on the books.

“Found a woman on the web who was one of the victims. She helps people find you. So you can help them.”

The two men exchange a look.

I stare at them, wondering aloud, “What’s the issue here? Why are you hiding doing good work?”

Sage beseeches her father, “Dad, you can trust him.”

Honey Badger scowls.

Jett says, “I don’t think we have a choice. What I want to know is why you’re searching. Is it to get to know who Sage is associated with?”

I blink at him, unsure if I even know the answer to that question. “That has something to do with it. But I just felt… when we were searching for Sage… this kind of energy like you’d done it before. It felt professional. Can’t explain it better than that.”

Honey Badger asks, “Are you serious about my daughter?”

“Dead serious.”

He looks at his wife, then at Sage, finally at Jett, “He’s going to be part of the family.”

Luna walks in. “Can’t keep secrets from family. Especially when he’s digging around like that.”

Jett casts a sideways look at his wife. “You were listening.”

“Everyone’s listening.” She gives a subtle motion with her hand toward the other room, or rooms, I haven’t been in yet. And can’t see from here. “We’re just giving you space.”

Honey Badger grits his teeth. “What do we do, Jett?”

Jett inhales. “I think we tell him. He already knows and, if we don’t, he’ll just keep digging to satisfy that curiosity he’s given in to.”

Sage holds my gaze as she steps closer to me, her voice almost intimate. “The Ciphers help the innocent. People who don’t have anywhere else to turn. Many who’ve found the police,the system,to not be able to save them. Or they’re too scared to go to the police.”

“Why keep it a secret that they help the innocent?”

“Because…” Sage glances to Jett.

He fills in the blank. “You could say that we don’t follow the Law.”

There’s a heavy pause that fills the air. “That’s what the woman on the phone said to me. Something along those lines.”

“So you know this?” Jett asks, cocking one eyebrow. “But you didn’t turn us in.”

“Why would I?” I drag a hand down my face, aware that two sides of me are suddenly at war. “Look, there’s a part of me that vowed to uphold the Law. And there’s another part that’s been burned by it. Because I’ve seen some really bad guys back on the streets over a technicality. Even if I knew the full extent of what The Ciphers have done, I still don’t think I’d want to do anything but thank you.”

Margaret touches Honey Badger’s shoulder with what looks like hope in her eyes, and he grunts, “Thank us?”

I cross my arms. “And congratulate you. When that woman said she has her own business now because of the college education you paid for, with the traffickers’ money, all I could think was…that’s how it should be done!” A grin spreads on my face. “And you’re doing it! You’re actually righting wrongs in a way that lasts.”

Everyone is silent.

Sage sighs, “Don’t you see it?”

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