Page 5 of Fatal Temptation

He stopped at the door and poised himself before reaching for the handle. He opened the door and kept his gun raised, stepping out. The door led to the only place they couldn’t get cameras pointed at without risking being spotted. These guys had already known they were there so it would’ve been a moot point, but they couldn’t have known that when Mo and Evan set up the cameras.

At the far end of the gravel road, right in front of the green gate, there was a truck with the back doors open, a man jumping up into the bed. From what little he could see of the inside, he guessed that the girls were in the back.

He took off running. He was too far away to get a good shot off. He didn’t have enough vision of the inside of the truck to risk it, either.

The man turned around, grabbing one of the doors and when he’d closed it, he looked up. He stared right at Lucas as he slammed his hand against the side of the truck and yelled for the driver to go. Their eyes met for a split second before the last door was jerked shut and the truck was taking off too fast for him to follow on foot.

“Fuck,” he yelled.

He pressed the button to his earpiece and relayed the make, model, and license plate, knowing damn well there was nothing he could do to stop that truck.

∞ ∞ ∞

He dumped his tired ass into the chair across from his unit’s Assistant Special Agent in Charge. They’d lost track of the truck. These guys were sophisticated enough to make a whole ass truck disappear. The others were at their computers, waiting for any camera in town to pick up the truck again, but he knew it was gone. The plates would’ve been switched by now, and the truck was white. It would be impossible to find again. They’d had them and they’d blown their chance at catching these bastards.

He could feel ASAC Robert Edmunds’ eyes on him and slowly raised his head.

“You look like shit,” Edmunds said.

The only answer he had to that was a grunt. He knew he looked like shit. He felt like it, too.

“Sanchez isn’t happy with you.”

He pressed his lips together to keep from saying exactly what he thought about Sanchez. It wouldn’t do him any good to mouth off to his ASAC about his boss. It didn’t matter anyway. It wouldn’t change anything.

“It could’ve been worse,” Edmunds said, bushy brow arching.

Lucas leaned back in his chair, a sigh rocking through him.

“If he’d listened, we could’ve got them. We could’ve saved those people.”

“I don’t disagree, but it is what it is.”

He gave a tight-lipped nod.

He knew how it went. He knew the rules. The politics. He hated them just the same.

“You haven’t used a single vacation day this year. Take the next two weeks off,” Edmunds said, giving Lucas a stern look that meant he wasn’t asking.

A grunt escaped him, and he nodded as he got up. A week of doing nothing was the last thing he needed.

CHAPTER FIVE

Akio

A PILLOW slapped him in the face, and he turned his head to glare at his best friend. Maggie was grinning right back at him. They had met on the first day of class. He’d been completely overwhelmed and unsure if he’d been heading the right way. Maggie, however? Despite it being her first day, too, she’d taken him under her wing and got him to class with time to spare. They’d been inseparable since then.

“Get your ass up,” Maggie said, a wicked smile on her lips. “We’re going out.”

Akio groaned. “I just got back.”

Maggie sat down on the bed next to him and tugged him into a seated position.

“Which is why I’ve been waiting two days for you to get back, so we could go out.”

He rolled his eyes and received another pillow to the face for his trouble.

“We’re just going to the bar,” Maggie said.

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