Page 40 of Fanatic

“You’re buying,” he stated as he walked to a desk and grabbed his suit jacket.

“Somehow, that doesn’t surprise me,” I responded, and Jimenez smiled. Wow, that made him seem entirely different.

We headed to a local diner, and I picked Jimenez’s brain for what he thought about the new unit. Jimenez believed it would be a good idea but had concerns around the staff. A lot of prejudice had built up, and the bureau had lost a couple of agents itself.

“Why aren’t you SAC yet?”

“I’ve applied, I’m waiting on the reply,” Jimenez said.

“If I accepted the job offered for the new department, would you be my SAC?”

Jimenez looked surprised. “Why would you want me?”

“We don’t like each other, but I respect you, Jimenez. Your way of working does compliment mine, and we could create something good. I could trust you to run things and know you’re not going to fuck up. And I need a partner I can rely on.”

“You don’t like me, ASAC Ware, but you trust me?”

“Yup. Strange, ain’t it? But there you go. If I accept this position, I’d want you as my SAC.”

“Do I get to help choose the team?” Jimenez asked shrewdly.

“Yeah. I’ve been absent a year, there’s bound to be new faces.”

“You take the job, and I receive the promotion, you got yourself an SAC,” Jimenez said.

“I’ll be in touch tomorrow. I’m going to read over the proposal and see what it contains and what our boundaries are. And I’ve got leeway, if I want you as my SAC, then that’s what I get,” I stated.

Jimenez held my gaze. “Yeah, guess you earned that ASAC Ware.”

“I fucking did.”

???

When Fanatic came home with Danny, I was reading through the offer and seeing where I could develop it. I looked up at my laughing boy as he bounced and babbled in Fanatic’s ear.

“Good day?” I asked.

“Boyo here learned to bubble spit at last! Hit his Uncle Chance right in the face!”

“Ouch,” I replied, chuckling as Danny grinned.

“Tell me you warned them he was teething?”

“Nope, Danny got Big Al, Chance, Shee, Clio, and Chey today,” Fanatic said proudly.

Danny had three teeth and was biting everything. I’d had to stop breastfeeding because that shit was painful.

“What are you reading? A case?” Fanatic asked.

“No. A proposal for a new unit. It will focus on Major Crime and Major Offenders, but there’s more to it than the usual stuff. After the Venomous Fangs, the country has now recognised that home grown criminal gangs like them are a huge threat. If we’d cut the pipeline from Santos and other criminals, we could have shut the Fangs down much sooner.

“Markin devised this idea, and right now, he’s got a shitload of support, so he’s cashing in on it. He wants to make a specialised unit combining all this together. Markin’s asked me to head it up,” I said.

“That’s great!” Fanatic exclaimed. “Isn’t it?”

“Yeah, it’s a huge feather in my cap. And I get to pick my team from field agents to SSA’s to a SAC. This is massive, and we’ve got eyes on us. Markin thinks my connections will give us a leg up.”

“Markin ain’t wrong. You know an MC inside out, and a lot are dirty. What’s the barrier because I’m sensing one?”

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