Page 58 of Leading Conviction
The not knowing was chilling enough on its own, until a thought crossed Hawk’s mind.
“Wait, what if… what if Vlad is really calling all the shots?”
“What do you mean?” Wes frowned.
“Think about it.” Hawk pointed to the screen, checking with everyone else’s expression as he hypothesized. “Draco, you said before that the men you encountered a few weeks ago back at the Charitable Technologies International building were mostly Russians. What if the General fucked up? What if he relied too much on Vlad as his henchman and Vlad tipped the scale, so to speak, hiring men on his side to make it easier to turn against the General when the time was right? We know most of the lackeys at the Ashland County fundraisers were Russian.”
“You could be onto something,” Callie pointed out, giving Hawk a burst of satisfaction. “I was underground in that compound for two years and Vlad was the one doing not just all the dirty work, but all theactualwork, too. What ifhe’sbehind everything while the General is just the mouthpiece?”
“I doubt the General would like that.” Jason frowned.
“Maybe he didn’t realize it until it was too late…” Hannah offered, her face tight as she obviously fought to keep her emotions in check.
Hawk couldn’t imagine what was going through her head. Granted, if they were sitting there talking about his pops in the same way, Hawk would tell them they were all out of their damn minds. But the relationship between Hannah and her father was obviously more twisted than he’d ever known or could’ve guessed.
They all watched the screen in silence as Vlad did a hand motion to the man outside of the van. The lackey hopped into the car and Vlad drove off. A snippet of the General appeared in the picture, the whites of his eyes wide with terror.
“Shit, what if you’re right?” Phoenix mumbled as the van drove off the screen.
The room grew silent for a few moments as they sat in thought.
Hawk absentmindedly traced his lips, finding comfort in the gesture in the face of so many unknowns. After a few circles around his mouth, he finally spoke again. “The only question I have—”
“You only haveone?” Jason interrupted.
Hawk tipped his head. “Fair. But I do wonder… why would they still go after Hannah? When Draco and I went to Mexico, she was already under attack… why?”
“Loose ends,” Hannah murmured quietly beside him.
“We all heard him saythatplenty of times,” Phoenix pointed out.
“Vlad even threatened me with ‘cutting loose ends’ when he found me at the party. Before yesterday, the threats I got were more taunts that the General knew where I was and he’d found me once again. This time it escalated.Maybe, it wasn’t the General after me in Mexico. Maybe it was Vlad trying to get rid of me? He already thought I knew more than I did.Dios mio… I could’ve actually died yesterday.”
Hannah’s olive skin turned sallow with the realization. Hawk ground his teeth and squeezed her hand, hoping to provide comfort. It was one of the few gestures they could do in front of people, but he wished he could do more.
“He won’t get to you, Hannah,” he promised.
A small smile lifted her lips. It felt good to give her a modicum of relief, but when he turned back to his team, the rest of them had similar sickly looks as they all glanced around the room.
“If Hannah’s a loose end. That means we’re all loose ends,” Wes said out loud and swallowed.
“Good.” Phoenix took off his hat and slapped it on the table. “We’ve been on the General’s radar for way too damn long. It’s time we take him and his giant henchman off the map entirely. Let’s go through the evidence and see what other loose ends there are.”
Nora nodded. “You’re right. If we find some of our own, maybe they’ll lead us straight to where Vlad and the General are going.”
Hawk’s fingertips drummed on his bottom lip for a long moment. “Anything else to know, Wes?”
“No, that’s the most recent footage we have. It’s a gas station right before the interstate on-ramp. I lost them after that, the net gets too wide and I’m already pushing our goodwill with the FBI.” Wes nodded appreciatively in Callie’s direction.
“In that case…” Hawk glanced at Hannah with a smile. “Ready to play detective?”
“I’ve been stuck as the mouse in this cat-and-mouse game for way too long. I’m ready to play any other role you’ve got at this point.”
The curve of her pretty lips had imagery of a completely different role Hannah could play flashing through his mind before he banished it.
Now’s not the fucking time.
“Alright.” Hawk dropped his hand to the table with a light tap. “Time to put together all the evidence we’ve collected the past ten years and solve the biggest case of our lives.”
