Page 78 of Deadly Force
I glance down. Zack. Great. The voice of reason, Southern edition.
I jab the button, set it to speaker. Static clicks, then his voice comes through, slow, casual in that way that means business.
“You drivin’?”
“Yeah. On my way to see Mateo.” Iscan the road ahead, his name tasting like unfinished business on my tongue. Like a prayer I’m not brave enough to pray. “Why?”
“Need you to pull over, brother.”
My spine locks. I flick the blinker, veer onto the shoulder. Gravel pops under the tires as the truck eases to a stop. Dust curls in the mirror.
The silence stretches long and heavy. I know that pause. I’ve heard it in foxholes and hospital corridors, in the moment before someone’s life splits in two.
“Talk to me, Zack.”
The line’s quiet for a beat. Then Zack exhales, and I can hear the weight behind it.
“TPD just found the director of Desert Rose.”
My hand hovers near my sidearm. Reflexive. Not drawn. But aware.
“Travis Bell? Where?”
“Just north of Oro Valley. Ran off the road into an arroyo bed. Looks like he’d been drinking—tested positive for alcohol and diazepam. Dead on impact.”
I stare through the windshield, but the landscape’s gone soft at the edges. This isn’t a coincidence. Can’t be.
While we were chasing shadows, Bell ended up dead in a ditch with just enough in his system to call it a closed case.
I tighten my grip on the wheel. “Tell Delilah to forget Sonora,” I say. “It was a false flag.”
Zack relays my instructions to Delilah. “You want us to focus on the clinic?”
My mind jumps to the obvious. “Yeah. Look at Desert Rose,” I pause. “Employee rosters, shell companies, clinic licenses, anything.”
I don’t wait for a reply. I floor the accelerator, and the truck surges forward with a roar. Gravel spits across the shoulder as I tear back onto the highway, tires shrieking for grip.
The engine growls beneath me, devouring pavement like it knows I’m behind. Like it knows I never should’ve left her.
And I shouldn’t have.
Because the body count’s climbing for a reason.
We didn’t just pull a thread, we kicked the hornet’s nest wide open.
And if they’ve started tying off loose ends, Brooke could be next.
NINETEEN
Brooke
Outside my office window, a dog barks and sunlight spills through the glass, warming my fingers as I read another passive-aggressive email from Lawrence.
Subject: Urgent: Reconsidering Your Current Draft
Brooke,
I understand you’re passionate about this story—but framing it the way you have could easily be interpreted as anti-choice and dangerously inflammatory. We must ask ourselves: are we amplifying truth, or fueling division?
