Chapter 10
Netflix should have a category called ‘easy to follow while looking at my phone the whole time.’
— Quinn’s secret thoughts
QUINN
1 year later
I saw her in the parking lot of Trader Joe’s eating a rotisserie chicken.
She sat there, her eyes far away, as she munched on a chicken leg.
When she was done with it, she tossed it in the lid that had one other chicken bone in it and moved to the breast meat.
Like she used to, she’d peel all of the skin off and toss it to the side. Then , she’d leave it for me.
Now , I was fairly sure she would’ve stabbed me with a sharpened chicken bone before letting me have anything of hers.
“ What are we doing here again?”
I looked over at Boseman and said, “ You know why we’re here.”
“ A team bonding exercise would usually take place at a restaurant. Or a fuckin’ bar. Not a grocery store,” Boseman groused.
I snorted. “ We’re taking a fuckin’ picnic. And you know they have healthy meals here we can take over to the park before we start our team bonding.”
Except , my eyes never left the woman two cars down from my own.
“ Who is that?” I heard Ameer whisper.
Boseman didn’t answer.
Neither did I .
“ That’s her, isn’t it?” Assman , my newest member of the gang division, asked.
I looked at Assman , whose actual name was Berger Assman , and shrugged. “ Why do you ask?”
“ Because you’re looking at her like she’s hung the moon, not like she’s a weirdo for eating an entire rotisserie chicken in the parking lot of a grocery store,” he pointed out.
Well , he did have a point.
“ She did, once upon a time,” I said as I walked past, keeping my head down.
No matter how hard I tried to break through her walls this last year, she’d resisted.
I’d called.
I’d stopped by.
I’d sent her gifts.
I’d sent Ande .
I’d sent my brothers.
Hell , I’d even gotten desperate and approached her brother.
That had been a mistake.
Her brother hadn’t given me anything and had, in fact, given me a reason to arrest him.
And arresting her brother hadn’t gotten me into Shayne’s good graces.
In fact, it’d only made things worse.
Yet , instead of walking past, I went around her car to the passenger window and knocked on it.
She rolled down the window, not once looking at me. “ You want to meet up tomorrow?”
That was the only thing she’d give me.
Meaningless sex.
We’d meet at my place. She’d fuck me senseless. Then she’d leave.
But , since I was a glutton for punishment, I didn’t fucking care that she left.
I only cared about taking her any way I could get her.
“ Sure ,” she grumbled.
“ Are you…” I started, but before I could finish the rest of my question, she rolled up the window.
“ Burn ,” Assman snorted.
I narrowed my eyes at him, and he clenched his mouth shut tightly.
“ Don’t ,” I heard Boseman murmuring. “ Not her.”
Nobody said a word until we were at a park thirty minutes later where my mom was setting up the last of the cones for the obstacle course that the PD owned.
“ Mamasauce ,” I called out to my mom.
She winked at me. “ How are you, baby?”
“ Not good,” I admitted. “ Saw Shayne .”
“ And let me guess, she didn’t let you get a word in?” She raised her brow.
“ Nope ,” I grumbled.
“ You deserve it, honey,” she replied.
I hated that she was right.
I’d been paying for my young, dumb, stupid mistake for fuckin’ years now. Would she ever forgive me?
But still, this was my mom. She was supposed to choose me.
I groaned. “ Are you sure you’re my mom? Maybe I’m adopted. That has to be why you’re so mean to me.”
My mom gave me a raised brow before totally destroying me in front of my team. “ Don’t be stupid. Why would we choose you?”
Assman choked.
Boseman laughed.
Ameer made a weird choking sound.
The rest of the crew wisely stayed quiet.
“ Thanks , Mom ,” I drawled, causing her to wink at me.
That was the thing with our family.
If you were a sensitive little bitch, you wouldn’t make it. It was the survival of the fittest in the Carter household.
Even worse, if you showed any kind of weakness, they’d jump on it like a bunch of starving dogs that were desperate for their next meal.
“ What’s y’all’s plan for today?” she questioned. “ Are you having fun, or are you competing?”
I looked at my motley crew, then laughed. “ That’s hilarious that you think we’d do anything but compete.”
I mean, my team wasn’t SWAT , but we were just as dedicated. Just as in shape. Just as on call.
Hell , we might as well be the gang division SWAT team.
My mom shook her head, more than used to dealing with all this testosterone, and said, “ Isn’t that your brother?”
I looked over my shoulder to see Gable walking toward a group of people standing near the flagpole about half a football field away from us.
For the last year, he’d been undercover. We got to see him, sure, but not in the way that we’d like.
For him to be here, unannounced, meant very bad things.
Generally , he wouldn’t be caught dead in the same park area that the city used to train their police officers. There was always an off chance that a young, dumb officer would see him and inadvertently out him.
“ Shit ,” I said as I saw him stop near the group.
Our eyes met, and connected, over the span of the park.
Then a nervous flutter started to swell in my belly.
If he was here, that meant that there were others here as well.
I started to look around, my practiced eye trying to find the colors of the gangs in the area.
The Breakers were orange and teal.
Then there were the West Backers , that were neon green and blue.
The gang that Gable had been slowly digging his way into the middle of was orange and teal. Gable , in his orange shirt, black bandana, and teal Air Force Ones , had my belly tensing.
Because the man that he was talking to was also wearing orange and teal.
But across the park…
“ Mom ,” I murmured urgently. “ Get on the horn and call in a code 192.”
My quiet words had my mom moving before I finished speaking.
“ Boys ,” I said quietly, knowing that they were listening. “ Start spreading out.”
Assman , Boseman , and the others dispersed, all going to different points in the park.
Boseman reached the park and started talking quietly to a group of dads.
All of them tensed, but they slowly started to gather their children up without alerting anyone that anything was wrong. The moms, sensing issues, did the same, and started to herd them in the direction of the bathrooms, which were at the farthest point in the park. It also offered the one area in which they could hide behind actual brick walls.
There were too many of them.
And the kids holding the kite competition were right in the middle of the two gangs.
Mother . Fucker .
A text came through in my pocket, and soon they came, one after the other after the other.
The family text chain had been activated.
Mom returned to my side, her trusty firearm now on full display, along with her badge.
My mother might be all of five-foot-four, but she was a powerhouse. And she’d kick every man’s ass that she encountered if she needed to.
“ Ma ,” I murmured. “ I need you to get to that group of kids behind the bathrooms.”
“ On it.” She paused. “ Are you going to the kites?”
I swallowed hard. “ I’m going to the kites.”
As I did, more and more colors of the two gangs started appearing.
All of them gathering right across from each other.
I pulled my phone out when it started to ring Gable’s ringtone.
“ Yeah ,” I said as I tucked my chin and headed toward the kids.
“ Shit’s about to go down,” he said without preamble. “ I wasn’t supposed to be here today. Acted like I was in the area and started to see people. It’s …”
He didn’t need to finish.
Gang wars were rather simple.
Both of them wanted to be the superior gang in the city. Hell , they wanted to be the only gang in the city.
The only problem with that was, they didn’t care who had to get hurt to make that happen.
Even worse, they chose to do it in public places, like at parks, where there were a bunch of kids as collateral fuckin’ damage.
“ Your covers gonna be blown wide open,” I said.
“ It’s okay,” he said. “ I got almost all that I need. Whatever is about to happen here today…”
I got to the kite competition, and found the nearest adult, who happened to be a man in his late seventies, as he tried and failed to teach a bunch of tiny kids how to fly a kite.
We made eye contact over the tops of the kids heads, and I said, “ Hey , kids. I know that y’all have worked up quite an appetite. We got the Kona Ice truck here, and everything is set up for you.”
Kona Ice wasn’t here.
In fact, we didn’t have anything here but a goddamn box truck that held all of our training equipment.
But it was empty, and they needed to get the fuck out of dodge, fast.
“ Oh !” a kid cried. “ I love cherry!”
Then they were all running toward the empty truck.
I watched out of the corner of my eye as Ameer guided them toward the back of it, and then they all started jumping inside.
“ Hey ! What’s going on with my kids!” a parent yelled across the park. “ You ! What are you doing with our kids?”
That’s when we finally came onto the radar of the gang members.
Before , they hadn’t seen us.
We’d all dressed in plain clothes today.
But I wasn’t someone who stayed low profile with them. I was arresting all of their friends every single day. They knew who I was, and now that they saw me…
“ Old man,” I said to him as the first gang member pulled their gun. “ Run .”
The old man didn’t waste time.
What he couldn’t do was run, though.
The first shot rang out, and I hit the ground and rolled.
A hot sting had me glancing down to see that I’d taken a bullet graze along the length of my calf, but that didn’t stop me from getting back up and running like my life depended on it.
The old man went down with a cry, and I turned around to see his face get blown off.
Black and yellow.
The man who’d been shot was wearing black and yellow.
Colors of the third most prominent gang—and getting stronger by the day—in Dallas .
The Codes colors.
“ Fuckin ’ hell,” I gasped as I went into a crouch behind a tree. “ God dammit!”
“ Backup !” I heard yelled.
I turned to see the police cars start pouring into the parking lot, but they were too late.
This had already gotten way out of hand.
I pulled out my gun, checked the backdrop to make sure there would be no collateral damage, and then started taking out the gang bangers with the guns.
Most of the ones I could take out safely were Breakers .
However , when one of the West Backers ran across my line of sight, gun in hand, aimed at a kid wearing orange and teal, I took him out the old-fashioned way, by tackling him to the ground.
I felt something snap in my finger, but ignored it as I gave the West Backer one solid punch to the temple, and then moved through the trees.
It lasted all of two minutes.
Cops swarmed the area.
Parents screamed.
Kids were lost in the woods behind the park.
And every last gang member that showed up was either arrested or taken down with a bullet.
Even Gable lay cuffed on the ground, playing his part well.
I started to move around the area, assessing.
There were minor injuries all over the place, until I came to the bathroom and saw that one of the children hadn’t quite made it to safety before the shooting had started. And since he’d been wearing black and yellow as well, he’d been a target.
“ Shit ,” I said as I dropped down to my knees, feeling for a pulse.
It was faint, and I steeled my spine as I rolled the poor boy over onto his back.
He was all of maybe eleven, eyes wide, staring at me with fear in his eyes.
“ You okay?” I asked.
“ Don’t talk to me, pig,” he snarled, kicking out.
I went back onto my ass, and then watched in horror as this kid pulled a gun out of his pocket and aimed it at my face.
My mom came around the corner and reacted with years of training, taking the kid’s arm out with her baton.
The kid’s arm audibly snapped, and the gun dropped uselessly to the floor.
“ Oh , God . Oh , God . Oh , God ,” she repeated as she dropped down to her knees beside the kid. “ Why ? Why are you doing this?”
I assessed the damage to the kid, besides the obviously broken wrist.
“ Gunshot wound to the upper left… Mom ,” I called out. “ Get the medi-vac here. ASAP .”
My mom looked down to the see the blood pouring from the kid’s mouth and pulled out her phone.
Angel Flight arrived less than two minutes later, landing right in the middle of the field that it’d all gone down on.
I saw my sister jump out of the Angel Flight , followed shortly by Shayne .
This morning, when I’d seen her, she must’ve been on the way to work.
She’d started working full-time for Angel Flight a couple of months ago, and according to Ande , loved it.
“ What do we have?” Ande asked as she dropped down onto her knees in the grass.
I tore my eyes away from Shayne , who was following behind with the stretcher and the bags, and gave her all the information.
“ Thanks , Quinn ,” she said as she went to work.
I stepped away, giving them room.
And watched, heart in my throat, as the woman of my dreams went to work with my sister, not sparing me a glance.
“ Tell us everything,” Dad said, using his assistant chief voice.
The actual chief, who was sitting across the room, arms crossed in front of him, nodded his head in agreement.
I recounted everything, from start to finish.
“ And you?” the chief asked Gable . “ Tell us you have what you need.”
Gable nodded. “ Actually , I do. I fell on some information two days ago. I’ve been following around one of Costas’s lieutenants or whatever they call them, kid by the name of Rummy , for the better part of two months now. He thinks we’re best friends.”
“ And you’re sure that you weren’t recognized by Costas ?” Dad asked.
“ Positive ,” Gable said. “ I was careful. I also dyed my hair. Got a perm. And I know that he hasn’t been following me anywhere. There’s no way he would’ve made me.”
“ Tell me what you got,” Dad ordered.
Gable steepled his fingers before saying, “ I got the time and place of some major things that are happening over the next few weeks. I also caught wind of a very large drug operation being run out of his grandmother’s house.”
My stomach sank.
His grandmother’s house, where Shayne lived with him.
“ Tell me you’re joking,” I pleaded.
Gable’s eyes were sorrow filled as he said, “ I wish I could, brother, but it’s true. They’ve been running ice out of that house for a month. I just got close enough to find out what and where, though. It’s not good.”
He was right.
After a couple of days of surveillance, I found out that not only was he running drugs out of that house, but also prostitutes.
And there Shayne was, right in the middle of it.
I had to do something.
I just had to.
Except , the more information we learned, the more I started to think that Shayne had no way of not knowing what her brother was doing at that house.
Which meant, I couldn’t warn her at all.
Right ?