Chapter 15 I Know Him!
I KNOW HIM!
TEDDY
Early the next morning, he and Sydney worked out in the small gym, then decided to brave it out by leaving the building to run the Rescue Team course through the woods.
Next up? Target practice. With their eye and ear protection in place, they walked to the outdoor range, took their positions at two different stations. And that’s when Sydney came alive.
When she’d finished shredding the paper target from a stationery position, they moved to the tactical area. On his command, she homed in on her target—thirty yards away—and zig-zagged her way toward the stationery dummy, firing round after round.
Sydney Austin did not miss.
Whichever weapon she held became an extension of her. Two hours later, she was glistening with perspiration, smiling big, and done.
“That was fantastic,” she said. “Love how you push me. I need that in a trainer.”
He was happy to be that person for her.
She removed the ear protection. “I need to get up on that rooftop before Monday.”
“I got you.”
“Perfect.” She kissed him. “I’m gonna shower off. Meet you in the conference room.”
She headed toward the building, vanishing inside.
In the conference room, he jumped online to check out the private chat groups on the Dark Web.
The first group had over twenty new postings, their anti-American comments so vile he had to leave the room and shake off the immense hatred.
He refilled his water bottle in the break room, then returned to drill down into another anti-democracy chat, also spewing their heinous thoughts and ideas.
He had no issues with people having differences of opinion, but the level of contempt blew him away. His grandmother had been married to the head of the Sicilian Mafia, so power and coercion were no strangers to him, but he tried to live his life with Elsa’s guiding words.
Lead with love.
Except that he was a cold-blooded killer. The irony of the situation was not lost on him.
As he scrolled through the comments and photos posted in a newer chat group, adrenaline powered through him. The Haqazzii terrorist had posted two pics of Slash, dressed in her paint fatigues, in Tucker Town.
The caption read:
Here One Minute, Gone the Next
Teddy blurted, “Son of a bitch, he had a bodycam.”
There was a pic of Slash on the ground after she’d been shot.
The caption read:
BANG BANG the Bitch is Dead. One Down. Who’s Next?
Did they see us? Did they see us bring the body to the crematorium?
Teddy screen-shot the posts with the pics, jumped over to , and reposted with an email to the team before sending them a text.
Check portal
Fury had him shoving out of his chair. He left the conference room, started pacing the hallway. Agitation pounded through him. He wanted to put his fist through the cinderblock. He wanted to rip their limbs off and shove their bodies through a brick wall.
A seething anger filled his dark soul. The one that believed in vengeance. The same one that would fight evil with his own brand of evil.
He’d learned at the knee of his mafioso dad. Young Teddy didn’t say much, but he absorbed every single thing. He’d watch his dad and his uncle take men out with no regret. He witnessed them silence others with vengeful threats, and he saw things that were seared into his marrow.
As a child, he learned that power and winning were The Santini Way. He understood that family was everything… and everyone else was il nemico—the enemy.
As a young adult, Luciano taught him charm. Carrera taught him cunning, and Gabriel reminded him that he was a Santini, first and foremost. Being a Santini was synonymous with power and family pride.
Greystone—though late to the game—taught him that leaders put their team first.
These men had shaped him into the person he was today.
When it came to fighting evil, he relied on his past and his present. He was a ruthless hunter, a swift executioner, and a man committed to eliminating apex predators. His family at ALPHA mattered, the innocents mattered, and being a Santini mattered… maybe most of all.
His phone rang, snapping him back to the moment. It was Slash.
Teddy answered. “Did you see it?”
“Carrera’s with me,” Slash said. “I’m surprised about the bodycam.”
“No fucking kidding,” Teddy bit out.
“Who took the body?” Carrera asked.
“Sin had a bag,” Teddy said. “He and Dakota went to the crematorium.”
“This is bad,” Slash said.
Teddy flashed back to his childhood when Elsa would say that to his grandfather. He’d always respond the same way. With tender hands, he’d cup her face, gently kiss each cheek, and say, “Elsa, my love, it is never bad. Do you know why?”
She’d smile, place her hands over his, still resting on her face. “Yes, Luca, I do. Because we have each other. We have our family.”
They’d speak this in Italian. Always Italian. Teddy loved watching how they interacted. How gentle and loving he was to his grandmother, yet how ruthless he could be at work.
“No,” Teddy said, pushing back. “It’s not bad.”
“How the hell can you say that?” Carrera barked.
“Fratello, we got this,” Teddy said. “We have each other’s backs. We won’t make that mistake again. We’ve got a plan we’re days from putting into action.”
“We don’t even know if—”
“Carrera—” Teddy snapped. “Monday, we strike. If you don’t feel safe, take the jet and vanish.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Slash bit out. “I’m gonna work that mission like the boss lady I am.”
Teddy smiled. “There it is. Use that anger.” After a beat, he said, “Carrera, I know you’re concerned about Slash.”
“I’m not afraid,” Slash said, “and I’m not backing down.”
“Sorry for the outburst,” Carrera said.
“We’ve always kept things real between us. I don’t want that to change.” Teddy ended the call, waited for another, but silence filled the air.
Blessed silence.
Sydney walked around the corner, her computer bag slung over her shoulder.
Dressed in black, black combat boots on her feet, she’d pulled her hair into a tight ponytail.
His pulse kicked up speed, heat radiated in his chest, and every single thought stilled.
All that mattered was the beautiful badass heading his way.
“I love the eye-fucks,” she said. “You look like a lion stalking me.”
“I could eat you alive,” he growled.
She stopped inches away, peered up at him. “What happened? You look angry.”
“How can you tell?”
“There’s a shadow over your eyes for one. Your cheek muscles are flexing and your hands are fists. You need to do some boxing?”
“There was a bodycam on the terrorist you took out in Tucker Town.”
Her eyes grew large, her eyebrows crowding her forehead. “And?”
He brought her into the conference room, showed her the photos and the captions. Unlike Carrera, her lips curved up. “They’re good, but we’re better. Mistake made, never repeated. Must’ve been a micro cam on his chest.”
She unearthed her laptop and opened it, then shifted toward him. “It’s your mission, but this isn’t your fault. It’s a lesson learned, but you can’t own this.”
Her smile lifted his spirits, but didn’t relieve the responsibility. It was his mission and his fault, but it was pointless to argue the point. They were on the same team.
She turned her attention back to her laptop. “I’ve gotta hunt me down a sex trafficker.”
They worked in silence, each determined to flush out their target.
BING!
One of several programs Teddy had running in the background alerted him that he had a match. Excitement had him minimizing screens until he found the one he needed.
Years back, he’d downloaded Stryker Truman’s IDware—a proprietary software package that performed image searches on the Internet, the Dark Web, and all social media.
When Teddy had been brought into BLACK OPS and assigned to work with Greystone on The Day of Destruction, he’d uploaded the photos of the terrorists from the Haqazzii network.
When they changed up their identities, it made it challenging for the computer to find a match. Even with the odds stacked against them, the software had found one. Whether it was reliable had yet to be determined.
He opened the file. The software had found a photo of Muhammed Haqazzii it deemed “current within the past week”.
Three men had posed for a selfie. Smiling big, they were toasting with champagne flutes filled with bubbly. Streaks of energy thundered through him. This was the break he needed.
“This is good. Damn good.”
“Whatcha got there?” Sydney asked.
“Muhammad Haqazzii and two of his lieutenants.”
After eyeing the photo, she leaned close. He loved how her scent wafted over him, loved that they were working together on such intense cases.
“From when?” she asked.
“It’s current.”
She shot him a smile. “Nice. The pic is kinda dark. Can you lighten it?”
He played with the settings while she stayed close. As the photo lightened, she said, “There’s someone in the background, on the left— a profile shot.”
“He’s opening a bottle of champagne.”
“Hmm,” she said. “He looks like someone I know.”
Teddy enlarged the picture, then enhanced it to make it less grainy.
“What the fuck,” he said. “I’ve played poker with him.”
“You must be a badass poker player.”
“I’m okay. Why?”
“My cousin Robby is a pro.”
“Who’s Robby? That’s Burt Goodson.”
“Burt Goodson? I know my cousin when I see him. Maybe he uses a professional name.”
Teddy chuffed out a laugh. “This guy has never—not once—won against me in poker. He’s got tells no pro would have. He taps the table when he’s lying. He crooks his head to the left when he’s bluffing. There’s no way he’s making his living playing poker.”
As the reality of the situation unfolded, they studied the photo. After several long seconds, she murmured, “That looks like the Waters’ family cabin. The one his uncle sold after his dad died. Can you zoom in on the left wall?”
After he did, she said, “See those tick marks? That’s where all the kids would get measured every summer.”
Teddy tried enhancing it further so they could read the names, but the image became too fuzzy.