CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
“Still no answer?” Kat asked, getting concerned.
“No, I keep getting voicemail for both Jessie and Ryan,” Hannah said. She sounded as worried as Kat felt.
They were pulling onto Jessie’s street, which still looked normal.
That was by design. Captain Parker had agreed to Kat’s plan to send in SWAT, but because of the former CIA assassin’s training, they were taking extra precautions setting up.
The armored SWAT vehicle was one street over, waiting for the go-ahead from the plainclothes team members.
Two of them were wearing jogging clothes and casually running down the block in front of Crewes’s house, getting the lay of the land.
An unmarked van was halfway down the street, where a surveillance team was setting up infrared cameras and long-range microphones to capture what was happening in the home.
“Can we just park here?” Hannah asked as Kat pulled into a spot one house down from Jessie’s. “Aren’t we in the way?”
“I don’t care,” Kat said. “We’ve been through too much to listen in on this from the station. I want to see them take this woman down, whether it be in cuffs or a body bag.”
Hannah looked about to reply when her phone rang. She held it up. It was Jessie. She answered the call but before she could speak, her sister jumped in.
“Do they have her?” Jessie asked.
“Not yet,” Hannah answered. “SWAT is setting up a perimeter. We’re watching from down the street, near your place.”
“Where were you?” Kat interrupted. “When we couldn’t reach you, we started to get worried.”
“I was in the hospital. My partner on this case got tased by the suspect. I guess I missed your call in all the hubbub. But he just got the all clear to be discharged and I’m on my way home. I should be there in a few minutes.”
“Is Ryan with you?” Hannah asked. “We couldn’t reach him either.”
“No, he’s back home already. But he said he was going to take a nap so he might have turned his ringer off.”
“So, we shouldn’t go inside the house then?” Hannah asked.
“No, you can. Just be quiet in case he’s zonked out. If you see the bedroom door closed, just leave it be until I get there. But if he’s awake, definitely fill him in on everything right away.”
“That’s probably a better plan anyway,” Kat said, realizing how exposed they were. “We really shouldn’t be sitting out here on the street. You never know if Pierce is in the window, scanning the neighborhood.”
“Good point,” Jessie said. “See you soon.”
After they hung up, Kat started to get out of the car. But Hannah suddenly grabbed her arm.
“Wait, if she’s watching from Crewes’s window and sees us go in the house, won’t that alert her?”
Kat hadn’t thought of that. But after a moment’s reflection, she came to a different conclusion.
“Actually, that might be a good thing,” she said.
“We’re her targets, right? So, if she sees us go in the house, maybe she gets excited and decides now is the time to try to get to us.
We’ve been in hiding at my apartment for over a month.
She might think this is her only opportunity. She won’t want to waste it.”
“But she’s a hitwoman, Kat. What if she takes us out with a rifle while we walk across the front yard?”
Kat shook her head.
“That’s not her style,” she said. “She wants to do this up close. I’ve seen her handiwork. She likes to make people suffer. That will be doubly true with us. She wants to see our faces as she takes us out. A long-range rifle won’t do the trick.”
“Great,” Hannah said. “Your certainty that she wants to kill us in the most intimate way possible is filling me with confidence.”
“It should,” Kat told her. “That’s going to be her undoing. Let’s go.”