Page 112 of The Soldier

“Jesus fucking Christ.” Josh shakes his head. “I should have hired monks.”

I snort.

“They’re not so good with guns.” Cole shrugs with a smirk. “I think. Shit, do you think they train monks how to shoot?”

He’s stalling and we all know it.

“I think you need to clean up and go face the music.” Josh laughs. “I’m going to take this big guy home before he kills himself in here.”

Great.

Home.

Where all I’ll do is sit and think about Trina. But he’s right, my body is aching. My wound has split open and I’m extremely dehydrated.

I hit the showers, then let Josh drive me home.

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TWO DAYS LATER, I’m back at work, my arm is healing well but my mind is a fucking mess.

Roger, like the snake he is, was difficult to find. But I just received news he’s been captured.

Thank fuck.

“Where did you catch him?” I ask Josh, sitting opposite his desk while Cole and Aidan lean against the wall and a cabinet.

“He’s a clever asshole.” Josh leans back in his chair and taps a pen on one of the arms. “He ditched his phone.”

“Of course he did.” I mutter.

“But he needed cash, so withdrew a bunch from an ATM on a busy street. Guess he didn’t have many options. We got footage when our system picked him up on face recognition, then just plugged it all into our AI program and we followed the footsteps.”

I was kept right out of the loop.

“Why did it take two days?” I frown.

Every single day he was on the run, I was worried about Trina. I know we had a guard outside her home, but Roger is a Green Beret. If he wanted to really hurt her, he’d find a way in.

Yes, I did about a dozen drive-bys.

After the final one I got a call from Josh after. “Go home. Or I’ll cable tie your ass to your sofa.”

“Fuck off Josh. What if this was Cassy?” I snarled through the phone.

“I’d burn all of California to the ground until I found him. Then end up in prison for the rest of my life. Don’t be me.” Josh then hung up.

I’d laughed out loud for the first time in days.

I knew he would do it too.

Both threats.

“He kept moving and didn’t stop.” Aidan answered my question, snapping me back to the present. “By the time we pulled him out of a McDonald’s restaurant, he was almost dead on his feet.”

Mc-goddamn-Donalds? That’s where they found the Green Beret?

That’s fucking sad.

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