Page 4 of Jacqueline's Quest

Chapter 1

The office just outside of C&C appeared on the screen accompanied by the common chatter he'd realized he missed since arriving in Juarez, Mexico. There'd been a few new faces added to the team, too, and two, in particular, appeared a little wet behind the ears for a mission like this. Murray grinned as Asher took his seat and folded his hands on the table. The idle chitchat came to a close and it was all business.

After the initial shock of Jaqueline’s words, he’d worked day and night to figure out a way for them, his R.O.O.T brothers, and Jaqueline to infiltrate the fetish club. He also woke several times a night due to night terrors, something he’d thought he’d gotten under control the minute he kept his mind occupied. It’d been a forced trick that took several years to perfect, and more so after his parents died. Murray ran sequences and numbers in the moments before he’d fall asleep. Most of the time, it’d been how to break code. He’d gotten good at it, too.

However, this time, when he fell asleep, his subconscious turned all those violent, vicious dreams back on, he didn’t have his numbers or codes to occupy his mind. The terrors gripped him by the throat and squeezed for all it was worth until he thought he’d succumb to them. Several times, he woke to Jaqueline shaking his lumbering frame, trying to get him to open his eyes and speak to her.Shit...It still embarrassed the fuck out of him.

“Long time no see, asshole,” Noah grumbled.

Murray laughed. “You missing me already, precious?”

“Blow me,” Noah scowled. “Murray, these are the three new members of R.O.O.T Asher and I were telling you about.” He pointed to each of them before naming them. “This is AJ, Scotty, and FBI Agent Thomas.”

Murray nodded at them in greeting. The young girl appeared uncomfortable being there while the men across from her appeared bored. "This is Jaqueline. She is the one who found Hannah and her brother Christian for us. It's also why I took off as quickly as I did."

The woman beside Murray smiled. “It’s good to meet you. Thank you for agreeing to take on this mission. Murray and I understand it’s daunting, but if we can pull this off, we’ll be returning family members back to their families after who knows how many years.”

“Can you tell us what you’ve found and why we need this kind of dynamic between the three of us?” Thomas asked while also signing to the man beside him.

Jaqueline gasped. “I had no idea.” She held her hand up. “What I meant to say, without being so rude, is, I didn’t know your team has a deaf member.”

Noah smirked. “When you called in, they were already here.” He gave AJ a curious look. “Although, she’s usually the one interpreting for Scotty.”

AJ frowned. “Yeah, about that...”

“I’ve taken over,” Thomas said. “I think from here on out while we’re on this mission, I should be doing the interpreting.”

Jaqueline nodded. “It’s for the best. The club deals with men more than women and if they believe they have two deaf subs, they’ll be more apt to let you in or allow you to bid on another person or sell both of them.”

AJ jerked. “I’m sorry what?”

“Which brings us to the mission itself,” Murray said. “Jaqueline, can you please tell everyone where you found Hannah and how you did so?”

The woman nodded and the surveillance photo filled the screen. "The building you are looking at is called the Emporio de Monstruo—Emporium of Monsters.It is bankrolled by the Nieto Cartel along with several others. It's a specialty sex club, dealing in freaks."

The wordfreaks,still made his stomach twist in disgust, even though they’d been working on the case for two weeks. Murray snorted to himself. He’d probably never get over the connotation of the word.

“Freaks as in?” AJ swallowed hard and cut her gaze to the red-headed guy, Scotty.

“Exactly what you think,” Murray said. “This club’s clientele list is filled with scum that get off on exploiting people who are disabled.”

“What the fuck? No.” Scotty pushed away from the table while Thomas relayed everything he said. “Fuck you all for thinking this is okay to do.”

“Scotty,” Thomas said. “Sit down. We won’t let anything happen to you.”

“What’s going on?” Murray asked.

“Scotty doesn’t like the idea of being bait,” Thomas said.

“Scotty doesn’t like the whole fucking idea. Level the fucking building. No way in fuck I am going in there to watch people be debased because someone gets off on raping disabled people,” Thomas interpreted for Scotty.

“Well, at least he had the same reaction I did,” Murray murmured.

“Did he puke?” Jaqueline added.

“Not yet, looks like he might,” Thomas replied with a shrug.

"Look, kid, I get it. I had a violent reaction to it, too. My sister is in there. Jaqueline's brother as well. We can't not do this. If you can't perform for this mission, we can get Thomas and AJ in there," Murray said. "It's okay. It was a crapshoot asking to begin with."

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