Page 44 of Cherished By the Sinners
Yup.An act.
Graster took an aggressive step toward Nika.“You fucking accusing me of something?”
“Several things,” she smiled at him.It wasn’t a nice smile.It was the kind of expression that made Darlene want to take a big step back.“It turns out you’ve been moonlighting as a scumbag human trafficker.I really hadn’t thought you’d be stupid enough to go after Darlene.”
“Bullshit,” Graster shouted.“I’ve been a cop for twelve years.I’ve seen every play, every scam, and grift.”He pointed at Darlene.“This piece of shit has been playing all of you.”He pointed at Nika and the twins.
“So,” Darlene said, confused.“I’m a low life prostituteanda criminal mastermind?”
“Shut your fucking mouth,” Graster said, a sneer twisting his face.
“We’ve been watching you for weeks,” Nika told him as Williams approached the vice cop with his handcuffs out.“You’ve been selling police records on sex workers and other vulnerable women for a long time.Did you know that every time one of those records is opened, a flag goes up?”
“You’re fucking crazy.I’m a vice cop, I’m supposed to look at those records.”
Nika’s smile turned radiant.“You looked at and copied my undercover persona’s file, you dumb fuck.You sold information on another cop.”
Graster’s face lost all color, then he broke and ran.
Straight at Darlene.
Mason and Magnus somehow got in front of her, both men crouching like they were line-backers prepped for a clash.
Graster was smaller and lighter than both men, so when he collided with the twins, he bounced off them and went down in a tangle of arms and legs.
Williams was on him a moment later, rolling the vice cop onto his belly and handcuffing his hands behind his back.Williams dragged him up onto his feet, then tugged him toward the numerous police cars parked all over the street.
“You fucking bitch!”Graster tried to yank himself out of Williams’ grasp, but the detective had a good grip on him.“I’ll have your job for this!I’ll sue you for slander too!”
Williams stuffed Graster into a car and slammed the door.
Mason turned around and took Darlene by the shoulders.“Are you all right?”
“What?Oh yes, I mean, I’m not worse than I was five minutes ago.”
Mason frowned as he studied her.“We need to get all this blood off you to see where you’ve been injured.”
“I can feel some bruises.Most of them are on my arms where Thug One and Two grabbed me, and on my face.They punched me a few times when I wouldn’t stop fighting them.”
Mason’s mouth tightened into a thin line.That’s when she noticed that his hands were bloody.Was he afraid?No, he was angry.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there to prevent them from touching you.”Mason’s expression said that if the two men were in front of him now, he’d kill them with his bare hands.If he didn’t calm down, he was going to have a stroke.
“It’s not your fault,” Darlene said, patting his arm.“How could you know they would try to kidnap me?”Darlene tilted her head to one side.“Why did they try to take me?If you want a prostitute, there are plenty willing to do whatever for a price.”She winced.“It seems kind of stupid to be going after me.”
As she spoke, Nika’s phone buzzed.She pulled it out and glanced at the screen, her expression hardening.She looked up from the phone, her focus sharp.
“It’s a very complicated knot of human trafficking going on here and around the world,” Nika said, her voice low and directed at them.
“There are a lot of people involved, some in law enforcement.Graster and another guy in Vice have been on my radar for a while, and your question of ‘why you’ might be linked to ‘how they did it.’My team just confirmed it.”She held up her phone briefly before putting it away.
“They found a cloned keycard on the kidnapper we arrested.One of the guys from your hotel security team ran the signature for us.It matches a temporary all-access pass issued to an HVAC contractor last week.The guy never realized he lost it, so the ID was still fully active in your system.Graster must have found it, giving him a skeleton key to your operation.”
“You think he and his friends came into the hotel planning to grab someone vulnerable and Darlene was the target they decided on?”Magnus asked.
“That’s one theory.”
How many theory’s could there be?
