Page 15 of Secret
"Aren't they all?" Beau rolled his shoulders. "Today was busier than usual. A lot of broken arms and accidents like that. The warmer weather has the kids playing outside and that means more accidents. At least there wasn't anything very serious today. I was able to send everyone home once I patched them up."
The door opened again and Dyson walked in, carrying bags of food with Becca following behind him with more.
"I picked it up, you sort it out." Becca set the bags on the kitchen table.
Kasey stayed where he was, avoiding the rush of others swarming to the table. He'd get his in time. Truth was, he wasn't that hungry. He'd been living off simple meals the last week, not in the mood to cook or eat much.
"I smell food." Carter walked out from the geek cave.
"Help yourself." Becca waved at Carter before she sat down beside Kasey. "How are you?"
Kasey smiled. "Good, and you, Becca Boo?" He messed with her hair as he called her the nickname he'd given her when she'd started with them.
"Tired. Ready for the weekend to get here." She leaned against him.
"One more day." He wrapped an arm around her. "If I could go in for you, I would."
"I'm pretty sure they'd notice." She grinned up at him. "It's just been a long week. I've been working a trial that just goes on and on. It's an extortion case, and everyone knows he's guilty. They are just wasting time and money with this huge trial, and it's boring as hell." She took a deep breath. "You got a job tonight?"
"Nah, Xander's up tonight. Unless we have a new case, I don't have anything planned the next few days." Kasey glanced up as Bryon walked toward them, eyeing Kasey's arm around Becca.
Kasey grinned, enjoying the jealous glint in Bryon's eyes. While neither Becca nor Bryon really admitted openly that they were seeing each other, the whole team knew they were. They kept it hidden for the most part, but it had been going on for years and was impossible to hide when the team was as close as they were. To push Bryon a little more, Kasey leaned over and kissed Becca's cheek.
Bryon narrowed his eyes as he sat down beside Becca. "You remember who pays you, right?" He grabbed Kasey's hand and removed it from Becca's shoulder, replacing it with his own.
"You won't stop paying me. Then you'd have to do the dirty work yourself." He settled his hands in his lap. Teasing Bryon was fine for a minute, but you didn't push your luck with him. "So, what do we have going on?"
"Got somewhere to be?" Dyson sat down on the floor with a heaping plate of food.
Kasey rolled his eyes. "Some of us have lives to live."
"Keep your pants on." Bryon sat forward. "We'll get to everything once everyone sits down. There isn't much, but what I do have is important."
Kasey watched as everyone slowly gathered. He just wanted to get out of there. He had nowhere to go, no one to see. He just didn't feel like sitting around. He leaned back harder against the couch, waiting.
It took a few minutes, but once everyone had their food and was gathered, Bryon stood. "So, we are working on a few cases, but we have nothing now. Xander has a sting tonight, but other than that, there's nothing on the schedule, but we know how quickly that can change. What I do want to talk about is the rise in kidnappings in the area." Bryon glanced at Matt. "They started about the time Faith was kidnapped a few years ago and have steadily been increasing over the last couple of years. Two more girls were taken last week. One of the eleven-year-old girls was groomed by a man who was in his forties, pretending to be a fourteen-year-old. We have his name, but he's gone missing. Cops sent a team to his home and he'd cleared everything out. So, we know who we are looking for, we just don't know where to find him. We all know that probably means he's skipped town with the girls."
"It sucks and all, but what can we do about this?" Dyson poured soy sauce all over his food.
"That's the thing. We can't do anything, and that drives me nuts. I'm tired of saving the kids after the fact. Somehow, we have to get to these men before they get to the kids. So, I've asked Trenton and Matt to take a little time away from hunting the dark web and start playing around on social media more. They're going to create social media accounts and act like young girls. I think we're around Faith enough to understand how the kids talk these days. Once the pedophiles make contact, we'll hack their information, locations, and whatever else we can dig up on them. Some are going to be nothing more than lonely men looking to talk, and while I'd love to scare the shit out of them, the ones we're looking for are the ones who want to meet and take things to the next level—"
"Whoa, hold up." Beau held up his hand. "We don't entrap people. I get these guys need to be stopped, but I'm not sure this is the way to do it. When I joined the group, we were going after the worst of the worst. The men and women who had already been convicted, served time and were released and offended again. We were looking for sex traffickers, rapists. I'm not sure I'm okay going after some nineteen-year-old senior in high school who is hitting on the fourteen-year-old freshman. Right or wrong, we have to draw the line somewhere. I can't go along with fucking up some guy's life by cutting off his cock because he was flirting on Snap Chat."
Bryon nodded. "I agree completely, and that is why, for now, we aren't going after them. We're only getting case files on them. If while doing this, we come across a trafficker or pedo with a history, we will sting them as we normally do, but this is more to gain information, to see who is out there we haven't been paying attention to. We've been focusing on the dark web, but honestly, half the offenders wouldn't even know how to find the dark web if they wanted to. With the expansion of social media, they are using simpler means to earn trust, find victims, and hurt the kids. This just gives us another place to explore."
"And what about the cases that Matt and Trenton were working on already?" Becca asked.
"Carter and I will still be digging into the dark web. We aren't stopping that. We aren't even sure putting Trenton and Matt on other sites will be beneficial, but I want to try. I'm sick of turning on the news every night and seeing another family destroyed because their child has been taken. I don't want others to go through what Matt and other parents have had to face." Bryon sat back down beside Becca. "As always, we are a team, and even though I've already planned this out and talked to Matt and Trenton about it, we will vote on it. If you all don't agree that this is a good idea to try, we'll scrap it. I just know that what we're doing isn't enough. We are losing too many kids, and I want to find a way to stop it."
Kasey looked around the group, trying to guess what the others would say. Beau had a good point. When were they going too far, when should they back off? It was a lot to think about, but he'd heard about the child's body found a couple of nights before, and he hated that they couldn't stop it. If this helped, if this maybe just kept even one or two kids safe, it was worth trying. He raised his hand. "I'm in. I think we should give it a trial run, see if it works and what we find out."
Becca nodded. "I'm in."
Xander and Matt both raised their hands.
"I'm in." Trenton lifted his hand.
"Me too," Dyson said.
