“You don’t think it’ll do any good?”
“I thinkthey’re too smart to be tripped up by that.”
“It was a big risk killing a cop and then kidnapping two people.”
“If they had unfinished business and needed the leverage that hostages give them they’d take that risk.”
“But they cleared out the drug stash, and they killed the only witnesses we had. We have no case against them.”
“That may not matter to them.”
“What elsewouldmatter to them?” retorted Kemper.
“Like I said, unfinished business.”
“Such as?”
“If I knew that I wouldn’t be sitting here waiting for them to call,” snapped Decker.
“Okay, okay, but we need to come up with a plan.”
“That’s hard to do, since we don’t know what they’re going to throw at us.”
“But once they makecontact, you have to loop me in. Then we can go after them in a coordinated effort.”
“You need to let me play it out the best way I see fit.”
“What precisely does that mean?” said Kemper warily.
“That means I’m going to do all I can to make sure this doesn’t go sideways and two innocent people end up dead.”
Jamison shuddered next to him and looked down atthe floor.
“Decker, I don’t know if I can do that,” said Kemper. “I have people to answer to.”
“So do I. Their names are Amber and Zoe. And if you don’t want to do it my way, I’ll just have to do this solo.”
“You are putting me in an impossible situation,” complained Kemper.
“Thisisan impossible situation.”
Kemper calmed and said, “I guess Idon’t have much choice. But I hope you know what you’re doing.”
Decker clicked off and stared down at his phone.
Jamison said, “Do you?”
“Do I what?” he asked quietly.
“Know what you’re doing?”
“I’ll be able to answer that after they call me.”
“We can’t lose Amber and Zoe.”
“We won’t.”
“You can’t be sure of that,”she exclaimed.
“No, I can’t,” he conceded.
“Then what are you telling me?” she demanded.
“I promised Zoe that I wouldn’t let the bad guys get you. And now I’m promising you that I’m not going to let them hurt Zoe, or your sister.”
Jamison pulled out her gun and looked at it. “Oh, we’re going to get them back safe, Decker. And then we’re going to nail everyone of these assholes right to the wall.”