Bite the Bullet

Chapter 19

About 30 minutes after I got the call from the Director, all three of my team members were standing in the living room of Dr. Hansen's home. Dinah has been in the kitchen since I told her she has been threatened and she hasn't said a word. ...she's scared. I should go in and comfort her.

NO. AGENT Hamilton , you will not comfort the witness whose protection detail you are over seeing.

"You alright Mani?" Khalid asks, but I'm zoned out as I'm staring towards the kitchen and the woman who I can't get out of my mind. I can still feel her lips against mine. I can still taste her on my tongue. Finally, he snaps his fingers right in front of my face and I jump back to the present.

"What?" I yelp.

"Damn...you're wound tight. What? Your last women couldn't get you off or something?" He snaps back at me. I give him a hard punch in the shoulder and he walks away, trying to rub the pain out of his arm. The ringing of my phone pulls me away from the direction of the kitchen.

"He got another one." Lauren doesn't even give me time to say anything after I answered.

"Who? Zac?"

"Yeah, Zendaya has dropped off the radar so I've been watching Zac's activity. Not 2 hours ago he got a call from one of those go-phones. You know, pick up at your local convenience store and buy minutes."

"Yeah, yeah and so?" I urge her on, impatient and very frustrated. ...sexually and mentally.

"Damn Normani, you're wound tight. What's got-"

"Fuck! Lauren, just spill it!" I spit at her. ...why is everyone all up in my shit. So I'm fucking horny as hell...get over it.

"Fine. Santa Ana area code. Alright? Your person X got lazy, bought a traceable phone and instead of having Zendaya call, this person did it themselves. And..."

"And?"

"And...I got a position on them. Two blocks from the Doc's house."

"What? Two blocks? Shit." I groan. The rest of my team looks up form their places around the doctors living room. ...a call right before each incident. When the house was empty or Hansen was supposed to be alone. ...Something's not right. A leak? ...no, not my team. I can't have a leak on my team.

"Lauren... I need you to do something, but keep it on the downlow." I say as I move into the dining room, away from the team and Dinah.

"You got it. Let me have it."

"Check..." I can't believe I'm about to say this. "Check our teams credit histories, umm...phone activity. Anything that may hint towards outside influences. Like their getting paid off or blackmailed. Check the other protection details as well. Also..." I hear a flurry of clicks as Lauren's fingers move over her keyboards. "Check local stores who would carry those kind of go-phones and run their security footage. See if anyone we recognize purchased a phone like that within the last twelve hours."

"Got it. That's all you want from me?"

"Anything new on Zendaya?"

"Not a damn thing, I swear it's like she dropped off the face of the earth."

"Thanks, let me know when you got something."

"Yep." And the line goes dead. I move back into the living room to give out marching orders to my team. They are all upset that their freedom pass got called back but its comes with the job.

"Alright team, as you know, a threat has been made against Dr. Hansen. The Director says it's credible so we are playing it as a high risk. We are locking down until I say otherwise which means, three people on guard at all times. One inside, one doing perimeter sweeps, and the other in the van. This allows the fourth to rest. You all know the drill. If anything should happen, our priority is Dr. Hansen's safety. Everyone clear?" They all nod. "Great. Khalid, you got post. Choie, you're on perimeter duty and Keith, can. Where did Dr. Hansen go?" I ask. They all point upstairs before they go about their assigned duties. I climb the stairs and walk along the hallway until I am standing in front her bedroom door. I raise my fist to knock but pull back.