Jason watched in slow motion as a group of people rushed over to the battered custom olive colored 1999 BMW after it took its last flip and skid upside down on the rain filled streets of US-27. His breathing fell short as the rate of his cardiac muscle engorged with blood and his green eyes glazed over in unknown trepidation as he watched his old crew try their best to pull him out of the battered car.
-Two hours earlier
Brandon glanced over to where Victor stood looking just as bored with Tabitha’s apology as he was. It wasn’t that they weren’t going to forgive her; they just didn’t want to go easy on her because she somehow came back and easily raised hell amongst their group.
“You’re apologizing to the wrong people Tabs.” Victor quipped as he watched Sierra and Carter step out of an early edition of a Silver Jaguar XF. Next to them, Jason stepped out of the drifter. “The person that you need to say sorry to is about fifty feet away from you.”
Tabitha turned towards the new crew that just showed up and watched with a heavy heart as the guy that she’d been pining for the past couple of days, stop in his tracks and glare at her the second he noticed her.
He was still mad. Obviously.
“You look like a puppy that just lost its owner. Cheer up.” Dennis muttered behind her while awkwardly patting her back.
“Shut up!” She snapped.
“Whoa! Down girl.” Dennis put his hands up in surrender and took a step back.
“You’d better step back before she bites.” Brandon muttered amused.
Rolling her eyes at the idiots behind her she huffed. “So where’s this Mason guy that I’ve heard so little about?”
“Look straight ahead.” Chico suggested.
She did just that and her eyes landed on a tall attractive guy with deep brown skin, dark and cropped hair and an air of confidence and authority that would challenge a kings. Under his arms was a woman with… “I think I know her.”
“Who?” Brandon asked.
“The girl that’s with Mason.”
“Small world.” Victor muttered.
“Yeah, but I’m not sure if it is her.” She answered slowly. “I’m going over there.”
Chico’s eyebrows shot up. “Don’t!”
Turning she placed a hand on his shoulder. “It’s ok Valentino. I won’t be long.” She turned back to walk towards Mason and his crew but stopped in her tracks when a voice rung out.
“And where the hell do you think you’re going?!” Drake spat.
Tabitha tried her best to avoid speaking to him the whole thirty minutes that they’ve been on US-27 but of course the inventible happened. After the weird moment that they had at his apartment, she was starting to feel a bit weird around him because well, she was in love with his brother; not him. How the hell was she supposed to act around him after his initial confession?
Sighing, she reluctantly turned to the leader of her new crew and shrugged all the while avoiding his piercing green eyes. Pissing these boys off would be a bad choice at the moment; especially when she was already on their shit list. “No where.” She finally answered with a trace of annoyance and went to sit on the trunk of her deep purple Lexus LF-A.
“Amazing how he can shut her up so fast.” Victor muttered.
“Yeah. Wonder what his secret is. In high school we tried everything.” Brandon chuckled.
“You know I could hear you two assholes right?”
Both guys simultaneously turned and looked at her with a winged brow. “If you’re trying to get on our good side then it’s not working Tabs.” Brandon said next to her.
“I didn’t know that I was supposed to be trying to get on your good side. I already apologized so-”
“If it isn’t my old friends. It’s been a while.” Mason interrupted. None of them noticed him or his crew approaching but when they did, they all straightened in defense. Drake was the first to step up and speak out.
“What do you want?” He bit out.
“Still as hostile as ever aren’t we big brother?” Mason’s smile was a smug one.
Drake eyes narrowed. “What do you want?” He repeated in a gruff tone.
“Not much really. Just wondering ho-”
“So you’re the jackass who stole Jason from us.” Tabitha hopped off of her car and stood next to Drake with her arms crossed over her chest while sported a deep scowl.
Drake and the rest of the guys all looked at her with brooding expressions as they wondered what the hell she was up to.
Jason’s frown couldn’t have deepened anymore as he stood beside Mason and watched as Tabitha mouth off to him. ‘What the hell is she doing?’ He shot his brother a look that said ‘shut her up’. Understanding dawned on Drake’s face and he mirrored that same look over to Victor who quickly grabbed her by the waist, hauled her backwards and tossed her like a rag doll to Chico who lifted and placed her on top of his car. When that was done, he stood in front of her like a body gaurd.
By the time they finished tossing her around, Tabitha’s hazel eyes were blazing red. Jason and the rest of the racers around could’ve hardly cared less. He looked over to his brother and nodded. A telltale sign that though their issues weren’t completely resolved, they weren’t on such horrible grounds with one another anymore.
“I see you got a new lap dog.” Once again Mason was the sardonic one in the group but just as quickly as the words left his mouth, Tabitha succeeded in pushing Chico away from her and jumping off the car.
“Run that by me again you piece of shit!” She snapped. Her stance could clearly be defined as one of an angry woman who was on the verge of attacking.
Jason sighed. Tabitha had a silver tongue but it was her temper that scared most. When she started, stopping her was a mission all on its own and she wouldn’t quit till she got her point across; whether verbally or physically was her choice.
But this was Mason; a sadistic son of a bitch who abused women and who probably had blood stained hands from his various victims. Just standing next to him made Jason’s blood boil.
Mason smirked at Drake. “She has a lot of bark. Does she bite?”
Before Tabitha could say another word, Drake quickly covered her mouth with a palm and snaked an arm around her waist. Jason watched in awe as his brother whispered something into her ears and kissed her temple all the while glaring at Mason.
Confused wasn’t the word!
Jason, Tabitha and everyone in his former crew mirrored one another’s staggering expression as they watched the unexpected public display of affection coming from Drake of all people. What really had Jason flabbergasted was how easily she calmed down; though it may have had something to do with her being startled by the man still holding onto her.
Snapping out of it, Jason’s green eyes flickered to Drake and met his angry ones. But anger was only a surfaced emotion. Jason knew him well enough to look passed his anger and discover the turmoil swimming in his eyes. He was just as shocked as they were by his action but there was also a trace of something genuine in his eyes that Jason couldn’t point out.
This wasn’t normal.
“What the hell is going on?” Carter asked just for Jason to hear. It skipped his mind that Carter was right behind him.
“Beats the hell out of me.” He replied. His gaze was switching from Mason to Tabitha to Drake. Why did he have a feeling that tonight wasn’t going to end very well? Too many abnormal things were happening and that didn’t sit well with him at all.
Finally, Mason scoffed after he thoroughly studied the opposing crew with his dark eyes. “Obviously the only person who was worth a damn in this little group of yours lost to me. I won’t even bother wasting my time.”
Jason quickly put a lid on his anger when it threatened to burst after Mason’s comment. It was becoming harder by the second to be around the poor excuse of a man and honestly, he just wanted to rip his head off and take Machayla away from him… as soon as possible. Preferably, tonight!
He noticed Mason giving him an onceover before he turned on his heels to leave and everyone but Jason and Carter followed behind. They hadn’t taken anymore than five steps when Jason caught Tabitha wiggling her way out of Drake’s grasp in his peripheral vision.
“I want a race!” She bellowed.
Mason and his lackeys stopped dead in their tracks and rounded towards them. “Is that right?”
“That’s right.” She answered and folded her arm over her chest.
“Shit!” Jason muttered under his breath. Couldn’t that girl ever learn how to pick her fights? Though, she did look the part of a bad-ass with her black leather assemble and studded boots while her auburn hair fell straight down her back and her eyes blazed with fire. One look at her harsh demeanor at the moment would send certain men cowering under a table with their tales between their legs. Tabitha was never one to be called sweet and she was about to prove exactly why that was.
“Tabitha!” Drake warned.
She ignored him. Mason started to chuckle which quickly turned into a condescending laugh. Soon enough, the idiots behind him started to laugh along. They were drawing unnecessary attention from other racers who were in the crowd and soon enough, there was a great amount of the people surrounding the two crews with curious glints in their eyes.
After some time, Mason finally stopped laughing and looked at Drake who was glaring down at Tabitha. “This is so pathetic! I’m not racing your lap dog.”
It came as a huge shocker to Jason when Tabitha suddenly smirked instead of acknowledging his remark and firing back her own. “Why? You afraid of getting your ass handed to you by a girl?” She challenged.
All trace of amusement was wiped off of his face. “You obviously don’t know who you’re speaking to.” His voice came with a warning that in turn alerted Jason.
“Enlighten me then.”
He didn’t know what Mason was going to do or say but he looked menacing enough for Jason not to like it. He searched for Brandon’s eyes and when his gaze finally locked on his best friend’s, he shook his head from side to side. Brandon quickly caught on to his silent message and nodded in response. It was moments like this that he was grateful that his friends could read him when he wanted to be read.
“If it’s a race you want, then it’s a race you’ve got.” Mason finally answered with a smirk of his own.
Tabitha opened her mouth to say something else when she was cut off. “No.” Drake’s voice sounded final and left no room for arguments. Looking Tabitha in the eyes with all the seriousness in the world, he said “You’re not racing him.”
She could do nothing but glare at him. Jason pointed out that she was smart enough to keep her mouth shut this time around and not say a word but her eyes told him everything he needed to know as anger burned through their duo-tone color and presented how strong her dislike for him at the moment really was.
“Looks like this crew have gone soft on us.” It was Eddie who spoke from beside Mason.
“Soft?” Victor suddenly piped up.
Jason –like always—stayed silent throughout the dispute and watched as both his ex crew and his new crew banter with one another. He expected this to happen but what caught him off guard was when he saw Brandon suddenly smirk which caused Jason to immediately frown and wonder what was going on in his head. Hopefully, Eddie didn’t say anything to trigger any crazy thoughts that were swimming in Brandon’s mind but knowing that imbecile, he would do just that. Jason tossed a glance in Mason’s direction. He looked bored.
“Yeah, soft.” Eddie continued. “From what I’ve heard, the past few weeks haven’t been all rainbows and lollipops.”
“How about you stop gossiping like a little bitch and do what the hell it is that you came here to do.” Brandon snapped. Though everything about him was calm, his tone was the only thing that gave him away. With the smirk suddenly gone from his features, his crystal brown eyes turned steely.
“Who the hell are you calling a lit-” Mason suddenly cut Eddie response off by shoving him away.
“He’s right.” Mason’s voice was platonic. “We came here to race and that’s exactly what we’re going to do.”
Brandon nodded once. “So let’s race.”
Mason smiled smugly. “Let’s. You lose, I get that BMW. I lose, you get a stack. Deal?”
“Deal.” Brandon quickly agreed much to Jason’s dismay. He had a feeling that something big was about to happen and as he watched his best friend march over to his BMW, the feeling became stronger.
*
Machayla had been receiving the evil eye from Sierra since the moment she stepped out of the car with Mason. She had expected to feel guilty about supposedly cheating on Mason and getting caught but she found that she didn’t at all. She could honestly admit that she liked Jason and even though he was a bit pushy and nosey, she didn’t mind.
In a way, he was helping her grow some type of backbone in order to stand up to her suppose fiancé. The fact that she actually had someone in her corner for a change gave her strength because she realized that maybe, just maybe, she might not be so alone in the world anymore.
It was a feeling that she missed. Having friends and family was now a foreign thing to her and if somehow, someway, she managed to escape from Mason’s grasp, she would definitely make an effort to stay connected with Jason. After all, she had to start off somewhere.
“So,” Sierra’s voice suddenly cut into her thought process “you care to explain why Jason’s tongue was down your throat while the guy that you’re engage to was in the next room?”
Machayla’s eyebrows furrowed in aggravation due to the accusation which was laced into Sierra’s question. “No.” She simply answered without sparing her a glance. Sierra didn’t know what was going on and Machayla had no intentions of telling her. It wasn’t any of her business.
“Ok, fine. I won’t pry but just make sure you two think twice about what it is that y’all do. You of all people know that Mason isn’t the type of guy anyone should play games with.”
Machayla nodded to show that she understood what Sierra was going on about.
“Good. Now let’s cut this conversation short because they’re coming back this way with some company.”
At that, her head snapped up and one of her brows winged in question. Why was Mason heading this way with Jason’s old crew and a crowd of people in tow? When they were close enough, Machayla, Sierra and the rest of the girls that was with them became alert.
“What’s going on?” Sierra asked with her hands propped on her slim waist. Machayla felt a bit of envious of her confidence and apparent ability to stand up for herself. It was going to take her some time to get there herself but she was sure that she would prosper. After all, she wasn’t always this shell of a woman.
Carter came around and wrapped his arms around his girlfriend. “Looks like we’re about to have ourselves a race.”
“Between…?”
“Just watch.”
Right after he said that, Mason broke away from the group, strolled towards Machayla, smashed his lips against hers and jumped into his Benz. A cold chill ran down her spine due to the unwanted contact but she let out a sigh of relief after. She was glad that there was going to be even more distance between the two of them for at least a little while.
Mason started up the car and a pathway suddenly formed as his crew, Jason’s crew and the on lookers spread out. Just as quickly, an olive green BMW pulled up and the driver revved his engine in indication that he was ready for the race.
“Is that Brandon?” Sierra exclaimed.
“Yup.” A ridiculously cute guy with long thin dreads and hazel eyes answered from beside Jason whose smoldering eyes were now trained on Machayla which in turn caused her to feel nervous and a bit guilty at the same time thanks to Mason
“That’s a bit… unexpected.” Sierra voiced. “If anyone was going to race Mason, my best bet would’ve been on Drake. Not Brandon. What happened over there?”
Machayla no idea who this Brandon person they spoke about was but she assumed that he was the one in the BMW. She barely knew the names of any of the racers much less the guys in Mason’s crew. She’d been so caught up in her own problems that she’d failed to acknowledge what was going on around her. All she knew was that when Mason snapped his fingers, she was to latch onto him and let him drag her where ever she went.
Now that she thought about her situation, her place and her role, she wanted to call herself ten types of stupid. Had Mason’s friends realized that she was being used as a punching bag? Could one of them possibly have been able to help her if she only had asked? Hells, did her pride force her to become a loner who had entrapped herself inside of her own head simply because she didn’t trust people?
Probably.
“She happened!” This time it was Jason who spoke with a dose of animosity in his undertone as he pointed to a girl that Machayla noticed for the first time was standing next to a guy. The girl looked strangely familiar but once again, she’d been out of it for so long that maybe she’d actually met her at one of these races.
Switching her gaze over to the guy – who also seemed to be annoyed with the same girl—she studied his face structure and realized how similar it was to Jason’s. His brother! If she hadn’t crash into Jason’s chest that memorable night where she unintentionally stood him up, she would’ve never had known that Jason had a big brother.
“It’s not my fault that he had to race in my spot. Drake wouldn’t let me!” The girl retorted to Jason’s accusation.
Machayla eyes once again landed on her and the second that she noticed the auburn hair that she somehow missed the first time, she gasped. “You!” All eyes suddenly fell on her but she was too shocked to give a damn. The world couldn’t possibly be this small.
Tabitha on the other hand frowned for a few seconds then when the realization of who she was staring at finally settled in, she –just like Machayla did—gasped. “From the mall! I thought you looked familiar when you stepped out of the car with that Mason guy but you look completely different from yesterday so I brushed it off.”
“Yeah.” She frowned all the while cursing Mason for making her wear this damn getup. “I had clothes on.”
“You know each other?” The guy with the dreads asked Tabitha.
“Sure do.” Tabitha said as she snatched what looked like a joint out of Jason’s brother mouth before he was able to light it up. “She’s my- ow!- She’s my new friend.” She finished off as Jason’s brother twisted her arm to her back and made her drop it back into his palm. She didn’t bother to put up a fight.
Machayla didn’t miss the weird look that Sierra and Carter shared after Tabitha had finish spoken. “Out of all the damn-” Carter started but trailed off. “Wow!” Sierra quipped at the same time as their worried eyes traveled over to Jason who was standing there, with a pain stricken expression.
‘Wonder what’s wrong with him?’ She thought about asking him but decided against it. He probably wouldn’t even tell her. He knew a whole lot about her but, she realized, she didn’t know anything about him. That little fact troubled her a bit. Was she selfish for not ever asking him anything personal about his life? Did he think herself absorbed?
Her inner turmoil was immediately cut off when the aforementioned brother became restless. “What the hell are you two waiting for? Start the damn race already!”
The guy who was in the BMW poked his head out of the window and bellowed, “Sierra is taking her freaking sweet time to start the damn race!”
With a roll of her eyes, she stepped out of Carter’s embrace and muttered a “whatever” as she headed to the starting line. The two cars slowly followed and stopped at the white traffic line that they used as a staring line. The remnants of the rain caused the ground to become more slippery than usual and even though the two men were expert racers, the fact that Mother Nature always won caused her heart to become heavy.
The way the wind was picking up speed as she pulled out her flags from her back pocket, was a bad omen. It was signaling that something big was going to happen. What that something was, was what Sierra wanted to know.
Her feelings and intuition weren’t her own though. Drake, Tabitha, Victor, Carter, Chico, Denis and especially Jason felt it too. They all, at some point thought about stopping the race but sometimes humans ignore the signs that was being thrown their way and became optimistic instead. It was a defense mechanism in which a person was faced with a fact or a thought that made them uncomfortable to accept and there was a word for it.
Denial
Brandon watched as the wind picked up through his tinted windshield. It was going to be an interesting race though how he found his self in this predicament was a mystery. One minute, he was nudging Drake to tell him to not let Tabitha –who had become a thorn in their side for the past few days—race Mason.
He sighed. What the hell was she thinking? Down here, once a challenge was issued, you couldn’t take it back. Somebody from those two or more crews would have to race one another even if it wasn’t the same person who initiated the race or risked the reputation of your crew.
There wasn’t any way Brandon was going to let that happen. The name sake of their crew was already in trouble due to Jason leaving. It was a noticeable fact because lately, crews were coming out of the woodworks to challenge them.
“Uh, y’all ready?” Sierra asked with uncertainty.
‘That’s weird.’ He thought. She was usually pumped when she was about to count off a race. What could have possibly had her bothered?
“Oh well.” He muttered as he revved up. He was about to slip his seat belt on but decided against it. He wanted to feel as comfortable as he could while racing a rat like Mason. Clutching the steering wheel, he connected his index and middle finger together and touched his temple in a salute.
Sierra’s eyed Mason to confirm then her eyes wavered over to Brandon and stayed there. Her eyes held a bit of worry as her brows creased. She looked as if she was pleading him to do something but, what the hell could it have been?
After a while, she visibly sighed and threw up two checkered flag, each in a hand. “Alright, you two are no strangers to this road and I know that you are familiar with the rules. But just in case one or both of you have a short term memory lost or suddenly become stupid, listen up. No shortcuts, avoid cops, and come back …alive. Got it?”
Both men gassed up their vehicles and took a side glance at one another before turning to face straight ahead. The only thing on their minds was winning. Forget that drag racing was dangerous on the wet ground of US-27; they just wanted to win, each for a different reason.
“On three!” Sierra continued.
“1!” Both men place a hand on their gear shift.
“2!” Once again, they revved up their engines by playing with the gas pedal but they both knew better and switched their gear into drive while their foot rested on the brakes.
“3!” Both men quickly sped off with the distinctive screeching sound of tires against pavement which left the smell of burnt rubber behind.
Brandon and Mason sped down the empty road neck and neck with one another, battling for the lead. He was smart enough to not only watch where he was going but to also watch where his opponent was going and when it looked like Mason was going to get the lead, he slammed his foot down on the gas pedal, switch to second gear and sped past him.
He was in the lead now and the first turn up ahead was coming fast. Since it was a loose turn, Brandon hardly had to yeild and instead pressed down onto the gas a bit harder. He couldn’t afford to slow down due to the few feet that he had on Mason.
They were each going over 100 miles per hour when the second turn became visible. This one was a bit tricky due to the turn being a bit tight but that still wasn’t any problem for either one as they curved along the road. By the time the turn was over, they were once again neck and neck but a few meters away lay a double turn. The first went left and the second went right.
“Shit!” Brandon exclaimed. He had a bit of trouble coming off of the second turn and landed about a meter or two behind Mason’s Mercedes. He eyed his dash board and wondered whether or not if it was safe to use the twin turbo engine that he recently installed into the BMW. It worked for the drifter that Chico worked on but that was a more recent edition Nissan GTR.
Maybe he should wait, after all there was a last turn coming up and though it was really tight he was confident about getting around it. He just had to focus.
The second that the last turn came into his sight, he angled his wheel to the left and tried to speed pass Mason as quickly as possible as the road narrowed into the turn and blended into just one lane. He did just as he intended to do but in turn, Mason became pissed off and tried to reclaim the lead once again.
The finish line was so close that Brandon could taste it! The road finally split into two again and he became blatantly aware of Mason catching up. Deciding to just get this race over with, Brandon threw caution to the wind –almost literally—and flipped the turbo switch on his dash board.
It would’ve been a great way to end the race, but unfortunately for him, the speed that the BMW gained, along with the very wet and slippery grounds and Mason purposely conjoining into his lane to bump his car which in turn caused him to lose control of the wheel.
Brandon tried his best to regain control of the car but it was too late. His alternative was to turn the wheel and foot his breaks. Bad idea. Due to the immaculate amount of speed he was going, the car drifted out of control, tipped over and flipped not once, not twice but five times before it stopped upside down and slid towards the finish line.
The last thought that came to Brandon Knight’s head as he felt the metal of the door crushing his lungs which made breathing difficult while fresh blood dripped from his temple was ‘bad idea’ before he passed out cold.
-Present time
Jason’s eyes left the horrid scene and moved to the left where he observed Mason stepping out of the Benz with a smug smile. “Darn it. Guess I don’t get a new car after all.” He feigned disappointment. He didn’t even bother to hide his amusement. He looked remorseless and proud to have purposely collided into a car going over 100 miles per hour.
The sadistic son of a bitch! Jason fists quickly clenched. Words couldn’t explain his wavering emotions at the moment but if he had to pick one, it would be the darkest form of hatred.
Mason opened his mouth to speak again but oddly enough, Jason couldn’t hear a word. His ear drums were clogged by the loud and extremely heavy beat that his heart was making. A movement to the right caught his eyes and he glanced over to watch –only to watched— Machayla turn away from the battered car and shout –Jason guessed—out a NO before turning her focus back onto the car.
Switching his sight back to where Mason stood, Jason watched as his face contorted into a deadly scowl and growled out some type of command to her. He felt like he was watching a ping pong match. He glanced back in Machayla’s direction and watched as her strong countenance suddenly vanished.
He could see the reluctance, the annoyance but also a small tinge of fear written all over her face as she moved away from the group of guys who were now trying their best to get his friend out of the car. One look at the way Brandon’s bloody body was lodge in the most uncomfortable way in the driver’s seat made Jason’s blood boil. If possible, his fist tightened.
His eyes traveled to where Machayla vehemently went to stand beside Mason and felt the sudden need to have Mason’s blood on his hands when he forcefully pulled her to him and raised his hands to hit her. But remarkably, the blow to her face never came for Jason’s limbs had a mind of its own and not only closed in the space between himself and Mason, but also managed to pull Machayla out of his grasp and sent her hurdling onto the wet ground.
He would apologize later.
The silence that fell over the crowd was almost deafening as Jason’s hand slipped behind his black yellow jacket and under his shirt to pull out the 9 millimeter handgun that he so badly wanted to use on the son of a bitch that he was standing but a few inches away from and cocked it.
His normally calm and pleasant demeanor was no longer a part of him as his face contorted in an all consuming anger; his nostrils flaring, his dark green eyes flashing and narrowing into slits. He was livid.
“Jay no!”
“Shit!”
“Somebody get him!”
Ignoring the frantic shouts from his friends, Jason quickly blocked out any noise that would distract him from his target and pointed the barrel of the gun at Mason’s forehead. His index finger landed on the trigger as he stared him in the eyes.
Dark and mocking brown eyes met dark green angry ones. “Go ahead Mills. Shoot me.” Mason quipped. His feathers weren’t a bit ruffled.
Stealing a quick glance at Carter who was suddenly hauling ass over to him, he turned to Mason and let his index finger press down onto the trigger. “Gladly!” The echoing sound of a gun going off rendered everyone to complete silence….
*
“You’ve got to be freaking kidding!” Slamming her hands down onto her desk, she raked a hand through her raven black hair. She’d been working on this stupid case for weeks now and when she finally got a lead, BAM! She hit a dead end. Mason Scott was smarter than she thought and after working so close to him as a junior partner in the law firm Scott and Co. for the past three months, she still couldn’t figure out how to properly get him to confess to the crimes that she suspected he was involved in.
In the pasted five months, his name has somehow magically appeared in six murder cases that occurred in South Florida. All of the victims history somehow have led her to Mason but she and the mediocre investigators that were assigned to help her couldn’t properly accuse him of any crimes because not only was his record squeaky clean but he had connections all over the place which gave him fantastic covers and basically made him impossible to touch… to everyone but her.
Honestly, she believed that he was behind every single one of those murders cases; she’d guess so since the chief sent the case file to her office in Washington DC. But unfortunately for her, the chief of police in Miami just couldn’t connect the dots and called out for assistance from a federal agent to thoroughly go undercover and investigate the case.
It was a wonder how Mason was able to dodge being detained, prosecuted and even questioned. He was almost untouchable; key word being almost. She was very adamant about figuring out what he was all about and why he was linked to those murders. She was ready to put a stamp on this case or her name wasn’t-”
“Agent Leah Hassan!” Lieutenant Aiden Parks sounded off as he walked into her temporary office at the local station. Taking a seat without permission… once again, he crossed his arm over his broad shoulders. “Or should I say Isis?” He asked with a dark winged brow. “Again, I and all my colleagues appreciate the time and effort you’re putting forth to help solve this case. How’s the undercover work going?”
She sighed. “It’s going. But I’ve once again hit another road block. I searched his office for clues and I even questioned some close co-workers but nothing. The greatest lead I had came to a dead end today when the results for the fingerprints that they found in Pete Nash’s apartment came back. It didn’t match Mason’s print so I’m back to square one.”
“Mhhh.” The Lieutenant mumbled. “Pete Nash’s murder was quite a horrific one; I mean can you imagine getting your brains shot out? But are you sure that Mason Scott was involved? Nothing in that case leads to him.”
“I just have a hunch. After all, cocaine was found in his system just like the other victims that did lead to him. I’ve recently discovered that he is involved in the illegal drag races that go on in this city after the sun goes down but I don’t have enough information on my findings to bust him. It was just something that I overhead him mention on the phone to someone. I need to get closer to him and maybe get a bit of insight on what it is that he’s really up to. Something tells me that he also might be involved in the drug trafficking business going on in this city too.”
“Can you find and befriend one of the people he races with… if any?” Lieut. Parks asked while scratching his stubbly chin with a prominent five o’clock shadow growing onto it. Leah and apparently every woman who worked in this building found Lieut. Parks attractive. He resembled a taller and tanner version of Ryan Reynolds; with those piercing grey-blue eyes, he was very attractive Indeed. “When you stop ogling me, I would like to get a response to my question Leah.” Dropping her title, he gave way to a cocky smirked.
She immediately snapped out of her shameless act and easily returned his smirk with a cocky smile of her own. “Don’t think that I don’t notice when you ogle me too Parks.”
“Ah,” He looked surprised that she knew. “Touché. Now back to the matter at hand.”
She nodded. “Alright, I’m actually glad that you mentioned befriending someone. For one, he has a girlfriend or fiancé and I coincidently met a guy at the grocery store and about a week or two later, I bumped into him at Mason’s house. I’m not sure why he was there to begin with but I have a feeling that though he and Mason are not best friends, he sure is involved with him.”
“You think you can get them to talk?”
Leah gave him a sultry look. “With a little convincing, I can get any man to talk.” She sent him a quick wink. “Trust me.”
He nodded in approval of her efforts. “Oh, there isn’t any doubt in my mind that you can’t agent.” He answered with a knowing smile. “Just make sure to run a background check first so I can at least have something to give to the Chief when I report to him. Then maybe,” he reached over the desk and traced her bottom lip with an index finger “you can report to me after this case is done and over with.” He returned her sultry wink.
Chuckling at his sexually innuendo, she shook her head and decided to dismiss his comment. “Already ahead of you Lieut.” Bending forward in her chair, she pulled open one of her desk drawer and reached for a manila folder. Placing it on the desk, she slid it towards him and waited as he opened the folder.
“Jason Mills.” Lieut. Aiden said as he read the name off of the top of the file. Then he switched his gaze over to the picture and his lips tilted upwards. “Let’s hope that he doesn’t have a jealous girlfriend. Wouldn’t want you to be involved in a cat fight while you’re trying to convince him now would we agent Leah."