"You don't know shit about it," Derek said.
"So enlighten me. Why is this asshole even on your radar? He's in California. You all are in Chicago."
"Let's just say he has ties to Chicago and leave it at that. Follow. Take photos. Document. That's it. If you can't do that, just go back to the damn rental house."
Dylan merged into traffic, relieved Davenport appeared to be taking Hannah home and not to his warehouse. They may not know exactly what went on in his warehouse in the seedy part of town, but Dylan knew enough that a good girl like Hannah didn't belong there.
"Fine. I'll just follow, but things need to change tomorrow. We need a lot less watching and a lot more action around here."
"And you need to be patient."
"Fuck patience. I want vengeance."
"All in good time. Tomorrow." The call dropped.
Twenty minutes later, Dylan watched as Jake dropped Hannah off at her small duplex apartment. He pretended to be a gentleman by opening her car door and escorting her to the door. Dylan wanted to scream when Davenport pushed his way inside her apartment. He had his hand on the car door latch to jump out and follow the two inside when Davenport left a minute later to stalk back to his sports car and drive away.
Dylan debated going up and knocking on her door to see if she was okay, but in the end, he knew he'd only scare her more. He'd only talked to her a few times at the Four Seasons bar when he'd trailed Davenport inside. Something about the petite woman called out to his protective side. She tried to project this tough exterior, but he'd seen a vulnerability in her that made him want to wrap her up in bubble wrap and protect her at all costs. Now that he'd been trailing Jake Davenport for a few weeks, he understood it was that exact vulnerability that Davenport noticed in her, too. The difference between the men was that Dylan wanted to protect her—Jake wanted to exploit her.
When Davenport took off in the direction of the warehouse, Dylan put his car in gear to follow. He'd be patient for one more night.
Lukus
Lukus crossed to the coffee maker and poured the last cup of burnt coffee into his Stanford University mug. He was running on only a few hours of sleep, but he was too wired to slow down.
They'd been lucky to find a furnished townhouse available for rent by the month, and turned it into their west coast war room. It was easier to maintain the privacy they needed here than in the hotel suite Z and Dylan had been holed-up in a few days ago. The rental also gave them a small kitchen and two bedrooms to crash in when they needed to catch a few hours of rest.
He looked around the room at the motley crew he had on the ground, and wondered again if he needed to bring in more help. He had purposefully kept the team small on this one, mainly because he wasn't entirely sure if they were going to be able to do this job by the book. The fewer men he needed involved, the better.
He was relieved to have Zachary 'Z' Zimmerman, his most senior detective, on the case. To an outsider, Z could, at times, appear to be as much of a predator as their mark, Jake Davenport. Lukus knew that as ruthless as Z was in the pursuit of a target, he was at least usually on the right side of the moral compass. Still, he regularly found himself having to overlook his employee's rather unconventional, and sometimes shady, methods used to get his man. Under normal circumstances, those methods made Lukus nervous, but with Jake Davenport on the loose, he couldn't be happier to have Z on the case.
His friend and second in command, Derek, was in the corner talking softly to his brother, Dylan, Lukus's newest and most junior employee. Dylan was the antithesis of Z. Too emotional. Too volatile. Too inexperienced. Lukus would send him back to Chicago if he thought for a minute the kid would go, but cutting him loose now would only drive Dylan to go rogue. Better to keep him close.
On the phone with Z was Cameron Solinski, their tech guru. Only twenty-three, the kid was a computer genius. Lukus didn't want to know the details of how Cam acquired the confidential information they needed for their investigations.
Plausible deniability.
"Okay, I've got the monitors set up. Let's get started," Z called out to get everyone's attention.
Dylan couldn't wait to lay down his own agenda. "We've been watching long enough. Tell me we're going into the fucking warehouse tonight."
Lukus didn't need to intervene. Z had just about had enough of young Parker. "And do what? For the hundredth time, we don't have enough evidence yet. Davenport is smart. He's got a lot of security around him. We haven't found anything illegal, and even if we had, we know for a fact he has some of the local law enforcement's ear. You know we got a lot of push back after you got the shit beat out of you. We're gonna need something rock solid before we can involve the police again," Z snapped.
"Fuck the police," Dylan retorted.
"Sure. Fuck the police. I'm not exactly their biggest supporter, but will you get your head out of your ass for five minutes and listen to me rationally? What's your plan here? To rush in there guns blazing and shoot the bastard dead? If so, that's great. I'll be sure to visit you once a year in Statesville."
"All right, everybody calm down. We're on the same team." Lukus had stepped between them to try to keep the two men from throwing punches.
Cameron's voice came over the speaker. "If you guys are done, I have new information."
Derek
