Page 67 of Under Cover
Garcia gave a quick smile. “Youarehelping. And tomorrow we’ll be running active shooter drills and the like, you and me, and you’ll be learning a buttload. I came up from a small-town deputy through the ATF to this—you’ll be super excited to know how much fun we’ll be having and how you’ll be fucking exhausted in the morning—and the dress code is real simple. Combat boots, tactical clothing, black T-shirts. Boom. You’re in.” He allowed his expression to gentle. “But this? This goes high up. I think I can tell you that. This goes high up, and we do not want to leave our boy with his ass swinging in the breeze.”
Doba nodded. “Tactical gear, you say?”
Garcia tilted his head back. “Doh! Go see Pearson. She’s got the number of the uniform department. Sorry about that, brother, I’ve been—”
“Thinking about other things,” Doba said. “Understood. Hope your boy stays safe.”
“We all do,” Garcia told him.Me most of all.
Harding looked at the text as Garcia held out his phone, then held up his hand. Without a word, he headed toward a filing cabinet in the back of his office. He came back with two small boxes, one with five tiny plastic listening devices in it and another with fifteen tinier batteries.
After another trip to his magic filing cabinet, he had a small recorder that could be programmed for every listening device.
“Range is twenty, twenty-five feet at most,” he said quietly. “Go see Denison. She’s got trackers and Narcan.”
“Thanks,” Garcia told him. “I’ll be back—”
“Tomorrow’s soon enough,” Harding said and then grimaced. “I just got a call from Gail’s old roommate—said the guy’s looking for a place to flop between gigs—a night at the most. You might hear from him.”
“I’ll be ready,” Garcia said, his heart thundering. A night. Or at least the rest of the day. It was a gift he hadn’t dreamed of. “In the meantime, I’ll go meet my CI.”
“Fair. Let us know how it falls out. I’ve got some names to run down too.”
Meaning Crosby and Iliana had been exchanging information. Good. Good.
“Mañana!”
Garcia practically ran out of the room.
THE FIRSTthing he noticed when he got to his little house was that the gnome, which he had parked outside on his porch, looking creepy and kitschy and weird, was gone. It didn’t stop him from keeping his hand on his piece as he let himself in, but when he saw the thing on his coffee table, a thick file folder underneath, it did let him relax just a tad.
Venturing farther into the house, he saw the boots he’d put the tracker inside were sitting in the hall outside the spare room, and the door was open a few inches. Crosby lay, shirtless, in a pair of sweats, facedown on the bed, his bare shoulders hunching slightly in the spring chill.
Garcia had been undercover a few times in his career. He murmured, “Crosby, it’s me, Calix. I’m coming in.”
He was prepared for the sudden stiffening, the instant alertness, and relieved when Crosby reached under the mattress for his weapon and not under his pillow, which could be so much more dangerous.
“Calix?” Crosby muttered, his words obviously catching up to his reflexes. “Izzat you?”
“Yeah, papi.” Garcia ventured into the room and placed a soothing hand on Crosby’s back. “Why you in here and not where you belong?”
“Didn’t want to be there without you,” Crosby muttered, sitting up and looking so utterly exhausted Garcia gave up any dreams of having a quickie before they talked. “Didja see the folder?”
“Here, let’s move to the other bedroom, I’ll lock up our weapons, and you can sleep while I look through it and share some info, okay?”
“Yeah, sure.”
Crosby allowed himself to be led, meek as a child, to the room they’d shared so passionately three nights before. This time, he took off his sweats and slid between the sheets in his boxers, pulling the covers tight around his shoulders.
Garcia bent and kissed his temple. “Get some sleep, okay? I’ll wake you for lunch in a few.”
“Anything but pizza,” Crosby mumbled. “Maybe a nice salad.” And then he was asleep.
THREE HOURSlater, Garcia’s stomach grumbled, and he yawned and stretched from his place on the bed next to Crosby. He’d spent time with the file and his laptop—a clean one, with no connection to the SCTF or the federal offices they were stationed in—looking up the names and the connections Crosby had brought back. He had some info to share, mostly with Harding, but he didn’t want to talk about that now.
Instead, he ran his hand along Crosby’s shoulders, smoothing away the tension that had haunted Crosby even in sleep.
Crosby moaned faintly, his shoulders relaxing, and then rolled over, smiling sleepily up at him.