Tactical Pursuit Read online

  Tactical Pursuit

  Copyright © 2012 by Lynette Mae

  Acknowledgments

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  About the Author

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  Tactical Pursuit

  by

  Lynette Mae

  Copyright © 2012 by Lynette Mae

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The characters, incidents and dialogue herein are fictional and any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  ISBN 978-1-61929-073-0 (eBook)

  eBook Conversion August 2012

  Cover design by Donna Pawlowski

  Published by:

  Regal Crest Enterprises, LLC

  3520 Avenue H

  Port Arthur, Texas 77627

  Find us on the World Wide Web at http://www.regalcrest.biz

  Published in the United States of America

  Acknowledgments

  This story would not have been possible without the support of so many wonderful people. I thank my friends and family for their continued encouragement and love. Thank you, Andi Marquette and Chris Svendsen for your invaluable lessons and insights. Thanks to my wonderful betas, Sue Chittock, Elaine Burns, Doris Garden, and Sue Hilliker, for sound advice and the unselfish gift of your time. Thanks to the staff at RCE, especially the outstanding editing of Lori Lake and Patty Schramm. Finally, to Steve, my SWAT technical advisor, I’m so proud to call you my friend (and brother).

  To all of my sisters and brothers who walk the Thin Blue Line: Be safe.

  Dedication

  For Sandy. Always.

  Tactical Pursuit

  by

  Lynette Mae

  Chapter One

  Tampa, Florida, 1994

  DEVON JAMES EASED her patrol car down the dank, narrow street, peering at the group of about twenty youngsters assembled in the darkness ahead. The branches of towering oak trees arched above her, reaching across the space, blocking the moonlight and casting the area in deeper shadows, obscuring the loiterers gathered in the middle of the block. Profanity-laced rap music blared from an unknown source, proudly chanting, “I’m ’bout to bust some caps off, I’m ’bout to dust some cops off.”

  Devon thought an argument was going on within the group, or maybe they were just carrying on like angry adolescents living in the midst of crime and poverty.

  “Adam Four, on scene,” Devon advised dispatch, putting her cruiser in park. Twenty feet from the gathering, she opened the driver’s door and exited cautiously, senses on full alert, taking in everything around her. She left her headlights on to provide lighting for her approach, but purposefully positioned herself outside of the beams, lest she make herself a silhouetted target. The darkness was her ally now.

  Thick, humid air enveloped her, almost immediately drawing sweat from her pores and soaking into the t-shirt beneath her ballistic vest. A large bead rolled from her hairline down the side of her face. The fresh smell of rain still hung in the air, while the stench of neglect and decay rose up from the still-damp sidewalks and soggy discarded furniture abandoned at the curb. Bottles and empty chip bags floated in the puddles. As Devon plodded through in her black leather boots, avoiding the obstacles, she watched the group carefully, searching for a male who fit the description of the suspect in the call. He was said to be her height, five feet ten, with a low-fade haircut, dark-skinned, wearing a white t-shirt and baggie shorts. “That fits the description of half the freakin’ neighborhood,” she muttered.

  Devon neared the group. Seeing her, several young men drifted away, out of the light, toward the buildings. The two-story, block structures were identical throughout the sprawling, dilapidated public housing complex. Each contained four apartments with two harsh cement slabs for a shared porch centered between the pairs of doors. Sheets hung in place of curtains in most of the small windows facing the street. Devon smelled the grease from a fryer mingled with the unmistakable pungent odor of marijuana hanging in the air.

  “Five-O, Five-O!” More figures stepped back and away, into the shadows.

  “Fuck the po-lice! Fuck the po-lice!” The voice raged from the speakers.

  She moved forward warily, eyes scanning for overt movements. Then she spotted him. A kid at the back of the crowd. He wore the right clothing, but so did about ten others. What made this kid different was the way he looked at her, not just defiant, but brazen and sure, challenging. She knew him instantly. His posture screamed, “Try me, bitch.”

  He nodded and grinned to the guy next to him. Devon eyed his hand as it reached slightly behind his right hip.

  “He gotta gun!” a girl screamed.

  In the next seconds the world erupted in frenzy even though everything went to slow motion in Devon’s mind.

  The kid raised what appeared to be a gun. She couldn’t see it very clearly and reacted instinctively to the movement. The weapon’s outline became visible when he twisted it horizontally, no doubt mimicking some gangsta movie. Devon drew her pistol. “Drop the gun!”

  People ran in all directions desperately trying to escape the impending danger. Some screamed, others yelled warnings. “Get the fuck outta here, that cop’s gonna shoot him!”

  The commotion blurred into a loud buzzing sound in her head. She raised her pistol and shouted, “Drop the weapon!” Their eyes locked and his teeth sparkled white when he smiled. Again she yelled, keeping her gun at eye level and stepping to her right.

  A flash burst from the muzzle of his gun. Rounds exploded from her own. Bang, bang. Double tap. The crowd screamed louder. Her bullets struck his torso. He jerked back from the force. The kid’s face morphed from the grin into a shocked expression. The arm holding his gun came up again.

  The slide on her semi-automatic kicked back, ejected the spent shell, and slammed forward again, only to repeat the process. The kid fell.

  Devon’s ears rang. She shouted into her shoulder mic, “Shots fired. I need an ambulance and expedite my backup.” Her breathing and heartbeat were amplified over the screams and shouts from the crowd. People ran everywhere. The kid’s associates now moved in. Someone yelled, “Get his mamma!” Aware that another in the crowd might be armed, Devon kept her gun trained on the group. She told the crowd to get back. They moved too slowly, so she yelled louder, “Back away! Now.”

  DETECTIVE JOHNSON CLEARED his throat, pulling Devon back to the present. “So, once again Corporal, where were you when the suspect allegedly pulled his weapon?”

  Allegedly. Devon stared at the Internal Affairs detective, fighting her rising irritation. It seemed as though he kept asking the same question in different ways, trying to trip her up, make her say som
ething that he could and would use against her. Or catch her in a lie. Well, it wasn’t going to work because she was telling the truth. She looked past the detective out over the western downtown skyline beyond his eighth floor window. The police chopper hovered in the distance, somewhere between the performing arts center and the minaret spires of the university just across the river. Devon wondered if the pilot was Mac.

  “Corporal?” She stared back at Detective Johnson and then over at the union representative seated next to her. He was the same guy who had responded the night of the shooting.

  “Again, I was in the middle of the block, about twenty feet away from my car. The suspect was within ten feet of me.” The memory rolled through her mind. A loud bang made Devon jump, her heart racing. Sweat broke out on her brow. She sat up and scanned the room, searching for threats. Then she realized it was only the construction going on in the lot of the building next door.

  The detective gave her an odd look. She pulled in a deep breath.

  Johnson went on. “And the original call was a fight? With weapons?”

  “Yes. I’m sure it’s in the radio call.”

  She took in the appearance of the man on the other side of the desk. He looked older, likely near retirement. His outdated brown suit was ratty at the seams. He’d probably worn it for the last ten or fifteen years. It was no doubt the latest fashion back then. His striped tie clashed with the checkered shirt he wore and a reddish spot that looked like ketchup was conspicuous in the center. Devon wondered how old the stain was. The buttons on the front of his shirt virtually screamed for mercy with the force of his gut pressing against them from the inside trying to escape. Felony buttons. One wrong move and one’ll put my eye out. She rubbed a hand over her face to hide the smirk growing on her lips.

  “Yes. Unfortunately, we've been unable to locate the person who placed that call.” He shuffled through his notes.

  Devon knew better than to offer anything beyond the question asked in an Internal Affairs investigation, so she remained silent.

  Behind him the helicopter banked northwest. Ironically, in a few seconds that would put it directly over the scene of the shooting. A telephone rang in the next office.

  “So, you were going to arrest the suspect—”

  “Detain him and check for weapons,” she corrected.

  “Okay...detain him. Can you tell me why you didn’t wait for your backup to arrive?”

  “As I said, the situation was fluid. I saw a kid matching the description of the suspect given in the call, and I wanted to stop him before he hurt anyone. If he disappeared into the crowd and did have a gun, then he would continue to be a danger. I made the decision to stop him.”

  “And then he pulled the weapon? What type again?”

  He was definitely trying to make her give a different answer. She took a deep breath and looked up at the clock on the wall before answering. Four-thirty. Christ, they’d been at this for over two hours. How many times did she have to tell him the same details? Not to mention the fact that all of this was documented in her written report from the night of the shooting. “He had a nine millimeter. Glock, I think.”

  Detective Johnson gave her a critical look. “That just happens to match the description from the call.”

  “Maybe because it’s the truth.” She refused to give this asshole any ground.

  His mouth quirked up at the corner, like a twitch. “And you're on the SWAT team and serve as a defensive tactics instructor, is that correct?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “And yet, you had no other option than shooting the suspect?”

  “We train officers to respond with an appropriate level of force. If a suspect is armed, the appropriate response is a firearm. I know you’ve been to our in-service training classes.”

  The detective nodded and said nothing.

  She remembered this guy now from their annual training day. His dismal level of fitness earned him a no-go on the physical abilities exam. Devon had been the lead instructor that day and infuriated him by not giving a passing score. That meant repeating the course. He had let her know he was none too happy about it. She figured now he was trying to exact a little payback on his turf. Whatever.

  “When you approached him, he pointed the weapon at you, just like that?”

  She took another long breath. I already told you, asshole. She heard a click and felt the cold blast from the air conditioning vent on the back of her neck. The little pink message notes on the metal stick next to his in-basket fluttered. “He initially turned away from me, as if to conceal what was in his right hand. The crowd scattered a little and started yelling. I heard someone shout something about a gun. I told him to put his hands in the air. I saw the pistol as his right arm came up. I stepped to the right, drew my pistol and ordered him to drop his weapon. He didn’t. He fired and I returned fire.”

  “How many times did you fire?”

  “Four.”

  “That was necessary?”

  “I fired until I stopped the threat.” Christ, this guy wanted her ass in a big way. The shooting was textbook. Devon knew she’d done everything correctly.

  He shifted in his chair and it groaned under his weight. The sound, combined with the interrogation setting and detective’s demeanor, catapulted Devon’s mind back in time to another investigator just like this guy. Martin Honeycutt. The Army Criminal Investigations Division Chief who had made it his goal to end her military career ten years earlier. He hadn’t succeeded outright, but it had a direct affect on her decision to leave the army.

  As a young lieutenant Devon had learned what it was like to be on the other side of the arrest. She’d spent almost seventy-two hours locked up and interrogated relentlessly for the heinous charge of loving another woman, Jillian Gray, who had been the love of Devon’s life. Honeycutt had coerced Jill with threats of outing her and Devon. He manipulated the specifics until Jill broke and made her deal, in doing so destroying their relationship. Not content with that, he’d pursued Devon for the rest of her enlistment. Finally, because he couldn’t dishonor her with facts, he falsified records to justify her arrest.

  During her incarceration she was repeatedly abused and mentally and physically beaten. Now, here she was again under the microscope of suspicion. Anger simmered within her at the thought of enduring another unwarranted investigation because some jerk had an ax to grind. Fuck him.

  “Then what happened?” Johnson asked. The union representative sitting next to her gave her a reassuring smile and a nod. She didn’t know him very well, but he had a good reputation.

  “The crowd went a little nuts and surrounded me. A woman came rushing at me screaming that I’d shot her baby. I had to push her and several other people back, maybe family members, I didn’t know at the time. A few seconds later, my backup arrived. I had already called an ambulance for the suspect and administered first aid. We checked the area for the weapon, but it wasn’t there.”

  “Maybe he wasn’t armed?”

  “He had a Glock pistol and tried to shoot me.” Devon ran her hand through her hair in frustration.

  “But the gun was not found?”

  “No. Somebody in the crowd must have picked it up. But I know that we interviewed several people in the crowd who saw the suspect with a gun.”

  “Yes,” the union rep concurred. “The original report states there were four witnesses. All confirmed they saw a gun.”

  The detective nodded and jotted a few notes on the page in front of him. She hoped he hadn’t found some inconsistency to exploit. “Just one more question. How far were you from the nearest streetlight? Do you know?”

  That question threw her. Why did he want to know that? Her mind scrambled to picture the corner where the shooting happened. Main Street had plenty of lighting, as did Union to the north, but it was very dark in the middle of the block. Devon recalled a light mid-way, but was it blocked by tree limbs or broken? Was it like many of the streetlights shot out by dope deale
rs who wanted to peddle their wares obscured by the shadows? Her brow furrowed as she thought.

  “Uh…” She hesitated and then opted for the most honest answer she could think of. “It was very dark on the block. I’m not certain whether the light was out or covered by the trees. The night of the shooting, visibility was poor. That's why I'd left my cruiser lights on—to deal with the visibility issue.”

  “Mmm, hmm.” He scribbled some more on his pad. “So the lighting consisted basically of porch lamps and your headlights?”

  That seemed right. “Yes.”

  “But, despite that, you’re sure he had a gun?”

  “Yes.”

  The detective leaned forward and spoke in the direction of the tape recorder on the desk. “This concludes my interview with Corporal Devon James.” He glanced at his watch. “The time is fourforty-five. Corporal, you are instructed not to discuss this case with anyone until the final disposition. Understood?”

  “Yes.”

  He punched the off button and stood, extending his hand. “Thanks for coming in. I’m sorry I had to do all that. I just wanted to show that you have been nothing but consistent with your statements.” He offered a smile. “Hopefully, we’ve covered all our bases. The lighting on the street could end up being important.”

  Devon took his hand, chastising herself for making such negative assumptions. Maybe this guy was only trying to do his job. She reminded herself to leave the past in the past and stop letting her demons dictate her reactions. That was a different time and place. “Thanks, I appreciate it.”

  Once out in the hall, the union guy became animated. “I think that went well, don’t you?”

  Devon rubbed her eyes and rolled her shoulders, trying to work out the tension.