G. Moffat - Blindside

‘What’s your take on that? I mean, Hunter was definitely on your side.’

‘According to what you read about that Fed bank robbery job he got caught up in, he’s got reason to be cautious. Every new screw-up by the Feds that gets someone killed demonstrates a certain resistance to anyone’s perspective but their own.’

‘I think Grange said no because it was the opposite of what you said.’

‘You might be right. Great tactical thinking, huh?’

Logan smiled, though the knot of tension in his stomach was tightening with each minute that passed. He glanced back at the guns.

‘You know, you can still say no,’ Cahill said, seeing the anxiety in Logan’s face. ‘And I’ll go it alone.’

Logan stood and walked to the window, looking out into the city.

‘Tell me what we’re going to do,’ Logan said.

He turned to Cahill and leaned back against the window sill.

‘Webb and Grange will be across the street in the building opposite the diner where Raines will meet Horn. It’s a three-storey residential apartment building. They’ll put the occupants of the second-floor apartment at the front up in a hotel and use that as their forward command post. They’ll have comms links to their agents on the ground and to the SWAT team.’

‘Hunter and Collins will be in the diner at separate tables,’ Logan added. ‘Dressed like regular guys getting breakfast before going to work.’

‘Correct. There will be two female agents and a male agent in there also posing as the owner and serving staff.’

‘No civilians?’

‘Never. Too risky.’

‘What about ordinary customers. How do they deal with them?’

‘Turn them away at the door. Make up some story about why they can’t serve anyone else. Regular people will swallow anything if you say it with enough conviction.’

‘We’re regular people.’

Cahill looked blankly at him.

‘Never mind,’ Logan said. ‘So, that’s a total of five law enforcement personnel in the diner and two across the street.’

‘Plus Ruiz and Martinez in a car around the corner on Seventeenth Street.’

‘And we’re just going to walk right into the middle of this operation and order breakfast.’

‘While wearing our illegal weapons.’

‘I forgot that part.’

Logan shook his head.

‘The Feds are going to go mental when they see us in there, so how do we get past the first line of defence? I mean, won’t they turn us away as well?’

‘They know me well enough by now and won’t risk compromising the operation by getting us out of there.’

‘Sounds easy.’

‘It’s not. And you stay as far out of harm’s way as possible if Raines decides to light it up, okay.’

Logan nodded.

‘Leave that shit to me.’

‘You can count on it.’

‘If you have to put him down, though…’

‘I’ve done it before.’

They took Armstrong’s car to the flat in the East End occupied by the two prostitutes Pope had identified. Armstrong drove out of the city centre along Duke Street while Irvine stared at the old photograph of Butler, trying to see something in his eyes to explain everything that he had done. But it was just a digital facsimile of the man: coloured ink arranged by a computer on glossy paper. The more she stared at it, the less real it became. She put the photograph in the door pocket and looked ahead.

‘How did it go with the FBI?’ she asked.

Armstrong glanced at her then back at the road.

‘Not much for us to tell them. We don’t have anything to go on with this guy Butler yet.’

‘What about them?’

‘They were cagey about giving away too much. All they said was that they were close and planning for an operation.’

‘An operation?’

‘They didn’t elaborate.’

‘We’re co-operating with each other, right?’

‘As much as we can at this point. But they’ll want to keep it to themselves.’

‘You mean take all the credit.’

‘I suppose.’

They fell into silence again. Irvine checked her watch. It was around nine. She thought that the two prostitutes would likely be asleep after a long night shift. Might be good to catch them a little off guard. Maybe they would say something that ordinarily they would try to hide, whether out of fear or a general mistrust of the police.

‘I need to tell you something,’ Irvine said.

Armstrong didn’t look at her or say anything.

‘About how I got Butler’s name.’

‘I was wondering.’

She took a quick breath.

‘Frank Parker told me.’

She saw his fingers tighten on the steering wheel, the skin stretching and turning white.

‘He came to my house last night.’

This time Armstrong turned to look at her. There was something hard in his eyes.

‘There was nothing to it,’ Irvine said quickly. ‘He wanted to give me information.’

‘Such a gentleman.’

‘Kenny-’

‘He’ll want something in return eventually. You know that?’

‘Yes.’

‘Fine. It’s between you and him. Nothing to do with me. But watch your back.’

She sensed that her interaction with Parker both at the restaurant and last night had changed her relationship with Armstrong. Had soured it for him. He would never be able to view anything Parker did objectively, no matter how positive it might be for this case. There was nothing she could do about that.

‘This case will be over soon,’ he said. ‘Now that we know who Butler is, he can’t stay hidden for ever.’

Unspoken: and we won’t have to be partners any more.

Irvine didn’t regret how she had dealt with Parker: it was part of the job. Armstrong would have to carry his own personal demons.

Four men occupied the seats in the twin cab pick-up truck. A heavy-duty canvas sheet was strapped over the truck bed, covering two automatic rifles and four handguns. Behind the truck was a nondescript, five-year-old sedan. There were two men in the front seats with another two automatic rifles in a bag in the trunk of the car.

The six men travelled silently in the tension that builds before a battle. They were all veterans and used to the stress of such situations. It did not matter to them that their adversaries this time would be their fellow countrymen and officers of the Federal authorities.

These men were now on the other side of the line. And the pay-off that awaited all of them was all that mattered now. No one was going to take that away from them. Not one of their own and not the FBI.

The enemy was the enemy, no matter what flag they operated under.

The cars moved on through the night, ten miles from Denver city centre.

The flat was at the top right of a block of four. It was a familiar local authority property probably built sometime in the fifties or sixties. The entry door was located at ground-floor level beside the door for the lower flat. The stairs up to the first floor were internal.

Armstrong pulled up to the kerb outside the block and switched the engine off. Irvine looked up at the windows of the flat facing the street.

‘Curtains closed,’ she said.

‘Maybe no one’s home.’

‘Probably still asleep. Let’s go wake them up?’

Two young children, no older than seven or eight, were playing alone in the front garden of the neighbouring house on the left. Irvine smiled at one of them and got a two-fingered salute in reply.

‘Nice,’ she said under her breath.

Irvine stood behind Armstrong as he knocked on the door of the flat. They waited for thirty seconds and Armstrong tried again — harder this time. Third time, he banged with his fist until they heard movement on the stairs inside. A woman’s voice, groggy from drugs or sleep or something else, asked who was there.