Page 151 of Cautious Love

Hopefully, this is productive news.

“Agent Beckett,” I answer.

“Morning, sheriff. So we’ve talked to our new friends. They lawyered up pretty quickly. That being said, it’s probably time to finish this. But of course not without your go-ahead,” Lawrence says.

“I figured. It’s been oddly quiet over there. We haven’t seen any of the Kensington family in town either. But my guy is still in there and we can’t get ahold of him at the moment. Hehas another check in today, and I won’t move until we have confirmation. I don’t want this to turn into a hostage situation,” I tell him.

“I understand. Verify his status, then call me back,” he says.

“I appreciate that. Thank you.”

“No problem. Talk soon.”

I hang up, tossing my phone onto the stack of papers, and drop my head on my chair.

I glance through my window into the bullpen to see if Luke is here yet, but his desk is empty.

Trying to focus on everything that isn’t Shiloh, or worry that I made a terrible decision to let Will, my employee, myfriend,walk into the lion’s den with little backup because I couldn’t give it to him. I close my eyes, trying to think through our plan A, but considering a plan B.

“Ledger, Luke is here,” Daisy calls.

“Can you go get him, please?” I ask her.

“He’s already coming this way,” she says.

Luke hurries to my office and tosses a half-hearted wink at Daisy before stepping into my office and closing the door.

“He didn’t check in,” Luke says.

My stomach drops.

Luke’s face is pale as he paces back and forth.

Shit.

“He’s in a tough position, but I should have tried harder to let him know we were picking them up.”

I take a deep breath, trying to release the tension in my jaw.

“We need to follow protocol. We wait for the second check-in. If he doesn’t … then we move the timeline up,” I tell him.

Luke rubs his neck. “Yeah, okay.

“Elise, John, and Connor already lawyered up.”

“Can’t say I’m surprised,” Luke sighs.

“We have to do this carefully, or it puts Will at more risk.”

Luke nods. “I know. But I’ve got a bad feeling about all of it.”

I should have stayed at the office because the mountain of paperwork I need to do keeps building. We’re so close to ending all of this chaos with the Kensingtons, and I’m on edge. Everyone is. But we have to keep our cool, operate as normally as possible, or it could make dominoes start falling faster than we’re prepared for.

We have to catch them before shipping the product. It will spread the teams thin, but the only way this works is if we strike together. In the meantime, I need to seal up our plan and make sure it goes off without a hitch because if it doesn’t, that not only puts my people on the line, but that means a lot of cocaine gets to a whole lot of people. I can’t let that happen.

Normally, I would have stayed at work, eaten at my desk and kept working, but I can’t shake the feeling that something is up with Shiloh. My wife is a tough nut to crack, and it’s a good thing I’m a proactive man because I’m going to get to the bottom of it tonight.

I thought she’d be ecstatic about the copper still I got her and the barrel. But it seemed to almost scare her, which is an odd reaction if I’ve ever seen one.