Collateral

Book 3: Parker Crime

by De'nesha Diamond

Genres: Suspense; Thrillers

Synopsis

Within D.C.’s ruthless halls of power, the conspiracies are killer—and the endgame is anything but fake news . . .

With her name finally cleared of a murder charge, Abrianna Parker can at last marry her partner, Kadir Kahlifa. But the two have barely shared the news with their team of street rebels and digital revolutionaries when a disturbing disappearance throws everything off course. A reporter is missing, but not just any reporter—Tomi Lehane, whose articles exposed Abrianna’s parents and the shadow group behind the experiments that changed her life.

Now Abrianna must decide if she will put aside her plans in order to save the woman who nearly cost her everything. With the government one step behind, the mission to rescues Tomi goes off the rails. Another team has been there first, one with more firepower than even the US Government. With more players on the scene and no idea who to trust, Abrianna, Kadir, and the rest of the team are flying blind—and all of their special skills combined might not be enough to protect them from the fallout. With enemies all around and nowhere to turn, the only way out may be to burn it all down.

Release date: November 24, 2020

Publisher: Dafina

Print pages: 352

Sample

Office of the Washington Post

Reporter Tomi Lehane slammed the phone down and raked her fingers through her jet-black hair. “Abrianna hates me.”

Photographer and colleague Jayson Brigham rolled his chair into her cubicle and cocked his head with a lazy smile. “I doubt that.”

“Then why isn’t she answering my calls? It’s been days since I ran that last article about her parents.”

“Her mother did commit suicide while she was in jail after it ran,” he answered honestly. At Tomi’s sharp look, he added, “That doesn’t mean that she hates you. Those two didn’t get along anyway, right? If anything, you guys need a break from each other. Give Abrianna some time.”

Tomi dismissed Jayson’s advice. “I had to print the story. It’s news. Cargill Parker is the second biggest story in the country—next to her.”

“Yeah, bringing down a presidency is sort of a tough act to follow, but running a child sex-trafficking ring out of a D.C. country club is as close as anyone is going to get.”

“I never expected Marion would hang herself in that cell. I thought . . . Who am I kidding? The only thing I was thinking was beating everyone to the punch before Cargill Parker tossed my ass out of here. Now that he owns the damn paper, I’m sure that pink slip will arrive any day now.”

Jayson didn’t respond, and that was more damning.

Tomi swiped away a tear and bolted to her feet. “I better get home. It’s late.”

Jayson stood while she gathered her things. “You all right?”

“I’ve been through worse shit than this. But maybe I had hoped that Abrianna and I could be . . . I don’t know.”

“Friends?” he asked.

She shrugged. Being rejected by the cool kids stung.

“You guys will always have a bond. You survived some shit that most couldn’t wrap their heads around.”

“Being kidnapped and tortured in the basement of a murderous mad scientist is hardly reminiscing material.” Tomi sighed. “Sorry. I don’t mean to turn you into my therapist.”

“No. It’s okay.”

“I’m going.” She patted him on the shoulder as she exited her small space. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

An exhausted Tomi arrived home to an excited and hungry Doberman shepherd dancing by the door. The doggy door in the laundry room saved her from returning to ruined carpets and floors. However, her long work hours at the paper made Rocky aggressive whenever he did see her. But it couldn’t be helped. Ever since Abrianna Parker blew back into her life, nothing had been the same. First, Abrianna had been framed for murdering the speaker of the House by none other than the new chief justice of the Supreme Court and the president of the United States. Shortly after, news of Abrianna’s billionaire father running a child-sex trafficking ring out of a famous D.C. country club hit the media circuit, and things got crazier, leaving a trail of dead bodies everywhere.

When Abrianna brought Tomi the whole story on a silver platter, it made her the hottest reporter on Capitol Hill. Not only was she was a rising star in print, but she was fast becoming a regular on the cable news circuit. However, chasing the story about Abrianna’s father may have cost her Abrianna’s trust. That saddened her. She and Abrianna shared a horrific past. When they were teenagers, they’d been kidnapped and tortured by D.C.’s serial killer Craig Avery—however, recently, they had discovered that Avery was more of a mad scientist who once worked for some quasi-paramilitary firm. And the crazy concoctions Avery used to inject them with killed all but three girls: Tomi, Abrianna, and Shalisa Young. After Shalisa took a headlong dive off the building of a government psychiatric hospital, Tomi and Abrianna were the only survivors.

At home, Tomi took a couple of steps into the house before her big baby knocked her down.

“Okay, boy. Get off of me.” She laughed.

Rocky ignored her. Instead, he slobbered and licked her face.

Tomi sat up. “Aww. Did you miss momma, huh?” She scratched behind his ears the way he liked it and was rewarded with more kisses.

Thump!

Tomi and Rocky froze.

“What was that?” she asked.

Rocky’s ears pointed up as he cocked his head from side to side.

Tomi pushed her hundred-pound baby off of her and climbed to her feet. Had the sound come from upstairs or the basement? She looked to Rocky, but he just stared back. “You’re a lot of help, you know that?”

Leaving her bag and purse on the floor, Tomi went for the .38 holstered at her back. “C’mon, boy.” She and the dog crept to the basement door.

Heart pounding, Tomi turned the knob and then cringed when the rusted hinges announced to the whole world that she was opening the door. She hit the light switch, but it lit only the top of the stairs and not the basement.

She stood there, cringing. In the three years that she’d lived in the townhouse, she’d only been in the basement three times before. A psychiatrist wasn’t needed to tell her why. Of the three Avery survivors, Tomi had been huddled in the mad scientist’s basement the longest. Ten months. Ten months of hellish torture, watching other teenage girls die around her and scared every second that she would be next.

He’s not down there. It was silly that she had to say that as she coached herself down each step, determined to conquer her fear. At some point, she’d stopped breathing. She was sure of it. However, her heart sounded like an African drum in her ears as she crept along. At the bottom of the stairs, she hit the second switch and flooded the room with light.

Nothing.

Other than boxed summer clothes and home tools, the coast was clear.

Relieved, Tomi sighed and lowered her weapon. “I’m going crazy.” She rolled her eyes and marched back up the staircase.

Rocky sat on his haunches at the top of the stairs, panting happily at her return. She closed the basement door.

“Thanks for having my back.”

Rocky barked.

“Yeah, yeah. I’m going. I’m going.” She holstered her weapon and headed to the kitchen. As she crossed the living room, she noticed the lace curtains billowing, the sliding glass door open. “What in the hell?” She shifted direction from the kitchen to the dining room.

A disappointed Rocky whined.

Tomi palmed her weapon again and performed another slow creep. The closer she got to the open door, the louder Rocky whined. When she reached the door and glanced out into the backyard, again she didn’t see anything. She relaxed, but then her entire scalp tingled. Instinct made her duck. The sliding door exploded and became a cascade of shattered glass. Rocky barked wildly. Tomi quickly crawled out of the dining room.

However, her shooter wasn’t outside. He was in the house.

She heard another suppressed gunshot.

Rocky cried out and then hit the floor, hard.

Tomi’s scream died in her throat when a hand gripped the back of her head and snatched her to her feet. A needle was jammed into her neck. Her eyes widened as the plunger emptied a drug into her bloodstream. A poisonous fireball roared through her veins, closing off her throat and shutting off her oxygen. She dropped her weapon and slumped into a man’s arms, but before she blacked out, she heard more gunfire. Her attacker released her to return fire.

She hit the floor with a thump! Eyes still wide open, Tomi had an unobstructed view of Rocky’s still body. Her big baby. Were they now going to watch each other die? Tears swelled and blurred her vision. Smoke. Fire. Her townhouse was going up in flames.

Just before losing consciousness, she was picked up and carried out of her townhouse and into a waiting van. The last faces she saw were Dr. Zacher and Jayson Brigham.

The Bunker . . .

In the bowels of Washington, D.C., Douglas “Ghost” Jenkins, a lifelong hacktivist, paced inside his underground bunker while he replayed a news clip for Kadir and Abrianna.

Ghost shut off the television and swung his gaze toward Abrianna and Kadir. “So, what do you guys want to do?”

Abrianna broke eye contact. “I’m not sure there is anything we can do.”

Ghost’s brows rose—then he took in her body language. The stiff back, crossed arms with her hands gripping her biceps, and the stiff jaw. He stepped back while his eyes narrowed. “What did I miss?”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“What do I mean? A month ago you were down my ass about how we needed to protect this chick from these T4S assholes, and now you’re acting like you couldn’t care less if the bitch lives or dies.”

“That’s not true.” Abrianna stood but turned her back.

Ghost’s gaze shifted to Kadir. “You want to give it another try to sound more convincing?”

Kadir pulled a deep breath. “I’m not exactly sure what the hell it is you think we should do, either. T4S is a heavily armed paramilitary mammoth. If we storm that place like a Z-list A-Team, it would be suicide.”

“So, tough shit for Ms. Lehane. Is that it?”

“Nobody said that,” Kadir responded defensively. “First of all, we don’t know for sure that they have her.”

Ghost opened his mouth.

“I admit there’s a good chance that they do have her,” Kadir cut him off. “But Lehane is a reporter. She could be out of town or on assignment. We don’t know yet. And if they do have her, they could have shipped her to any one of the facilities around the world.”

“I’m still hearing ‘fuck that bitch,’” Ghost said. “And nobody is telling me why. I thought this chick was one of the good guys. Has that changed?”

Silence.

“Ah, I see.” Ghost sighed. “This has something to do with that last article she wrote about your parents.” He nodded to Abrianna.

“My adopted parents.”

Ghost’s brows inched toward to the center of his forehead. “Okay, Team Petty. Enough. You’re pissed off. I get it. But you guys gotta put that shit to the side. A woman’s life is at stake. That used to mean something to you.”

“It still does,” Abrianna snapped. “But Kadir is right. We don’t know for sure what happened. If T4S did pull this off, we need a real plan on how to get her out. You have guns; well, they have more guns. And they have powerful friends and the protection of the government. Whatever we do decide to do to get her out of there, it has to be smart.”

“What if they kill her?” Ghost asked.

“They won’t,” Abrianna assured. “I don’t know what they want with her—”

“Or you,” Ghost countered. “They put out an extraction order for you, too. Remember? If these motherfuckers are bold enough to take out a famous reporter like Lehane, they will be just as bold coming after you, too—again.”

Abrianna and Kadir shared a look.

“Ah, now I have your attention.”

Someone hammered on the bunker’s front door.

Ghost swung his AR-15 toward the door. “Who the fuck is that?”

No one had a clue.

Randall, one of Ghost’s hacktivist/militiamen, punched up the digital feed from the security camera.

At the familiar sight of Abrianna’s three best friends, Julian, Draya, and Shawn White, Ghost groaned, “I gotta find another spot. This place gets more foot traffic than a gay club’s bathroom.”

“Sorry about that,” Abrianna apologized. “I sent out a 911 text on our way over here.”

Ghost rolled his eyes and then opened the large metal door.

“Is everything all right?” Draya rushed inside. “We came as fast as we could.” She rushed over and wrapped an arm around Abrianna and then checked her over. “You good?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“It’s her reporter friend who is in trouble,” Ghost filled them in, closing the door. “T4S snatched her up and set her place on fire as a cover-up.”

Draya’s eyes grew large. “What? Tomi Lehane?”

“At least that’s Ghost’s hypothesis,” Abrianna corrected, not convinced.

“What are we going to do?” Julian asked. “You guys have a plan?”

“Yes,” Ghost said.

“No,” Kadir and Abrianna barked at the same time.

Shawn chuckled. “Glad you guys cleared that up.” He folded his arms and swung his gaze around the room. “Did we interrupt a cat fight?”

“No fight.” Abrianna forced a smile. “A disagreement on tactics.” She found Ghost’s gaze again. “If we go in after her, we’ll only get one shot at it. We need to be smart, not reckless. That’s all I’m saying.”

Ghost thrust up his chin and re-evaluated her. “Fine. We’ll do this your way. After all, it’s your neck on the line.”

Dr. Charles Zacher was dying—and he knew it.

At last check, he had three tumors growing in his head, which were responsible for his crippling headaches, endless puking, and sporadic nosebleeds, which always happened at inopportune times. The worse part was he had no one to blame but himself. He’d spent years trying to replicate Dr. Craig Avery’s human experiments. He had no choice. His professional neck was still stretched beneath a corporate guillotine.

T4S wanted and expected results. After all, they’d poured billions into his research and development department.

Zacher doubled over his office’s bathroom and retched more blood than food into the toilet. Once he started, it was impossible to stop. After an eternity, his stomach muscles cramped into a large charley horse and made it impossible for him to stand back up. The madness continued until he passed out. When he woke, his head was pressed against the bowl’s cold porcelain, his neck had a crick in it, and his stomach was empty.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

“Dr. Z,” Ned queried from the other side of the door. “Are you in there?”

Dr. Z clutched his head.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

“Dr. Z?”

“Stop hammering on the damn door. I’ll be out in a minute.”

The banging stopped, but Ned lingered at the door. Zacher could hear his thoughts humming through the door. “Get me a coffee,” he barked.

“Yes, sir. Right away.”

Zacher rolled his eyes and peeled himself off of the floor. He took one look inside the bowl and frowned in disgust before flushing the toilet. After he shuffled over to the sink and braced his weight against the counter, he looked in the mirror and didn’t recognize the man staring back at him. At least, not at first. Years were stripped off his sixty-five-year-old face. His once gray hair was now a rich black with springy, coiled curls not seen on his head in almost three decades. But his eyes were bloodshot, and his nose was swollen like he’d done enough coke to knock out a horse. There were also dried blood and vomit caked on his face.

This is going to take more than a minute.

It took twenty. But Zacher was refreshed after a shower.

“Your coffee, sir.” Ned thrust Zacher’s favorite mug toward him.

Zacher touched the cup. “It’s cold.”

“Um, yes, sir. Sorry about that, sir.”

“Get me another cup.” Zacher dismissed him with a wave.

“Right away, sir.” Ned jetted out of Zacher’s office.

Zacher returned to his desk and saw he’d left his latest blood test results exposed. Quickly, he shoved the new reports into his personal file and crammed it back into his desk before Ned blew back into the office.

“Here you go, Dr. Z. Nice and hot.” Ned set down the mug and beamed at his boss.

“Thanks.”

“My pleasure, sir.”

Zacher pulled out another stack of test results. “How is our test subject doing?”

Ned coughed and cleared his throat. “She is still stable, sir.”

“Still hasn’t woken up yet?”

“No, sir.”

Zacher shook his head. “All right . . . keep me posted.”

“Yes, sir.” Ned lingered.

Zacher sighed. He was befuddled by this latest turn of events. The propofol injected into Ms. Lehane during the extraction should have long worn off and evaporated out of her system by now. It was only a sleeping agent, commonly used by millions of anesthesiologist across the country. It was meant to put her in a deep sleep, not make the woman comatose. But Tomi Lehane wasn’t the typical patient, and the general anesthetic had a different effect.

In the meantime, it didn’t stop Zacher from running tests. He needed to break the code to what was happening with Tomi Lehane’s DNA. If he could do that, he could advance T4S’s interest—and save his own life.

Abrianna and Kadir rode home in a cocoon of silence, but at the same time, the air between them was filled with the things they couldn’t say. No matter how many times Abrianna shrugged off any guilt for Tomi’s situation, it crept back onto her shoulders and weighed her down. “I made the right call,” she blurted out.

Kadir nodded but kept his hands on the wheel at ten and two and his eyes on the road.

“Don’t tell me you think we should’ve blasted our way onto the T4S compound to rescue Tomi?”

“Nah. You made the right call,” he admitted.

“Then why the hard face and the silent treatment?”

Kadir sighed and weighed his words. He cast a look at Abrianna, but her face was an unreadable mask. “Aren’t you the least bit worried about her?”

Her features pinched together. “Why wouldn’t I worry? What kind of question is that?”

His gaze returned to the road while tension layered the space between them. Abrianna seethed. She shouldn’t have to explain anything to anyone. Her relationship with Tomi was . . . complicated—and not the social media kind. It was a real-life, multilayered, 3D jigsaw puzzle. The months that she, Tomi, and Shalisa were huddled in Dr. Craig Avery’s basement weren’t building blocks for some long-lasting sisterhood—far from it. It was months of listening to each other’s harrowing screams and watching other teenage girls die on tables or sitting in their own sick.

Dr. Avery stripped away their femininity and their humanity. They were treated like lab rats. They endured poison after poison being injected into their veins, while wondering and praying for death to save them. And like an evil bitch, death would never come.

When Lieutenant Gizella Castillo and her men charged into that basement to rescue them, it had been a miracle—the first one Abrianna had ever experienced. She came close to believing in some higher power, but the universe was only playing with her. The police were going to hand her back over to her parents.

Abrianna landing in the clutches of Dr. Avery in the first place had been a cruel twist of fate. She was fourteen years old and had gathered the courage to run away from her evil adoptive father. Cargill Parker was a sick fuck who had raped her and her brother, Samuel, almost nightly. Cargill was rich and powerful. He controlled everyone around him, including Marion, her adoptive mother. For years, Abrianna had dreamed of running away. Then one day, the opportunity presented itself, and she ran—only to land in Avery’s clutches.

“I need some air.” She hit the automatic button and rolled down the window. The night’s cold air nearly froze the tears on her face.

Kadir placed a hand over hers and squeezed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “The question was out of line.”

“No.” She shook her head. “It wasn’t.”

“I’m worried about you.”

“I’m mad, and I’m worried about Tomi. That’s okay, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. Sure.”

Abrianna sucked in a breath. “I want to go and see her place.”

Kadir frowned. “Do you think that’s wise? What if those guys from T4S have the place staked out?”

“Yeah, you’re right.” She powered up the window.

Kadir sighed. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to swing by.” He glanced at her. “You’ll go all tingling and shit if you sense danger, right?”

“Let’s hope.”

After looking at reports of Tomi’s home fire on her phone, Abrianna and Kadir drove to the reported address.

“I believe that this is it,” Kadir said after being lucky enough to find a parking space across from the burned-out townhouse.

“Oh my God.” Abrianna stared up at it in horror. She took in the total destruction that included the two townhouses next to the charred and hollowed-out place. She reached for the door handle.

“Where are you going?” Kadir asked.

“I want to get a better look.” Abrianna climbed out of the car.

“I don’t think that’s a good—“

Slam!

“—idea,” Kadir grumbled as he climbed out of the car. While Abrianna jogged halfway across the street, he grabbed a flashlight from the trunk. When he caught up to her, he took her by the elbow. “I have a bad feeling about this.”

“Chill out. It’ll only take a few minutes.” She broke free from his grip and then ducked underneath the yellow crime tape and jogged up the stone staircase to a ruined townhouse.

Kadir swept a bright light across the charred structure. “This was some intense heat. Are we sure that someone didn’t drop a bomb on this place?”

“I was thinking the same thing.” Abrianna glanced around.

“Are you looking for something in particular?”

Abrianna hesitated because she was looking for something—only she didn’t know what. “I’m trying to figure out how it started.”

“The papers said the fire marshal hasn’t figured that out yet. At least, the marshal hasn’t released it to the press.”

“Yeah.” She looked around again.

They lingered a while longer—long enough to make Kadir uncomfortable.

“Have you seen enough?” he asked.

Abrianna hesitated again before admitting, “Yeah, I guess.”

“Then we should get out of here. I don’t like being out in the open like this.”

Abrianna hitched up a smile and almost laughed at him when the back of her head tingled. “Yeah, you’re right. We better go.” She tried to keep the alarm out of her voice, but Kadir picked up on it.

“What? Are we being watched?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Come on.”

He reached for her hand just as the entire back of her head went from a tingle to a burning sensation. “Duck!”

Kadir trusted her and did as she commanded, no questions asked. A bullet whizzed by his head, clipping his right earlobe. “Fuck!”

“Are you all right?” she asked.

There was no time to answer. Another bullet zoomed past, and then in the next second, a hailstorm of lead flew in their direction.

Abrianna went for the Tiffany-blue Glock .45 tucked at the back of her black jeans and wildly returned fire. She had no confidence she aimed in the right direction.

“Keep moving,” Kadir shouted. It was his turn to bark the orders. They rushed toward the back of the burned-out structure and down another flight of steps into the backyard. From there, they ran blindly, unsure of where to go.

House lights turned on up and down the residential street, and the gunfire stopped.

“Bree, hold up,” Kadir shouted.

Abrianna kept running like a human cheetah with her scalp still tingling.

“Bree!”

She turned to shout back, but then something slammed into her neck. Her legs tripped over air as she fell forward.

“Abrianna!” Kadir launched forward and caught her before she cracked her head open on the street’s pavement. Tires screeched, and Kadir glanced up in time to see a black van charging toward him.

“Shit!” Kadir tossed Abrianna over his shoulder and was prepared to take off running when the van’s door jerked open, and Ghost and Roger shouted, “Get in!”

Relief swept through Kadir. Ghost had a knack for showing up at the right moment. He raced and dove into the van while the damn thing was still in motion. When he and Abrianna landed on the carpeted floor, he heard another series of bullets slam into the van’s windows. Glass cascaded over him, but Ghost floored it, and they rocketed out of danger.

Ghost swore. “I swear you two can’t follow simple directions like: ‘Go somewhere safe.’”

Kadir hung his head while Ghost continued, “I swear people think I talk for my health.”

“Let it go, Ghost.”

Ghost rolled his eyes. “Letting it go.”

Roger crouched over Kadir and Abrianna. “Is she going to be all right?”

“When isn’t she?” Ghost barked from behind the wheel. “That girl can take a licking and keep on ticking.”

Kadir’s jaws clenched as he struggled to squash his annoyance. Yes, Abrianna tended to heal quickly, but there was always the possibility of the one time that she wouldn’t.

“Is there something sticking out her neck?” Roger asked.

“What? Where?” Kadir brushed his fingers along the column of Abrianna’s neck.

“Right side. Near the back.”

Kadir felt it. “What the fuck?” He yanked the object out and held it up. “Ghost, hit the light.”

Ghost grumbled but turned on the interior light.

“It’s some kind of dart,” Roger marveled.

“Tranquilizer gun,” Kadir and Ghost said at the same time, but Kadir added a stream of expletives.

“You know what this means?”

“The extraction order is still in effect,” Kadir answered.

Ghost nodded. “Can I say it now?”

Kadir sighed. “Make it quick.”

“I told you so.”

“Feel better?” Kadir asked.

“You have no idea. What now?”

It was on the tip of Kadir’s lips to say that they needed a doctor. However, Abrianna had made it clear during several previous life-or-death incidents that she was never to be taken to a doctor. “What about your off-the-grid warehouse pad?”

Ghost rolled his eyes. “Why not? You guys have practically turned the place into a bed and breakfast anyway.”

Kadir smirked. “Thanks, buddy.”

Ghost grumbled.

Kadir leaned over Abrianna’s still form and brushed a kiss against her lips. “Hang in there, baby. I’m going to get you somewhere safe.”

Abrianna heard Kadir’s voice, but it was faint and sounded far away. She tried to run toward him, but instead, she tumbled into the past and into Dr. Craig Avery’s basement of horror where she begged for death.

She tossed and turned throughout her fevered nightmare. Everywhere she turned, evil’s razor-sharp claws slashed across her body. She screamed, terrified. Visions of being strapped to a pole and then spun over a fiery pit filled her head. In the distance, she could hear maniacal laughter, but she couldn’t make out where it came from.

“Please! Let me go,” she shouted and begged. Hot tears scalded while they streaked across her face. The more tears she shed, the louder the laughter grew. Her pain had never meant anything to anyone. Hadn’t she learned that lesson already?

The pole turned, spinning her over a growing pit of fire. The closer the flames came toward her face, the louder she screamed and fought to get loose. Somewhere in the recesses of her mind, she knew this torture wasn’t real. She’d been here before. If she could wake up, she would be able to prove it.

But no matter how loud she got, the torture went on forever.

“Wake up! Please!”

The fire singed every hair on her body while her skin blistered and curdled. Surely, she was cooking from the inside out. Her grip on reality waned. Maybe this horror was really happening. She would die roasting over this pit, and there was nothing she could do about it.

“Pleeeaassee wake up,” she sobbed.

“There, there. Everything is going to be fine,” Kadir soothed from the great beyond.

For a brief, miraculous moment, something cool pressed against her forehead. She attempted to lean into it, but the coolness disappeared as fast as it came. The fire below resumed its endless torture.

“No, please,” she cried.

Kadir’s cool touch returned. “It’s all right.”

She sighed, too exhausted to build up hope. . . .