This local cop wasn't just clearing an intersection on a blind hunch. He wasn't acting on a lucky guess or intercepting radio chatter with a civilian scanner. He was watching a live, classified federal feed. He was tracking the President’s exact coordinates in real time.
That feed was restricted to a closed-loop internal server. It could not be hacked from a squad car. It could not be intercepted by local law enforcement. The only way that specific encrypted tracker was displaying on a civilian tablet in a rogue cop's vehicle was if someone deep inside our own command center had actively bypassed the firewall, mirrored the feed, and pushed the live data out to Mitchell's device.
The betrayal wasn't just Mitchell. The threat was coming from inside my own detail. Someone with high-level clearance had deliberately stationed me at this exact intersection, knowing Mitchell would be waiting in the shadows to physically remove me right before the trap was sprung.
And Mitchell had left my gun in its holster.
The realization hit me like a physical blow to the chest. He hadn't bypassed the weapon out of laziness or a rush. He left it on my hip on purpose. When the motorcade was hit, and the inevitable chaotic aftermath flooded this intersection with federal investigators, they were going to find my abandoned vehicle in the grass. And they were going to find me—a fully armed federal agent who had seemingly abandoned his post, turned off his comms, and allowed the perimeter to fall. I wasn't just being removed from the board; I was being actively framed as the insider who facilitated the breach.
The alphanumeric timer on the tablet ticked down. Seven minutes.
Waiting for standard backup was no longer an option. Protocol was a death sentence. If I stayed in the back of this cruiser, the motorcade was going to drive straight into an ambush, and I was going to take the fall for a presidential assassination.
I slid down off the slick plastic bench, wedging my back tightly against the rear driver's side door. The footwell was incredibly tight, designed to restrict the movement of violent prisoners. I pulled my knees up tightly toward my chest, curling my body into a tight, agonizing ball. I forced my wrists down past my waistline, the cold steel of the handcuffs catching painfully on my heavy leather duty belt.
I took a sharp, shallow breath, held it, and shoved my left boot toward my locked hands.
The metal cuffs bit brutally into my skin, tearing through the top layer of flesh on my wrist as I forced the heel of my boot through the narrow loop of my arms. Blood instantly slickened the steel, warm and slick against my palms. I gritted my teeth, swallowing a sharp groan as I twisted my body to the side, fighting for another two inches of clearance. I shoved my right boot through.
The contortion pulled my shoulders backward to their absolute physical breaking point. My right rotator cuff popped with a loud, sickening crack. A blinding spike of white-hot pain shot straight up my neck, blurring my vision and forcing tears into my eyes. I didn't stop moving. I couldn't stop. I threw my weight forward, pulling my arms aggressively under my boots, dragging the steel chain over the soles of my shoes.
My hands cleared my feet, snapping up in front of my chest.
I gasped for air, my chest heaving in the stale heat of the cruiser. My right shoulder throbbed with a deep, grinding agony, and fresh blood dripped steadily from my torn wrists onto the plastic floorboards. But my hands were in front of me.
I reached down to my right hip. My fingers wrapped securely around the familiar, textured grip of my federal-issue Glock 19. I drew the weapon from the holster, the metallic slide clicking softly in the dark cabin. I kept my finger off the trigger, resting it flat along the frame, and pressed the heavy steel barrel directly against the reinforced plexiglass divider.
Through the front windshield, I saw a shadow moving in the amber glow of the streetlights. Mitchell was walking back from my discarded Charger, rolling his heavy shoulders, completely confident that the intersection was fully prepped and his prisoner was securely packaged for the aftermath.
He reached for the driver's side door handle. I adjusted my grip on the Glock, bracing my bleeding wrists together to steady my aim. I was done asking for his badge number.
CHAPTER 2 CONTINUED
I ignored the grinding agony radiating from my dislocated right shoulder. I wedged my left boot against the floorboard for leverage, braced my bleeding wrists tightly against the lower plastic rim of the partition window, and pressed the heavy steel barrel of my federal-issue Glock 19 directly into the thin gap where the plexiglass met the reinforced seat backing.
"Reach up and unlock the rear doors," I said.
My voice was low, rasping from the dry heat of the cage, but it cut through the silence of the cabin like a blade. Mitchell’s broad shoulders instantly locked up. He froze, his hands hovering inches from the steering wheel. Slowly, deliberately, his eyes flicked up to the rearview mirror. He saw my battered face pressed against the scratched plastic. He saw the cold, black muzzle of the weapon aimed directly through the seat at the base of his spine. He realized immediately that he had made a fatal assumption about my hands.
But Mitchell didn't surrender. His right elbow flared outward as his hand dropped aggressively toward the heavy leather duty holster sitting on his right hip.
I didn't wait for him to clear the leather. I pulled the trigger.