Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 63763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 319(@200wpm)___ 255(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 319(@200wpm)___ 255(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
“I…I don’t know. He’s big. And angry. His fists are bad enough.”
“You’re doing really well, Nina. Keep breathing for me,” I urged. “In through your nose, out through your mouth. I’m staying right here with you.”
I finished building the call in the computer-aided dispatch system, marked it priority, and requested the nearest unit. The system showed 2-Adam-9 only three minutes out.
Glass shattered in the background, and Nina’s breathing hitched. “The window just broke.”
“Stay silent if you need to. I’m still here. Units are rolling.”
She let out a terrified sound, and the line went dead.
“Crap.”
I had her phone number, but it wasn’t safe to call back right now because that would give her location away. All I could do was hope nothing horrible happened to her in the next four minutes. But as I stared at the screen, the incident I’d just created blinked once and vanished.
I pulled up the active screen, and it showed no live calls currently. “What the heck?”
Then I checked the CAD log, but the incident wasn’t there either. As I blinked at the screen, 2-Adam-9’s status flipped to a rollover call six miles in the opposite direction. I checked the active screen again, and the rollover looked like it had been there all along even when I knew darn well nothing had been there a minute ago. It didn’t make any sense. I would’ve thought maybe there was a computer glitch, but that wouldn’t explain a new call suddenly appearing out of thin air.
Something was very wrong here.
I looked down at the legal pad. Every detail I’d written was still there in black ink. Nina was out there, waiting for help that wasn’t coming. I needed to do something for her. Now.
And I knew exactly who to call.
I snatched my personal cell out of the drawer and hit my dad’s number. He answered right away. “Bex? Everything okay?”
“No.” I kept my voice low so the other dispatcher across the room wouldn’t hear. “I just had a 911 from a protected address. Woman named Nina, ex forcing entry through the back window. She’s in her bedroom closet. The entire incident vanished from the system like it never existed, and the unit got flipped to a rollover six miles away that wasn’t there a minute ago.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
He went straight into sheriff mode without second-guessing me.
I heard the click of him keying his portable radio. “2-Adam-7, clear your current and roll code to—”
I provided the address, which he relayed to the deputy before providing him with the other details I’d given. Then he instructed, “I’m en route to dispatch. Keep me updated.”
“Copy, Sheriff. Four minutes out.”
My shoulders slumped at the confirmation Nina would have help soon. Whatever was going on, it had cost her a few extra minutes. Hopefully, the delay wouldn’t come at the steep price of her life.
With that taken care of, Dad growled, “Stay off the console. I’m three minutes from the building.”
I sat frozen in my seat until the side door slammed open and my father strode in, his expression carved from stone. He came straight to my console and braced both hands on the edge of the desk. “Run through it for me again.”
He listened without interrupting, and when I finished, he scrubbed his hand down his face. “Fucking hell.”
His radio crackled, and I squeezed my eyes shut as I waited to hear Nina’s fate.
“Sheriff, 2-Adam-7. I’m on scene. Male subject was inside. Victim is alive but injured. He got to her before we made the door. Medics are rolling. Subject is in custody.”
Some of the tension in my dad’s shoulders eased, but his eyes were still furious.
He looked at me, then swept his gaze across the room. “Nobody touches another terminal. Not one keystroke until I say otherwise.”
The supervisor came out of his office at the tail end of my dad’s announcement. “You can’t just shut down 911, sir.”
“We damn well can,” Dad retorted. “Route all calls to the backup county line.”
Mr. Hendrick bristled. “We only do that in cases of extreme emergency.”
“Which is exactly what we have here.” My dad crossed his arms. “And that’s why I’m calling in Black Castle.”
“That is not the protocol.” Mr. Hendrick shook his head. “And my budget doesn’t—”
“I don’t give a damn about your budget, Hendrick,” Dad interrupted. “The only thing that matters is keeping the people of Sable Canyon safe. We can’t do that if our CAD system is being used against us. And we have no way of knowing if this was an inside job yet, so I’m bringing them in.”
I knew that tone well. My dad was going to call Black Castle…and Cipher would come.
2
CIPHER
The sheriff’s department’s secured rear entrance sat beneath a hard wash of white security light, the camera above the steel door following us as we crossed the service lot shortly after one in the morning. Raines had called Black Castle Security through its official emergency channel, which made the response legitimate. And defensible when his higher-ups eventually demanded to know why he had bypassed protocol. But following procedure would have sent the incident straight to the same technology personnel who maintained the system, and one of them might have been responsible for the compromise.