Chapter 12 - The Traitor in the Badge
The black SUV rolled slowly toward the school parking lot.
Its windows were completely tinted.
No license plate was visible on the front bumper.
I turned from the window so fast that my chair scraped across the floor.
"Mercer."
He looked up immediately.
"What is it?"
I pointed outside.
"Sullivan."
"He's on the phone."
"And that SUV..."
"...it's heading this way."
Mercer's expression sharpened.
He moved to the window without hesitation.
Outside, Sullivan casually ended his call and slipped his phone into his pocket.
The black SUV accelerated.
Not fast enough to attract attention.
Just fast enough to reach the front entrance within seconds.
Mercer's voice became ice cold.
"Everyone away from the windows."
Agent Torres was already moving.
She drew her service weapon.
"Rebecca."
"Get Claire into the hallway."
Rebecca grabbed my arm.
"This way."
We had barely reached the interior corridor when tires screeched outside.
A car door slammed.
Then another.
Mercer shouted from the front office.
"Police!"
"Show me your hands!"
Instead of answering...
Someone fired.
The first gunshot shattered the front glass doors.
Children in nearby classrooms began screaming.
Teachers rushed students into locked rooms.
The school instantly went into lockdown.
Another shot rang out.
Then another.
Rebecca pulled me behind a concrete support wall.
"Stay down!"
My heart pounded so hard I could barely hear anything else.
Agent Torres moved toward the entrance with two uniformed officers.
"Cover the east side!"
"I'll take the lobby!"
Mercer crouched behind the reception desk.
"Sullivan!"
"Where are you?"
No answer.
Mercer risked a quick glance around the corner.
Sullivan was gone.
His police jacket lay on the floor.
His badge.
His radio.
Both abandoned.
"He planned this."
Mercer whispered.
"He was never trapped inside."
Outside, tires screamed again.
The SUV sped away before backup units could block the exit.
The shooting had lasted less than thirty seconds.
Just enough to create chaos.
Nothing more.
Within minutes, additional patrol cars flooded the area.
SWAT officers secured the building.
Parents gathered behind police barricades, desperate for information about their children.
Fortunately, no students had been injured.
The attackers hadn't come for the school.
They had come for us.
An hour later, investigators reviewed the surveillance footage.
Mercer watched every second.
"There."
He froze the video.
The SUV stopped briefly outside the entrance.
A rear window rolled down.
A masked man fired several rounds toward the lobby.
Then the vehicle immediately pulled away.
No one even attempted to enter the building.
"It was a diversion."
Rebecca said quietly.
Mercer nodded.
"But for what?"
Agent Torres stepped into the room carrying a sealed evidence bag.
"We found this."
Inside was Sullivan's police radio.
Mercer frowned.
"He left it behind?"
"No."
Torres shook her head.
"It was hidden behind a vending machine."
She removed a folded piece of paper from the evidence bag.
"Apparently he wanted someone to find this."
Mercer unfolded it.
There were no fingerprints.
Only one handwritten sentence.
The judge knows everything.
Rebecca stared at the note.
"Judge Miller."
Mercer nodded.
"Looks like he's no longer just a family friend."
A crime scene technician entered with another report.
"We traced Sullivan."
Mercer looked up.
"And?"
"His real name isn't Sullivan."
The room became silent.
"What?"
"He transferred into the department eight months ago."
"But every employment record before that..."
"...is fake."
Agent Torres folded her arms.
"So we've had an undercover infiltrator wearing a badge."
The technician nodded.
"We still don't know his real identity."
Mercer looked toward the ceiling for a long moment.
"They've been inside this investigation from the beginning."
Rebecca added quietly,
"Which means every warrant..."
"Every interview..."
"Every piece of evidence..."
"...could have been reported back to the Caldwells."
A heavy silence settled over the room.
Everything suddenly made sense.
The anonymous threats.
The break-in.
Victor Kane's murder.
Someone had always been one step ahead.
Because someone had been listening.
Mercer's phone buzzed.
He answered immediately.
His face changed after only a few seconds.
"When?"
He listened carefully.
"I'll be there."
He hung up.
"What now?"
Rebecca asked.
Mercer looked directly at me.
"We found Maya."
Hope surged through me.
"Is she okay?"
He hesitated.
"They found her car."
My heart sank.
"Where?"
"Parked outside an abandoned winery."
"And Maya?"
Mercer slowly shook his head.
"She wasn't inside."
Agent Torres spoke before anyone else could.
"What about Emma?"
Mercer's voice was barely above a whisper.
"There was only one thing inside the vehicle."
He reached into his folder and placed a small photograph on the table.
I picked it up.
It was Emma.
Smiling.
Holding a stuffed rabbit.
Across the bottom of the picture, someone had written a message in black marker.
Tick... Tock...
Before I could process it, another officer rushed into the room.
"Detective!"
"What is it?"
"We just got a call."
"From who?"
The officer swallowed hard.
"The caller wouldn't identify himself."
"What did he say?"
The officer looked directly at me.
"He said..."
May you like
"...if Claire wants Emma alive..."
"...she has exactly twenty-four hours to hand over something called Project Harbor."
