Chapter 1 - THE BADGE KARA NEVER EXPECTED TO SEEKara Vale looked like she could barely stand.
One hand held the curve of her stomach.
The other pressed against her lower back.
Her face twisted in pain beneath the weak yellow glow of a roadside light outside Cleveland.
“Please!”
Her voice cracked.
“Please help me!”
Wade Mercer saw her from nearly fifty yards away.
He slowed his motorcycle.
The road was dark, narrow, and nearly empty.
Industrial buildings sat farther back behind chain-link fences.
No businesses appeared open.
No other vehicles were stopped.
Wade’s first instinct was caution.
His second was harder to ignore.
A pregnant woman appeared stranded.
He pulled over.
“You okay?”
Kara bent forward.
“My sister’s house is up ahead.”
“You need an ambulance?”
“No.”
She shook her head quickly.
“No ambulance. Please. I just need to get there.”
Wade looked around.
“No car?”
“It broke down. My phone died.”
“Where is it?”
She pointed behind her.
“Back there.”
Wade saw nothing.
Kara whimpered.
“Please. It’s not far.”
Wade should have questioned more.
He would think about that later.
But right then, she looked frightened.
Cold.
Pregnant.
Alone.
“Helmet?”
“I don’t have one.”
“It’s not safe.”
“I know.”
She grabbed his sleeve.
“Please.”
Wade hesitated.
Then nodded toward the passenger seat.
“Five minutes. No farther.”
Relief covered her face.
“Thank you.”
She climbed on carefully.
For the first two minutes, nothing happened.
Kara occasionally pointed.
“Straight.”
Then:
“Left up here.”
The street became darker.
The buildings disappeared.
Trees replaced warehouses.
Wade slowed.
“How much farther?”
“Almost there.”
Another quarter mile.
No houses.
No driveways.
No lights.
Wade’s unease sharpened.
He began turning his head.
Then two men stepped onto the road ahead.
Wade stopped.
Another pair emerged behind him.
Four men.
Two front.
Two back.
The space tightened instantly.
Kara climbed off.
And stood straight.
No pain.
No hand against her back.
No trembling.
Wade watched her reach beneath her coat.
She unfastened something around her waist.
The large pregnant belly came away from her body.
Foam.
Straps.
Fabric.
Fake.
She threw it beside the road.
Then smiled.
“Turn it off.”
Wade said nothing.
One of the men stepped closer.
“Engine.”
Wade calmly switched off the motorcycle.
Kara extended her hand.
“Keys.”
He removed them.
“Wallet.”
Wade looked at her.
“Phone too.”
Still no panic.
That bothered Kara.
Her smile faded slightly.
“What are you looking at?”
Wade glanced at each man.
Youngest perhaps twenty-five.
Oldest near forty.
Faces partly shadowed.
One held a tire iron down beside his leg.
Another kept both hands in his jacket pockets.
Wade did not assume what was inside them.
He didn’t need to.
Five against one.
Bad odds remained bad odds whether you wore a badge or not.
“Wallet,” Kara repeated.
Wade slowly reached inside his jacket.
All four men tensed.
“Easy,” one warned.
Wade removed a small leather wallet.
Nothing else.
He opened it.
Kara saw the shield first.
Then the identification card.
CLEVELAND POLICE DEPARTMENT.
For one second, nobody moved.
Kara’s smile vanished completely.
One man whispered:
“Oh, hell.”
Wade looked directly at her.
“Still want the wallet?”
Nobody answered.
The youngest man took one step backward.
Then another man—stockier, wearing a dark knit cap—stared at Wade’s identification.
His expression changed differently.
Not only fear.
Recognition.
“Mercer?”
Wade heard it.
So did Kara.
She turned.
“You know him?”
The man said nothing.
Wade’s pulse changed.
He hadn’t given his name aloud.
The badge was visible, but the man was standing too far away to read it easily in the darkness.
“You know me?” Wade asked.
The man looked away.
Kara snapped:
“Darnell.”
There.
A name.
Darnell.
Wade stored it immediately.
Kara stepped toward him.
“Everybody shut up.”
Wade remained beside the motorcycle.
“I’m off duty.”
Darnell looked at him.
“That supposed to make us feel better?”
“No.”
Wade closed the wallet.
“It means I don’t have backup standing ten feet away.”
Kara seemed to relax slightly.
That interested him.
Then Wade continued.
“But you should probably think carefully about what happens if five people rob a police officer and leave him standing on a road.”
The youngest man looked toward the trees.
“We should go.”
Kara glared at him.
“Shut up.”
Darnell stepped closer.
“He has something.”
“What?” Kara asked.
“The phone.”
Kara’s eyes returned to Wade.
Suddenly the demand changed.
“Give me your phone.”
Wade noticed.
Not the bike.
Not money.
The phone.
Why?
He removed it slowly.
Kara’s attention locked onto the screen.
“Unlock it.”
Wade’s suspicion became certainty.
This was not a normal roadside robbery.
They wanted something specific.
“What are you looking for?”
Kara’s eyes flickered.
“Unlock it.”
A truck appeared far down the road.
Headlights.
Still distant.
But approaching.
The youngest man turned.
“Car.”
“It’s a truck,” Darnell said.
Kara cursed.
“Take the keys and move.”
Nobody moved fast enough.
The headlights grew brighter.
Wade raised his voice.
“Bad place to stay.”
Kara stared at him.
For one second, anger and fear fought across her face.
Then she turned.
“Go!”
The four men scattered toward the tree line.
Darnell stopped only long enough to look back.
Wade saw his face clearly beneath the roadside light.
Then Darnell disappeared.
Kara ran after them.
The truck thundered past minutes later.
It never stopped.
Wade remained alone beside the silent motorcycle.
His keys lay ten feet away where Kara had dropped them.
The fake pregnancy belly remained beside the ditch.
And near it—
something small blinked faintly in the grass.
A phone.
Not Wade’s.
Kara’s.
She had dropped it while running.
Wade picked it up by the edges.
The screen lit.
One message was visible without unlocking it.
MASON: Did Mercer give you the phone?
Wade stopped breathing.
Mason.
There were thousands of Masons in Ohio.
But Wade knew one who had asked him about his phone earlier that same day.
His best friend of fifteen years.
May you like
Mason Drake.
And suddenly the badge was no longer the most important thing revealed on that dark road.
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