Page 16 of Rekindle My Heart

Chapter 5

Ryan crept along the hollowed-out building in full fatigues, his M4 at the ready. He was entering the kill box and knew it but didn’t have a choice. His teammates chattered in his headset.

“Go left,” RipCord15 shouted in his ear.

“Enemy fire coming in hot.” the new guy yelled. He couldn’t be more than twelve, Ryan guessed by his squeaky voice.

He steadied his breath as he entered the structure. One bogie popped up as he rounded the corner. Two quick shots neutralized him. A second one entered the hollowed-out room from what was left of the stairs, bullets zinging as he descended. Ryan dove for cover, spraying a pattern of bullets in his wake. The enemy collapsed and tumbled down the last few steps.

Hoots and hollers echoed in his ear as his teammates celebrated his success.

His chest puffed up for a second before he realized he had to cross the open courtyard. He checked his supplies and health. Half health and no ammo. But he still had a grenade in his hip pocket. It was now or never.

He swept left, then right. Clear. He started to run. Two steps and he’d reach his injured teammate.

His head swiveled as he ran, surveying the battlefield.

Hustle. Hustle. One more step.

Bam! Red flashed on the screen. He was dead.

“Dirty, rotten, chicken fucker.” KarFire89. That asshole killed him again.

Ripping off his headset, he threw it on the couch. “Ugggh.” Placing his hands on his knees, he pushed to stand. His long legs ate up the fifteen feet of carpet in his living room.

Breathe. This was supposed to be relaxing. Ha. It would be if that prick didn’t have a hard-on for Ryan every time he played. If Ryan were a lesser man, he’d hack into the game and find out who this guy was.

On the desk, his computer beeped.

“Finally.” He crossed to it. The diagnostic he was running on a fire incident report finished.

“Shit.” No traces or trails left from the changes. This was the tenth one that came back the same way. Zip.

This guy was good. Either he was an incredible hacker—Ryan was fair but even he didn’t have the ability to cover his tracks this well, or whoever changed it had admin status and rewrote the file, then wiped the log activity. Either way, Ryan hadn’t gained any clues from the files. He needed to get inside the system.

A yawn snuck up on him. Ryan’s jaw clicked as his mouth opened wide. He checked his watch. After midnight. He’d run the rest of the files tomorrow. Not that he expected to find anything. At least he could cross off the task and move on to the next. Something had to hit.

He scratched his midsection as another yawn snuck up on him. He needed sleep, but his mind wandered over the case.

Maybe Erica found something on her end. He looked at his phone. No. It was too late to call. Not that the time of day ever mattered before.

He dropped his head. Two days. That’s all it took for him to fall back into the old routine of calling her first. But they weren’t friends anymore. Hell, they were barely civil when they did speak.

Setting the phone beside his bed, he moseyed into the bathroom. It took him all of five minutes to do his nighttime routine before he slid under the covers.

Shadows danced across the ceiling as the wind blew the tree branches outside his window. He exhaled. Sinking down into the mattress, he closed his eyes. He wanted sleep. He needed it. Too bad his brain didn’t agree. Even playing Call Of Duty didn’t work to turn off his mind tonight. That would explain why he kept dying spectacularly in the game. He couldn’t get into it.

All the pieces he’d collected so far whirled in his head as he fought to get some sleep.

He rolled to the right, punched his pillow two times, then closed his eyes.

The drug dealer. The SUV. The two victims.

He flopped to the left.

Two.If one was his contact, then who was the other?

And how did the edited fire files fit in? Or did they?