Cut and Run 4 - Divide and Conquer

far side of
    the bar. He reached out and dragged it over. Coupons. A church tract.
    Generic insurance offers. A flier advertising a nearby car-wash grand
    opening, another announcing a special couples‟ dinner night out at one
    of the other prominent Italian restaurants in the area. He unfolded the
    last one to find only a sheet of paper with messy handwriting.
    But it was clearly his name at the top.
    Zane silently read the few short lines, and the emotions started
    bubbling up again, threatening to choke him.
    Mr. Garrett, Pierce Sutton is the reason you’re blind. He has
    your truck too. You have to stop him before he kills somebody. Please.

    Divide & Conquer | 241

    FOUR days had passed since the teenage girl had been shot outside the
    bank, and the whirlwind was still churning. The public was equal parts
    praising the FBI‟s dedication to keeping Baltimore safe and crucifying
    the “trigger-happy monster” who‟d taken the shot.
    That monster just happened to be the same agent who‟d become
    one of the darlings of the media, but no one knew that. And he was
    missing in action, sent home to lay low yet again until the case was
    done. He kept thrusting himself in the middle of all the trouble, and
    Dan McCoy simply couldn‟t have him around anymore.
    McCoy felt sorry for Ty Grady. Usually he was like a cat: he
    didn‟t necessarily always land on his feet, but he had the uncanny
    ability to twist during the fall and at least land on all fours. He just
    couldn‟t seem to win on this one, though. He was on all fours, all right,
    but McCoy didn't think it was voluntary.
    So McCoy had sent him packing, sending a different agent
    several times a day to check up on him. By all accounts he wasn‟t
    handling the shooting of the girl well. One agent reported that Ty had
    actually uttered the phrase “you kids get off my lawn” when the rookie
    had knocked on his door. McCoy knew that Ty was either messing
    around with them for shits and giggles or he was truly traumatized.
    Truth be told, it was probably a combination of the two.
    On the plus side, Zane Garrett had been released to light duty by
    the Bureau doctor late yesterday and was “officially” back in the office.
    He‟d called in the night of the shooting, having found a letter left at his
    apartment while he was blind, a letter that gave them a name.
    Fingerprints were no help; whoever had handled the paper didn‟t have a
    record, so there was no way to know how the writer had found Zane‟s
    apartment. That still bothered McCoy, as well as Zane‟s team, who had
    all volunteered to continue the protection detail.
    It would have taken a fight to keep Zane out of the office,
    doctor‟s orders or not, so McCoy had Zane brought in—his truck was
    still MIA—sat him down, put his cyber skills to work dredging some
    more nontraditional sources of information, and kept a close eye on
    him.
    242 | Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux

    Pierce Sutton turned out to be a kid and therefore in the wind, not
    at any address his meager records said he might be using and hard to
    pin down. The search continued, as did other aspects of the
    investigation, including the one currently on top of the pile on McCoy‟s
    desk.
    McCoy pushed a button to call for Zane as he perused the file in
    front of him.
    He got an immediate reply. “Garrett.”
    “Get in here,” McCoy grunted as he flipped a page.
    He didn‟t get a verbal answer, but Zane was in his doorway
    within a minute. He was dressed down, in black jeans and boots with a
    nondescript blue button-down, pushing the line of what office dress
    code strictly allowed, and he still looked pretty haggard, hair ruffled
    and face scruffy. McCoy ignored the break in protocol and beckoned
    Zane into his office.
    “Sit down. I need your help with something.”
    Zane hesitated for a beat before moving into the office and taking
    one of the chairs across from him. McCoy looked at him for a moment,
    then down at the file spread out across his desk. Ty Grady‟s file. These
    two were like lightning rods, and any given day, he wasn‟t sure which
    one would draw the most voltage.
    “You doing okay, Zane?”
    Zane snorted quietly. “Better, anyway.”
    McCoy nodded, looking Zane over critically. Zane‟s eyes were
    still bloodshot enough that he could see the red in them from seven feet
    away, but he decided the answer would do for now. “Have you heard
    from Grady?”
    Zane sat up straighter in his chair and made eye