Sweet Pain (Amatucci Family #3) - Sadie Jacks Page 0,3
the police to see that we were all participating with their orders. No fewer than five SWAT members and fifteen uniformed officers streamed into the bunker. The amount of noise they made was unbelievable.
How we hadn’t heard them was a miracle. Although, I feel like we’d been pretty well occupied with other news. And we weren’t actually in trouble with these people. Or at least not bad trouble.
Wright came in behind the uniformed police. “What the hell happened here?” he demanded as he made his way over from the catwalk stairs. He threaded his way through the Kool-Aid man holes we’d made on our first horrible trip through this hellhole.
Turo stepped forward. “Would you like a full accounting now, or would you like to get the evidence you came for? We are completely fine in either case. We just ask that we be allowed to lower our arms.”
Wright waved his hand. We all lowered our hands. “Your guns will be confiscated. Run through the system. If they are cleared, then you’ll get them back, provided you have the correct permits.”
Momma looked a little weepy as she handed over her gun. She narrowed her eyes at the SWAT officer. “Do not hurt or scratch my baby.” She fished in her pocket. “Here is the magazine for it.”
The SWAT officer took both. Turned and handed them to his partner. “Any other weapons on you, ma’am?”
Momma shook her head. “No. But you are free to check, although I request that a woman be the one to pat me down.” She tugged her robe closed at the neck. “My husband gets antsy when other men try to touch me.” She winked at her husband.
Nico groaned. “Momma, not now. You can frisk her. We’re all adults.”
Momma stuck her nose up in the air as she held out her hands. “Just because I try to preserve my marriage vows does not earn me your griping, Domenico Amatucci. See how you like it when they pat down your doctor.”
Nico snarled. Took a quick step towards the doctor in question. He caught himself as the various police officers took aggressive stances again. He clenched his jaw so hard, I saw the muscles in his face twitch. He nodded. “Momma, we will be talking.”
She glared at her son. “Yes. We will.”
So badly did I want to make the ‘oooooh,’ sound from high school, but I restrained myself. A female officer came over, patted down Nik and Willow. A male followed behind and patted down me and Turo.
Once everyone in the room was cleared, a few family members were told to wait with a small contingent of officers. Nik, Willow, Nico, and I were pulled aside by Wright. “I need that evidence now. I’ve brought along a tech.”
Nik sniffed, but kept her mouth shut.
“Right this way, District Attorney,” Nico said. He moved back down the long hallway we’d emerged from earlier. “Most of the evidence is on hard drives. Your tech will need to discuss extraction with our tech.” He pointed at Nik. “I trust they can work together without incident.”
Nik smiled. “As long as your tech is competent, I can work with her.”
Wright smiled. “She’s a him, but thank you.” A man with bags of gear waved from the back of the group. His reddish hair was a crazy tangle of curls that looked more suited to a baby than a man old enough to work with the DAs office.
We turned into the room. Even with all the equipment off, the room felt heavy. As if a low burning expectation waited in the corners. Waited for some kind of weakness to show itself. To pounce. To shred.
I pulled Willow into my arms. If I felt it, I could only imagine how she felt in here.
“The hard drives are encrypted with 256 bit encryption,” Nik said. “I’m familiar with the software he used, so I utilized an old developer backdoor. But there is a self-destruct function that has been activated. Unless, or until, you get the correct biometrics inputted, you have one more chance to access the data. I highly suggest you make a secure copy and securely send the data.” She smiled. “It just so happens that PennCorp specializes in such software. I’d be happy to set you up with a partitioned section of a secure server or help you send it to one of your own.”
I smothered the smile as the DA looked at my IT expert. The IT tech with the DA looked equally as surprised.