need to be cleansed. You have any religious fanatics on radar?”
“No. I ran the checks myself. Closest thing I could find was a Baptist church, but their focus is on drug addiction. Even still, I went around and talked to them about their outreach program and they’re more activists for getting junkies in faith-based recovery programs. I wouldn’t call them radicals.”
“Get them to go back.” I pointed to the two uniformed officers inside the door. “This time, ask them about other churches in the area. Extremists. Maybe a cult. Anything. And give me that address.”
Ethan rattled off the address. I took off down the hall to my office, hearing boots pounding behind me. I hit my desk, powered up my computer, and lifted my eyes to find Carter glaring down at me.
“Need you to call in the others. The team needs to be ready to roll out as soon as we have a location,” I told him and looked back down at my computer, which was taking a fucking year to boot up.
“You wanna explain why you didn’t—”
“Call in the fucking team,” I roared and Carter took a step back.
“Jesus, Brady, we’ll…”
Carter abruptly stopped and jerked his chin in my direction before he turned and left.
Two minutes into my search, I really fucking wished Dylan was in the office. Not only was he better at this than I was, I didn’t want to be sitting behind my desk. I wanted to be out looking for my woman but I needed to know where to look. And I knew, she wouldn’t be at the address she’d give Ethan.
“Just got a call in,” Ethan said from the doorway of my office. “They found Hadley’s car down the block from that address, still running, door left open, cell on the ground smashed.”
The tightness in my chest increased, making it hard for my heart to beat.
“John Swanson owns the property.” I glanced from Ethan back to my screen. “My take, it’s a rental. He’s got five others in his name. Four in not so great neighborhoods, one in a gated community. But I can’t find the rental agreements.”
“Move,” Dylan said, coming into my office. I gladly got up from my chair and let him sit. “Did you find anything else?”
“No.”
“I need twenty minutes.”
“Make it ten,” I snapped and followed Ethan down the hall into the conference room. I ignored Carter and Drake and went straight to the whiteboard.
Once I had the books I remembered written on the board, I pulled my phone out and scrolled to the pictures I’d taken and tossed it to Carter.
He caught my cell and his gaze went to the screen. “That’s what we’re dealing with. Lolita, The Handmaid’s Tale, Sex is a Funny Word, The Garden of Eden, Thirteen Reasons Why. There were more books defaced but the two books I’m most worried about are The Garden of Eden which had “Godless heathens be warned” scribbled in it and Thirteen Reasons Why which had “We warned you and you didn’t listen. You must be cleansed of your sins” written in it.”
“What the fuck.” Carter’s grimace swung from me to Ethan. “Why didn’t you bring this to us?”
“We’re not discussing that right now. What we’re doing is finding Hadley. Dylan’s working on locating a rental agreement. Once we have that, we can look into whoever’s name is on that contract. In the meantime, have you read those books?”
“No,” Carter snapped.
I hadn’t either and I really should’ve found the goddamn time to.
“Where we at?” Logan asked as he entered the room with Matt behind him.
I took the time to get them up to speed, and when I was done, Dylan was coming into the room with his laptop in hand, Clark and Jasper following behind.
I didn’t acknowledge the newcomers, I didn’t even look in Jasper’s direction. I was hanging on by the tips of my fingers. I did not need to see his fear, his disappointment, to know I’d let him down.
I had to find Hadley.
I’d take what I deserved from her family after she was safe.
“John Swanson,” Dylan started. “He owns Swanson LTD. In the last year, he’s run background and credit checks on Iliana Thornburg, Ricardo Chavez, and Beth Heinz. Beth and Ricardo’s credit reports show they live in two of his rental properties. Iliana was denied. I’m still searching the address to see if I get a hit, but so far I’m not finding anything, not even renter’s insurance. Also, there are no rental agreements online. It might