Excerpt of Her Secret Family by Sherry Lewis

IT WAS FRIDAY NIGHT. Date night. For most women,

that meant Manolo Blahniks, slinky dresses and fine dining. For Jolene Preston, it meant steel-toed boots, her trusty 9 mm Beretta and a cold hot dog wolfed down on her way to a stakeout in one of Tulsa's older neighborhoods. Just the way she liked it.

Her back against the cold brick wall of an abandoned store, she tried to see through the late-night shadows. Fifty yards away, a single light burned in a fenced-in yard, just bright enough for her to see people milling around.

"Hey, Jo-Jo. You in position yet?" Her partner's voice was little more than a breath in the earpiece she wore.

"I'm here," she whispered, "but it's black as pitch. I can't see much."

"Yeah? Well maybe you should have stayed out here and let me take the back."

Coming from anyone else that suggestion would have felt like a challenge, but from Ryan Fielding it just made her grin. She and Ryan had been working together since she transferred into the Special Investigations Division eighteen months earlier. He was a good cop and a decent guy — one of the few men in the department who didn't feel threatened by women on the force. Jolene inched around a stack of rotting cardboard boxes. "Forget it, old man. You'd hurt yourself trying to get through the obstacle course back here. I wouldn't want that on my conscience."

Ryan chuckled as she'd known he would. The five-year difference in their ages had been a running joke between them since the one-and-only time he tried to cushion her from a harsh situation. She'd accused him of gender bias. He'd denied it, claiming instead that he thought she was too young to handle the job. It was as close to an apology as she was likely to get. Afterward, they'd settled into a working relationship that suited both of them.

"Any sign of Zika or his boys at your end?" Jolene took another look at the men behind the warehouse. Two years ago, Raoul Zika had moved into Tulsa and set up a drug operation, which Tulsa's finest hadn't been able to shut down. "There are a few of them back here. Can't tell what they're doing yet. How close are you?"

"I'm there now, but it's like a morgue out front." Gauging the distance between her position and the fence, Jolene whispered, "I'm still about fifty yards away. Give me a few minutes to get closer."

"What the hell have you been doing? Your nails?"

"Yeah, well, you know me, always dolling myself up." Jolene checked the ground in front of her with one foot and moved carefully around a stack of old newspapers. "I stopped off to do a little shopping at that secondhand store on the corner."

"Figures. It's awfully quiet around here tonight," Ryan said as she slid behind a battered white van parked in back of Capriotti's Sandwich shop. "You think Big Red gave us the wrong information?"

"I don't know." Jolene didn't trust Red, but who did? He was a junkie who'd do anything for a fix.

"He sounded pretty sure that Zika would be moving the shipment tonight."

"Yeah, well, he might just have been playing us," Ryan said, voicing her own thoughts. "He'd give up his own mother if he thought it would save him."

Jolene started to agree, when she heard something. The response froze on her lips. "I think there's somebody back here," she said, dropping her voice. Clouds covered the moon and stars, making it hard to see, but she heard something again, and this time she identified it as someone talking.

"Come on." It sounded like a young male. "Just try it. What are you worried about? Your dad's never gonna know."

Kids? Here? Now?

A second person spoke, the voice high-pitched and feminine. "He might be able to tell. He'd probably see it in my eyes or something."

"If you're that worried," the boy said, "just hang with me for a few hours until you come back down again."

"He's not going to let me stay out late. He barely let me come to the party at all."

Smart father. Jolene tried to guess how far the kids were from Zika's operation, but the way noise echoed in the alley made it hard to judge. Wherever they were, they weren't far enough.

Jolene could almost see the case they'd been slowly building against Zika — late nights watching his operation, uncomfortable interviews and countless hours spent with the scum of the earth — swirling down the drain.

"So call and tell him you want to stay longer," the boy bargained. "You can talk him into it, can't you?"

"You don't know my dad."

Something or someone banged into metal and Jolene decided they must be near the Dumpster not far ahead.

"C'mon," the boy taunted. "Your old man can't be that smart." His voice dropped, and Jolene missed whatever he said next. Then she smelled the stench of burning marijuana.

Frustrated and angry, she searched the shadows for the telltale red glow that meant somebody was inhaling. Every time a kid lit up, swallowed a pill or used a needle, someone like Raoul Zika was responsible. She ached to get him off the streets, but if he and his men were moving a drug shipment tonight, they'd be heavily armed, probably high and definitely edgy. Ignoring those kids would be reckless and irresponsible.

Biting back her disappointment, she spoke into the mouthpiece. "Hold on, Ryan. I've got a couple of kids back here."

"Say again?"

"Kids — smoking up, by the sounds of it. Two. Maybe more. Not very old, either. I need to get them out of here."

Ryan swore. "How close are they?"

"Too close to ignore. If something goes wrong, they'll be right in the line of fire."

"Well, get 'em out of there fast, before Zika and his boys figure out something's going on."

That might be easier said than done. A couple of kids with a joint weren't likely to lie down and give themselves up if they saw her. Wiping away a trickle of perspiration, Jolene stepped carefully around a recycling bin, but she wasn't careful enough. Her toe hit a loose board and the clatter echoed up and down the alleyway.

The kids froze, the red glow disappeared and one of them took off at a dead run toward Zika's warehouse.

Damn! Tossing a warning at the girl to stay where she was, Jolene set off after him. She raced full-out, but the kid had the advantage. Halfway down the alley, she rammed into a garbage can and crashed to one knee. As she hit the ground, she heard the rattle of chain link, which meant the boy had reached the fence surrounding Zika's warehouse.

Shouts from a couple of men went up as Jolene staggered to her feet again, and she knew their chances of catching Zika doing anything tonight had just gone up in smoke. Why couldn't the kid have run the other way?

"Jo?" Ryan's voice sounded urgent in her ear.

"What's going on?"

"The kids heard me and one of them took off," she panted. "He went over the fence into Zika's turf."

"Dammit! Have Zika's men seen him?"

"He ran right into their arms." Jolene took a second to catch her breath, then muttered, "We might as well shut down and get out of here. There's no way Zika will move that shipment now."

"Eisley's not going to be happy," Ryan grumbled.

"Tell me about it." And he'd blame Jolene. He always did. Captain Eisley had been trying to get Jolene out of his previously all-male unit since the day she transferred in — but he flew just under the radar, making it impossible for her to prove.

As she turned back, pain shot through her leg and nearly knocked her off balance. Her palms burned where bits of dirt and gravel had embedded in her flesh, but none of that came close to matching the irritation she felt. He was a skinny kid, she should have been able to catch him.

To her surprise, the girl still hovered behind the recycling bin. Too high to know she was in trouble, or too frightened to move. Either way, Jolene planned on having a few words with her.

Brushing wind-tossed hair from her eyes, she radioed Ryan to let him know what was happening, then strode to where the girl was hiding. "Hey — are you all right?"

"M-me?"

"Yes, you. Why don't you come on out of there?"

"That's okay. I'm fine right here."

Jolene glanced toward the warehouse and moved in closer. "Well, I'm glad to know you're okay, but I really need you to come out where I can see you."

The girl hesitated then sidled out from behind the bin, eyes wide, one corner of her lip clamped in her teeth. She couldn't have been more than eleven or twelve — a mere wisp of a thing with wide eyes and long dark hair. "Am I in trouble?"

"Well, that depends. What are you doing out here at this time of night?"

The girl raised one thin shoulder. "I was at a party with some friends."

"Yeah. I saw the party you were having."

"Not that one!" Somehow, the girl's eyes grew even wider. She nodded toward the apartment building at the end of the alley. "My friend lives over there."

"Then what are you doing out here?"

"Just taking a walk."

"Yeah, me, too. Why don't we get out of this alley? You can tell me your name while we walk."

Those big wide eyes narrowed in a hurry. "Do I have to?"

"I'm afraid so."

"I don't want to get in trouble."

"It's a little late for that." The girl shifted from one foot to the other, glanced at her only escape route, then lifted her chin defiantly. "You can't get me in trouble if you don't know who I am."