You're a US police officer, what are you thinking about going back to the East for?

Chapter 260 So he turned and walked into the rain.

Lyon stood there, his fist still clenched.

The body of the man in the black woolen hat lay slumped against the wall, blood was still flowing from the back of the thug's head after his leg was severed, and the air was thick with the smell of gunpowder and rust.

He stood there for about three seconds, then suddenly raised his hand and touched his face.

There are no more face masks.

I just took it off, and I haven't put it back on yet.

He quickly scanned his surroundings.

The grenade shattered all the intact light bulbs in the dance floor, leaving only a few people waving their cell phone flashlights around.

The trash can philosopher is squatting next to the ruins of a DJ booth, tearing up bedsheets, the beam of a flashlight shining on his knees.

Walter was bandaging Cole's wound, Old Weld was counting the captured weapons, and Ray was leaning his Remington 870 against the wall with his back to them.

Nobody was looking after him.

Lyon put his mask back on, pressed the metal strip on his nose, and pulled the brim of his baseball cap down.

We must not act rashly.

If we reveal our true identity now, all our previous plans will be for nothing.

Mia.

The moment the name popped into his mind, his hand had already reached into his windbreaker pocket and found his phone.

I pressed my thumb on the power button, the screen lit up, and the lock screen was clean and uncluttered, with no missed calls or unread text messages.

His thumb hovered above Mia's number, but didn't press it down.

According to what the man in the black wool hat said before he died, Vic's side acted simultaneously.

If Mia were still able to answer the phone, she would have called me long ago.

If her phone is in Vic's hands right now, a single call from him would be tantamount to telling them directly: I know you've arrested someone, and I know what you're planning to do.

At most, Vic knows that the raid failed because he lost contact with Luke, but he probably doesn't know that he already knows about Talon's plan.

This intelligence gap is my only chance.

He turned off the screen and put the phone back in his pocket.

If Vic wants to use Mia to force him to show himself, he most likely won't kill her before she appears.

The problem is that the other party is a drug-addicted gang.

I've seen too many stupid things drug addicts do; reason is a luxury for them.

Fingers, ears, toes. To them, taking apart a few things is no different than taking apart a toy.

We can't delay.

He turned and walked toward Lei at the top of the stairs.

"thunder."

Ray was leaning against the wall inspecting the Remington 870's magazine when he heard the voice and immediately stood up straight: "Boss."

"In which state is your driver's license valid?"

"Washington State." Ray paused for a moment. "Here, my veteran's ID was directly converted into a civilian driver's license. I can drive trucks, and it's never been revoked."

"Okay." Leon took the Toyota Camry car keys out of his jacket pocket and tossed them to Ray.

Lei caught it with one hand, the keychain rattling in his palm: "These are your car keys. What do you mean by this?"

"St. Judy's Church, Reverend Thomas. The car is parked in the alley outside the back door of the dance floor, a gray Camry. There's a first-aid kit in the trunk, with gauze, antibiotics, and iodine. Take it to the screwdriver guy for some basic first aid. If you encounter any police checkpoints on the way, just say you're taking the injured person to the church hospital, and don't mention anything about this place."

Lei had already stood up straight and hooked the car keys onto his belt with his finger.

"Understood. Same old routine, a few more laps?"

"I don't follow the old rules with you—I'll call you when I need to contact you."

MacArthur then walked over to the two of them.

The wound on his left shoulder had been hastily tied with a torn strip of T-shirt, and blood seeped from the edge of the strip, but his eyes remained sharp.

"I'll go with you."

Lyon glanced at him. MacArthur's injury wasn't serious; the knife tip hadn't pierced the muscle layer, and he could walk without any problems.

"The church is full of homeless people. You can go in with a wound on your shoulder, but they won't be afraid of you because getting injured is normal for homeless people. Keep an eye out for mines on the way, so they don't mess things up while driving," Leon said.

Ray's expression didn't change, but he looked away.

The problem refers to unnatural tremors that occur after opioid withdrawal.

He hadn't had any problems during the ten-odd days he'd been working at the mutton stall, but the fact that Lyon remembered this incident at a time like this made his throat tighten inexplicably.

Lyon turned to Old Welder and shouted, "Old Welder, open the iron gate at the back door and prepare to transfer the wounded."

Old Welder stood up from beside the pile of weapons, still clutching the blood-stained Glock in his hand: "Understood."

Leon led Ray and MacArthur toward the back door, where Old Welder had already opened the security bolt on the iron gate.

The back door opened, and a cold wind carrying raindrops hit my face.

As soon as Lyon stepped outside, he heard police sirens coming from afar.

It didn't sound like a large-scale police deployment; it was more like the short, sharp siren of a patrol car, the sound coming from the east along 12th Street, piercing the rain and bouncing back and forth over the empty industrial area.

Lyon stood under the eaves of the back door and listened for a few seconds.

The late-night gunfight and explosions caught the attention of the patrol officer, which was expected. But was the car really a regular patrol car?

Is it possible that Connor and his gang of corrupt cops are deliberately trying to escalate the situation?

He ruled out that option.

Connor has something on him, and Sterling has the recording of the bribery. They will definitely just watch and not dare to deliberately cause trouble.

Furthermore, Tyrone wouldn't want the police to get involved. Vic kidnapped Mia to force him to show himself, not to get the state troopers and FBI to kill the Blood Gang.

The more police arrive, the worse it is for Tyrone.

"Police car." MacArthur heard the sound too.

Lyon didn't respond.

He needs to go and take a look.

Regardless of who called the police car, if the police do cordon off the area, they need to control the flow of people on site.

We cannot allow them to arrest people indiscriminately, we cannot allow them to discover the corpses and weapons inside the psychedelic cat, and we certainly cannot use proper law enforcement procedures to turn the situation into a street closure investigation.

Moreover, it would be best to use police resources to investigate Mia's case, but those resources can only be mobilized in secret, not openly. The corrupt police within the organization must be watching their every move at this time.

He also needs to find someone who won't trigger a chain reaction to find out Mia's whereabouts, Vic's license plate, cell phone signal, and the time and place of the last time he was captured on camera.

"You take care of the church first," Leon said, turning to Ray. "Take the wounded there, settle them all in, and then wait for my news in the alley behind the church."

"And what about you?"

'

"I have other things to take care of first."

Ray opened his mouth as if to ask something, but when he saw the eyes above Leon's mask, he swallowed his words.

He had seen that look before; back in Iraq, veterans looked just like that before they were about to storm in.

"clear."

MacArthur raised his hand to adjust the makeshift bandage on his shoulder. Rain lashed against the old man's thin face as his gaze swept back and forth between Lyon and the distant sirens, and his lips twitched slightly.

"Be careful on the road," he said.

Lyon then turned and walked into the rain.

One minute ago.

The radio in the patrol car was playing a late-night country music station, the volume turned down low, with guitar sounds mixed in with the screeching rhythm of the windshield wipers.

Bob held the steering wheel with one hand and reached for his coffee cup in the cup holder on the center console with the other. After a couple of tries without finding it, he glanced down and saw the cup was stuck in the door storage compartment.

"Help me get this," he said to the passenger.

Miller reached out and handed him the cup.

Bob took a swig and frowned. "It's cold."

"You've been soaking for forty minutes now," Miller said.

Bob put the cup back and tapped his fingers on the steering wheel twice. "I mean, it was hot forty minutes ago and it's cold now because we fucking drove around outside for forty minutes and nothing happened in those forty minutes."

"That's how it is with night shifts," Miller said, looking out the window. "Didn't you work night shifts before?"

"That was before. Back then, I was young and healthy, and I could handle it." Bob patted his belly.

"My back aches when I sit for a long time. Do you know what that feels like? You wouldn't know at your age."

"Besides, I only had to switch to the night shift with you on my first day back at work because of your internship progress. Normally, I should be a patrol officer on the day shift."

Miller turned and glanced at him: "You've only been back at work for one day."

"so what?"

"So you've been lying at home for months, and now you're complaining of back pain after a four-hour drive?"

Bob glanced at him, his lips moved slightly, but he chose not to engage.

Miller is not the same Miller he used to be.

Bob still remembers how that kid used to not know where to put his hands when he sat in the passenger seat.

When Miller encounters a homeless man burning a trash can on the street, he calls out to the command center in a tense voice that's almost cracking, his fingers gripping the holster tightly, as if something in the trash can might jump out and bite him at any moment.

Now this kid has his hand on the car window, his thumb scraping the fog off the glass, and he even knows how to talk back.

"A lot has happened while you were gone," Miller said.

Bob didn't reply.

A few minutes earlier, the dispatch center sent them an instruction saying that residents near 12th Street had reported hearing sounds similar to an explosion.

With fewer officers on the night shift, the patrol officers on duty are scattered six blocks away dealing with homeless disturbances, family disputes, convenience store thefts, and other such trivial matters, leaving only their vehicle as the closest to the scene.

The dispatch center then told them to "go and verify".

"Please go and verify." Bob repeated in the dispatcher's announcer's tone, then lowered his voice to his own hoarse voice, "They always say that. 'Please go and verify.' It means you go and see, if it's homeless people setting off firecrackers you chase them away, if it's a gang shootout you go and get shot."

Miller didn't reply and turned his head to look out the window again.

The rain was light but dense, and the car headlights reflected a blurry light onto the road ahead.

Bob turned the radio volume down a little further.

Several muffled thuds came from afar, like someone banging on a wall or setting off firecrackers.

It could also be gunshots.

But Bob quickly dismissed the idea as soon as it popped into his head.

Don't jump to conclusions. He doesn't want to act in a scenario where he encounters a gunfight on his very first day back at work.

"Do you think it might be someone's tire that blew out?" Bob said.

"It's midnight. Who would change a tire at midnight?" Miller said.

"Can't you give me a more positive assumption?"

Bob clicked his tongue.

What he wants to do most right now is to turn around, drive back to the convenience store, continue drinking his now-cold coffee, and then write this instruction as a "false alarm" in his patrol log.

But the problem is he is not alone.

Miller was sitting in the passenger seat. The last time he went to the convenience store to buy some corn chips, he stared out the window with that overly responsible look, as if he would miss something important if he didn't look at it for even a second.

He changed; he became more capable, but perhaps a little too capable.

"What do you think Lyon is doing right now?" Bob said.

Miller turned to look at him.

"Hey Lyon, isn't he at ACU now?" Bob tapped his finger on the steering wheel. "ACU also works the night shift, so they should be the ones doing this kind of thing. They have assault rifles, bulletproof shields, and that woman, what's her name again, she likes to blow up buildings."

Chloe.

"Yes, that's her. They have Chloe." Bob nodded. "What do we have? We have coffee, cold."

"Lyon is off today," Miller said.

"Okay." Bob pulled on his seatbelt. "Then wake him up. Call him; he'll answer whether he's on leave or not."

Bob took his phone out of his pocket, unlocked the screen, and then turned it off again. "Never mind, what if he's really sleeping?"

"You're afraid he'll complain, so you'd rather run into a gang fight yourself."

"First, we're not sure if it's a gang fight," Bob said, holding up one finger. "Second—although it certainly looks like a gang fight."

"So do you think Lyon will come if he hears this reason?"

Bob thought for a moment.

Holy crap.

It seems like he really will come.

Leon, that kid, if he hears about shootings, he'll jump up, put on his pants, and grab a gun.

But before he could say it, Miller had already answered for him.

"If he comes, it will definitely cause a big commotion—he's off today."

Bob paused for two seconds, then nodded.

"He definitely needs a rest." Bob put his phone back in his pocket, patted the steering wheel, and said, "Okay, we'll handle it ourselves."

The car slowed down a bit, approaching the circular red dot marked on the GPS map. Miller took a closer look this time and then spoke.

"Bob."

"Um.

""

Do you know where we are now?

"Where?"

"Psychedelic Cat Nightclub"

Bob raised an eyebrow: "That strip club that got shut down?"

"right."

"Didn't it close down a long time ago?"

"Now it's a homeless shelter."

"What does the fact that a homeless person has taken over an abandoned nightclub have to do with those noises we just heard?"

“That hideout is now under the control of a group of shady characters,” Miller interrupted him. “A bunch of retired veterans, former construction workers, and some crazy old man who calls himself MacArthur. They’ve turned this place into some kind of community,” he said. “I didn’t see them doing drug deals or collecting protection money.”

Bob moved his hand on the steering wheel, gently turning it half a turn to the left to pull the car a little closer to the side and reduce the speed slightly.

How do you know so much?

"Because I was assigned to patrol around the mosque for a while," Miller said. "Sergeant Danfoss gave the order, but it was actually Lyon who was in charge."

"Danfoss actually did something like this." Bob paused for a moment. "No, this sounds like something Danfoss would do, given his protective nature—wait, was it Lyon again?"

"right."

"A building that had been sealed off was occupied by a group of retired veterans who turned it into a community, and then our patrol cars set up checkpoints around it." Bob spread his fingers one by one. "Does Chief Sterling know about this?"

"She should know."

"—She knows, she won't stop it, but she won't sign either. I understand, I understand." Bob's face suddenly turned deathly pale.

He moved his foot from the accelerator to the brake and slowly pressed down.

He had just returned to work, a statement he had repeated countless times. He didn't want to end up in the hospital again on his first day back at work, and he certainly didn't want to get involved in anything related to the shady business that the bureau chief had tacitly approved.

All he wanted was a hot cup of coffee, to stay in the patrol car until dawn, and then go home to sleep.

"We can't get involved in this," Miller said.

"I haven't said anything yet."

"You stopped the car."

"I was slowing down to observe," Bob said. "It's a dangerous road, the road conditions are bad, and the streetlights are broken. Slowing down is routine for me."

Miller looked at him: "Is the streetlight broken?"

"Yes." Bob looked up at the streetlight that was still on outside the car window, then looked back at Miller. "It's broken. I see it's broken."

Miller's lips twitched, and he couldn't help but laugh.

"What are you laughing at?"

"It's nothing."

"6

"You little rascal," Bob poked Miller with his finger, "I haven't worked with you for months, and you've changed. You used to never undermine me, and you never dared to say a word."

"That's because I didn't understand anything before."

"Now do you think you understand?"

"At least I know some things."

"What do you know?" Bob's finger was still raised. "You know you can't touch these kinds of shady hideouts? You know you can't do what the chief approves of? Then do you know what my blood pressure is right now?"

Miller didn't answer. He leaned back in his chair, looking at the fan-shaped view on the windshield repeatedly cleared by the wipers, and thought of Bob being ambushed by drug dealers.

He later spoke with Bob many times in the hospital room.

Miller initially claimed that he was the reason Bob was shot, but Bob always told him to shut up, saying that it was the drug dealers who fired the gun and that it had nothing to do with him.

Bob complained that the coffee at the hospital was worse than the coffee at the police station, while telling him that he would encounter this situation again in the future, and that he shouldn't let his hands shake then, because shaking hands wouldn't help anyone.

So he would keep thinking about Leon, who had solved everything.

"Bob," Miller said.

Bob had already pulled his hand back and was staring at the road ahead.

"Um?"

"Thank you."

Bob's fingers paused on the steering wheel.

The carriage was quiet for two seconds, with only the screeching of the windshield wipers and the muffled country music coming from the radio.

"What are you thanking me for?" Bob's voice sounded a little unnatural. "Thanking me for driving to the scene of the gunfight at midnight?"

"Thank you for what you said to me at the hospital. You said that trembling hands can't help anyone."

Bob's lips moved.

"I actually encountered that situation later," Miller continued. "When I was keeping watch at the mosque, there were two people loitering in front of the dry cleaner."

"How did you handle it?"

"Go up to them, check them, and let them leave. Your hand didn't shake," Miller said. "Because you told me that."

Bob opened his mouth, then closed it again half a second later.

Then he reached out and slapped Miller on the back of the head.

Stop being so mushy.

Miller didn't dodge; he just raised his hand, rubbed the back of his head, and smiled.

Then, Bob grabbed the walkie-talkie and pressed his thumb on the talk button.

"Command center, this is 7-Adam-12. We have arrived at the perimeter of the target area and have not detected any unusual sounds. The streets are quiet and there are no suspicious persons. The reason for dispatching the police may be a burst pipe in the residential area or garbage truck operations. We are unable to pinpoint the specific source of the anomaly. Call closed." He released the button.

There was a silence on the walkie-talkie for about three seconds, then the dispatcher's voice came back.

"7—Adam—12, Received. You are the third vehicle tonight to use 'burst pipe' as the reason."

Bob's lips moved slightly as he brought the walkie-talkie an inch closer to his mouth: "That means the pipes in this area are indeed quite old lately. I suggest contacting the municipal department to conduct a pipe health inspection. Call over."

This silence lasted even longer, about five seconds.

"Understood. Arrange for you to return to work from October 22nd. Be careful. By the way, next time come up with a fresh reason; I need to write it in my log."

"Roger, command center. Fresh pipes are aging, I've got it."

Bob hung the walkie-talkie back on its mount, let out a long sigh, and casually turned the steering wheel, steering the car back the way it came.

"See?" he said to Miller. "That's called experience."

"That's called being thick-skinned."

"Being thick-skinned is also a kind of experience." Bob patted the steering wheel.

Miller leaned back in his chair, a smile still playing on his lips.

Bob glanced at him, about to say something more, when he saw it.

As the car headlights swept across the street corner, a figure emerged from the rain.

The baseball cap and tactical mask had been removed, so Bob recognized the figure immediately.

Broad shoulders, an upright posture, and that kind of imposing presence that can't be developed in a police academy, but can only be cultivated through real experience of being through gunfire.

Bob stepped on the brakes, and this time he really slammed on them.

The car stopped in the middle of the road.

"Holy shit," Bob said, "What the hell? Didn't they just say Leon was sleeping at home?!"