Breach of Peace (The Lawful Times #0.5)(21)

Thirty officers had been brought to take the warehouse. Ten backed Khlid and Samuel, approaching from the front. Five more would enter through the smaller side doors. The last ten were to watch for runners out the back—a tactic Khlid was a big fan of. Funnel your enemy to an exit which is itself a trap. She had never seen it fail.

Samuel consulted his pocket watch. He signed “two minutes” to all in the alley. Getting so close without being seen had not been easy. They had sprinted the whole way, through pounding rain and side streets and alleys filled with waste, and worse, to avoid detection. Now they crouched, breathing heavily, waiting for the other teams to get in position. At a quarter to the hour, all would make their approach.

Smits approached from the back of the line of officers and said, “Good to go, Inspectors. Though a few of the men need reminding about their required cardio regimen.”

“Thank you, Smits,” Samuel said.

“Smits,” Khlid pulled the man closer. “Tell me honestly, have they been keeping up with their rifle practice?”

“Absolutely, ma’am.” Smits let a grin spread across his face. “Easier to get an officer to the firing range than the track; I was at the range last night myself. Just be glad the M.O.D. let us start using cartridges. Dealing with powder in a downpour like this would be impossible.”

Khlid nodded and let the officer go. The advancement of weaponry in the last few decades had been extraordinary. Her own breech-loaded rifle was the greatest weapon she had ever fired. It was bulky, yes, but what had once taken minutes now took just a few seconds; all she had to do to reload was flip down a lever and insert a cartridge. As if that weren't enough, these rifles were accurate to almost four hundred meters. Khlid couldn't shoot quite that far with good accuracy herself, but the die-hard snipers of the Seventh certainly could.

Samuel signaled “thirty seconds.” Officers shuffled forward in response.

Khlid moved up and peeked around the corner connecting the alley to the street Warehouse Two was on. Four guards stood under an awning keeping watch. They had no visible weapons, but Khlid would bet her career they were concealing small handheld arms.

Samuel got into position behind her as the officers settled into preparatory stillness. Anticipation tensed her entire body. The adrenaline she would need blessedly began to pulse through her veins.

Sam’s hand lay on her shoulder. “Ten seconds.”

The rain pattered on tin roofs. One of the warehouse guards barked a laugh that echoed through the street.

Sam’s hand tapped her shoulder three times. “Go.”

Khlid raised her rifle and turned the corner.

The guards were well trained. One spotted her when she was only feet from the alley. He raised a cry of alarm.

Khlid matched his cry with her own call: “Police! On your knees!” As more officers emerged from the alley, the guards went from startled to panicked.

A shot rang out in the night from the other side of the warehouse.

Fuck fuck fuck.

Two of the guards darted for the large door to the right, while the other two went for weapons. Disobeying an officer of God during a raid was punishable by death. Khlid pulled her trigger. Five more shots rang out from behind her.

All four guards dropped. One screamed as he died. Khlid closed the distance while pulling out her sidearm. She ended his pain with a bullet to the head.

Several more shots rang out from the other side of the warehouse yet again.

Are they already fleeing? She snapped open her rifle and replaced the cartridge. “On the door!”

Khlid and the other officers stacked up at the door. Samuel, positioned across from her, began counting down from five, but Khlid stopped him. She gestured behind him to a small ladder leading to a second-floor fire escape. He nodded his agreement. Khlid tapped Smits and they broke off.

Khlid climbed the ladder first, with Smits close behind. Sam watched them climb and waited a hair-raising beat for them to get into place at a window.

The window led to a dark, messy office. Papers were strewn about and the door had been left open. An open box of small-caliber rounds on the desk caught her eye.

“Well, Smits, it looks like resisting arrest will be added to the charges here tonight.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Below, Sam gave the count. On five, he battered through the door. Simultaneously, Khlid and Smits separated the window from its cheap lock with a sharp snap.

Below, shots rang out again over Sam’s cries of “Police!”

As far as she could tell, she and Smits remained undetected. The commotion below provided more than enough sound cover as they reached the doorway and peered into the hall.

To her right, a closed door at the hall’s end. To her left, a man in fine attire leaning against the wall, pistol in hand. He was looking away from Khlid, down a stairwell at the other end of the hall. In a matter of a few seconds, Khlid watched him jump at a shadow, point the weapon down the hall, think better of it, holster the gun, and then raise it again.

Khlid signaled Smits to watch the door to the right, and pushed into the hall. Smits crouched down and trained his rifle there, while Khlid slowly walked up behind the tall man with the pistol.

He was too focused on the noise coming from the bottom of the stairway to notice her approach. She pressed the end of her rifle to the back of his head. The man froze like glass.

“Drop the gun.” He did so. “Good. Move and you die. Understand?”