Running
Out of Time
by Cindi Myers (on-sale June 16, 2020)
Book description: When a terrorist is on the loose,the Tactical Crime Division is on
the case.To find out who poisoned medications, two of TCD’s agents are tapped
to go undercover posing as a married couple and infiltrate the company. But as
soon as Jace Cantrell and Laura Smith arrive at Stroud Pharmaceuticals, someone
ups the ante by planting explosives in their midst. Turns out that the
small-town family business is hiding a million secrets. Could they unknowingly
be protecting a vengeful killer?
Love CSI and Criminal
Minds? Meet the Tactical Crime Division.
Get to know a team of dedicated crime solving experts as they fight for justice, safety, and one by one are rewarded by finding love.
Get to know a team of dedicated crime solving experts as they fight for justice, safety, and one by one are rewarded by finding love.
CAST OF CHARACTERS:
Special Agent Laura “Smitty” Smith—A
disciplined agent who never breaks the rules, Laura must go undercover as a
newlywed to find the person responsible for a rash of poisonings and bombings
in a small West Virginia town.
Special Agent Jace Cantrell—The
military veteran and special ops expert has a reputation as a rebel and a rule
breaker—exactly the kind of man to clash with Laura, yet the two must pose as
husband and wife to solve a case that brings death to their very doorstep.
Donna Stroud—The head of
Stroud Pharmaceuticals intends to keep her company going and her family
together in the face of tragedy, but how far will she go to do so?
Parker Stroud—Donna’s son
chafes at his parents’ unwillingness to put him in charge of the family
business.
Merry Winger—Parker’s
girlfriend has big plans to marry Parker, despite his parents’ disapproval of
their relationship and Parker’s own reluctance to make their relationship
public.
Leo Elgin—His mother was poisoned by
tainted medication manufactured by Stroud. He holds a grudge against the Stroud
family.
***
“We’ve got another tough case on
our hands.” Jill Pembroke, director of the FBI’s tactical crime division,
surveyed her team from the head of the conference table in the Bureau’s
Knoxville headquarters. “One that re-quires a great deal of discretion.”
Something in the director’s tone
made Agent Laura Smith sharpen her focus. Pembroke, with her well-cut silver
hair and feminine suit, might be mistaken for a high society grandmother, but
she was as hard-nosed as they came, and not prone to exaggeration. That she
reminded her team of the need for discretion pointed to something out of the
ordinary.
The door to the conference room
opened and a man slipped in. Tall and rangy, Agent Jace Cantrell moved with the
grace of an athlete. He nodded to the director and eased into the empty seat
next to Laura. No apology for being late. Typical. Laura slid her chair over a
couple of inches. Cantrell was one of those men who always seemed to take up
more than his share of the available space.
“We’re going to be investigating
product tampering at Stroud Pharmaceuticals in Mayville, West Virginia.”
Director Pembroke stepped aside to
reveal a slide showing a squat factory building set well back on landscaped
grounds.
“The antacid poisonings.” Agent Ana
Ramirez spoke from her seat directly across from Laura. She tucked a strand of
dark hair into the twist at the nape of her neck, polished nails glinting in
the overhead light. “That story has been all over the news.”
“Do the locals not want the FBI
horning in?” Agent Davis Rogers—the only member of the team not wearing the
regulation suit—sat back in his chair beside Ramirez, looking every bit the
army ranger he had once been. “Is that why the extra discretion?”
“No, the local police are happy to
turn this over to us,” Pembroke said. She advanced to the next slide, a listing
of the deaths—six so far, with two additional people hospitalized—attributed to
Stroud’s Stomach Soothers, a natural, organic remedy that claimed a significant
share of the market as an alternative to traditional antacids. “This hasn’t
been released to the public, but the poison in the contaminated tablets was
ricin.”
Laura would have sworn the
temperature in the air-conditioned room dropped five degrees. “Any suggestion of a link to terrorism?” Hostage negotiator Evan Duran,
bearded and brooding, spoke from the end of the table. “Anybody claiming credit
for the deaths?”
Pembroke shook her head. “At this
point, we aren’t assuming anything. Obviously, we want to avoid panicking the
public.”
“The public is already panicked,”
Rowan Cooper, the team’s local liaison, said. “People have been organizing
boycotts of all Stroud products.” She absentlytwisted a lock of her jet-black
hair, brow furrowed. “We’ll need a strategy for managing the public’s
response.”
“The facility where the Stomach
Soothers were manufactured has been closed for the time being and the product
is being pulled from store shelves,” Pembroke said. “But another facility in
town, which manufactures other items, remains open, and the company has reduced
hours and reassigned as many employees as possible to the single plant. The
company, the town, even the state officials, are very anxious to downplay this
tragedy and get Stroud up and running full-speed as soon as possible.”
“Why do that?” Kane Bradshaw,
Agent-at-Large, said. Laura hadn’t noticed him until now, seated as he was
behind her and apart from the rest, almost in the shadows. Kane always looked
as if he’d just rushed in from an overnight surveillance, all wind-blown hair
and shadowed eyes. The fact that he was here spoke to the gravity of this case.
While always on hand when the team needed him, he wasn’t much on office
decorum.
“Jobs.” Cantrell’s voice, deep and
a little rough, like a man who smoked two packs a day, sent a shiver through
Laura. He didn’t smoke, but maybe he once had. “Stroud Pharmaceuticals is one
of the biggest employers in Boone County,” he continued. “The coal mines are
shutting down, and there isn’t a lot of other industry. Stroud has been a
savior to the community. They—and the officials they elected—are going to do
everything in their power to keep the company running and redeem its
reputation.”
“Even covering up murder?” Laura
asked.
Cantrell turned to her, his gaze
cool. “I doubt they want to cover it up, but they’ll definitely downplay it and
keep it quiet.”
“They want us to help, but they
don’t want us to be obvious.” The youngest member of the team, computer
specialist Hendrick Maynard, jiggled his knee as he spoke. A genius who looked
younger than his twenty-six years, Maynard never sat still.
“Precisely.” Director Pembroke
advanced to another slide of a small town—tree-shaded streets lined with modest
homes, some worse for wear. A water tower in the distance displayed the word
Mayville in faded green paint. “Agents Smith and Cantrell, you are to pose as a
married couple and take jobs at the Stroud factory. Investigations so far point
to the poisonings having originated from within the plant itself, so your job
is to identify possible suspects and investigate. Agent Rogers, you’ll be in
town as well…”
Laura didn’t hear the rest of the
director’s assignments. She was focused on trying to breathe and holding back
her cry of protest. She and Cantrell? As a couple? The idea was ridiculous. He
was rough, undisciplined, arrogant, scornful…
“You look like you just ate a bug.”
Cantrell leaned to-ward her, bringing with him the disconcerting aroma of
cinnamon. His gravelly voice abraded her nerves. “Don’t think I’m any more
excited about this than you are.”
***
About Cindi Myers: Cindy Myers became one of the
most popular people in eighth grade when she and her best friend wrote a torrid
historical romance and passed the manuscript around among friends. Fame was
short-lived, alas; the English teacher confiscated the manuscript. Since then,
Cindy has written more than 50 published novels. Her historical and
contemporary romances and women’s fiction have garnered praise from reviewers
and readers alike.
Purchase links:
·
Goodreads:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/48920861-running-out-of-time?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=x26Tj13kEC&rank=1
·
Barnes & Noble:https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/running-out-of-time-cindi-myers/1135079353?ean=9781335136589
·
IndieBound:https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781335136589
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