Hold You Close: A Jay Halstead Story

CHAPTER ONE

The smell of fresh coffee filled the upstairs bureau of the Chicago Police Department's Intelligence Unit. The first one to arrive for their meeting, Detective Jay Halstead opened the blinds in the break room to let in some early morning sunlight as the coffee machine hissed and howled, filling up the glass carafe with steaming hot beverage. As part of the Intelligence Unit, Jay and his fellow detectives investigate the city's major crimes, including organized crime, drug trafficking, high-profile murders, and whatever other cases they stumble upon or take over.

In case it wasn't clear enough: coffee is a must. Just the smell of the roasted beans filled his blood with a little kick.

Minutes later, the rest of the unit arrived. His partner, Erin Lindsay – not a morning person, mumbled a quick greeting as she dropped her belongings on her desk.

"Poured you a fresh cup," Jay pointed out the CPD mug sitting on the corner of her desk.

Her eyes instantly lit up. "Best partner in the world."

He laughed as he sipped his coffee and watched how she picked up her own, inhaling the caffeinated scent. She had the sweetest face and the kindest heart, and he truly appreciated the bond they shared.

As expected when two insanely attractive and charismatic people are paired up for a high-intensity job, there was definitely some attraction that they explored in the beginning, but it just never felt right to either of them, so they decided it was best to remain platonic partners and friends.

The veteran detective-turned-sergeant, Hank Voight, stood at the front of the room, ready to debrief his crew. As the leader of the Intelligence Unit, he was a tough, no nonsense, straight shooter who held the respect of most everyone he came into contact with.

"To be honest, I don't have much information about our next case yet," Voight began with his gravelly voice. "All I officially know is that we're being handed this case from the FBI. They're briefing me at 9am with all of the specifics, so I'll have more information for you then."

"That's unusual," Antonio Dawson, a veteran cop-turned-detective, said.

"Well, something tells me this case is unusual. Now, I don't like blindly dealing with the FBI, so I had Trudy do a little digging," Voight spoke of their tough-as-nails front desk sergeant, Trudy Platt. "Seems like we're dealing with some big time criminals using tight-lipped petty criminals to do their dirty work so they fly under the radar."

"Sounds pretty cut and dry then, no?" Adam Ruzek, the newest (and clearly the most naive) of the unit, asked.

Voight looked over at him with his lips in a thin line and his signature smart-ass glance. Out of the corner of his eye, Jay noticed Erin looking over at him, so he turned to meet her gaze. Knowing Ruzek was always digging himself into a hole with Voight, they gave each other smirks.

"If it was 'pretty cut and dry,' do you think it would be handed over to us?" Voight asked rhetorically.

Ruzek contemplated for a moment. "So... not cut and dry, then?"

"No," Voight answered. "Not even close. This seems to run pretty wide and pretty deep. Trafficking in every corner of the world."

"Of the world?" Erin questioned with raised eyebrows.

"Of the world," Voight confirmed with a nod. "Which is why the FBI is involved. But Trudy seems to think they just want us to infiltrate the Chicago hub. Once we do that, we'll hand it back over to the feds and let them handle it from there."

Everyone nodded in understanding.

"What we're looking at here is a very small section of a much larger underground ring of crime. We're meddling with a lot of dangerous people, and it's going to get ugly. But this one is a priority for the chief and being delegated by the feds, so we don't have a choice but to be on board," Voight explained.