In this detective show prequel, we follow the group of characters whose choices will influence the future murder of a local TV personality named The Troll.
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It was a quiet Tuesday evening on Peachtree Street. Locals on foot stroll the sidewalks. Bass from the speaker trunks of old school cars drive past in every direction. Inside a vacant parking lot, young men lay on their stomachs with their hands interlaced behind their heads. Narcotics detectives move with precision as they tower over with their guns pointed down at them. One detective, in particular, walks up with her gun still locked in her holster monitoring her team. She enters one of the cars and pulls down the backseat revealing bricks of cocaine neatly stacked for transportation.
"Well, well, well..." Detective Taylor says with a smug smile on her face. It's the 9th bust this month. She's making a name for herself with Atlanta PD. She's a shoe-in to become the next lieutenant when the position becomes available.
Her phone buzzes inside her back pocket as she entertains the pleading innocence from below. She pulls out her phone and looks at the ID. Her stature instantly erects at full attention before pressing the green button.
"Detective Sparks," she answers, breathless.
"We got him," the cold voice of a woman says on the other side of the line. Taylor's heart jumps. This is the call that she's been waiting for.
Yogi Jackson, Tennessee drug kingpin, has been arrested on RICO charges. She watches the news as the muscular yet well-manicured murderer is escorted out with his hands bounded in front of him. A jacket to cover the handcuffs, but nothing to cover his arrogant smile. It made Taylor's skin crawl to see how much dignity this psychopath was given. All the evil he's been able to get away with for decades because of one woman. But this time it was going to be different. No more passes.
This is the first domino to fall. If we're going to strike the second, now is the time to do it, Taylor recalled the voice saying earlier that night as they wait for the police van to pick up the detained. Her team stands perplexed by the instant change in their fearless leader's demeanor.
"You know you don't have to go," Thomas, her lawyer boyfriend, suggests as he brings out two glasses of wine from the kitchen. Taylor grabs hers without looking away from the TV. She hasn't moved since she rushed in from work completely overlooking the fact that Thomas had cooked dinner for the 4th time in a row.
We'll have the paperwork started to have you transferred first thing in the morning, Taylor repeated verbatim to her boyfriend who is now massaging her feet while she lays flat on the couch.
She couldn't tell him everything. She wanted to but she couldn't. The rules were set long before he was in the picture. So was her fate. She couldn't ask him to move away from the law career he built for himself here in Atlanta. She couldn't stay here in Atlanta for him either.
"Some day I can tell you everything. Just not today," Taylor says so cold that Thomas shivers.
He's always known she's had a traumatic childhood. He's just not sure to what extent.
"I'll be here when that time comes," the man in her life says with warmth and understanding.
She's never met a man like him before. Someone she felt like she could trust with all her secrets. But she did and now she's going to have to let him go. Faced with the decision of a stable future or a chaotic past...
She landed in the city a month later. As soon as she arrived she had the Uber driver take her to the Green Heights Dam like many other tourists do. The talkative driver claiming to once being a big time author working his way back to the top tried giving her the history of the dam and all its importance. But she didn't need the history lesson. She's been studying this city since she was 16 years old.
As her heel hit the concrete pavement, a wave of nostalgia consumes her. The driver tells her that it's her lucky day because the waterfall rarely ever runs this time of year. She goes to sit on the top of the stairwell staring into the crashing water falling from the reservoir above. She left everything behind for unfinished business: a progressing job, close knit team, and a man head over hills for her. But none of it was enough . A legacy was falling and she was going to be a part of its destruction.
