She would rather wait until Callie was safe. But if they waited till dark and used the night vision on the drone, the hard-to-decipher pale green images might not give them enough intel to figure out what was actually happening.
Skye reluctantly nodded. “Okay, let’s do it.”
Edge flashed one of his devastating smiles, a blaze of even white teeth. With his olive complexion, amazing blue eyes, and neatly trimmed, shiny black hair, the man was as perfect as one of his smiles. To say nothing of his broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped, perfectly sculpted body.
Skye’s heart squeezed. She’d once been as proud of her body as Edge must be of his. Not anymore.
“All right, let’s get this done.” Edge changed the drone battery and sent it off on one last flight, circling low along the hills outside the fence, then swooping in and silently flying along the eaves of the third building.
A FedEx delivery truck idled in front of two big metal doors that had been slid open. The drone darted in through the opening. Edge sent it up to the curved ceiling, out of the line of sight, then began to slowly circle around inside.
“Holy mother,” he said, his attention glued to the laptop screen positioned in the back of the SUV beneath the open cargo bay door.
“It’s some kind of laboratory,” Skye said. Long stainless-steel tables stretched from one end of the big open room to the other, three of them, running parallel about six feet apart. There were huge stainless-steel cooking pots, big glass beakers, all sorts of thick copper tubing.
High windows, in a row along both sides, were open for ventilation, the air stirred by three big fans perched high on the walls.
“It’s a frigging meth lab,” Edge said as two of the men, both dressed in white hazmat suits, began loading the white-and-blue box truck. “And it’s not just some amateur operation. These guys are in it big-time.”
Skye’s pulse speeded. “So that isn’t a real FedEx truck.”
“Not by a long shot.”
Skye thought of Callie and felt a jolt of fear. Meth labs were extremely volatile and dangerous, the chemicals themselves incredibly toxic. The drone camera picked up stacks of what looked like plastic-wrapped bricks and a pile of fat green cellophane tubes, all of them undoubtedly packed with white powder.
“That looks like a lot of product,” Skye said.
“Which equals a lot of money. I read somewhere that two hundred pounds of methamphetamine is worth over a million dollars.”
Skye forced herself to focus on the computer screen. “It’s made out of pseudoephedrine, right? I thought buying the drug in any quantity was banned a few years back.”
Edge nodded. “That’s right. It was banned in the US back in ’05. Which means Henson’s got a source, probably someplace out of the country.”
“Mexico?”
“Maybe. But the cartels mostly make their own synthetic drugs.”
“So somewhere else.”
“That’s right.”
Skye’s thoughts returned to her sister. “What about Callie? Should we call the police?”
Edge’s blue eyes lasered in on her face. “The situation is different now. All of the women are clearly in danger, but we aren’t equipped to get all of them out tonight. If we bring in the authorities, it’ll take time for them to set up a raid, and the more armed men, the higher the risk to your sister. Your family, your call.”
Skye’s decision was already made. “Everything’s set. We’re ready to go in and bring Callie out. Tomorrow we can go to the sheriff.”
“Good choice. Once Callie’s safe, we blow the whistle on Henson and his illegal money machine.”
Relief filtered through her. Taking action now was the best way to ensure Callie’s safety.
Edge called the drone back, and they waited for its arrival. “The way it looks, the men are in charge in there. Good chance none of the women are involved. From a legal standpoint, the less Callie knows about what’s going on, the better. The cops are going to bring these guys down hard. Better if Callie’s as far from the situation as possible.”
The drone arrived, and Edge stored it in the back of the SUV; then they belted themselves in for the trip back to town. When they arrived, Edge’s snazzy black sports car crouched like a sexy panther in front of the motel.
Trace was there.
Skye should have felt relieved.
