Sneak Peek: And She Runs

As an author, I like to share the first bit of a book before it comes out to give you an idea of what the book is about. However, I didn’t do this for And She Runs because I was keeping the subject a secret. Well now the book has been out for a bit, I wanted to share the opening bit in case you haven’t already read it.

The greatest thing in surveillance is when something actually happens. And if you’ve never had to watch someone, watch them almost every day, you know that doesn’t happen often. For two weeks now, my life has consisted of following this man around with nothing to show for it. But the name of the game is that as soon as you stop watching the paint dry, it’s magically all done.


So, I keep following. Keeping my space back from him, so he doesn’t know that I’m following him. Even if he did, he wouldn’t be able to prove it – I’ll look completely different tomorrow.


My rule that I’ve developed myself is “always one block behind.” On a downtown grid, that’s easy to do.


Off in the distance, the sun is rising above the White House, but it makes it hard to see him, to see him walk down the street, even though I know he’s there.


He has no idea that I even exist, and yet I feel like I know so much about him. 
There are so many questions I still don’t know, though, like why?


Why did he choose this life instead of the one that he had before? Why was he so determined to just up and leave? If this assignment goes the way I hope, there might still be a chance to ask him that at some point.


The sunshine bounces off cars on the street, moving as I walk to the east. Following him, wondering where we’re going today. We’ve already made one stop, where he had breakfast with a woman he’d met before. I don’t know if they’re a couple; the body language I get from them tells two different stories. She clearly wants to be with him, trying to flirt.


The hair tosses, reaching across the table while they wait for their food. But he recoiled every time she reached out, didn’t pay attention to the attempts to flirt.
I don’t remember anything about a woman in his file. No recent relationships; the last one ended about two years ago. Another missing piece to the story I’m trying to put together. 


I’ve followed this man across the District, North to South, East to West, underground in the Metro, above ground in the Metro, on the sidewalks, even into a few buildings. Just need to share a plane with him, and I think we’ll have it covered.


But I still don’t know what exactly I’m looking for. 


It’s only been six months since I graduated from college, became an adult, and made it out in the real world, so to say. Most of my days since then have been spent behind the desk, calling witnesses, writing reports, and occasionally going to a crime scene to investigate. But with white collar crimes, the crimes are often in an office. Health care fraud, embezzlement, mortgage fraud. There are other types of white collar crime, but most of what I’ve investigated lately has been rather boring.
White collar, at least what I’ve seen, is mostly people lying on paperwork to get away with money.


So, to be out in the field, following someone, it’s a nice change of pace. Even if it’s twenty-eight degrees outside, with a cold front coming in later today. Even if I still don’t understand why I’m following him. 


We turn from F Street to go south on 19th Street, past the General Services Administration building. I only know that from the sign on the corner. I’ve been in the D.C. area for almost five years now, but if I can’t find the White House, I’m lost.


So, turning away from the big house in the middle of downtown, I take a deep breath. I don’t know where we’re going now. I just have to trust that we aren’t going too far.


19th Street is just a one-way street, and he makes the decision to cross the street, hanging onto the left. I wonder if he’ll turn again, but for now, I keep my distance. Stay on the right side of the road, try to hide behind the different cars parked on the side of the street.


I get caught behind a bus, pausing for a moment to give myself some extra space. He’s not someone who looks behind him, not paranoid like I would be if I had even an inkling someone was following me. If he were to turn around and look at me, would he know who I am?


He can’t. There’s no way he could know who I am. Every time we’ve crossed paths in the last two weeks, I’ve looked different. Different hair colors, hair styles, sometimes extra weight added under a body suit. Different clothes. Never quite looking the same, always thinking about how a different person might interact with the world around her. 


Should have paid more attention back during that one semester of theater in high school. How to act like another person, how to embody another person while still being in your own skin.


Or maybe I’m thinking over it too much. I should just focus on the task at hand. Following him, trying to find out what he’s up to.


When the assignment landed on my desk a few weeks ago, to follow an F.B.I. agent who had gone rogue, find out what he was working on, it seemed cut and dry. Or maybe I’m just too naive. How one just ups and leaves the F.B.I., I’m not totally sure, but he did it. 


Maybe because I never belonged before I found the F.B.I., but I can’t imagine walking away. Or maybe I could, because I’m still not sure that I belong here, either. I suspect I’ll never feel like I truly belong anywhere. But a city is a nice place to simply exist, if one can’t belong.


I don’t know how long he wants to head down 19th Street, but eventually it runs into the National Mall.


It would be nice to know what’s going on in his mind. He’s been trained as an F.B.I. agent, and he knows how to evade people if he knows someone is looking for him. He knows how to blend in. Well, as much as you can when you’re taller than most people.


I’m 5’7”, taller than many women I work with, but I’m sure if I stood next to him, I’d feel short.
We cut a corner, and the wind picks up, forcing me to stop and make sure my wig is still on. Today I’m a brunette with short, almost choppy hair. If I lose this wig, it’ll be clear that I really don’t look like that. 


Two weeks, seven days, worth of following him around town looking for anything that might give him away, that might tip his hand and tell me what he’s up to. Every time I’m out here, the less confident I am that I’ll find anything. Maybe it’s the wrong time of the day to follow him in the morning. Maybe we can try to find him later today, later tonight.
It feels like a stereotype to assume that if he’s up to something shady, he’s doing it at night, after the sun goes down. But when sunset is before 5 p.m., it’s easier to do that. 


We’ve made it to the end of 19th Street finally, and now he can go down Constitution Ave or cross the street to go to the National Mall. In between cars driving down the road, I can see people in the distance at the Lincoln Memorial.


He elects to go left, closer to downtown. We’ll pass the White House again. Where does he think he’s going?
One thing they forgot to tell me about surveillance is that you never know what you’re looking for. A sleight of hand, walking past someone, and winking? A tiny gesture that seems innocuous?


I just don’t know. There’s nothing in his F.B.I. file that suggests he or his associates from the agency would be up to anything. He just up and left one day. 
It was just six months ago when that all happened, right when I graduated and finally joined the F.B.I. full-time. That first week, meeting all these new people, there was a heaviness in the air.
It’s not often that an agent abandons their job. Especially not like this.


And I suspect that’s why this case landed on my desk when he was spotted on a CCTV camera two weeks ago. Even if I were to lose my wig, lose the disguise, he wouldn’t know who I am. We never crossed paths inside the building.


But the idea is that with a new look every time, he really won’t know who I am, even if we were to run into each other on the street. The element of surprise, so when it is time to finally bring him in, he doesn’t see it coming.


Once we pass the White House, he crosses the street and heads through the National Mall. He conveniently skipped walking past the F.B.I. building. It doesn’t matter, because I don’t know where we’re going. Most days I follow him, we move through the north part of the city, today, it seems we’re headed more south.


Through the mall, we end up moving southeast, heading toward an area of D.C. I’m not familiar with. I know there are several government buildings here, but that’s all I have. 


Christmas is about a week and a half away, and the streets are empty compared to most of the year. The college kids who spend time at the National Mall have all gone home for winter break. This is the first year I’m not going back to Texas for winter break. Rookie life – I’m expected to be here at work on Christmas Day. Criminals never take the day off.


I take a deep breath as we cross the street again. If I lose him right now, I have no shot of catching him again today. 
We take another turn, and by the time I’m able to turn and cross the street, I almost lose him. 
Down the road, we pass more buildings, before he stops halfway down the block and turns and begins walking. If he’s halfway down the block and turning, there are only two options: a building or an alleyway.


I cross the intersection to be on the same side as him and wait a moment, curious if he’s going to pop back out. Now that I’m closer, I know it’s not a building. So I lean against the side of the building I’m in front of and wait a moment.


If this is an alleyway, he’s going to have to pop back out at some point. He’ll turn the corner, and there I’ll be, which means I need to be ready to run as soon as I start hearing something back there. But as I linger at the edge of the building, I want to peek over the edge, see what I might find.


But part of me is scared. What if he spots me? What if he’s doing something terrible, like murdering someone? If I need to arrest him, I have no handcuffs on me, no way to bring him in if I were even to catch him committing a crime. Despite the fact that I’ve done this so many times over the last two weeks, I suddenly feel terribly unprepared for what could happen.


I hear some noises from the other side of the wall, something in the alleyway, followed by a harsh tone. It’s hard to decipher what exactly someone is saying, but the tone is crystal clear.


Another voice joins the conversation, higher-pitched than his, but it still sounds like a man. Not that I’ll be looking around the corner to find out. I’ll just stand here, trying to flatten myself into a wall.


Then there’s a loud sound, almost like something was knocked over. A trash can? A box? 


That’s what breaks me. I lean over the edge, letting the brown hair of the wig swing loose, and when I look around the corner, I see him. Standing over someone else, leaning against the wall with his arm stretched out. 


I can see someone else’s legs out from behind some crates; those must have been what fell over. There’s some hair poking out from above the crate line; someone is there, but I couldn’t tell you anything else about the situation.


He gives the person a hard kick, and more crates fall over. How no one else has stopped to watch this, I don’t know, but I find it hard to look away. Who is the person on the ground? And why is he beating this person up?


Another hard kick, and he pushes himself off the wall, taking a step back to look down at the person. “You best stay out of my way, do you understand?”


Then he catches something in the corner of his eye and looks right at me.


And ten feet away, down a dark alleyway, I lock eyes with the man the F.B.I. wants, Connor Anders.


And then I run.


And She Runs ©2025 Laura Teagan Publishing, this chapter may not be shared without express permission of the author.