Deadly Holidays

by Lisa Phillips

  “So your gut says what?” Steve asked.

  “Something doesn’t add up is all. Not just because he’s older than me, and every computer geek I know is younger. Maybe that’s stereotyping, but it’s true, isn’t it? And they all have this cousin in middle school they call when they get stuck. It’s like a thing.”

  “But not with this guy?”

  Bradley shook his head. “I can’t put my finger on it. Maybe he’s the most techy, old person ever, or he did what he needed just to get ahead. Stay at the top of the hacker game. What do I know? I’m a grunt with a gun.”

  He was a lot more than that, considering he’d been a Tier 1 operator before Steve hired him. “How is your knee?”

  He’d had surgery a few weeks ago. Now he barely walked with a limp, though that didn’t mean it wasn’t still healing.

  “Hurts.” He glanced at Steve, then looked back at the road. “Don’t tell Alexis.”

  Steve pressed his lips together, thinking about Rachel. It was inevitable. Despite the fact it was both redundant and pointless that his thoughts were full of her. Everything that needed to be said had already been said. Unless his life drastically changed, he wasn’t going to ruin the career of the senator because she was tangled up with a fugitive. After all she’d been through, she didn’t need that.

  “Get anything?”

  Steve heard the tone, as Bradley switched back to operational details. He told his friend about the meeting the VP had at the hotel, and the fact he’d followed his former teammate into that alley so they could talk.

  Bradley glanced at him. “And then you just let him go?”

  Steve shifted in his seat, as achy as the age his disguise pretended he was. Life on the run wasn’t fun after your mid-twenties. “David is going to feed me whatever he gets, and I have his number. If you pass it to the FBI, maybe they can track him.”

  “So far we’ve come up empty on known associates.”

  Steve nodded. “We knew this wasn’t going to be—” Brake lights lit up in front of them as traffic slowed to a stop. Buildings flanked them on both sides. “—easy.”

  Bradley said, “It’s a choke point is what it is.”

  “Huh?”

  “This whole street. It’s—” Bradley didn’t get the chance to finish.

  The SUV to the right of the armored vehicle exploded. Both of them ducked in their seats. The reflex to a battle they’d seen many times over.

  Men poured out of the buildings on either side, dressed in black and armed with high powered rifles. Skull masks covered their faces.

  Bradley pulled a weapon from the backseat and flung his door open. Steve did the same on his side with the pistol under his jacket. Behind the cover of the doors, they fired off shots. One fell. Then another.

  An agent up ahead lifted his weapon.

  Gunmen took him down.

  An older lady screamed. Steve spotted her, two cars in front of him. He ducked out from behind the door, then crouch-walked to the passenger side of her car. He opened the door and leaned in. “Come on!”

  She blinked at him and closed her mouth. Her earrings swayed, but the screaming ceased. She clambered across the parking break toward him. He hauled her out, and they duck-walked their way back to the SUV. He gave her a little shove in the direction of two other people running away.

  “Go with them.”

  In the distance, he heard sirens over the sound of gunfire. Smoke laced the air, thick with the scent of cordite. There was a limited amount of time he could stay here before cops descended, and he ran the risk of getting caught.

  He turned back to the SUV. Got back in position.

  Bradley ducked down, so his face was level with the door handle. “They’re mowing down the agents.”

  Another vehicle exploded.

  Steve yelled, “Rocket launcher!” He found the open window and pointed. “Up there.”

  Bradley nodded. “They’re breaking him out.”

  There was no way they could let that happen.

  “Ready?”

  He didn’t even need to explain the plan. Bradley said, “Go!”

  They moved out from behind the doors. Strode between vehicles toward the armored truck. Steve reached a female agent pinned down with a gunshot to her leg. She lifted her weapon. A reflex.

  “Stand down.”

  “Who are you?”

  He decided to opt for truth. “Steve Preston.” He was in an old man disguise. Maybe she wouldn’t believe him.

  She yelled, “Hey!”

  He kept going and hoped she didn’t shoot him in the back. More gunfire erupted from in front, this time at him. He’d lost sight of Bradley but heard the answering shots from his friend’s gun. Steve took cover then took out two more of the gunmen. Hired. Not Steve’s former team. The blackmailer had other people in his pocket—or just a lot of money. Enough to hire a black ops team to break out the hacker.

  A mysterious hacker knew who he was and could even provide them with the evidence they needed.

  Steve fired another shot, aware he was going to run out of bullets very soon. Two shots came back at him.

  He ducked, then lifted back up.

  The hacker strode out in the middle of a group of men. Steve caught a glimpse of his face. Not as old as Steve was pretending to be, but Bradley had been right. He wasn’t your stereotypical hacker. This man had thinning gray hair and a craggy face.

  More than that, Steve thought.

  This man looked familiar. Steve had seen him somewhere before.

  Chapter 13

  The gunman at the rear glanced back. He shifted his weapon to fire.

  Steve took cover.

  Bullets clanged into the metal of the car beside him. He crawled back toward the SUV. “Bradley! Let’s go!”

  “Copy that!” His friend yelled back, but Steve couldn’t see where he was.

  Sirens were getting louder now. Time to leave.

  He moved past the fallen agent. Blood now pooled on the concrete around her leg. He stowed his weapon then pulled his shirt open. Buttons skittered across the ground.

  She gave him a look. “Nice moves hotshot. Too bad I’m going to have to arrest you.” She lifted her weapon from the ground and pointed it at him one-handed.

  Steve ignored her. He lifted her leg only enough to get the shirt under, then tied it around her leg and pulled the material tight.

  She hissed.

  Steve said, “Maybe next time.”

  He raced away. She didn’t fire at his back. He’d have to send her a thank you note later, along with a box of cookies.

  Steve climbed in the front passenger seat. Bradley jumped in the driver’s door and said, “What are you thinking?”

  “Cookies.” He buckled up. “And hit the gas, or we’ll never catch them.”

  The street was chaos. Bradley used the SUV to shift two vehicles apart enough they could slip between. Steve winced at the crunch of metal on metal. Bradley turned the corner just as two black and white police cars tore down the road toward the scene. Plenty of agents down. A fugitive loose. A gunfight on a Washington DC street.

  They would be busy for a long while. And as far as Steve had seen, no other agents had gone after the gunmen and their charge.

  “Take the next left.”

  Bradley did as Steve ordered him to. They cut through a side street and came out on a parallel street, busy with cars. Bradley said, “We’ll never catch them in this.”

  Steve wanted to believe it wasn’t true. Still, he could hope. “I know him.”

  “The hacker? Who is he?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Bradley cut in front of a Mercedes and ignored the driver laying on his horn. “Talk it out. You might remember.”

  “I’ve seen him,” Steve said aloud. “It was the turn of his head, that line of jaw. The gray hair.” He tapped his fingers on his leg as Bradley sped down the street. “He looks like someone I’ve seen recently.”

  None of his teammate
s were old enough, and there wasn’t one man from the Venezuela group that he hadn’t spoken with—except, of course, those he’d heard were dead.

  He kept his finger tapping, thinking through everywhere he’d been.

  Nicola’s apartment.

  Rachel’s house.

  The VP’s study.

  He tried to remember details, but couldn’t place anything. Bradley swerved and Steve grabbed the handlebar at the top of the door. “See them?”

  “Nothing. But we don’t know what car they’re driving, right?”

  Steve said, “Unless the FBI got it. Or they can look on traffic cameras.”

  He no longer had the clout to ask such a question. He was a fugitive. One who had stashed the sniper rifle he was supposed to use to kill the president in a safe place. Maybe he would just leave it there until after the summit. Or send it by courier to Adrian, c/o the FBI office. They could do all kinds of processing on it. But that was assuming the blackmailer had made a mistake and left evidence behind. Not likely.

  Steve didn’t figure they would find a fingerprint on the case. At least, not one that didn’t belong to him.

  Bradley tossed Steve his phone. “Call Mint first. I want to know where he is.”

  “So do I,” Steve said, dialing the number.

  No answer.

  “Last I heard, he was going to the safety deposit box with Emma to retrieve what was in there.”

  Bradley nodded. “He hasn’t called me since.”

  “If he got mixed up in something, he might have dumped his phone and gone dark.” What about Emma? They would be together—but were they okay?

  “Call Adrian.”

  Steve ignored the fact it was an order and did it. Good idea.

  When he answered, Steve put him on speaker. Adrian said, “Kinda busy cleaning up a mess.”

  Steve held the phone out but didn’t say anything.

  Bradley said, “Not our fault.”

  “Yeah.”

  Steve didn’t know how to interpret that. He wasn’t happy, but he didn’t blame them?

  Bradley got in the left lane, his blinker on. “They were pros. A team of operators.”

  “Hired as a group.”

  “You can tell by the way they moved,” Bradley said. “Totally in sync. No words or commands. They’ve done this before, in some shape or form.”

  “Okay, I’ll run what we have against military databases. Thanks.”

  “No problem. One thing, though.”

  “What?”

  Bradley said, “Can you send me a picture of the hacker? My friend here thinks he recognizes him from somewhere.”

  “Will do,” Adrian said. “Keep me posted on that. It might help.”

  “I hope so.” Bradley paused a second. “Let Alexis know we’ll be back in a while.”

  “She left.” Adrian’s voice was distracted.

  Bradley’s face whipped around to the phone. “What?”

  “Megan’s with her. She took Alexis and Rachel to the hospital to check on that reporter who got shot.”

  Bradley took the left turn. As soon as there was a gap in oncoming traffic he flipped a U-turn. “Gotta go.”

  Steve hung up the phone, while Bradley muttered about his wife and sister.

  **

  Megan hung back. Rachel knocked on the door and cracked it, Alexis right behind her. The woman on the bed turned her head to see who was at the door. She clearly recognized Rachel.

  “Is it okay if I come in?”

  “Sure. I’m already bored of staring at the walls.” Nicola spoke as though pained. Her face was pale, dark under her eyes.

  “I won’t stay long. I just wanted to make sure you’re all right, so I can pass that information along to our mutual friend.” She stepped into the room, but left the door open.

  Alexis stayed in the doorway, Megan on duty in the hall. Their own personal protection detail. It was a risky move, but Megan had given them instructions they’d followed to minimize danger.

  “If you’re really not okay, I can leave.”

  Nicola said, “I’m not going to lie and say it doesn’t hurt. But it’s more discomfort than pain. They gave me some good stuff.”

  “Good.” Rachel smiled at her. She’d heard of Nicola Starns and had read some of her work, but they’d never met. “I’m—”

  “Senator Rachel Harris.” She looked more curious than anything else. “Steve told me about the blackmail. He’s kept me updated in case I can find information that might help clear his name.”

  “So you know he only acted under duress, firing at the FBI. He’s been dragged into this even though it has nothing to do with him. It’s all about a mission carried out by a colleague of his.”

  Nicola nodded. “The general who died at the think tank.”

  It was good she knew that. Even while it rubbed Rachel a little the wrong way that Nicola had talked to Steve. She had to remind herself that the two of them had a professional relationship these days. Nicola’s career as a reporter made her the perfect person to advocate for Steve. No one else could.

  Rachel would try. But even when she did, everyone wrote it off as the aftermath of trauma. Like she was losing her mind. “Have you been able to find out anything?”

  Nicola shook her head, a tiny movement. “Steve’s plan was to find other members of his team so that if he didn’t go through with the mission, he could keep anyone else from going through with it. In case the blackmailer has a backup plan in place.”

  “Oh.” Rachel had only just found out about the presidential assassination. It seemed like Nicola knew more than she did. Had Steve managed to find any members of his team?

  “I’m going to call the Secret Service today. Let them know there might be an attempt on the president’s life at the summit. I just can’t sit back and not say anything. I would never forgive myself.” Nicola paused. “Not if something happened.”

  Rachel tried to figure out why she hadn’t thought of that. Instead she’d done nothing, which meant she was allowing an attempt on the president’s life. She’d been convinced Steve was joking. And then, when she’d wondered if it was a real assignment from the blackmailer, she’d been sure he would never do it.

  Was there someone else contracted by the blackmailer to take a shot at the president if Steve didn’t do it?

  She needed to talk to Steve. Make sure he had a plan in place. Of course he did, and okay, maybe it was the senator in her that needed to be kept abreast of the situation here. But that was who she was. Committees and meetings. So many meetings. Feeling like she was out of the loop on something this important wasn’t fun.

  “Adrian just called.”

  Rachel spun around. Megan stood beside Alexis in the doorway. The former FBI agent said, “The transport was attacked. The hacker was set free by a team of mercenaries.”

  Rachel yelled, “What?”

  Nicola gasped, then groaned.

  “Are you okay?” Alexis wandered over to speak to her in that low, soothing voice she had. “Do you want me to call a nurse?”

  “I’m okay,” Nicola said.

  Rachel didn’t believe her. “I think you should call for some protection to keep you safe while you’re here.”

  Nicola bit her lip.

  “Is there someone who can do that?”

  Nicola shifted one shoulder. When she didn’t elaborate, Megan said, “I can have the FBI send over an agent to sit at the door.”

  Rachel wondered if she’d have called Steve, if he hadn’t been a fugitive at this present moment.

  Nicola said, “Thank you.”

  Alexis backed up. Megan headed for the hall and spoke over her shoulder, “Two minutes.” Her phone rang and she continued on her way out while she pulled it from her back pocket. “Perkins.”

  She disappeared into the hall. Alexis moved back over to the doorway but stayed inside.

  Rachel turned to Nicola again. “We don’t know each other.” This was weird, but she didn’t know how
to say it other than to just say it. “But I’m glad you didn’t end up as just another victim of this blackmailer.”

  Nicola’s lips shifted, not precisely a smile. “Me too. Though I don’t think I’ve ever felt worse.”

  “I’m sorry. I’ll leave you to it.” Rachel smiled her “senator” smile. “I just wanted to make sure you were all right.”

  “Nah,” Nicola said, a gleam of humor in her eyes. “That isn’t why you came. Not totally. You wanted to feel me out. See about me and Steve.”

  Rachel heard Alexis snort a tiny laugh but ignored it. She tried to sound as innocent as possible when she said, “There’s a ‘you and Steve’?” Like it was a perfectly reasonable question.

  Nicola said, “A long time ago. He’s a good man.”

  Rachel nodded. “He really is.”

  Something moved across Nicola’s face. Rachel didn’t know what it meant. The reporter said, “The tricky part is convincing him that that’s true.”

  “Let’s go,” Megan called out from the door.

  Rachel laid her hand on the reporter’s for a second. “I’m glad you’re all right.” Would it be weird to ask if she wanted to hang out when she was better? Nicola beat her to it.

  “Coffee, when I’m out of here? Or dinner?”

  Rachel smiled. “That would be great.”

  Right now she needed as many friends as she could get. Even if this one was only just a potential friend at this point.

  She waved and strode out.

  “Feel better?” Alexis slid her arm into Rachel’s as they walked.

  “Yes.” How had she known that?

  “You always did like field trips.”

  Rachel chuckled as they turned toward the elevator.

  “Stairs.” Megan’s tone left no room for arguments.

  Rachel eyed her. Just a few weeks ago the woman had multiple broken bones. Rachel pulled open the door to the stairs. “How are you feeling, Megan?” There was a limp, but just like Bradley, Megan covered it well.

  “Fine.” Her full attention was on the environment around them as she watched for danger. Hand close to her holstered gun. The lines on the outside of her eyes were pronounced.

  “You look like you need a nap.”

  “And you don’t?”