Kill Shot

by Susan Sleeman

  “The FBI just told me he’s the one who emptied my bank account.” Olivia expected shock. Outrage even. She got dead silence. “Mom?”

  “You can’t trust the FBI. What do they know?”

  Odd response. “I’m working with them, and they’re very competent. Especially Agent Cannon, who’s in charge of the investigation.”

  Her mother huffed a breath of air, and that’s when it hit Olivia. “You’re not surprised. You knew Harrison did it, didn’t you?”

  “I…I…Yes.”

  Olivia’s anger evaporated, to be replaced by an ache knifing through her chest. That her brother had betrayed her was bad enough, but her mother? Unfathomable. “How could you not tell me?”

  “He hasn’t spent the money. He just wanted to teach you a lesson.”

  “A lesson. What kind of lesson?”

  “You’ve been kind of stingy lately. He thought if you didn’t have your nest egg to rely on you’d better understand what we’re going through.”

  “Oh…my…gosh! You think I’ve been stingy. Unbelievable. Anytime either of you asks for money I give it to you.”

  “Yes, but honestly, you’ve been kind of cranky about it the last few months.”

  Olivia’s anger returned with a vengeance. What should she say? Do? Nothing right now or she’d lose her cool, and saying something harsh would just exacerbate the situation.

  “Besides, you know Harrison,” her mother continued. “He’s not like the rest of us. He needs more grace, and we can’t blame him.”

  “Oh, I can blame him all right.”

  “But you won’t tell the police.”

  “The FBI is the police, Mom. They already know and, as far as I know, they’ll prosecute him.”

  “No! My baby can’t go to jail. He’ll give the money back. Don’t do this, Olivia. Just don’t. It could tear our family apart. Exactly what I wanted to avoid. Why I didn’t tell you.”

  Rick stepped into the room and signaled for her to join him.

  She was glad for the interruption so she could take the time to process her mother’s news and not say something she’d regret later. “I have to go, Mom. I’ll talk to you later.”

  “Don’t press charges against him.”

  “I can’t promise that.”

  “Just think about it. Please.”

  Olivia wanted to tell Rick about her mother, but something already weighed him down, and she didn’t want to add to his burden. And truth be told, she was embarrassed over letting her family dupe her like this in spite of her professional expertise. If those weren’t enough reasons to keep quiet, she’d come to rely on him too much, and she had to go back to standing on her own two feet.

  She met him at the door, and they boarded the small jet together. The plane had eight luxury leather seats, two of them facing backward to form a small conversation grouping. In the middle row with two seats, computer monitors were mounted on swivel mechanisms affixed to the side walls. The entire team minus Brynn sat in the back. Olivia hadn’t connected with Brynn, but she felt sorry for the woman for always being left behind to work crime scenes. Still, Olivia could tell Brynn loved her work, and Olivia also believed she was more at ease with her science than with people.

  Olivia took a seat. Rick sat next to her. The engines rumbled, making conversation impossible as the plane rose into the sky. Her thoughts returned to her brother. She tried to take a deep breath, but the space felt airless and claustrophobic. Rick seemed to be experiencing the same thing, as he kept tugging on his shirt to loosen the collar.

  “Want to tell me what’s wrong?” she asked the minute it was quiet enough to hold a conversation without raising her voice and alerting the entire team to Rick’s distress.

  His eyebrow went up. “Is this Dr. Dobbs asking or Olivia?”

  “I thought we were way past that.” She tried to sound cheerful, but his words stung. “That you trusted me when I said I wasn’t acting as your counselor.”

  “We are, but…” He shrugged.

  “But what?”

  “But I just had a blow, and I’m trying to work through it.”

  A blow? After the call from her mother, Olivia knew all about blows. She finally realized how much his parents’ actions had hurt him, and sharing her pain wouldn’t help him now. She needed to support him. Encourage him. She rested her hand on his, but said nothing and simply waited for him to continue.

  “We learned that the sniper class is involved in illegal weapon sales.”

  “Everyone?” she asked, surprise settling in. “Ace. Cesar. All of them?”

  He nodded, his face contorted. “Even Levi.”

  “Have you talked to him?”

  Rick shook his head.

  “Then don’t jump to conclusions.”

  “You can read my mind now?”

  “Your thoughts are written all over your face.”

  “Is that so?”

  “You’re thinking that if Levi’s guilty, he’s betrayed your trust just like your parents.”

  He pulled his hand free and rubbed it over his chin covered in dark whiskers. “Well, he has.”

  “He didn’t do this to you. It’s not personal. At least not like my brother,” she added without thinking.

  “Aw, honey, I’m sorry.” Rick scrubbed his hand over his face. “Here I am thinking only about myself when you have to be hurting. Did you get a hold of Harrison?”

  “We were talking about you,” she replied to keep from adding to his burdens.

  “It would do me good to focus on something else.” A tight smile found his lips. “So about Harrison…”

  “He didn’t answer.” Tears pricked at her eyes, but she wouldn’t cry. Not now. Not in front of the team. After hearing about her rocky relationship with Harrison, they already had to think she wasn’t much of a psychologist. She didn’t want them to think she was weak, too.

  “You must be eager to talk to him.”

  “Actually, no. I talked to my mom just now. She knew about the theft and—”

  “She what?” His voice rose, drawing attention from the others. He leaned closer. “And she didn’t tell you?”

  Olivia told him about the conversation with her mother, and her tears continued to beg for release.

  “What are you planning to do about it?”

  “I guess it depends on what you all do. I mean, now that you know that he committed the crime, aren’t you obligated to report it to the detective?”

  He frowned. “There’s no easy answer here. Bank fraud falls under the FBI’s umbrella, but thirty thousand dollars doesn’t meet the FBI’s threshold for prosecution. Not that we don’t want to take on every case, but it can cost a couple hundred thousand dollars to prosecute. At some point we have to say no.”

  “But I—”

  He held up his hand. “That doesn’t mean the local authorities can’t handle this for you. I can pass the information on to them. It’s up to you, though, to decide if you want to press charges.”

  How did she decide whether to send her brother to prison or not? She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. She looked at Rick. “If he pays the money back, I’m not sure what I’ll do.”

  He nodded. “You should know that even if you don’t press charges, the bank will likely want to.”

  “So what you’re saying is that it looks like my brother will go to jail no matter what I do.”

  “Not necessarily. If you don’t press charges, and he repays the money, then that could change the court’s sentencing. And if you want, I can go to bat for him. Try to get the judge to be lenient.”

  She appreciated his help, but this was her problem to deal with. “I’ll have to think about it. Part of me says it’s high time Harrison faces up to his issues, and now is the perfect time to do so. But the other part of me says it’s all my fault.”

  He stared at her. “How’s that even possible?”

  “As a psychologist I knew better when I kept making excuses for him no matter
his actions.” Her tears finally won the battle and rolled down her cheeks. “Still, I can’t see ruining his life by branding him a criminal. How will that help him?”

  Rick lifted a hand as if he planned to swipe away her tears, but then his arm dropped to the armrest. “We could go to the DA together. Ask them not to prosecute as long as he meets certain goals. That would hold him accountable, but not give him the criminal record.”

  “Do you think they’d go for that?”

  He shrugged. “We can try.”

  “Thank you.” She clutched his arm. “I don’t think I could handle this without you.”

  He looked uneasy at her leaning on him, but his attention was soon pulled away by Kaci, who stepped down the narrow aisle.

  She rested against the seat across the aisle. “I spoofed my messages on the darknet to look like one of the regular weapons buyers and set up a buy for as soon as we land.”

  “Good work.”

  “One thing you should know. The confirmation message said, ‘No light, no deal.’ I have no idea what that means, and it could blow the whole deal.”

  “Let’s talk about that as a team to see if we can come up with a logical explanation.” Rick got to his feet. “Any sign that Levi will be at the buy?”

  “I’m not sure who I’ll be meeting.”

  Rick clamped his hands on the empty seat in front of him and shook it. “What on earth was he thinking getting involved in something like this?”

  Despite Rick’s outburst, Olivia was impressed that Kaci’s gaze didn’t waver. “If he’s the one who shows up at the meet, you can ask him yourself.”

  * * *

  Atlanta, Georgia

  5:20 p.m.

  Rick had been sitting in the surveillance van with Cal and Shane for the last hour while Max escorted Olivia to the house. Max had volunteered to keep an eye on her while following up with the ME in Atlanta and Mobile to see if Griffin’s and Santos’s scars were UV tats of a number three as well.

  Rick glassed the area with his binoculars and came to rest on Kaci, waiting in a rental car for their suspect to show up.

  Rick received a text from Max. Thought you’d want to know. Levi ditched his detail.

  Rick slammed a fist on the console.

  “Problem?” Cal asked.

  “Levi ditched the agent assigned to him.”

  “And you think that means he’s coming here?”

  “He might have done it just to mess with me, I suppose,” Rick said, but he didn’t really believe it.

  He swallowed down the pain. He’d trusted Levi. Totally. Completely. With his life. He’d never been closer to another human being except Traci, and in some respects he was closer to Levi. Levi was like a brother. He didn’t think brothers betrayed your trust. Fathers did. Mothers did. But now, thanks to Harrison Dobbs, he knew brothers did, too.

  An older-model SUV pulled up behind Kaci’s car. Rick offered a prayer that Levi didn’t step out of the vehicle.

  “Someone call Max to run the plates,” Rick called out, not taking his eyes off the car as he waited for the driver to show himself.

  “I’ve got it,” Cal replied.

  Kaci stepped from her rental car and approached the SUV. Rick didn’t like putting her in harm’s way and would have done the meet and greet himself, but if Levi was the buyer, he would take one look at Rick and hightail it out of there.

  The SUV door opened. Rick held his breath. Booted feet dropped to the ground. Could still be any one of the men not in custody. The guy pushed out of the vehicle and came to his full height.

  Rick’s heart dropped to his stomach. “No.”

  “Levi?” Shane asked.

  “Levi,” Rick confirmed and started to get up. “I need to talk to him.”

  Cal grabbed Rick’s arm. “You need to let Kaci make the buy first.”

  Protocol dictated that they allow money to change hands as proof of Levi’s crimes. Rick knew that, but he could hardly stomach the thought of his best friend, the guy who’d saved his life countless times and vice versa, being arrested and rotting in prison.

  “You brought the money?” Levi’s voice came over Rick’s earbud, and he thought he might hurl.

  Kaci held out a tote bag. “It’s yours as soon as I see the weapons.”

  “They’re in the back.” He made his way to the rear of the vehicle, keeping his eyes on Kaci at all times. “You’re former military.”

  Kaci didn’t speak at first. “What makes you think that?”

  “Once a soldier, always a soldier. You’re marked for life.” He laughed.

  The sound darted through Rick’s brain. A sound he’d heard so many times in the past and couldn’t reconcile hearing in conjunction with weapons theft. Levi. His buddy. Was a common thief.

  Why, man?

  Rick tried to push the thoughts from his brain, but as he watched Levi, Rick couldn’t let it go. He would soon be sending his best friend to prison. What would that do to Levi’s wife? Their kids? One of them Rick’s godson?

  Man oh man.

  “Let’s see the light,” Levi demanded.

  “About that,” Kaci said, sounding uneasy.

  “You don’t have it?” Levi’s tone was ice cold, threatening.

  “I—”

  Levi suddenly pitched forward and collapsed to the ground. Rick’s heart split, but he kept his binoculars on his buddy.

  Kaci dropped to the ground and hovered over him. “He’s been shot. Large wound. Likely a .50.”

  “Take cover, Kaci,” Rick commanded and forced himself to forget that his friend couldn’t have survived the shot.

  “How?” she asked. “There’s no way to take cover from a smart bullet.”

  “Move to the far end of the vehicle,” Rick said. “The bullet will have to pass through the car to get to you.”

  “Roger that.”

  “I’m not leaving her out there alone.” Shane lurched for the back door.

  Rick grabbed his arm. “I don’t need two teammates as targets.”

  “We can’t leave her,” Shane snapped.

  “Cal, get the van going and get us over to her,” Rick ordered, though if the shooter wanted to take them out, the bullet would pass through the van like a knife through butter, and from so far away they wouldn’t even hear the rifle’s report before it ended a life.

  Cal slid behind the wheel. It took what felt like an eternity to move a few hundred feet. He swung the vehicle around and backed up to the SUV.

  Rick threw open the back door to find Kaci, wide-eyed and looking up at them. He reached out a hand and pulled her inside the van, then slammed the door. Cal floored the gas and the van jerked into motion.

  “What took you guys so long?” Kaci’s face creased in a grin fueled by shock and panic.

  Rick’s heart began to beat again, but barely. They still weren’t safe. No one was. Not with an unstoppable sniper on a killing spree.

  * * *

  Rick paced the road behind the yellow crime scene tape fluttering in the wind. Levi was dead. His buddy. Friend. Betrayer? Rick had confirmed it himself. Man oh man. The bullet. The damage. Rick had seen it before. In Iraq. Afghanistan. But other than losing Traci, nothing had ever been so difficult as witnessing the devastating injury to his best friend.

  Shane crossed the road, his hands clenched. He was bringing bad news. Rick didn’t want to hear it, but he stood waiting.

  “So?” he asked.

  “Levi has a tattoo on his wrist. It’s a number three like the others.”

  Max had called to tell them Griffin and Santos both had tats matching Neal’s wrist, too.

  “Why a three?” Shane asked.

  Why indeed? “Could be for the year they graduated from the Schoolhouse, but what’s up with it being UV?”

  Shane shrugged. “You should know the ME thinks Levi’s tattoo is new.”

  “New as in he just got it?”

  Shane nodded. “What do you make of that?”

  “I
don’t know what to think.” Rick stared across the road to where the ME and her assistant had settled Levi’s body in a black bag like the hundreds of bags Rick and Levi had managed to avoid on deployment.

  He couldn’t stand here any longer. “I need to take off.”

  “Of course,” Shane said. “Take the van. We’ll handle the scene and hitch a ride back to the house.”

  Rick trudged to the van and got it heading down the road. He tried to shake off the pain. He had to if he planned to find Levi’s killer. So far they’d recovered the bullet, and Rick had located the hide. They’d cordoned it off, and Brynn was on her way back from D.C. to handle the forensics. But that was all he’d done to help with the investigation. He could do no more. The pain. Man, his gut was on fire with it. With the loss Levi’s family was experiencing.

  After confirming Levi hadn’t survived, Rick had immediately driven over to Levi’s parents’ house to notify his wife that her husband had died. No way Rick would let April hear that from a stranger. He’d held her as she sobbed on his shoulder, then let his arms drop to his side as she beat on his chest, blaming him for not protecting Levi. She ended up kicking Rick out of the house. He didn’t deserve that blame, but she was grieving, so he’d taken it. Shoot, maybe he was to blame for not being in Atlanta to protect Levi himself.

  Rick sighed and parked in front of his parents’ house, the anguish he was trying to contain riding on his breath. People could die in the briefest flash of time. He’d known that—experienced it, even—but Levi’s death brought it all back. Reminded him that the sniper could get to Olivia, too.

  Man, that was a kick to the gut. It didn’t really matter how well he knew her or if he could trust her. She’d become important to him, and the thought of losing her felt like a tank crushing his chest.

  He headed for the house. Olivia met him in the entryway.

  “Do you want to talk about Levi?” Her soft tone should have comforted him, but it sounded like her shrink voice, and he snapped.

  “Right. Dr. Dobbs reporting for duty.”

  She winced, but he wanted to lash out at someone, and unfortunately for her, she was the only one nearby.

  “As much as you want to avoid it,” she said quietly, “first and foremost, I’m your friend.”