by Mary Calmes
“Hey,” Kohn greeted, pulling his badge from the breast pocket of his stand-up collar trench coat. “Lemme see yours, gentlemen.”
They brought out badges for him, which were basically redundant since we were only there because we had clearance to be. After we all shook hands, I turned to talk to our witness.
Nina Tolliver was a tiny woman. It was the first thing I thought. Her long brown curly hair hung to the middle of her back, and it was held away from her face with an octopus clip—which I recognized because I had roommates in college, four of them, all women, and the bathroom had been littered with everything from rubber bands to lacquered chopsticks. None of my annoying, loving friends had hair as long as Nina’s, though. So to be saying something as I walked up to her, hand out, I commented on it.
“Damn, woman, you got a lotta hair.”
And that fast, instead of the obvious apprehension she had for the police detectives, I got a warm smile. She looked good in her navy Ann Taylor suit.
“I’m Nina Tolliver,” she said, like I didn’t know. Like maybe we were having a normal conversation. “And you are?”
“Miro Jones,” I answered, smiling back.
She tipped her head. “Miro?”
“It’s short for Miroslav,” I explained like I always did. “It’s Czech.”
“I like it,” she said, and I recognized that along with the interest I was getting, the genuineness, I was also seeing concern.
“Are you scared?”
She shook her head.
“Then what?”
“You two came alone?”
“No. There are two other marshals here somewhere. Maybe you haven’t seen them yet.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Gotta be,” I scoffed. “I promise you, we always transport in fours, not twos.”
Her brows furrowed. “You’re wrong. You’re the only marshals I’ve seen today.”
It was instant—the roll of my stomach, the shiver of dread, because I knew, right then, at that moment, that it was me and Kohn and Nina, and that was all.
I glanced to Kohn and he gave me a quick nod, understanding what was happening as much as I did.
“Oh Lord, I gotta pee,” he announced loudly, and all four detectives laughed as he darted out of the room.
“I like the running shoes,” I said, pointing at them. “They really set off the outfit.”
She shrugged. “I figured I’d carry my heels with me for the deposition, but I’m probably overdressed anyway. It’s not court today, not yet.”
“Right,” I agreed, realizing that now would be the perfect time to kill her, before the bright lights of the media circus. The calm before the storm, just a federal prosecutor and the defense attorney listening to what she had to say. “So we have some time. You want some tea?”
“That would be great,” she replied softly.
“I’ll make you some tea,” I yelled after Kohn before pivoting to face Nina again. “Take me to the kitchen if you would, please, madam.”
She graced me with a smile, and I was about to follow her down the short hall, but I remembered that I was acting and had to make sure it all appeared real.
“You guys want any?” I offered the detectives.
“No, man, we’re good,” Cassel answered.
Grabbing Nina’s arm, I walked her directly through the living room, into the kitchen, and stopped at the back door, where I waited.
“Hey,” one of the detectives called out to Kohn. “You all right in there?”
It was obviously to gauge where Kohn was, and in that instant, I heard the chirp of a sensor.
“Fuck!” came the yell as I heard feet pounding across the floor.
“Check the kitchen for the other one!”
Hurling open the sliding glass door, I drew my gun and shoved Nina through. “Keep up with me when I run,” I ordered loudly.
“Yes,” was all she said.
We scrambled down the back stairs, bolted across the yard, and I hopped the small chain-link fence that separated one piece of property from the other, and then helped Nina over, lifting her easily. I was surprised that I didn’t have to urge her on, to follow me, but she was very focused on survival. She wanted to live, kept chanting it, telling me as we ran.
“I have boys,” she repeated as she hiked up her skirt. “They need me.”
Through the neighbor’s obstacle course—a Jack Russell terrier that came streaking out through its doggie door to greet us, swing set, patio furniture—we ran as I pulled my phone from my pocket and called my boss on his private line.
“Jones?” he rumbled.
“I’m running from the safe house in Brookfield with Nina Tolliver. I’m not sure if Kohn got out or not. He was creating a diversion for me and the witness by going out the bathroom window. I have two detectives in pursuit. I think White and Sharpe are down somewhere on the grounds. I’m headed to George’s diner two blocks away because it’s the only place I know around here. Send backup now.”
“Copy that. We’re en route. I’ll be on-site in twenty, Jones.”
He was basically thirteen miles away, which could take him either twenty minutes or an hour. It all depended on traffic, even with a flashing blue light on top of his car. I-55—we never referred to it as the Stevenson Expressway—was the quickest way. “Okay.”
“Don’t die.”
“Yessir.”
And he was gone as Nina and I hit the street and ran. With her skirt around her ass and her running shoes on, she was flying. With my longer legs, I was still much faster, so I slowed to keep pace with her, but both of us were running for our lives.
A car closed in behind us, and a bullet hit a trash can beside me. I shoved Nina to the ground, turned, saw the threat, and fired. Cassel, who had come around the car to shoot me, went down as I put one in his shoulder. But Rybin, using the car as a shield, shot over the hood and caught me in my right shoulder, just off the edge of the second-chance vest I wore under my shirt. I absorbed the shock, feeling pressure and pain. Nina’s scream scared me as I fired back, putting shots in the hood and shattering the windshield, enough to make Rybin dive for cover.
“Come on!” I yelled at her.
The sirens terrified me, because the men chasing us could also call for backup. I could have been a rogue marshal who drew down on them. I could be trying to kidnap Nina. The scenarios were endless, and so because of that, I didn’t stop to wave down a police cruiser. We ran on toward Ogden Avenue, gun in one hand, the other pressed to my shoulder. Not that it was helping, there was blood seeping through my fingers.
A car came up fast beside us, and my first thought when Nina screamed was that she’d been hit. But the fact that she was able to run by me, followed by searing, smothering pain in my upper chest, let me know that it was me who took the bullet. It was at the inside of the shoulder joint and above the neckline of the damn vest, on the left side this time.
Time slowed and I was scared for a second, worried that I couldn’t protect her, knowing I was hurt. It was strange, that clarity in the midst of all the adrenaline.
“Are you—”
Her voice, the tremor in it, snapped me back into the moment. “Don’t stop! Run!”
I passed her and she followed me, the two of us running behind a frozen yogurt place, then between two buildings. We lost them because the alley was too narrow for a car and they had to circle back around. Grabbing Nina’s hand, I ran headlong into the street, horns and yelling greeting us as cars came to squealing stops to avoid running us over.
It always looked so easy in movies or on TV. People dodged cars like it was nothing. It was why I normally ended up yelling at the screen. Ian wouldn’t go with me to movies anymore; instead he made me watch them at his place. He said I got too invested in the action and needed to learn to distance myself emotionally. I was working on it.
Nina was amazing. If I had to handpick a civilian to run from armed gunman with, I could not have chosen any better. She
listened better than anyone I had ever met.
Safe on the opposite sidewalk, I stumbled forward, my vision blurring for a moment. I was losing too much blood too fast and had to make a change.
“Follow me,” I barked at her after catching sight of a man standing in the doorway of an automotive repair shop.
Charging over to him, Nina staying right with me, I yelled for help.
People always surprised me. Instead of turning tail, running inside and rolling the big bay doors down from the ceiling, he waved at us to hurry. When we got close, he stepped aside so I could run past him, Nina right behind me.
I lost my balance, fell to my knees but twisted sideways, shoving Nina behind me, shielding her between my body and a parked car, my back plastered to her front. I heard her gasp.
“I need to see how bad you’re hit,” she ordered. “Take this off so I can check.”
“Not until I’ve assessed all threats.”
“Yeah, okay,” she said, her breath catching, “but maybe you could hold the gun with one hand and let me take off the coat and then change hands?”
“What?” I was having trouble following her among the dizziness, darkening vision, and sharp, throbbing pain. I really needed to remain conscious.
“Just—let me.”
It was difficult to maintain my focus as she reached around my chest, unzipped my jacket, and pulled at me roughly, divesting me of my ruined piece of outerwear.
“Oh God,” she moaned, her face scrunching up. “You’re really bleeding. This T-shirt is soaked and—I thought this vest was supposed to fucking do something!”
It did, just not everything. It wasn’t body armor.
“Move your arm. I need to check and see if it came out the other side.”
I ended up transferring the gun between hands as she’d suggested.
“Oh Jesus,” she cried, which gave me an even better idea of the amount of fluid she was looking at. “Miro, your collarbone is—and your shoulder, I—you’re losing too much blood!”
The man and five other mechanics crowded in around us even as I held my gun on them.
“It’s okay,” the man who let us in soothed, lifting his hands, turning his head right and then left, jerking it up both times, clearly signaling to the men. The others stepped back before he took a step forward. “You running from the cops?”
“Yes,” Nina cried, her bottom lip quivering. “And they shot him! Twice!”
“Yeah, I see,” he murmured before he reached behind him, pulled a shop towel from his back pocket, and wadded it up. “I’m gonna throw it over to your girl, okay? Don’t shoot me.”
“He’s not going to shoot you!” Nina shouted, her voice rising fast. “He’s a US marshal, for crissakes! He’s trying to save my life!”
He startled as I felt a throb run through my chest, making me shudder with the effort it took to hold the gun up. I was starting to worry that I was going to pass out and wouldn’t be able to protect Nina. If it were only my shoulder, I wouldn’t have worried. The bullet had gone in the back of my right shoulder and exited from the front. The through and through was good, the blood running down my bicep to the crook of my elbow to my forearm was not so great, but still probably not life threatening. The one in my chest was another story. I wasn’t sure about the damage there and it was unnerving. If I was going to die, I wanted to talk to Ian first.
“You’re a marshal?”
Shit. Had to focus. “Yeah,” I said, leaning sideways so he could see the badge on my belt.
“Lemme come to you, marshal.”
I lowered the gun because I was quickly losing the ability to hold it up.
He moved fast, rushing forward and shoving the towel against my shoulder, near my throat.
“Fuck.”
“Lado!” he bellowed. “Bring me clean towels from the back and call 911!”
“No,” I said, turning my head to look at Nina but not able to catch her eye when she was in motion. She had gotten up and moved around in front of me, took her suit jacket off, and wadded it up so she could push it against the other hole in my shoulder. “Nina, get my phone and call my boss.”
“How do I know who—”
“It says boss,” I said, having trouble focusing before I met the gaze of the man who took over for her, now holding both his towel and the ruined suit jacket to both sides of my shoulder.
“This looks more glamorous in the movies,” he informed me, smiling gently.
“Right?” I coughed, chuckling.
“I’m sorry, man, I thought maybe you’d kidnapped her or the two of you were running from the cops.”
“We are,” I said, laughing and groaning at the same time.
“Hurts, huh?”
“Yeah.”
The phone was suddenly against my ear, Nina pressing it there gently.
“Hello?”
“Where the hell are you, Jones?” Kage growled angrily.
I looked up at the man keeping me from bleeding to death. “Where am I?”
“You’re close to Ogden and Maple at Chaney and Sons Restoration.”
“Okay,” I said, letting my head drop forward. “You hear that?”
“Yeah, but Brookfield is like the auto shop capital of the world, I need a landmark.”
“Landmark?” I asked.
“The Flower Pot Garden Center is next door.”
“Boss?” I asked, because talking was fast becoming a real chore.
“I heard him. We’ll be right there. Where are the detectives who were chasing you?”
“I dunno. God willing, not outside preparing to come in, guns blazing.”
“That’s not funny, Jones.”
“I—” The sirens sent a ripple of fear through me instead of inspiring the relief they normally did. “You hear that?”
“Yeah. That’s me.”
I nearly passed out. “Okay. I’ll wait here and bleed, ’kay?”
“Just don’t die. I haven’t lost anybody yet today, let’s not start with you.”
“Yessir,” I said and hung up just as my phone rang. “It’s gonna be okay,” I swore to the kind Samaritan and Nina. “I promise.”
“What?” Kohn asked from the other end of the line.
“Oh thank God, hey, buddy,” I winced.
“Now I’m your buddy? Since when?”
“Where the fuck are you?”
“I’m in a shed in a civilian home on Vernon Avenue.”
“You okay?”
“I got scraped up going out the window, but I’ll live. I really don’t want to shoot the raccoon that’s in here with me, but if it charges, I’m gonna. I mean, it could have rabies.”
I winced because it hurt to laugh. “Please shut up. Call your boss now, he’s almost to me.”
“I did already,” he said quickly. “You sound weird. What’s wrong?”
“Shot.”
Silence.
“Eli?”
“Don’t fuckin’ call me Eli, you’re not gonna die.”
“Okay,” I said even as my vision started going darker around the edges.
“I’ll see you in a minute,” he rasped, and I heard the words “federal marshal” on his end before the line went dead. He was safe, I was relieved.
“Oh shit, Miro, sit up,” Nina commanded even as I slouched to the cold concrete floor. “The ground is gonna suck out all your warmth. You gotta sit up and lean on me.”
But there was no way. I wanted to rest. Nina was safe because of me, and Kohn was safe because he was in a potting shed or a tool shed being hunted by a rabid woodland creature. The very idea made me chuckle.
“Jesus, Miro, you’re so cold.”
But I wasn’t anything anymore.
“Federal marshals!”
I made a noise of relief as there was the sound of gunfire close by, like right outside. Several shots followed by two more. It was important to warn Nina, to get her down, but when I tried to speak there was nothing.
“Jones,”
I heard Kage say in his guttural growl at the same time I got a big hand on my chest. Amazing the amount of warmth in my boss’s palm, I could only imagine what being wrapped in his arms would be like. “Don’t die.”
Lord, I really was out of it. I liked my boss, but I was only carrying a big blazing torch for one man. And Jesus, this would piss him off when he found out.
“Boss?” I managed to choke out.
“Don’t talk, Jones,” he snarled, and then I heard him yell. “In here!”
“Kohn’s in a shed.”
“He was. Dorsey and Ryan picked him up.”
“Tell Ian I—”
“You can talk to Doyle your damn self. Hold on and shut the fuck up.”
I was going to argue, but I passed out instead.
Chapter 9
I WOKE up with one IV tube feeding me, one pumping me full of antibiotics, one keeping me hydrated, and the last one keeping me comfortable. That same morning, the drugs and the catheter went bye-bye. I was glad to be rid of both. I had never been a fan of being incapacitated or drugged up and fuzzy. I like being 100 percent in control at all times. I had too many bad memories of being at someone else’s mercy.
It was two days later. Once I was awake, the inquest guys showed up: the federal ones, the Chicago PD ones, my boss, his boss, and the boss of the four detectives who tried to kill me and Kohn and Nina Tolliver. The chief of police was there as well, and the state’s attorney, his assistant, and a stenographer. It was a lot of people, but my room was big.
Apparently they had already questioned Kohn and Nina and had been waiting for me to wake up and corroborate everyone else’s stories.
“How did you know you were in trouble?” the federal investigator asked.
“As soon as Nina Tolliver said that Kohn and I were the only marshals she’d seen, I knew there was a problem.” I glanced at my boss. “Are Sharpe and White dead?”
Quick shake of his head even as the muscles in his jaw clenched.
“No?”
“White’s in a coma two doors down from you, and Sharpe went home yesterday.”
“What’s the prognosis on White?”
“He simply needs to wake up,” he assured me.
I nodded, and the investigator was going to speak again but I asked my boss another question. “Are Cassel and Rybin dead?”