by Alison Bruce
“Sure. Thanks.”
He left and I let out a long sigh of relief.
CHAPTER 17
Whatever came next, taking Walter’s advice made the most sense for now. Funnily enough, with all the various stressors, the one that really took it out of me was having my wound gush. It was almost as if I had been leaking fuel and now I was running on empty.
I checked under my dressing. It looked benign now, but appearances could be deceptive. Under the circumstances, I decided to leave my pack in the kitchen. As it was, I had to drag myself up the stairs.
Five minutes, I told myself, as I changed into an over-sized t-shirt. I’d lie down for five minutes—thirty minutes tops. Then I’d do whatever I had to do. I lay on top of the covers so I wouldn’t get too comfortable, then pulled half my duvet over top of me so I wouldn’t get chilled. Luxuriating in the feeling of release that came from letting go of my tension, my eyes drifted shut.
I wasn’t aware of falling asleep, but someone was shaking my shoulder. Groggy, it didn’t immediately occur to me to be worried. Then two little words took me from zero to sixty.
“Wake up.”
I was completely and absolutely awake—so awake I knew I had to be careful how I reacted.
“Huh?” I grunted. I sat up, pulling the cover up protectively. “Kallas? What the hell are you doing here? How did you get in?”
It was dark except for the light spilling in from the hall. I shot a glance at my bedside clock. It was seven-fifteen. I’d been asleep for almost four hours.
“Get dressed. Time to leave.”
“What are you talking about?”
She backed away a couple of steps. For a moment, Kallas was silhouetted by the hall light. Then she flipped on my overhead. I winced at the brightness.
She wasn’t in uniform, but she had her tough cop face on, just as she had the night of the murder. I didn’t fool myself into believing that she was here on police business, however. If her reason for being here was legitimate, she wouldn’t be holding a gun on me.
“Delia, you can stand there, pointing that gun at me ’til the cows come home,” I said, in the role of nervous but mostly outraged friend. “I’m not going to move until you explain what’s going on.”
She picked up my portable phone and pocketed my cell phone.
“You’re not stupid, Pru. You know why I’m here. I have a call to make. You’ve got five minutes. I’ll be waiting outside your door.”
“Five minutes,” I said, nodding.
What the hell could I do in five minutes?
As soon as the door closed behind her, I threw back the covers, pulled on jeans, and layered a sweater over my t-shirt. As I scrambled, I tried to think. How could I let Merrick know what was happening?
Although neither Merrick nor Zeke went into depth about their investigations, I knew that almost everyone I knew, with the exception of Boone and Hope and the possible exception of my mother, were considered suspects. Merrick never said anything directly, but I think Rick was his favourite suspect right up until Lorraine tried to kill me. The poor way he handled her didn’t jibe with a spy master.
My money had been on Walter, which would have made me feel awful about now if I had time to worry about it. I’d really hoped it wasn’t Kallas, though it worried me how much she had inserted herself into my life and the investigation.
“Two minutes,” Kallas called through the door.
It reminded me of getting Hope and Boone off to bed. Like my kids, I looked for a way to prolong the inevitable.
“Why?” I asked. “What’s going on? Why two minutes? Why not three or ten or—”
“Don’t pretend you don’t know.” She sounded weary, disappointed. “It was a clever trap, but I discovered it. Fortunately, I’m prepared.”
“Prepared for what?”
I jerked the door open, startling her.
“Why are you doing this? I thought you were my friend.”
For a moment, she looked sad and the hand holding the gun dropped a little. That was my cue.
I slammed my arm down on her. She yelped in pain and lost her grip on the pistol. I kicked it through the bathroom door and swung my arm into her shoulder, knocking her out of the way. Before she collected herself, I was behind the locked bathroom door. The iron bar, a leftover piece of hardware I kept under my bed just for an occasion such as this, slid down my arm and out my sleeve.
To think, my mother thought I was crazy, always having a blunt instrument under my bed. Seth joked that I’d use it against him one day. He wouldn’t laugh now. I kept the bar within reach and picked up the gun. Nate hadn’t turned me into a sharpshooter, but he’d taught me enough.
Mere seconds had passed. Kallas recovered and slammed against the door. It creaked, but held.
I shot—maybe on level with her hips if she was standing upright. I knew the chances of me hitting her through the door were slim, but I wanted her to know I was prepared to use the weapon against her.
For a moment, there was silence, except for the ringing in my ears.
“You’re making things difficult.”
“Then make it simple,” I shouted at the closed door. “Just go. You don’t need me. Go while the going is good. Take my cell phone and portable phones. I won’t be able to call out . . .”
“I do need you.” Her voice was calm, but loud enough to ensure I heard. “You’ve made it clear that Merrick is onto my little sideline.” Not accusing. Just stating the facts, ma’am. “You’re my insurance—you and your children. Even as we speak, I have operatives picking up the twins at their great-grandmother’s farm. If I don’t meet them at the appointed place—with you of course—they will kill Hope and Boone. Do you understand, Pru?”
The thought of Hope and Boone being kidnapped made my knees weak. I sat on the edge of the bathtub, forcing my mind to focus on the situation as it was, setting aside what might be.
“Open the door,” said the reasonable, helpful cop. “You aren’t in any danger as long as you cooperate.”
She meant to soothe me. I made her try harder. “How long do we have to be your hostages? How do I know my children are safe? If you want me to be reasonable, you need to give me answers.” I took a deep, shuddering breath. “Short answers will do for now.”
She blew out a sigh. Again, I wondered, why the hell didn’t she just cut and run. Surely, I wasn’t worth all this trouble. When I thought it was Walter, I assumed some sort of romantic attachment. If it had been Rick . . . he would never have threatened my children.
“You’ll be my hostages until we’re safely out of the country. Then you can go home and I’ll disappear. I don’t want to hurt you. This is business, not personal.”
Not personal? You don’t threaten my children and say it’s not personal.
“I need to talk to Hope and Boone first. I need to know they’re safe.”
“You can call them,” she said. “That’s a reasonable request. Open the door.”
I unlocked the door and stepped back, holding the pistol out in front of me, braced in both hands.
Kallas turned the nob and pushed the door open with her foot. She had a second gun pointed at me. Not overly trusting. That’s okay. Neither was I.
“I have Hope and Boone’s numbers on speed-dial on my cell phone,” I said, voice pretty steady, if I do say so myself. “You give me the phone, I’ll give up the gun.”
She pulled out my cell phone and placed it on the counter. I picked it up and lay down the pistol. She stuck the second gun in the waistband of her jeans and picked up the one I had relinquished. Meanwhile, I flipped open the phone, and hit the necessary buttons.
“Hello? I need to talk to my son or daughter. I need to know they’re safe.”
I took a breath and waited.
“Hey, honey, it’s Mommy. You okay . . . Yeah, I’m okay. Look I know you’re probably scared, but Kallas and I are going to see you soon . . . We’re leaving the house right now.”
Kallas raised
the gun level with my face, “I think I’d like to talk to your children too.”
“You don’t think they’re scared enough already?” I snapped.
She held out her free hand for my phone. I gave it up.
“Hello? Boone? Hope? This is Constable Kallas.”
Her brows furrowed then cleared. As she relaxed, so did her aim. The barrel had dipped from my face to my left shoulder, but even if I took her off guard, she was blocking my exit, so I waited.
“Hi Hope. I know things seem a little scary right now, but you’ll see your mother soon . . . I can’t tell you that, but I think you’ll find it very exciting . . . Okay, but just to say good bye.”
She handed me back the phone, mouthing, “We have to go now.”
“We have to go now,” I said. “I’ll see you soon . . . Okay.”
I hung up and automatically pocketed my phone.
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s go. I want to see my kids.”
Kallas backed out of the bathroom and gestured me to precede her downstairs. She waved me toward the front door. I started toward the kitchen.
“I need to get my pack,” I said. “I’m not going anywhere without my laptop. My stories are there.”
I felt the draft from the open back door just before crossing the threshold. Kallas must have felt it too because she grabbed hold of me and pressed the gun to my temple.
“The gun she’s holding isn’t loaded,” I shouted—not for Kallas’s benefit—but to inform Zeke and the two uniformed officers pointing guns at us.
After a dull click that proved my statement, Kallas tossed the gun aside and reached for the one in her waistband.
“No way,” I shrieked, throwing myself backwards, knocking us both over.
There was a muffled shot followed by a deafening scream. I might have screamed too. I rolled off Kallas, letting the two uniformed officers secure her and assess the damage. I fought down the urge to giggle. All I could think of was, good thing she wasn’t a man.
I heard Zeke’s voice cut through the confusion.
“Merrick, she’s bleeding.”
No shit, I thought. Then I looked down and realized he meant me.
I pushed myself up into a sitting position, wondering where Merrick was. Kallas’s hand grabbed my jeans, twisting the fabric in her fist, painfully knuckling my shin.
“You’ve just killed your children,” she rasped, obviously in a lot of pain.
Merrick crouched beside me and pried her fingers off me.
Zeke stayed with Kallas, while Merrick helped me to my feet and led me to the kitchen table so I could sit. I was a bloody mess, but only because my fistula wound had torn open and was seeping blood and pus. I had a powder burn across my butt, but it mostly hurt my jeans.
Someone put a blanket around my shoulders. Evidently, there was a medic in the group because Merrick requisitioned a compress and bandages so he could fix my dressing. His hands were steady and he seemed to know what he was doing. I, on the other hand, coming down from yet another adrenalin rush, was shaking like a washing machine on the spin cycle.
“Y-you’d think I’d b-be used to this,” I stuttered, holding my head up with my elbow braced on the table.
Then I thought about my kids and it was as if an electric shock went through me. I dropped my hand from my head to clutch Merrick’s sleeve.
“Hope and Boone.”
“Hope and Boone are fine,” he said in a low voice, gently easing my grip so he could finish my dressing. After a minute or so he continued. “Your daughter was brilliant—as brilliant as her mother. I only had time to give her a few instructions before I patched her through to you.”
“She’s probably thrilled she got to help in a real case. But does she know?”
He pulled my shirt down over the bandage and took my hands in his. His eyes held mine. A calming wave washed over me.
“She only knew that she was helping to trap a criminal, not that you were in danger,” he said. “I didn’t tell her and she was smart enough not to waste time asking.”
When I used the phone, I called Merrick, not my kids. When Kallas wanted to talk to one of them, I was afraid I’d be caught out. Either Merrick was very fast off the mark, or he had my bathroom bugged. Or maybe he just heard us—we were loud enough. Merrick and his officers were already on the scene, having been alerted by Kallas entering my home.
“I told her we’d call back when the dust settled,” he continued.
I squeezed his hands.
“Thank you.”
It was a woefully inadequate expression of gratitude. Thanks to Merrick, Hope and Boone had been spending the last month or so in Ottawa, living at his home, under the guardianship and protection of his son, back at the school they had attended last spring. Their presence there was on a need to know basis. Even Seth thought the kids were with his grandmother.
“Nana Morgan!” Tension flowed back into me, overwhelming the peaceful calm Merrick had established.
“Probably disappointed that she missed the action,” Merrick said, his tone matter of fact, but his eyes smiling. “Her brother reported trespassers while she was at a Women’s Federation meeting. The OPP picked them up and reported to me minutes before you called.”
A paramedic in the familiar uniform of our city ambulance service appeared beside me. I blinked, suddenly realizing that Kallas, Zeke and that almost everyone else had left. My attention had been so focussed, I hadn’t noticed.
“Ma’am, are you okay?”
I shrugged. I wasn’t sure yet.
Merrick explained that I had a pre-existing wound and that I was suffering from adrenalin shock, but it seemed to be subsiding. Naturally, the paramedic, who introduced himself as Gray, wasn’t going to take Merrick’s word. Gray produced a blood-pressure cuff and politely suggested that Merrick might be needed elsewhere.
“No, I’m not,” Merrick asserted.
He eased himself up out of his crouching position, keeping hold of my hands. I’m pretty sure I heard his knees creak. He let go of one hand just long enough to snag a chair so he could sit.
“I’ll be okay if you need to take care of business,” I assured him, not sounding at all convincing.
He shook his head.
“I decided to recuse myself from the investigation. I’ve turned over control to Zeke and the forensic team.”
Probably just as well. Now he wouldn’t find out until later that I shot a hole in my bathroom door, and someone else would find the ejected shells hidden under spent tissues and sanitary products in my bathroom garbage. I wasn’t sure if he’d be appalled that I shot at Kallas or disappointed I didn’t try harder to hit her or maybe he’d just be as thankful as I was that Kallas hadn’t noticed I handed back an unloaded weapon.
“No offense, sir, but you’re in the way,” the paramedic insisted, stepping back to usher Merrick away.
Merrick didn’t move. He didn’t take his eyes off me. He freed up one of my hands, holding the other in both of his and gave an affirmative nod.
“Deal with it.”
Gray worked around Merrick and quickly came to the conclusion that my wound needed the attention of a doctor. That meant another trip to the hospital. Not given any other choice, he let Merrick ride in the back with me.
CHAPTER 18
They kept me in the hospital overnight. Seth took the next morning off to take me home. Rick was already there, making mac and cheese for our lunch. The three of us sat at the kitchen table and I brought them up to date. Seth laughed when he heard about the iron bar up my sleeve, but blanched when I mentioned shooting a hole in the bathroom door. Neither of them was happy with me for lying about the whereabouts of the twins.
“You should have told me,” Seth said.
“You could have told me,” said Rick.
I shrugged.
“Not my decision. You were still suspects, as far as the RCMP was concerned. Anyway, with any luck this is the end of it. They have enough on Kallas to convict her of
murder, attempted murder, espionage and treason. If we still had the death penalty, she’d be executed. Instead, they hope to milk her for more information.”
“They won’t let her plea bargain, will they?” Rick asked.
I shook my head. “As far as I know, her cooperation will only buy her a better and safer class of incarceration. Some inmates think treason is going too far and none will be happy having a cop in their midst.”
“Her fellow cops aren’t going to be happy either,” said Rick.
“Maybe not, but CSIS is very cheerful, according to Merrick.”
“CSIS?” asked Seth.
“Canadian Security Intelligence Service,” said Rick.
Seth grunted. “I know what CSIS stands for.”
I answered the question Seth meant to ask. “Merrick brought them on board early on, but they were in the background of the investigation.”
Seth nodded. “Have you told the kids? Hope is going to be especially disappointed. Delia Kallas was something of a hero to her.”
“Not quite that,” I said. “She was good about answering Hope’s questions though. I told her it’s like Kallas was the highly respected Vulcan ambassador who turned out to be a Romulan spy. Like Captain Picard, we can all feel like fools for not suspecting her earlier.”
“And CSIS and the RCMP didn’t suspect her either?”
“They suspected everyone. When we realized that I wasn’t just any asset, that there was a personal connection, everyone I knew was checked out. You two especially.”
Seth nodded. “That makes sense.”
Rick nodded too, but I’d bet dollars to a snack pack of Timbits that he hadn’t realized how closely he’d been watched and that must have irked him.
“I’ve got to go,” Seth announced.
I walked him to the front door.
“I’m sorry for not telling you about the kids.”
“That’s okay. I understand.” He surprised me with a tight hug. “Just don’t let it happen again, okay, Pru? None of it. Especially the part with you being in danger. Sarah’s self-esteem suffers when I worry about you too much.”
“She should know she has nothing to be concerned about. Whatever our problems have ever been, disloyalty has never been one of them. You’re a good friend and a good husband . . . to Sarah.”