Water Witch

by R. J. Blain

  It took him five minutes to figure out he wasn’t making it through the hole, resulting in him climbing over the fence. Under no circumstances would I admit to anyone I enjoyed the view while he hopped over and landed in a crouch beside me.

  If he hadn’t been assigned as my partner, I probably would have spent an inappropriate amount of time admiring him from a very safe distance, particularly his eyes. Such pretty eyes should have been criminal on a man, and it pissed me off even acknowledging there was something I liked about him.

  All my partners ever did was land me in hot water—or worse, a puddle of blood.

  Not all was quiet at the Seagram’s plant. Instead of turning around and calling for backup like sane agents, we crept inside. Jake went first without asking, which left me watching his back, a role I didn’t mind all that much. Had I been in the front, I would’ve been stealing glances behind me every second instead of every other second.

  I kept an arm’s length behind Jake, my hand on my holstered gun, the strap unclasped so I could draw if needed. I’d practiced thumbing the safety, drawing my weapon, and firing until the motion came second nature. The habit prevented a misfire or accidentally shooting an innocent. Trigger happy agents got people killed.

  I paid the price of requiring that extra second to draw my weapon and respond to a threat.

  Unlike me, Jake already had his gun out, muzzle pointed away and at the ground, finger safely away from the trigger. I appreciated his caution.

  All it took was being startled while fingering the trigger to cause a lethal accident.

  Jake kept close to the wall, stalking his way through the abandoned, rusting machinery and vats that’d once brewed beer. It never failed to amaze me how much equipment had been left behind to rot, surviving through years of neglect and general abuse.

  “Catwalk,” he hissed at me, gesturing towards the rickety, grated steps leading to an equally wobbly platform circling the primary factory.

  “Death trap,” I hissed back. “Ground’s safer.”

  “Better vantage.”

  My heart rate jumped to around a mile a minute at the thought of climbing the stairs. “It’s creaky and everyone in a mile radius will hear us.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Do you think someone comes in here with WD-40 and oils the place down? No.” I shuddered, tapped his shoulder, and pointed through the vats. “If you go that way, there’s a corridor around the main factory floor. Watch the doorways; most of them are either rusted, busted, or gone.”

  “Is the catwalk really that bad?”

  “No, it’s worse. Now move before someone hears us.”

  In reality, I had no idea what the catwalk was like; I had made it all of two steps up before the creaky, swaying monstrosity had broken my nerve. I had convinced my other partners to leave me with the ground while they took the risk of falling to a horrible death impaled on some sort of rusted piece of machinery.

  Maybe I didn’t like Jake, but I didn’t want him to die a horrible death by falling from an unstable catwalk and being impaled on some abandoned piece of rusted machinery. My partner muttered a few curses, shot a glare at me in the factory gloom, and took the path I suggested.

  Without any real source of light, I considered it a miracle we didn’t trip over anything while picking our way across the massive room. It took time for my eyes to adjust, which helped me follow behind Jake but did nothing to help me spot anyone who might be lurking inside the building waiting to ambush us.

  Jake had it right; even I was getting a bad feeling about the place, far beyond my normal nervousness whenever I stepped foot into the abandoned Seagram’s plant. No matter how many times I looked over my shoulder and checked Jake’s blind spots, the shadows hid everything. Flickering light came from one of the inner storage rooms along with the hint of struck matches and smoke. I sniffed, wrinkling my nose at the potent stench of weed.

  With a soft huff, Jake lifted his hand and gestured in the direction of the room. “See it?” he whispered.

  Careful to keep quiet, I grumbled, “Surprise, surprise. Someone’s smoking pot in the abandoned factory.”

  “Let’s check it out anyway just to be sure. If it’s just a bunch of kids smoking pot, we’ll send them on home with a warning.”

  I viewed his suggestion as a vast improvement over some of my past partners, who would do anything to make the arrest, a symptom of their history within the police force. Maybe in a few months—if we were still partners—I’d ask him if he had served on the force before moving into the FBI, or if he was a bit more like me, entering through non-traditional channels. “Roger.”

  Steeling my nerves, I followed Jake, wishing I could see farther into the darkness so I could better guard his back.

  Jake whipped his arm out, caught me across the chest, and slammed me to the floor so hard my feet kicked up. The crack of gunfire, muzzle flash, and thump of a bullet striking my leg barely beat the back of my head smacking into the concrete. The impact with the ground stunned me.

  I’d been in a similar position before, but then, my partner had been the one holding the gun that had shot me. Jake’s weight dropped on me and drove the air out of my lungs, and in a smooth motion, he lifted his weapon, aimed, and fired. Without ear plugs, the concussive burst of the weapon discharging set off a cacophony of ringing in my head.

  When my body registered the pain in my skull, it also registered the fire in my leg, which was pinned beneath Jake.

  The man weighed a ton, and he fired several more times. In the darkness, I saw his mouth move, but I couldn’t hear what he was saying through the din in my ears. Being shot hurt, but I didn’t dare scream or even whimper; gunfire was bad enough for revealing our position, and with Jake sprawled over me, I couldn’t pull my weapon free of its holster.

  Never in all of my planning had I considered my partner getting in the way of me drawing my gun. In every other situation I’d been shot, I’d been left to fend for myself. How was I supposed to help do anything with a giant of a man pinning me to the floor with my right arm trapped between our bodies?

  Then again, it was probably for the better. My head spun from my unexpected introduction with the concrete floor, and I doubted I’d be able to hit the broad side of a barn even if I could get a shot off. Blindly firing would only get someone hurt—someone I didn’t mean to hurt.

  Jake got to his knees, straddling me while he scanned the factory. It wasn’t quiet; someone moaned, far enough away I wondered how my partner had seen through the darkness to get a good shot off.

  He switched his magazine, the old one bouncing to the concrete. With his gun in one hand, he twisted around to get a better look at me, spitting a curse when he focused on my leg. “He was on the catwalk and had a line on the top of your head.”

  “Shit,” I hissed through clenched teeth. “You got him?”

  “Not before he got his shot off. He had a friend too.”

  I clenched my teeth so I wouldn’t join the shot man on the floor in pained groaning. Swallowing my pride, I choked out, “Thanks.”

  Jake pulled off his jacket, turned for a better look at my leg, and clucked his tongue. “That’s what partners are for. It looks shallow.”

  The novelty of my partner wrapping my leg—the same damned one that hadn’t fully healed yet—left me speechless. Using the sleeve of his jacket would help stop the bleeding until an ambulance came, and the windbreaker material was slick enough I held some hope it wouldn’t pull on the wound too bad when removed.

  “Help me up,” I ordered when he finished.

  “No. Stay down, and keep to the wall. Call in shots fired and that we have at least one live one. I’m going to check that room and make sure there’s no one else ready to open fire on us.”

  It took a single test shifting of my leg to realize I wouldn’t be going anywhere fast, and I spat curses, grabbed my radio, and handled calling in for backup, leaving Jake to take care of the heavy lifting.

  It didn’t
take Jake long to return, but in the time he was gone, I had a chance to look over my leg with a pen light. The shot had gone clean through not far beneath the skin, and wasn’t bleeding nearly as much as I feared. Maybe with a little luck, I wouldn’t be out of the field long recovering.

  I could deal with a couple of weeks.

  Jake huffed, crouched beside me, and pressed his fingertips to my throat to check my pulse. “There’s not much point in bandaging it if you’re going to just play with it and make yourself an easy target with that light.”

  “What was in the pot room?”

  “Tape recorder, incense burner with weed smoldering in it. Definitely a setup to get us in position for a shot. The one’s dead—other’s still alive, and I cuffed him and read him his rights. I think you’ll find the machine gun in the other room interesting.”

  “You’re seriously telling me we were lured here.”

  “Seems to be the case. Good way to screw up an investigation if you kill the investigators.” Jake shrugged. “Or they’re just idiots. Want to make bets on how tough of a nut he’ll be to crack when we get to questioning?”

  “Not particularly.”

  “All right. Let’s get you upright. I am going to do a once around while you babysit our new friend until the cavalry arrives.”

  I scowled at how readily he took control. “What if I want to do the once around?”

  “That has got to be a joke. The only way you’re going to be doing a round is if you’re hopping on one foot. You’ll end up falling in one of the vats the instant you go to check out the catwalk. You don’t need to lose any more blood—or end up with tetanus. Let me handle the walk around while you play guard on our suspect.”

  “Fine.”

  Grabbing hold of my arm, he hauled me to my feet, and I tested my injured leg with a grimace. It hurt but it held, something I considered rather promising. I hopped under my own steam to where Jake had handcuffed our suspect to one of the vat’s support rods. He’d taken a round in both arms, ensuring he’d have a difficult time handling a gun of any sort.

  Like so many criminals, he didn’t seem all that old to me, maybe in his mid-twenties, with a narrow face that made me think desperation had been part of his motive, suggesting he was nothing more than a hired hand. I’d seen it before in the first few years of my FBI career; someone didn’t like someone else—or wanted their position—so paid someone to eliminate the problem permanently.

  I’d place my bets on not learning who had hired him or why. The smart crooks covered their tracks, eliminating as many traces to the killer as possible in order to safeguard their position of wealth and power.

  Still, I could do something productive while waiting. Staring at criminals often softened them up for when I did get around to asking questions, so digging out my better flashlight, I set it on the concrete floor between us, sat down before my leg gave out beneath me, and watched him.

  It took less than two minutes for him to crack. “Why are you staring at me like that?”

  “Just wondering what a kid like you is doing in a place like this.”

  “You’re a kid too. What are you? You don’t look like a damned cop.”

  “FBI.” I showed him my badge. “Your friend thought I looked like bullet bait. Why?”

  “Just doin’ my job. Gotta eat, lady. Was told to stake this place out, get rid of anyone pokin’ around. I get off lighter if I tell you everything I know, right? Can do that whole bargaining thing?”

  Sometimes, I really couldn’t believe how bold people could be. “That’s for you to discuss with your lawyer, kid. Got a name?”

  “Butch.”

  “You know how this works, Butch?”

  “You’ll take me to jail and ask me questions. I can’t afford no damned lawyer.”

  “One’ll be provided for you. Yes, you’ll go to jail, but you’ll be given medical treatment, you’ll have a chance to make a phone call, and you can request a lawyer should you want one.”

  Butch scowled. “What use is a damned lawyer gonna do me? I did it, and I got paid to do it.”

  Well, come confession time, we wouldn’t have a problem getting some answers out of him, that much was for certain. I wondered if we’d be able to find the one actually behind the killing, or if we’d end up with a body and a young man who’d just ruined the rest of his life in a twisted effort to put food on the table. “You also have the right to refuse an attorney if you really don’t want one, Butch.”

  “I’m sorry Bubba shot you, though. It’s one thing to shoot up one of them politicians. No one likes them anyway, but you’re a lady. He should’ve shot that other guy instead, the big one who left me here.”

  “Bubba probably meant to shoot us both,” I pointed out.

  “True, that.” Going for the small, feminine target made sense; if I’d been killed, Jake would have lost enough time he might’ve been killed too.

  The same applied for me. I’d never lost a partner on duty, and I had no intention of starting to. The fact I’d gotten beaded with a scope without my awareness told me everything I needed to know. Not only would I be going in for physical therapy to get closer to my prime, I’d be taking a few extra classes to get my edge back.

  Within five minutes, the welcome sound of sirens approached, and I grimaced at the thought of walking, but grabbed hold of the nearest piece of machinery and hauled myself to my feet. “Don’t add to your troubles by resisting arrest, kid.”

  Butch gave his handcuffed hands a shake. “Already been arrested, ma’am.”

  Jake appeared from between two vats and huffed at me. “What are you doing on your feet, Karma?”

  “The cops are here. I’m walk—”

  Never in my almost four years in the FBI had any of my partners picked me up for any reason. Jake knocked me off my feet with a sweep of his leg and had me cradled in his arms before I could do any more than gasp. “If you complain or fight me, I’m tossing you over my shoulder, but there’s no way in hell you’re walking to the ambulance and hurting yourself even more.”

  “I’ll beg. Please let me walk.”

  “No.”

  “Jake!”

  “No.”

  “It’s just a scratch.”

  “When I can put my finger through the hole in your leg, it no longer classifies as a scratch. The answer is still no.”

  We argued all the way out of the building, pausing long enough to tell the cops where we’d left Butch cuffed and inform them he required medical care. Then Jake forced me into the waiting ambulance, told me he’d come to the hospital as soon as he finished taking care of business, and abandoned me to the EMTs.

  I ended up staying in the hospital overnight, an unnecessary precaution in my opinion. True to his word, Jake showed up at the hospital while I was dealing with discharge papers. “Sorry it took so long. Our suspect, Butch McDonald, is a rather talkative kid, and he decided he wanted to tell us everything he knew so we wouldn’t torture him.”

  “He thought we were going to torture him?”

  “Apparently. If all suspects were so cooperative, we’d be out of a job. How are you feeling?”

  “Good enough they’re letting me out, but only if I take painkillers so I don’t impair my healing. I have to use crutches for the next few days. Small caliber, didn’t do much damage going through, so I’m looking at three to four weeks to be back in shape. If I’m lucky and nothing goes wrong, two weeks.”

  “Good. Concussion?”

  “Mild at worst.” I drew a deep breath to steady myself. “Thanks.”

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t fast enough to prevent you from getting shot at all.”

  I snorted, turned my attention to my discharge papers, and resumed filling them out. “He got me in my blind spot.”

  “He got us in both our blind spots; if I hadn’t noticed the laser, you would’ve been killed.”

  “Well, you did. A bump to the head is far better than a bullet to the brain.”

  “You don�
�t have any problem that I wasn’t able to get here until now, do you?”

  Was he kidding? My other partners wouldn’t have showed up at all. With them, I’d be dead. I wasn’t sure what I thought about that. The idea Jake was actually watching out for me seemed so surreal it fringed on the impossible. “Did you get good leads on who hired McDonald?”

  “Colder than a frozen fucking turkey. McDonald was willing to sing like a canary, but all we have to go on was an email sent from the New York Public Library. Anyone could have done it, and while we’re putting together warrants to access and lock the email address, we’re expecting that to be a dead lead. They were definitely the ones behind the shooting. McDonald laid the whole thing out, identified the weapons, told us how they did it, but he didn’t know why. We did pick up one interesting thing, though.”

  I glanced up from my paperwork. “What?”

  “The individual who hired him wanted it to be a very public shooting—and he didn’t care how many people were hurt or killed in the process. Turns out, McDonald had no idea he’d shot Hamilton’s sister, either.” Jake sighed. “She died overnight. They’re still going to take the paternity test in the unlikely case the baby was his. I doubt it. Someone stepped forward as the father, but we’re going to confirm anyway.”

  Sighing over the waste of life and the senseless brutality, I shook my head and returned to work filling out the form. “Why’d McDonald do it?”

  “Simple enough motive: money. Fifty thousand dollars in cash and the weapons to do it, and he was expecting another hundred grand once Hamilton was dead. We recovered the fifty thousand. There are already people trying to source where the bills came from. His partner got the same deal. Turns out they were both part of a wannabe gang together. McDonald’s partner, Christopher Riley, convinced him to take the job.”