by Marlow Kelly
Marshall didn’t check to see if he was dead. He just kept driving.
****
David covered his head with his hands as he crouched in front of a Volvo. Rounds propelled pieces of framework in every direction, and chunks of cement wall peppered him with flying shrapnel. He needed to keep the engine block between him and Pretty Boy because there was a dense concentration of metal in the average engine, enough to stop a bullet. When Harper moved, he had to move, too, always keeping as much material between him and Brad.
It might not have been his best strategy, but it was the only one he had. Hopefully, Finn would come to the rescue. Fuck. He should’ve used Sinclair’s phone to call Finn, but he’d been so focused on getting to Marie, he hadn’t been thinking straight.
He hadn’t caught a glimpse of Pretty Boy’s exact weapon, but it was some kind of semi-automatic. He flinched as fragments hit him in the arms and shoulders. What was Harper waiting for? David was unarmed and vulnerable. All Harper had to do was walk over and deliver the kill shot.
It was time to move. David hunkered down near the front tire and peeked under the car, hoping to get a better sense of Pretty Boy’s location so he could judge his next step. He was in a kneeling position, his left elbow supported by his left knee. Damn. That was a good position. A shooter could move fast and relocate without taking his eyes from the target. David’s heart hammered in his chest as small, black boots worn by a person with pink thermal long johns crept toward Pretty Boy. Marie.
Damn it. What the hell did she think she was doing? He was the distraction. She was supposed to stay safe until Finn arrived. That was the plan, although he might have forgotten to mention it to her. If they lived through this, he’d start working on his communication skills.
Brad fired another round in David’s direction, oblivious to the woman creeping up behind him. They were underground, which meant the noise from the semi-automatic echoed off the cement walls, making it impossible for Harper to hear her approach. Unfortunately, it also meant the only light source was from the sloped entrance, which was behind Marie. The angle of her shadow would fall across Harper, alerting him to her presence.
David crouched low, calculating the best time to act. He shrugged out of his coat and then threw it to his left. A spray of bullets followed the jacket as he leapt to the right.
****
Moving fast, Marie stepped to Handsome’s side, holding the bar like a baseball bat, and wacked his nose, striking it as if she were trying to hit the ball out of the field. His head rocked back as one hand covered his face, but the other hand continued to pull the trigger. Bullets sprayed wildly. She slammed the iron bar into his nose again. He dropped the gun, both hands stemming the flow of blood from his nostrils. She kicked the weapon away, wanting it out of his reach. It clattered a few feet and then stopped. She stood over him, panting, waiting for him to attack. His back arched and then his gaze slanted to her. His eyes rolled to the ceiling. He crumpled to the grey cement floor without making a sound.
She stepped back, stunned by her own actions. Her hands shook as she held up the bar. She’d beat a man unconscious and she wasn’t sorry.
From the corner of her eye, she noticed a flash of movement. David took a step and then collapsed.
“No.” A white-hot light blurred her vision. “David?” She threw the bar to the ground and ran to his side.
His whole body shook as he tried to push himself to a sitting position. Sweat gathered on his deathly pale face.
“Stay still.” Marie ordered.
There was a small nick above his left eye.
He lay back and closed his eyes.
“Were you shot?” She felt along his arms and torso.
He didn’t answer.
“David. Answer me,” she shouted, as she reached his legs. Blood pooled beneath him. She ripped open his pant leg. A huge chunk had been carved out of his thigh.
“Yes.” His eyes flickered open.
“You are not allowed to die. Do you hear me? I’ve just found you, and I’m not letting you go. Got that?” She pressed her hands to the wound, desperately trying to stem the flow of blood, but it seeped through her fingers.
“Okay,” he whispered, his voice weak and thready.
“Stay awake. That’s an order.” She tried to put some power behind her words. Oh, God. She needed to stop the bleeding.
He closed his eyes.
“No, stay with me.” A scream erupted from her throat as she kept pressure on his wound, praying it would be enough to stop him from bleeding to death.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Finn crept toward the prone body with the battered face. David lay a hundred yards away. Marie yelled David’s name as she held her hands to Quinn’s leg.
The SWAT team had checked the building. It was secure. They found no other assailants, which didn’t make sense, considering Marshall Portman could afford to pay an army of men. Finn added it to the list of questions he would ask the president of PDE once he was arrested.
He suppressed the urge to rush to his friend’s side; instead, he followed protocol. The assailant’s weapon, a FN SCAR 17 semi-automatic carbine, lay a few feet from his body. Finn flicked on the safety. Kennedy searched the gunman’s body, checking for other weapons, and retrieved a Glock and a K-bar knife.
Finn placed his fingers on the attacker’s neck, checking for a pulse. It was thin, difficult to detect, but it was there. Big surprise. The man’s face was a mess. The remains of a bandage hung from his nose. His eyes were swollen, and one of his cheekbones was dented, probably broken.
He radioed the controller at the police Headquarters. “Situation is contained. I have two, repeat two, injured. Need two ambulances in the parking garage.”
Finn strode toward David wondering how he’d managed to beat up the gunman and then walk a hundred yards, bleeding. Then his commonsense kicked in. Women were just as capable of violence as men, given the right motivation. David had been shot, and Marie had attacked the gunman. Yes, that theory fit the crime scene.
He blinked as he neared David. Oh, God. That was a lot of blood. Shit. If there were even a small nick in the femoral artery, he would bleed to death before help could arrive. Finn discarded his helmet and vest as he ran. He stripped off his T-shirt, elbowed Marie out of the way, and placed the wadded-up clothing over the wound. “There’s an ambulance coming. You have to hold on.”
David coughed. “Okay.” He opened his eyes and stared at Marie. “You’re good?”
“No, I’m not good. You’re hurt.” Her voice cracked.
“He’s lucky,” Finn said.
“Lucky? You people are mad.”
“No, I mean the bullet missed the femoral artery.”
“How do you know?”
“He’s still alive. There are a lot of blood vessels in the thigh. That’s why there’s so much blood.” He was waffling. He knew he should stop talking, but he couldn’t. He needed to calm Marie down. He needed to keep pressure on David’s wound to lessen the blood flow. And most of all, he needed to believe that his friend wasn’t going to bleed out on the floor of a parking garage.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Marie dabbed her eyes with a tissue as she stood at the nurse’s station. Damn it, a woman could go over twenty years without shedding a tear and then become a crybaby in the space of two days. The gray-haired nurse behind the counter refused to tell Marie anything about David’s condition because she wasn’t family. The shrew wouldn’t even tell her if he was still in surgery.
She’d found herself alone in the Granite City Square, surrounded by emergency personnel and onlookers. David was wheeled away in an ambulance. She’d tried to accompany him. She had screamed and shouted and kicked up a fuss worthy of a toddler, but it hadn’t helped.
Agent Kennedy Morris wanted to interview her, but Marie refused. She needed to see David. Nothing else mattered. The no-nonsense agent had driven her to emergency.
The last time she’d been in a hospit
al was after her mom’s attempted suicide. Marie liked to believe that her mother hadn’t meant to kill herself with a lethal combination of pills and alcohol, but she didn’t really know. Her mom had lingered in the gray space between life and death for days, until there was no hope of recovery. Marie held her nanny’s hand, waiting for her mother’s life support machine to be turned off. This may as well have been the same hospital, the sterility, the white walls, the antiseptic smell, and worst of all, the same detached, efficient nurses who saw too many patients to care about one brave, strong man who’d been shot trying to save her.
Marie hammered on the desk. “He’s wounded because of me. I need to—”
“Look, if you don’t quiet down, I’ll have you removed from the premises.”
Agent Morris marched into the reception area. “That won’t be necessary. I’m special Agent Morris.” The agent flashed her credentials and badge. “What information do you have on David Quinn?”
The nurse tapped a keyboard. “He’s still in surgery. His family is in the waiting room on the second floor.”
Agent Morris nodded. “I’ve just finished talking to hospital security. We have a suspect and several witnesses undergoing treatment at this hospital. I do not want any information released to the media. Do you understand?”
Marie didn’t wait for the nurse to answer, but headed for the elevator. Agent Morris dashed after her and grabbed her elbow. “There’s something we need to talk about.”
“It can wait.”
“No, under the circumstances, it can’t. First, there was another man named Michael Papin. He went—”
“Michael, yes, he’s a friend of David’s.”
“He was hit by a car leaving the PDE office.”
“An accident?”
“No, we believe it was deliberate.”
Marie’s knees weakened. Michael had put himself in danger because of his loyalty to David, but his sacrifice added to her burden. Two men were dead and two injured because of her invention. How could a solar panel be worth all this? “Is he okay?”
“He has a broken pelvis, a broken shoulder, and a concussion, but he’s in stable condition.”
“I’ll make sure—”
“Do you know there’s eighty million dollars sitting in a trust fund under your name?”
“Portman said that, but I don’t think… I spent all my money developing that silly solar—”
“First, it’s not silly, and second, there were two accounts. The one you use has a balance of eighteen hundred and sixteen dollars, and there’s another that’s held in trust with eighty million—”
“Are you sure it’s mine?”
“Your grandfather on your mother’s side set up the trust. Your mother was the beneficiary. You inherited the money after her death. I emailed Rothman’s Bank where the trust is held. Apparently, you signed an order authorizing them to send your father yearly checks for the accumulated interest on the account. As far as I can tell, he has kept the money.”
“He deposited the interest on eighty million dollars?” She pictured her father, his distance, and his remoteness. He had never had any time for her. Her chest ached. She loved him despite everything, but he would never be the father she wanted him to be.
“That’s right, for five years.”
“Five years ago, he worked on the patent for my solar panel. He gave me mounds of papers to sign… I must’ve endorsed the consent form then. I thought he was interested in my work. We were finally connecting.”
The agent put a hand on her arm. “Sorry, but you don’t get to choose your family.”
“How much is the interest on eighty million dollars?”
“It depends on how it’s invested, but a conservative estimate would be between two and three million.”
It was typical of her father that he’d care more about her money than he did about her, but all the cash in the world wouldn’t change the fact that David had been shot. “Look, I’m grateful you told me, but this can wait—”
“I’m telling you this now because it means you can pay their medical bills. You can afford the best care money can buy.”
Marie didn’t need telling twice. She marched back to the efficient gray-haired nurse. “I’m going to pay for David Quinn and Michael…Michael… She stared at Agent Morris. “What’s Michael’s last name again?”
“Papin.”
I’m going to pay for David Quinn and Michael Papin’s care.
****
Finn ignored the tension in his gut as he waited for David to come out of surgery. Marie sat, her face in her hands.
Tim draped a blanket around her shoulders. “It’s not your fault.”
“No, it’s not,” Sinclair agreed, coming to sit next to Marie. “Portman convinced David to work for him. He used emotional blackmail to get what he wanted.”
“David felt obligated because Portman had taken us in,” Tim added.
“We’re looking into others who he might have manipulated into doing his dirty work.” Finn had talked to his superiors in Salt Lake City. They were arranging a task force of experts to examine the massive amount of data Michael had gathered.
Kennedy had returned to the police station to get started on the paperwork. At least, that was what she’d told him. She was probably taking advantage of his absence to move her desk into his office, which he supposed was now theirs. He didn’t object because she had a point. They were partners, and they needed to confer on cases. It made sense they share the space.
“Is there any word on Michael?” Sinclair wrung her hands. It was a sign of stress, which was understandable under the circumstances.
“He’s regained consciousness, but he doesn’t remember being hit by the car.” Finn had been to see his old friend and was appalled at his condition. “He looks like shit, but he’s fortunate.”
Sinclair’s green eyes, a shade darker than her brother’s, narrowed on him as if he’d said something outlandish. “Fortunate? Portman aimed at him.”
Finn shrugged. “Considering the car didn’t slow down, Michael’s lucky his back and neck aren’t broken. It’s early days, but I spoke to him, and he was coherent.” That was the second time today he’d qualified his friends’ injuries.
“Any news on Marshall?” Tim asked.
“None. His car was abandoned at the Best Western on the edge of town. We have uniforms and highway patrol looking for him, and everyone’s on alert at the airports.” Finn’s attention turned to the television. News networks now ran the full video of Marie and David escaping the PDE building under fire. It was good to see the whole scene and know that the truth was out in the open. The Department of Defense had released the details of Quinn’s actions under fire. He was being hailed as a hero.
“What about that guy?” Marie pointed to the TV. “The blond with the broken nose. Did I kill him?”
“No, he’s unconscious, but he’s expected to recover. He’ll be charged once he wakes up.”
“Pity, I wanted him dead.” She clutched the blanket tighter around her shoulders.
Despite the grave situation, Finn smiled. Marie Wilson was just what David needed, a woman with enough guts to keep him in line.
****
Marie could finally breathe. David was out of surgery and doing well. He’d lost a lot of blood, suffered a compound fracture of the femur, and muscle damage. The surgeon had pinned his bone fragments together and warned them his recovery would take at least six months and would include extensive physical therapy.
David lay in the recovery room. His face was deathly pale. She wanted to see his eyes light up and be graced with a smile. The rhythmic beep from the myriad of machines that monitored his condition comforted her. Even when she closed her eyes, she could hear his heartbeat and know he was alive.
The others had gone to get some food and check on Michael, but she wouldn’t leave. She couldn’t. The last couple of days had been a whirlwind of fear, trauma, and love. She could live without the guns and peri
l, but she couldn’t be sorry it had happened. Without the danger, she would have never met David. She wouldn’t know what it was like to love, or that love meant you had to be prepared to give up everything. And she had.
She had left her precious prototype at Big Sky News. She had no idea what had happened to it and, at this moment, she didn’t care.
She squeezed David’s fingers, taking comfort from the warmth of his skin.
“Marie, there you are.” Her father’s commanding voice made her spine tingle with anger.
Standing, she patted David’s hand and then faced the man who was supposed to love her, but didn’t. “Why are you here?”
“Why am I— There’s the kidnapping and the home invasion for a start. You’ve really made a mess of things, Mouse. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure you get the best defense—”
“Do. Not. Call. Me. Mouse.” She spat the words, her hands balling into fists.
He shut his eyes and then opened them, then took a step closer. “I won’t have you—”
“Shut your mouth. Did you or did you not withhold my inheritance from me?” She straightened, ready to fight.
“I never—”
“The FBI explained everything. You’ve been living off the interest and—”
“I see the little mouse has come out of her hole. Why shouldn’t I get paid? I’ve put up with you. Raised you. I deserve some recompense.” His upper lip lifted in a sneer.