Final Surrender: The Surrender Series, Book 1

by Jennifer Kacey

  All too quickly, the last model was making her way back down the runway back stage.

  Midway through the show, Angela had changed into an outfit all her own and she followed the other models out in one last parade of her entire fall collection.

  Her outfit was an A-line halter style dress in a shimmering pale blue fabric. Her belly protruded just enough to leave no illusions to anyone in the audience.

  Everyone stood and cheered when Angela made it to the end of the catwalk. She did her best impression of a model pose, curtsied like only she could do and walked back to the beginning of the stage with her head held higher than Clay’d ever seen it.

  The show was a huge success and a little while later, Angela stood in the wide prep area surrounded by the press and fans who were all congratulating her on the collection and her engagement and gushing over how beautiful she looked pregnant.

  It was chaotic with people everywhere, but Clay and Wyatt hovered close by to keep Angela out of harm’s way.

  Campbell was in the crowd and Clay caught a glimpse of him making his way to the back of the room.

  Clay caught Wyatt’s eye and motioned toward the back. He saw Campbell and nodded to Clay. He turned to walk away and Clay said into his headset, “Campbell, where are you going?” he asked as his partner passed into the back.

  “You said it was like it was right under our noses right?”

  “Yes, I know it is. Why?” And Clay scanned the area again and wondered why all the hair on the back of his neck had just stood up.

  “Do you guys remember Arthur Ramsey?”

  “Yeah, on our crew in Iraq ’til that last day when he died. Why?”

  “Do you remember his favorite hobby when he was on leave?”

  “Of course, he took photographs. He loved taking them.”

  “Yes, but he loved developing them and every time he came back to base before we were deployed, we’d rib him for smelling like a chemical booth.”

  “It was always there,” Clay admitted with no idea where this line of questioning was going. “Oddest fucking thing for you to bring him up. These past few months I kept thinking of Arthur but knew he couldn’t have anything to do with it since he was killed years ago.”

  “Same problem for me. Thinking of Arthur kept sidetracking me. But just now I smelled those same chemicals. Fresh. They’re also on photographs Angela’s been getting. I knew I’d smelled it before. And holy shit, Clay, TNT. What does it stand for?”

  “’Till Next Time,” Clay responded automatically.

  “No. What does it stand for?”

  “’Til Next…Dynamite.” Clay’s mind was reeling. “Oh fuck! The tattoo of the stick of dynamite. And the pictures.” Everything fell into place like dominoes. “The collages put together for each of Angela’s outfits for the show. That’s why they looked so familiar. We were looking at them almost every day and I never realized it.”

  Wyatt broke in then as he almost made it into the back. “Clay, the fingerprints.”

  “The fingerprints on what?”

  “The letter Angela got after the bombing. Who touched the letter in her office?”

  “Vanessa.”

  “You’re sure? Completely sure she was the only one?”

  “She was it. I’m positive.”

  “Fuck. I knew I missed something. Fuck!”

  “What, Wyatt? What the hell did we—”

  A funny thump registered through his headset. “Campbell, where the hell are you?”

  After no answer came, he spoke louder, “Campbell, what is your location?”

  Wyatt answered back, “I can’t find him back here. He’s just gone. Get back to Angela. I’ll meet you there.”

  Clay immediately turned back to Angela who was talking to one of the major maternity buyers that she had asked to come to the show. Clare stood at her side, smiling from ear to ear.

  He had to get to Angela before she could be hurt again.

  He heard her say, “I couldn’t have done it without her. She’s one in a million. Where is she?” Clay watched her turn and scan the crowd until she found who she was looking for. Her face brightened and he broke into a run.

  “Maddy, come here, I want to introduce you to someone. Are you okay? You don’t look so good. Is everything…” And that’s when she saw Maddy raise her arm.

  “But…” was all Angela got out.

  Angela remained frozen as she raised her arms to protect her belly. Maddy mouthed the words, “’Til Next Time,” with an eerie expression Angela had never seen before. Then she pulled the trigger. Just like that. No hesitation. No remorse. No conscience. She just pulled the trigger and Angela opened her mouth to scream…

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Clay threw himself in front of Angela. They both fell to the ground as Maddy grabbed Clare by the hair and held the gun to her head.

  Wyatt yelled, “Put the gun down, Maddy. Let her go. You don’t want to do this.”

  Clare screamed and Maddy yanked on her hair, spittle flying in her face. “Shut the fuck up! Not another sound outta you.” Maddy shifted from side to side, using Clare as a shield from all the guns pointed at her.

  No one could get a clear shot. Not without risking hurting a number of other innocent people.

  Pain streaked through Clay’s arm as blood soaked his shirt. He barely registered it as he searched Angela’s white face. She lay on her back, arms still draped across her stomach.

  “Angela? Baby, are you hurt? Talk to me!” he demanded. When she remained silent and limp, he moved one of her arms finding the small bullet hole in the side of her dress and then the horrific pool of crimson growing steadily wider beneath her.

  Clay ripped his shirt off and pressed it against Angela’s side, “Stay with me, baby. Don’t leave me, okay? Stay with me,” he begged.

  He heard a shrill laugh coming from behind him and saw Angela shudder as her eyes popped open.

  “You never even suspected me, Ang. I’ve been behind everything and you were all too stupid to suspect little, old, unassuming, Maddy. Well, it looks like I’ll be getting the last laugh this time, since none of you could keep her safe.”

  “Maddy,” Wyatt called through clenched teeth, drawing her attention to him. “How’d you do it? How’d you get the gun past us? We thought we had every angle covered. You obviously thought of something we didn’t.”

  She laughed again, making Clare whimper and she pulled her around again. “Angela brought it in herself. In one of the containers with some of the metal bullshit for the show. She set off the metal detector, and you and your little FBI pets never even checked it. Dumbasses.”

  Clay caught sight of several men talking into wrist mics, trying to get as many people outside as they could. Wyatt stood at the edge of the crowd and his parents both had hands on him, holding him back. They spoke to him, but it was too low to hear what they said.

  Angela turned her head toward Clay and tried to mouth something she wanted him to hear, but he couldn’t make anything out.

  “I hear sirens, baby. They’re coming for you. Hang on.”

  Moments later the hand that had been holding her belly went slack and her head fell to the side.

  “Dammit, Angela, don’t go to sleep!” he yelled as he kept pressure on her side that just wouldn’t stop bleeding.

  “Why? Why would you do this to her?” Clay spat at Maddy who was still smiling smugly.

  “Because I’m better than her and she didn’t appreciate me.” Her volume rose and she took a step toward Clay.

  Wyatt took a step closer as well, putting him in Maddy’s line of sight again. “Appreciate you? She treated you like family and valued your opinion above anybody else’s. Then how do you repay her, by stalking her for almost two years and bombing her?”

  “Appreciate me! She never wanted me with h
er overseas. She’d always take Jose or Vanessa or Nikki and leaves me here. She didn’t want me with her at any of the dinners or functions where she could have introduced me to the right people. She knew I was better than her and she didn’t want me around to show her up.”

  Wyatt stepped to the side, holding her focus. Maddy yanked Clare around who had locked onto Mark in the crowd and hadn’t taken her eyes from him. “Maddy, why don’t you—”

  “Stop fucking calling me that!” Maddy screamed at him. “I hate that name.”

  “Okay, okay. What do you want me to call you?”

  “April.” She quickly wiped her cheek on her sleeve and mascara smeared along with tears. “My name’s April.” For a moment she looked like the Maddy Clay had met. But confused. Lost. Then in a flash she sneered down at him. “I could have had my own label by now if it wasn’t for her holding me back.”

  He glanced at her. “Holding you back? She would have done anything for you. She was your friend and you’ve been the one terrorizing her for months! You tried to kill her. What in the hell were you thinking? Did you even hear what she said to you on the way over here? She adored you.”

  “Too little, too late. I thought I had her at the airport. Yet another trip where she didn’t need me,” she scoffed. “Then she changed her flight so I had to tip off the police so it didn’t blow up everybody in the terminal. So I changed detonators for the second one. I almost had her. If she hadn’t gone back down the steps, or my phone hadn’t delayed the explosion, she would have been dead then and there. Then it all would have been mine.”

  “Why didn’t you just blow up the apartment? You knew where she was?” Clay kept her talking as he watched Angela’s breathing grow shallow.

  “And destroy the studio where I could have had my new line? Not to mention the cameras across the street, it would have given me away too easily. Then you added the cameras into the studio and I couldn’t do shit without getting caught. Had to sneak packets in your paper. Hermano never suspected sweet, little, Maddy. She flirted with him. Promised to marry him. So stupid. Just like the rest of you.”

  “So you decide to shoot her in cold blood in front of three-dozen witnesses,” Clay accused incredulously. “FBI, NYPD. What the fuck is wrong with you?”

  Agents quietly moved people out from behind her. More than likely trying to get one of their men a clear shot. She never noticed, raging on against Angela as she took another step closer.

  “I don’t care anymore. She didn’t deserve to have it all. She didn’t care about the fame and she did everything she could to hide my talent and take credit for my work. And then she was going to throw it all away, for what? For you!” A brittle cackle came tumbling from her lips along with spittle.

  “She was going to get you and have a happy little family as well as all of her success. Bitch didn’t deserve it!”

  “Why the threats against this show, April?” Wyatt asked as he stepped closer to Clay and Angela. “What would you have gained if she would have stayed out?”

  “All she had to do was let me do the show. Just one show all my own. Then I would have made it. Started my own label. Taken over. I asked her, but she said no. She wanted the glory for herself.”

  “She didn’t want to give in to the maniac stalking her. She didn’t want to put you or any of her other people in harm’s way. She trusted you.”

  “Yeah she was always too gullible for her own good, and to think all these years it was you she pined over. You know, she never told me about you, but I knew some jackass had broken her heart. Don’t worry. You can lie with her for all eternity.” Maddy smirked, raised the gun and leveled it at his head.

  “April, put the gun down!” Wyatt yelled at her. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “You can’t hurt me. I’m already dead.”

  Clay saw Mark motion out of the corner of his eye and Clare nodded almost imperceptibly. “No, but you can rot in hell.” Clay captured Maddy’s attention just long enough.

  Clare went limp, throwing Maddy off balance.

  A single shot rang out and Clay held his breath and slumped forward, covering Angie’s body. He looked away just as he saw Maddy’s triumphant face fall. She looked at her leg as she crumpled to the ground, blood seeping from where Wyatt had shot her.

  Clare scrambled away from her as fast as she could.

  Tears streamed down Maddy’s face. “Detective Wyatt.” She sniffed. “You shot me. Why would you shoot me? You know me.” She looked up at him with wide eyes. Hurt. Confused. “You know me. I would never…” Her eyes changed again, her head twitching to the side and she raised the gun at Wyatt.

  When Wyatt squeezed the trigger it was right above Clay’s head. The blast left his ears ringing and he saw Maddy collapse to the side. Her head bounced once after it hit. The grip on the gun finally went slack and she stared at Angela as her eyes glassed over. One last shuddering breath and that was all.

  Detective Wyatt kept his gun aimed at her as he stepped over Clay and Angela. Paramedics rushed through one of the open doors and Wyatt kicked the gun out of Maddy’s now-dead fingers. Two of the paramedics ran over to Angela as more detectives and FBI agents secured the rest of the room. Wyatt put two fingers on Maddy’s neck but there was no coming back from a bullet through the heart.

  Clay didn’t spare her another glance or another thought. All he cared about was Angela.

  “She’s pregnant and you have to save them both,” Clay ordered as they checked her pulse.

  “She’s lost a lot of blood. We won’t know how much until we get to the hospital. You okay to ride with us? I’ll need you to keep pressure on the bullet wound because I don’t see an exit hole.”

  “You couldn’t tear me away. She’s my…everything.”

  They lifted her onto a gurney and within minutes they had her loaded into the ambulance. One medic hopped in the driver’s seat as the other closed the back door and Clay caught a glimpse of Campbell on a stretcher being loaded into another ambulance.

  How had everything turned to shit in two seconds?

  He looked down as the ambulance started moving and stroked Angela’s pale face as he heard the sirens blare. Angela’s breathing became faint and the man beside him said, “Her blood pressure’s dropping and I need to start an IV. If you’re a praying man, now would be a good time to start.”

  Clay stared back at the man across from him as if he had grown another head.

  He mentally punched himself while keeping pressure on her side with one hand, he took his other bloody hand and pulled her forehead over to him.

  His lips brushed against her skin and then he said, “I’ve loved you since the first day I laid eyes on you. You’ve owned my soul ever since and I’m sorry I fought it for so long. You and this baby are everything to me.

  “Please fight, Angela, please stay with me. I can’t be without you now that I’ve finally found you. I love you, baby. I love you.”

  He looked down at the face of the woman who had loved him through it all. Someone who had never given up on him and had waited until he figured out she was the one and only person that he wanted to belong to.

  She had a strand of hair across her face and he brushed it aside, streaking her face with his own blood that still ran down his arm unrestricted.

  As he looked down into her face, praying to God that they would be okay, Angela’s eyes popped open. She breathed deeply as her eyes focused on Clay.

  “My Clay for always,” she whispered as her hand found his face for a moment. “I’m sorry,” she said and then smiled a second before her arm went slack and her hand fell lifeless beside her.

  “Fuck, No!” the medic yelled. “You are not dying today, dammit.”

  They raced through traffic, lights and sirens screaming as the medic in the back rattled off numbers to the medic up front that made no sense to Clay.

 
The guy up front was relaying them to the hospital who assured him a neonatologist and surgeon awaited their arrival.

  Clay watched as if in slow motion. The medic put in a breathing tube, hooking on a bag valve mask because she’d stopped breathing.

  She’d stopped breathing…

  “Do you know CPR?

  “Do you know CPR?” the medic yelled again.

  Clay finally figured out the guy was yelling at him, when he shoved him in the shoulder. Pain shot down his arm and gave him enough of an adrenaline boost to clear the muddy fog trying to settle in his head.

  “Yes,” he answered.

  “Good. Put your hand on the bag. You breathe when I tell you to and we’ll make it to the hospital. Keep extra pressure on her side because this is going to get dicey real quick.”

  The medic watched her pulse on the screen, which had been faint before, and it finally stopped altogether. “Ready?” he asked Clay again as he hovered over Angela’s still body.

  “Ready,” Clay barked. He increased the pressure on her rib cage as the medic began chest compressions.

  “Now!” he yelled a few moments later.

  Clay squeezed air into her lungs. “I’m not losing you today, I’m not letting you go this easily.” He squeezed the bag again and wanted to hold her hand. He wanted to feel her squeeze back. He needed to know she was okay. That she’d make it. “Fight baby, just keep fighting,” he urged.

  Seconds later they pulled up to the hospital and they had her inside and behind closed doors, leaving Clay standing in the middle of a rat’s nest of doctors and nurses bombarding him with questions.

  He answered them all on autopilot, and finally one of the nurses noticed he was bleeding onto the floor.

  A little while later he stood in the surgical waiting room wearing a borrowed shirt, feeling numb and it had nothing to do with the anesthetic still fresh in his arm that had been stitched up.

  The bullet had passed clean through his arm and was now lodged in Angela’s rib cage. One of the nurses had finally told him that much when he refused to let her leave the room again with no explanation.