Standing in the Shadows

by Shannon McKenna

  He struggled into a sitting position. “Are you an undercover cop?”

  She laughed abruptly. “Hah. Far from it. It’s a personal thing.”

  “What did Novak do to you?” A foot sprang loose, swathed in gray tape. He still couldn’t feel it.

  “He murdered my favorite lover.” Tamara’s voice was matter-of-fact. She slashed his other foot free. “Nobody touches my stuff.”

  “Oh.” His brain was so squishy and soft from the drug they’d pumped into him that the pattern just leaped out of the net and broadsided him. “Tamara…Mara! From Stone Island! You were Victor Lazar’s mistress. I remember now. I saw you on the vid clips. But you were a brunette. You’ve changed your nose. And your eyes were…”

  “Topaz, smart boy,” she said. “Yellow cat eyes. Lucky for both of us you weren’t smart enough to figure that out at Silver Fork. You would have gotten your throat slit. Maybe mine, too. Come on, now. On your feet. Move. Get that blood pumping.”

  He staggered around the bed, catching himself on the bedpost when his knees buckled. His head throbbed with every heartbeat. He fought back the humiliating urge to vomit. It reminded him of his days in physical therapy. “Why are you helping me?”

  “Actually, I’m not. It’s you that’s helping me,” she said crisply. “Rescuing you wasn’t part of my agenda. I’ve been trolling for a chance to kill that bastard all week, but he’s too smart, and too suspicious, and I’m in over my head, and I think he’s about to kill me.”

  “Oh,” he said inanely. “Uh…why didn’t you just turn him in?”

  “Oh, yeah. Like that worked so well the last time,” she mocked. “Besides, I have my own reasons to avoid the law. I wasn’t expecting things to move so fast with you two, but it’s just as well. I’m tired of being that monster’s concubine. It’s stressful. And the rape and murder plans for you and your girlfriend, well…yuck. I have a very strong stomach, but everybody’s got to draw the line somewhere.”

  “Thanks,” he said. “That’s awfully nice of you.”

  “You’re welcome.” His irony was completely lost on her. “I’m glad for some backup. I would like to live through this. Can you walk? The drug should be wearing off by now. I loaded that dart myself.”

  He stumbled down onto his knees with a gasp. Tamara yanked him back up, her long, vicious nails digging into his arm. “I cut the power, so he won’t see us on the surveillance screens for a few more minutes,” she said. “He’ll send Nigel to check on it any minute now. He’ll be livid if he thinks he won’t get to see the sex show.”

  “Sex show?” He gave her a wary glance. “What sex show?”

  “Don’t ask. Oh, but speaking of sex shows—goddamn it, move your ass, McCloud! The one bright spot in my week has been watching you and your girlfriend get it on. Very entertaining. And that’s a high compliment, from me. I hate to be bored.”

  “Oh, Christ.” He stumbled onto his knees again. “Don’t tell me.”

  She yanked him back up. “You’re good, big boy,” she taunted. “Keep treating her right, or the next time we meet I won’t be so friendly.”

  She was trying to piss him off, to help him throw off the effects of the drug. It was a nice effort, and he appreciated the thought, but it was all he could do not to pass out or barf. He didn’t have the strength for anger. Tamara yanked the door open. He wiped cold sweat off his brow. His sleeve came away dark with dried blood. He swayed, and caught himself on the doorjamb. “In James Bond flicks, there are always at least two beautiful girls,” he panted. “A good one and a bad one.”

  She gave him a catlike smile. “I’m the bad one.”

  “Don’t confuse me. It’s hard to take this in when I’m stoned.”

  “Flexibility is the true measure of intelligence. Novak told me you were relatively intelligent. Don’t disappoint me now. OK, listen. This is the story. You got free somehow, clobbered me, took my gun, and forced me to show you where Erin is. We burst in, you using me as a shield—”

  “Forget it.” Connor splayed his hand against the corridor wall and stumbled doggedly after her. “He doesn’t care if I kill you. We know it, he knows we know it. He might shoot you just to prove a point.”

  Tamara’s perfect eyebrows snapped together. “Got a better idea?”

  “How about you tell me where they are, and then run like hell and get help?” he suggested. “I’ll just go in and do what I can.”

  She sniffed derisively. “Oh, please. You and Erin are dead meat if you go in alone, and so am I when he comes after me later. If I go in with you, it’s two to three. Sort of. Tonia’s stupid and slow, but Novak and Georg each count for two apiece.”

  “Three to three,” he said.

  “You’re counting Erin?” She sounded amused.

  “Hell, yes,” he said. “Erin is an Amazon.”

  “An unarmed Amazon,” Tamara said wryly.

  “Three to three,” he insisted.

  “Whatever. We’re getting close. Shut up, and think fast.”

  He struggled behind her for a second, and tapped her shoulder. “One thing,” he asked. “Why are you avenging Lazar? He was a—”

  “Criminal? Corrupt? Greedy? Ruthless? Sure. He was complicated. I like complicated men. I’m a greedy, ruthless criminal myself. And Victor was the only man who ever gave me what I needed.”

  He tried not to ask, with all his strength, but she’d set him up, and now he had to know. “Uh…so what do you need, anyway?”

  She yanked up her skirt and pulled his SIG Sauer out of a pouch beneath it. She flung it at him, nodding her cool approval as he caught it one-handed.

  “None of your fucking business, little boy,” she said. “Let’s move.”

  “Stop,” Novak said.

  Georg’s raised arm froze in mid-air. He and Novak exchanged looks. Erin reached out behind herself. Her stiff, cold fingers slid along the surface of the table, groping. They brushed the sharp tip of an object that spun around at her touch.

  The bronze dagger.

  They were all still looking away from her. She slid the tip of the dagger into her sleeve, trembling at her own daring. She scooped it up and wrapped that arm across her chest. She pressed her other arm over it in a shrinking, defensive pose. It didn’t take much acting.

  Novak barked out something in a language she didn’t recognize. Georg made a brief, sullen reply. Novak pressed a button on his watch and snarled into it in the same language. He held a conversation with the person who replied. A long, heavy silence followed.

  Novak paced back and forth across the room. He scowled at Erin as if the power outage were her fault. “I do not like surprises at this stage of the game.” He spoke into his watch. “Tamara?” He waited. No reply. He turned to Tonia. “Check on her. I will leave nothing to chance. If I cannot watch them on video, I will watch them in this room.”

  Georg leered at her. “We watch them, and then he watches us.”

  She recoiled. The dagger slid up into her sleeve, all the way to her elbow. It was very cold against the skin of her arm.

  Tonia opened the door. She leaped back with a shriek and leveled her gun. Guns appeared in the hands of Novak and Georg.

  “Relax, everyone,” said Tamara’s light, amused voice. “I have the situation under control.”

  She walked into the room. Connor staggered in beside her, his arms fastened behind his back, his head bent over at an awkward angle. Tamara clutched a handful of his hair. Her pistol was shoved under his chin. “When I saw the power outage, I assumed you’d want a change of plans, boss,” she said. “I know how much this means to you.”

  Novak’s eyes narrowed. “You should not take initiatives of this kind without consulting me. He might have overpowered you.”

  Tamara looked contrite. “I’m so sorry. I was overly eager to please you,” she said. “Forgive me. As you can see, I managed him easily.”

  Connor’s eyes sought hers across the room. He was so beautiful, and so pale. His chiseled face wa
s bruised and streaked with blood. The blaze of love in his eyes was like a blow against her heart.

  Tamara jerked her chin at Georg. “He has to be restrained for this. Help me cuff him to the radiator.”

  Georg shot Novak a questioning look.

  “Get on with it,” Novak said curtly. “It’s getting late, and we’re already behind schedule.”

  Tamara let go of Connor’s hair and eased away from him, her gun still trained on his face. “Down on the floor,” she said. “Sit. Right there.”

  Connor crouched down, and slowly did as she asked.

  Georg advanced, flexing his plastic-covered hands. “I want to beat you with your cane,” he hissed. “But it will be beautiful to have her”—he jerked his chin at Erin—“in front of you. And then you will die.”

  He leaped onto Connor with an animal snarl and bore him to the ground. Connor twisted under him. A gun went off. Georg arched back, gurgling. Tonia screamed. Tamara whirled, kicked her in the face.

  The gun in Novak’s arm rose, taking aim at Connor. Erin exploded out of her shocked paralysis. She flung herself against Novak and let the dagger slip from her sleeve into her hand. She jarred him, and stumbled back. His shot went wide. A window shattered.

  Novak let out a shriek of inhuman fury and leaped at her.

  Erin brought the bronze dagger up, clutched tight in both hands. It met his own furious momentum. The blade bit deep into his throat.

  His pale eyes went wide. Black-red arterial blood gushed out over spotless white linen. The gun dropped from his hand. His arms encircled her as he fell forward. His blood had a meaty, metallic smell.

  He was taking her down with him, into the steaming pits of hell.

  She heard another gun blast, then another, but they came from very far away. The table caught the back of her head as she fell, but it was some other person who suffered that awful pain. She was falling into the vortex that had always waited for her. Fading into the dark.

  “Erin? Goddamn it, Erin, wake up! Talk to me!”

  Connor’s voice sounded terrified. She wanted to comfort him, but she’d lost contact with the part of herself that knew speech. Everything was so far away. She was so small. Lost in a huge, echoing void.

  “She’s covered with blood.” Connor’s voice shook. Rough hands wrenched her blouse open. “I can’t tell if—”

  “Not hers,” said Tamara’s voice. “It’s his. Relax.”

  Erin’s eyes fluttered open. Staggering pain filled her head. She struggled to focus. “Connor?”

  “Erin? Are you OK?”

  “Don’t know. Am I?”

  His hands slid over her body, searching for injuries. He let out a long, unsteady sigh of relief when he found none. He slipped his arm behind her shoulder and pulled her up. “God, you scared me.”

  “My head.” Erin tried to lift her hand up to her head, but her arm was made of lead. Connor’s long, gentle fingers slid into her hair and explored. She hissed in pain.

  “You’ve got a bump, but it didn’t break the skin,” he said. “We’ll have it checked out.”

  “Novak?” she asked.

  He jerked his chin to the left of them. She glanced, and looked quickly away from the still, blood-drenched thing next to them. Her gorge rose. She squeezed her eyes shut. “He’s really dead this time?”

  “Very dead,” Tamara said. “Thanks to you.”

  She looked up, startled. Tamara was crouched next to her. “Me?”

  “You took him out with the neck wound.” Her approval was clear. “It would have taken a minute, but it was a sure thing. You hit an artery, girl. Blood’s all over the wall. Looks like a slaughterhouse in here.”

  Erin closed her eyes before she could see the gore-spattered walls. “I heard all those gunshots,” she said.

  “We were just making dead sure,” Tamara said. “Connor said you were an Amazon. He was right. I’m impressed.” Tamara was pressing hard on her upper arm, her fingers wet with blood.

  “You’re wounded,” Connor said to her. “Let me see.”

  “Tonia grazed me,” she said. “The bitch always did have lousy aim. No big deal. I’ve taken worse than this and then gone out dancing.”

  The world widened into vast, echoing emptiness again. Erin heard their voices, but she could not take in what they were saying. Connor’s hand was warm against her face. “Erin? Babe? Anybody home?”

  “I’m not dead,” was all that came out. What she wanted to say was too complicated, a million desperate things all struggling for precedence. “I’m not dead,” she repeated stupidly.

  “No, you’re not, sweetheart. Thank God.”

  Connor’s head dropped onto her blood-soaked shoulder. She smelled his warm, tangled hair against her face. He loved her, but he couldn’t follow her to that frozen wasteland. No one could. She didn’t know the way back to where he waited, warm and gentle, and needing something from her that she was too destroyed to give.

  “It’s all chaos,” she whispered. “That’s it. That’s all there ever was. Anything else is just a lie. Just a mask.”

  Connor smoothed her hair back, frowning. “I think you’ve got a concussion, baby.”

  “I think she’s telling you something important,” Tamara said. She tilted Erin’s chin up gently with a blood-streaked hand. “You know what? You’ve got the makings of an excellent professional bad girl.”

  That was so bizarre, it actually penetrated the haze and pulled her back to the room. She focused on Tamara, blinking. “Really?”

  Tamara smiled. “Sure. You’ve got all the prerequisites. The looks, the brains, the nerve, the flexible attitude. You need a little help with the style, but that’s no biggie.”

  Connor pulled her back against the warmth of his chest. “That’s very kind of you, but it’s not her scene.”

  “Let Erin speak for herself,” Tamara mocked. “Today’s a big day. Her first kill. It’s all chaos, right? I’ve known that all along, you see. It’s made me what I am today.”

  Connor’s body was rigid. “Hey. Forget it. Erin isn’t a—”

  “I owe you one, beautiful,” Tamara told her. “If you ever need help with something scary, leave me a message at the Honey Pot sex toy shop down in Pioneer Square. Scary things are my specialty.”

  “Scary like this?” Connor asked harshly. “Jesus. That’s kinky.”

  “This situation was pretty much my outer limit,” she admitted. “I plan to be very mellow for a while. Unless Erin needs me, of course.”

  Connor’s arms tightened jealously. “Thanks, but I can help her with anything scary that comes up.”

  Tamara stroked Erin’s cheek with a long red fingernail. There was a glittering silver lightning bolt appliquéd onto it. “Men may come and men may go, but sisters look out for each other,” she murmured.

  Erin let out a bitter laugh. “Like Tonia?”

  Tamara dismissed Tonia with a flick of her bloodstained hand. “Tonia is trash,” she said. “What you lost in her, you gained in me…and then some.” She leaned forward and kissed Erin’s mouth. Her lips were soft and lingering. “Keep that in mind, girlfriend.”

  Connor made a rumbling sound in his chest. “Hey. I appreciate your help, and this eternal sisterhood stuff is touching, but it’s been a tough day. You can stop fucking with my head anytime now. Anytime.”

  Tamara laughed in his face and poked him with her lightning bolt fingernail. “Toughen up, McCloud,” she said. “You’re such an easy mark.” She rose and hiked up her skirt to holster her gun. “This place is going to be full of cops in a while, so I’ll just be on my way. Cops make me itch. Except for you, of course, big boy.”

  “I’m not a cop anymore,” he said.

  Tamara’s eyebrows lifted. “Once a cop, always a cop. I’m out of here.” She smiled at Erin. “Ciao, beautiful. It’s been intense.”

  “Any other goons to worry about?” Connor demanded.

  She shook her head. “He was keeping a very low profile. The only on
es in the house were Silvio and Nigel. They probably bolted when they heard the gunshots. The rest are scattered around the city. They’ll evaporate soon.” She dug her toe into Tonia’s buttock as she passed. “Stop sniveling, you stupid cow. You won’t bleed to death. Apply direct pressure with the heel of your hand and shut up.”

  “Tamara?” Erin called.

  Tamara turned at the door.

  “Thank you,” Erin said. “I owe you one, too. You know how to find me if you need me.”

  Tamara’s brilliant smile flashed. “Till later, then.”

  She vanished into the dark. The two of them huddled together in the dim room between two blood-soaked corpses. Tonia’s miserable whimpering grated on her raw nerves. Connor was saying something. Repeating it. She wrenched her mind into focus.

  “…still got that cell phone on you someplace, sweetheart?”

  “In my purse.” Her teeth chattered. “Around here somewhere.”

  “I’ll find it,” he said.

  She started to shiver uncontrollably when he took his warmth away to search for it. She heard his voice, getting further and further away. “Hey. Nick. It’s me…yeah. Shut up and let me talk. I need an ambulance. I’ve got Novak and Luksch…come see for yourself. They’re dead. You can ID them at your leisure, and then you can arrest me, if you still want to. There’s a woman down with a gunshot wound to the thigh, one of Novak’s…hell, I don’t know. I was unconscious when they brought me here. Hold on.” He crouched down in front of Erin, and patted her face. “Baby, what’s the address of this place?”

  She gasped it out through chattering teeth. Connor repeated it to Nick. “Hurry,” he said into the phone. “Erin’s going into shock.”

  He tossed the phone aside and peeled off her blood-drenched blouse. He took off his own shirt, wrapped her in it, and pulled her onto his lap, hunching his warm body around hers.

  She felt the fear in his fierce, tight embrace. Part of her longed to comfort him, to tell him how sorry she was for not believing him. How grateful that he’d come to save her anyway, against all hope. He was heroic and beautiful, and she loved him.

  She couldn’t say it. She was shaking apart. She vibrated in his arms, teeth rattling. All the horrors that could have happened coexisted in her mind, an explosion of dreadful time lines radiating out from one crushing blow like the cracks in a shattered windshield.