Tough Justice: Countdown Box Set

by Carla Cassidy

  She couldn’t have kept talking if she’d been ordered to do it. Jennifer felt her body sag in absolute grief and was ready to never get up again. However, Ty had other plans for her. He put his arms around her and pulled her to his chest. It was less of an embrace and more of a way to keep her on her feet.

  In the back of her mind she knew coming undone in the stairwell of the Federal Plaza was in no way professional. Yet, sometimes things just happened that you didn’t plan for.

  Ty stood there with her in silence until the tears finally stopped. With them, she hated to admit, some relief gushed out. She hadn’t told a soul what she’d done. And now it might be taken out of her hands by a madman. Telling someone of her own accord had seemed so important minutes ago.

  Jennifer took a deep breath and pulled back, her cheeks starting to burn as embarrassment began to move in. Ty’s expression was still blank. It worried her.

  “I’m sorry,” she started. “I don’t expect you to keep this a secret I just had to tell you and—”

  “Thank you,” Ty interrupted. Jennifer felt her eyes widen.

  “What for?” she asked. “Sobbing on you when we’re supposed to be working? Admitting to my partner—a federal agent—that I’ve killed someone? Proving to you I’m a shit partner?”

  Ty actually cracked a smile. It wasn’t large by any means but it looked genuine.

  “For trusting me, even after giving you a year full of reasons not to after how I treated you,” he said.

  Jennifer was going to try and joke the comment off. But, she realized then and there, she did really trust the man in front of her. Even though, as he said, he’d given her a year of grief.

  Before he could reassure her, his expression pinched. His brow drew in and his gaze slid to the side before coming back to her.

  “I don’t know how I would have reacted if I’d been in your situation,” he said. “But, I think your sister’s last words might tell you more about your relationship with her than what you did.”

  “Her last words?” she echoed.

  Ty nodded. “What’s the last thing she said before it happened?”

  Jennifer felt her heart squeeze. This time there was less anguish there. She didn’t smile but there was some happiness seeping in. As if it was yesterday she heard her sister speak to her.

  “‘I love you.’”

  Chapter Six

  The bomb squad got held up in traffic.

  If that wasn’t the most New York thing, Xander didn’t know what was.

  Their lights and sirens had been ordered to stay off in an attempt to avoid alerting Halpert and inciting panic. That was the last thing they needed right now.

  Thankfully, Xander and James’s drive from Federal Plaza had been less congested. They’d managed to weave their way through lines of cars and pedestrians with relative ease. Though that was far from what they were feeling as they pulled up to the police station. James didn’t park. He didn’t cut the engine either.

  “Go ahead and get the GPS ready for the school farthest away from here,” Xander said, unbuckling his seatbelt. “We’ll let the bomb squad hit the closest school just in case.”

  “And if the bomb is in the second school?” James asked.

  Xander felt his muscles tense. “Then we’ll have to deal with it.”

  James nodded and started to plug in addresses into his phone. Xander got out and was ready to run inside and make a beeline straight for the chief of police. However, he met Xander on the stairs.

  Xander flipped out his ID, wordlessly. The chief, a man who had seemed exhausted in his own right, nodded.

  “I don’t feel right waiting to evacuate the schools,” the man greeted. “All of those kids and staff—”

  “If our perp gets any hint that we’re onto him then he might decide to detonate early,” Xander interrupted. “He’s already shown us that he has no regard for life. Adults or children. That’s why we’ve insisted we do this with our plan.”

  The chief didn’t seem to like taking orders but he also was a reasonable man. He knew what Michaels, Halpert, whatever the hell his name was, had done so far. Which is the only reason Xander was sure the chief was going along with them.

  The man gave a curt nod and then it was back to business. “You’re going to PS 22?” he guessed.

  “If it’s the farthest one from here, then yes,” Xander answered.

  “It is,” the chief confirmed. “And its principal is a stubborn man. But he’s a good one. I suggest you completely level with him about the situation. He’ll be more of a help than a hindrance.”

  “So you don’t think he will flip out and cause a panic?” Because that was the last thing needed.

  “No.”

  “And the principal at the other school?” Xander had to ask. The chief’s expression twisted.

  “He scares easily,” he hedged. “And that’s why I’m going there instead. I’ve had experience with wrangling him in.”

  “Good.”

  “Okay, I’m sending my two available units with you,” the chief said. He motioned through the window and a man and a woman rushed out of the door. Like the CMU had asked, they were dressed in plain clothes. The woman seemed to read his next question.

  “I borrowed my sister’s minivan,” she said. “It’s as incognito as we could get.”

  Xander nodded. He turned back to the chief.

  “Let’s get going then,” he said. “And remember, evacuate first.”

  “Good luck,” the chief said. “And Godspeed.”

  * * *

  Nick was mad for several reasons.

  One was the most obvious. They weren’t getting anywhere. Even with his God-given last name, information on the man was scarce. Mercer, and even the team, were not only waiting for a breakthrough, but being very vocal about how that just hadn’t happened yet. It put Nick and his new status as co-head of the CMU in even more of a mood. Which brought his mind, and current teeth-grinding annoyance, to another reason his blood pressure was rising.

  While he’d known that Lara wasn’t in the bullpen, what he hadn’t realized until that moment, was how long she’d been gone. The team had been so focused on their individual tasks, he wasn’t the only one surprised after making the announcement. He was getting used to her taking off for hours, like the six hours when she took off to sort out Ben’s coffee nightmare before heading to see Victoria, but this time was different. The stakes were high and the countdown was on. Where the fuck was she?

  Nick ran his hand up his face and over his hair. He wasn’t in the mood for where his thoughts went.

  “Want me to call her apartment?” Jennifer asked. “She has a landline right? Did I make that up?”

  Nick felt his own phone in his palm. If he was right in what he was thinking then Lara wouldn’t answer the phone for him. Not when she would know what he’d say.

  “Yeah, but last I checked no voice mail is set up. So a lot good it does anyone trying to get a hold of her. But still, if she does answer ask her when she plans on coming back,” he said. “And let her know I’d like to have a talk with her.”

  Jennifer didn’t seem uncomfortable at the prospect of having to wrangle in one co-head at the insistence of the other. She picked up her phone, searched the almost-forgotten landline and dialed it without hesitation.

  Nick was already coming up with the beginnings of a heated argument when the call didn’t even connect. She’d turned it off.

  “Well, I guess it’s safe to say our neighborhood lone wolf might have remembered how to howl,” Nick said. Jennifer hung up on her end but didn’t look convinced.

  “Maybe she just needed to get away for a bit,” she offered. “Or maybe even accidentally locked her cell phone away when she was looking through all of these dead ends.”

/>   Ty was on her heels with a nod.

  “It’s not like we all haven’t forgotten our phones while working a lead before,” he pointed out. “Or even put them in weird places. Xander put his in the freezer a few months back. Plus, I don’t know about you, but I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in what feels like years.”

  Nick let out a sigh.

  “And it’s not like Lara hasn’t tried to work a case on her own before,” Nick offered. He might have had a lot of feelings and thoughts about his partner but anger always won out when she decided to play too close to the chest to protect the rest of them. She had tried to be their personal martyr before.

  Hell, Nick thought. She even tried to throw herself at the mercy of Mercer just to try and save my ass from his wrath post press conference.

  “Last time was different,” Ty tried. “She was trying to fix what she thought was a personal mistake that was jeopardizing the rest of us. This case, the Whisperer, is different. What he is doing, who he is, isn’t her fault.”

  Nick wanted to believe that. He wanted to be able to believe that Lara had simply misplaced her phone by accident while rushing to follow up some wayward lead.

  But Nick had a bad feeling about her absence. One he couldn’t so easily sweep away.

  “Plus, what lead could she have found that we haven’t yet?” Ty asked. He motioned around the room and then directly at his computer screen. “No offense to Lara’s intelligence, but this guy is smart. If and when we find a connection I have a feeling it won’t be on our end but Christina’s and her dark web nonsense.”

  Again, Nick wanted to believe him.

  Again, he didn’t feel like he could.

  “Lara has a nasty habit of throwing caution to the wind when the team, any and all of us, are threatened,” Nick said. “And we were definitely threatened by Michaels.”

  “But so was she,” Jennifer spoke up.

  “But it didn’t hold up. For whatever reason hers was dropped and our names were added to his plans,” Nick said. “That could be enough to trigger her loyalty and put it in the ferocious category.”

  “You think she would really cut us out of the loop if she found something?” Ty asked after they all let a moment pass.

  Nick didn’t like his answer but nodded. “I think she’d try just about anything to help us,” Nick answered.

  He wasn’t trying to turn the team’s goodwill toward Lara against her but there was a bottom line they didn’t seem to be acknowledging. So, Nick decided to point it out.

  “It’s not her job to save us by herself,” he added on. “We’re a team. We work together. Especially when we’re getting our asses handed to us.”

  Despite their attempt to defend Lara, Nick could tell they were at least thinking about the possibility that Lara had chosen to seek out information solo rather than with the group. It wasn’t like she hadn’t done it before.

  Nick found himself sighing again. He needed more coffee.

  “Keep trying to chase down leads and I’ll try to chase down Lara.”

  Jennifer glanced at Lara’s desk but nodded and turned to her computer. Ty did the same.

  Nick didn’t have a chance to make it to Victoria’s old office, his and Lara’s until it was decided who was promoted to head of the unit, when his own phone started to ring. The caller ID belonged to James. Another agent who he believed would have defended Lara’s absence. Not that Nick was against defending her. He just wanted to help.

  Which was hard when the person he often was trying to save her from was herself.

  “Delano,” he answered.

  “We’re heading to Public School 22,” James greeted. “The chief of police is taking the other school and the bomb squad is still stuck in traffic. Apparently there was an accident and they’re trying to find a different route.”

  “Okay. That might help us keep this whole operation under wraps for a little longer anyway,” Nick admitted. “Christina has an alert set for any online chatter about either school and the evacuations that might pop up. Still, keep me in the loop as best you can. And, James?”

  “Yeah?”

  All Nick could think about were hundreds of children, being put further in danger because of their plan. If the bomb went off early and they hadn’t evacuated the school?

  Nick shook his head. They might not know Michaels personally but they did know he didn’t give two shits about killing. If he caught wind of what they were doing...

  “Make sure I don’t have to give a press conference about another bomb going off,” he ended up saying.

  James was quick to respond. “Wouldn’t dream of it, boss.”

  They ended the call just as Nick’s adrenaline started to spike. Hunting Lara down was replaced by thoughts of Long Island and bombs and how much he wanted to personally end the human scourge that was Michaels.

  And soon Nick forgot all about Lara.

  Lone wolf or not.

  Chapter Seven

  They’ll die if you die.

  Those words were becoming Lara’s silent mantra.

  She was trying to keep as much control of the situation as she could by stripping away her emotions and only showing a cool head while talking to the madman.

  Halpert gave her another one of the grins she was starting to hate more than the bomb beneath her chair.

  “You’d kill innocent people because of little ole me?” she asked, already knowing he would. “Should I be flattered?”

  “No, you’d kill them,” he answered, ignoring her bit of sarcasm. He pointed at her chair. “That’s a pressure-plated bomb. If you so much as move the wrong way it’ll go off. Whether I want it to or not. And since I’ve given you the choice to sit there and talk to me or I’ll detonate the bomb in a very public place, if you decide to blow yourself up then it’ll be your fault when those people go up in flames, too.” He shrugged. “Then you will have died for nothing.”

  Lara tried to keep her expression as neutral as possible. More than anything she wanted to wipe the smug look off his face.

  Lara wished, for the umpteenth time, that there was a way to communicate with the team, but she’d been coming up blank for ideas on how to do anything that wouldn’t set off the bomb beneath her chair. All she had was the computer in front of her and she had no doubt that Halpert was monitoring every single part of it at all times. Even if she managed to get to the mouse and move it around without him seeing her through the webcam, she’d bet a year’s salary that he’d know the moment she clicked anything or made any keystroke.

  “I have to remind you that the deal is that you sit still and talk,” Halpert said. Lara ground her teeth together. She wanted to be snarky—wanted to only answer him with heavy sarcasm—but was she willing to risk the lives of children?

  No.

  It was one thing to risk her life but another to risk innocent people.

  “And what is it that you want to talk about?” Lara asked. Again, biting her tongue against saying something less than civilized was harder than she expected.

  Halpert leaned forward in his chair and crossed his hands in front of him, just enough in frame that she could see.

  “I want to talk about Bartholomew Grant,” he said, as if it was a topic as mundane as the weather. “Your father.”

  “What about?” Lara shot back quickly. She might have decided to hold her sarcasm behind her tongue but her impatience wasn’t something she could easily tamp down.

  “Tell me about him. Who was he as a person?”

  Lara felt her eyebrow raise. “Why?”

  “Because I’m trying to get to know you better, Agent Grant,” he answered simply. “You’ve spent your life obsessing over your mother’s murder, so it’s safe to say you loved her, but what about your dad? Tell me, in your own words, who he was.
”

  Again, Lara tried to keep her emotions under lock and key. If she’d been told that she’d spend hour after hour sitting across from a bad guy through her laptop while a bomb was beneath her chair she would have been surprised but not shocked. But if you’d told her she’d be in that situation and would be questioned about her dad, of all people, she wouldn’t have believed it. Not at all.

  Yet, here she was.

  “I assume you already know everything about him given your penchant for research. But I’ll give you the bullet points if it’ll make you happy,” she started. “Bartholomew Grant was an NYPD detective in Queens for several years before he retired from the force and decided to became a full-time alcoholic. He was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s when he was fifty-four and died when he was fifty-eight. That was over a year ago.”

  When she was done, Halpert continued to sit in silence.

  “That’s it,” she added on. “Satisfied?”

  Halpert’s grin started to turn down, his humor apparently disappearing. She hated to admit it, but it put Lara on edge. More so than she’d already been. What was worse than a genius sociopath with a desire for revenge at all costs?

  An unhinged genius sociopath with a desire for revenge at all costs.

  “Like you said, Agent Grant, those are things I already knew,” he said. “What I don’t know is what the man was actually like. Was he nice but stern? Rough but had a soft spot for you? Did he have a sense of humor? Any little anecdotes that you carry around and use with you today?”

  Lara could feel her attempt to mask her emotions breaking. Along with the physical pain of trying to become a living statue atop a chair with a bomb, she was being prodded about one of the few things in her life she never wanted to talk about. Not even with people she was close to. So the fact that Halpert was asking—no, demanding—was getting to her.

  “Come on, Lara,” Halpert pressed when she was still trying to wrangle how she wanted to respond. “It’s just you and me here. What’s the harm in telling me about your father?”

  “And what’s the point of telling you?” she finally said. “Why the interest?”