“What happens after she gets him?”
“Can’t answer that.”
“What about the Armenians? Any chance she’s working with them?”
Gunner shrugged.
There was always a chance that any member of a crew could’ve been turned and had infiltrated a unit, however, with Ivashov’s connections, former or otherwise, that risk was exponentially greater.
Razor took a second look at where Dutch, Striker, Alegria, and Monk had been deployed to sniping positions. He and Gunner would be first entry, with Raketa their only backup.
“Do you trust her?” Razor asked.
Gunner nodded. “As far as I can throw her.”
Within moments, the Russian operative joined them.
“Razor,” she said, trilling the Rs on either end of his name in her Russian accent.
“Raketa.”
She studied him for a moment and then turned to Gunner. “My sources tell me that Petrov is not far behind his would-be captors.”
“Do they have an idea how many he’s bringing with him?” Razor asked.
Again, Raketa looked at Gunner. “Three or four they believe.”
“What’s their ETA?” Gunner asked.
“Not more than thirty minutes.”
Which likely meant the Armenians would be here in half that time. There were four men who would have to be taken out immediately upon the others’ arrival with Ava. Her three captors would be next, followed by the two who were inside with the girls. All of this needed to happen without the four hostages being harmed in any way.
At the same time, those in sniping position had to remain at the ready in anticipation of Petrov’s arrival.
“Bring Dutch back.”
Gunner nodded and radioed the operative.
“Do they have night vision?”
“Negative,” answered Gunner.
That didn’t surprise Razor, although he was certain Petrov and his team would.
Gunner radioed the update on Petrov to the three remaining snipers, and then had a conversation with Raketa that Razor couldn’t hear.
“What’s happening?” Razor asked when Raketa went back into the woods.
“We both agree we can use one more sniper. She’s good, Raze.”
Good, if she was on their side. Bad, if she wasn’t.
The next fifteen minutes dragged on while Razor went over the entry plan again and again in his head. If the snipers failed to take down any of the four, it would be up to him, Gunner, and Dutch to do so.
“You and Dutch take first entry,” Razor said, changing his mind about being on the outside rather than in.
“Roger that,” both of the men responded.
“Go!” he heard Gunner yell at the same time he heard the sniper fire.
Razor heard four shots. Each hit their mark, killing the men standing guard on the outside of the house. Two more shots followed almost simultaneously when Gunner and Dutch stormed through the door.
What Razor didn’t expect was to hear three more shots. Where the fuck was Ava? Had one of the snipers shot too soon? Razor raced around the makeshift structure where the other girls were being held, and stopped dead in his tracks.
There, only a couple of feet in front of him, stood the love of his life with her own father pointing a gun at her head. Four others had their guns leveled directly at him.
“Hold your fire!” he shouted.
Neither Petrov nor his men were wearing night optical devices, or NODs. Given his slight advantage, Razor slowly inched closer to Petrov.
His eyes met Ava’s. They were opened wide and tears ran down her cheeks.
“Another minute and we would’ve been gone,” Petrov taunted. “Now the choice is yours. We can leave with my daughter and no one gets hurt, or she dies.”
“Dad! What—” she gasped.
“Silence!” he barked, tightening his grip on her middle and shoving the gun harder into her temple.
“Let her go,” Razor said in the voice he’d been trained to use as a negotiator. He crept closer still.
“Nyet,” he said, emphasizing his long-since-gone accent. “I didn’t give up my own life, all those years ago, to lose it again now.”
Razor saw the flash of the infrared pulse through his NOD and dove, knocking Petrov and Ava to the ground while instantaneously, the snipers took out the other four men.
“Move!” he yelled at Ava, as her father reached to where his gun had landed, but she didn’t move.
“No! Don’t shoot him!” she screamed back.
Before Razor could react, another shot rang out of the woods, hitting just outside of Petrov’s reach of the gun. It didn’t appear he’d been hit, but the gun had been. There was no way of knowing from this distance whether it remained usable.
Razor raced forward. He pulled Ava to her feet, and got between her and her father. He heard another shot at the same time he felt the bullet’s impact in his side.
—:—
“No no no!” Ava screamed as Tabon fell to the ground.
She watched in horror as her father stood, grabbed the gun that had been knocked out of his hand, and pointed it at her.
She dropped to the ground near Tabon and closed her eyes, knowing that in the next few seconds, she’d be dead. She laid her body over his as more gunshots rang out, but she didn’t feel anything. Nothing hit her.
She looked up, expecting to see her father, either lying dead on the ground, or about to shoot her, but she didn’t see him at all.
“Call HEMS,” someone yelled from behind her.
“Let me get a look at him, Ava,” said Gunner, moving her away from Tabon. He checked for a pulse, and then rolled him to his side. “Get that fucking helicopter here!” he yelled.
“Ava!” she heard her sister scream. She stood but kept her eyes on Gunner holding Tabon’s listless body.
“You fucking hold on, Raze. You fucking hold on,” she heard him repeat again and again.
19
Ava stood with her arms around Aine as they watched the helicopter take Tabon away, and Gunner with him.
“Let’s go, Miss Ava,” Monk said, ushering her to a waiting SUV.
“I need to go to the hospital,” she said in a voice that didn’t sound like her own.
“That’s where we’re going. We need to get you and your sister checked out.”
He did his best to shield her from the carnage that lay along the pathway to the vehicle, and Ava tried hard not to look.
“Where are Pen and Tara?” she cried when she didn’t see them in the SUV.
“They’re already on their way,” Monk told her, gently grasping her arm and helping her inside. She moved over so Aine could get in next to her.
“I’ll stay in the back with them,” she thought she heard Monk say as he climbed in behind her sister.
The man she recognized as the pilot got in the driver’s seat. What was his name? Was it Onyx?
Everything around her seemed to be happening in slow motion and something was wrong with her hearing. Voices were muffled, words were unclear, even her own.
Ava clung to Aine’s hand as she rested her head on her sister’s shoulder and cried.
When they walked into the emergency room, the first two people she and Aine saw were Penelope and Tara. The four ran to each other, crying, and gathering into a group embrace.
“I’m so sorry,” Ava repeated.
“We’re just so glad you’re safe,” Aine said to her. “They wanted you,” she added, which only made Ava cry harder.
“Let’s go see the doc,” said Monk, again ushering her and Aine away from their friends.
Ava looked behind her before she walked through the door Monk held open, and saw that Pen and Tara were being taken to a room too.
“You can see them again as soon as the doctor has been able to check you out.”
Ava nodded. At least she and Aine had been taken to the same room.
“What about Tabon?” she said, resting
her hand on Monk’s arm.
“I’ll let you know as soon as I hear something.”
Ava sat next to Aine. “What did they do to you?” she whispered, knowing she had to ask, but not wanting to know the answer.
“They kept us drugged with something most of the time,” Aine told her. “At first we were in a warehouse. I think it had been abandoned. Then they moved us, twice. I think they were getting ready to move us again. Honestly, I don’t remember much.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Stop saying you’re sorry,” Aine said, squeezing Ava’s hand. “This isn’t your fault.”
“But it is,” she cried. “It’s all my fault. And Dad, God, I don’t even…” Ava looked at Monk.
Aine’s face paled. “What about Dad?”
“It was him all along. He was going to kill me.”
Aine studied her. “Ava,” she said, “what…are you …talking about?”
Monk stood and approached them, putting one hand on each of their shoulders. “There will be time for us to talk about everything that happened later,” he said, looking back and forth between them. “For now, let’s make sure that whatever you were drugged with is out of your system.”
Aine nodded like she did, but Ava knew questions were racing through her sister’s head just like they were racing through hers.
“Have you heard anything about Tabon?” she asked him again.
Monk shook his head. “Not yet.”
When the doctor came into the room, he asked Monk to step out, and someone brought another gurney in. They asked Ava and Aine to both lie down while nurses took their vital signs and drew blood. The doctor examined Ava first and told someone to start an IV.
He moved over to her sister and said the same thing.
Once he was finished, he rolled a stool between them.
“Until we get the blood tests back, we won’t know for certain, but I believe you were both given Rohypnol. You may have heard it called the date-rape drug. It isn’t used as commonly as in the past, but what is used is far worse in terms of side effects.”
Ava’s eyes met her sister’s.
“What are the side effects?” Aine asked.
“They’re different based on the amount someone has been given, but headache, confusion, low blood pressure, and slurred speech are what we see most often. You may experience tremors, and your reaction time may be diminished.”
Ava nodded. That explained why her own voice sounded funny and why she seemed to be having a hard time understanding and processing what others were saying to her.
“If my suspicions are correct and you were both given Rohypnol, the drug’s half-life is between eighteen and twenty-six hours. We’ll keep you both here at least overnight, and maybe longer, for observation.”
“What is half-life?” asked Aine.
“Essentially it’s the duration of action, but clinically it means the point in time at which the drug’s concentration is reduced by half. In other words, when you should expect to see signs of improvement.” He looked between each of them. “Any other questions?”
Ava rested her head against the pillow. She might have questions if she understood anything he’d said.
“How are Pen and Tara?” Aine asked.
“We’re keeping them overnight as well. At the moment the staff on the medical floor is working hard to arrange for you to have rooms side-by-side.”
The doctor stood to leave.
“Wait,” said Ava. “A man was brought to this hospital via helicopter. Do you know his condition?”
“I’m sorry, but I’m not aware of any flight of life arrivals today.”
“What happened?” Aine asked after the doctor left.
“Someone shot Tabon. It may even have been Dad.”
Aine rolled to her side.
“Start at the beginning, Ava. Tell me how Dad is involved in all this.”
“To be honest, I’m not really sure.”
Ava told her twin about the night Dash called her. “He asked me to meet him at a specific time, but I ended up taking a cab because I didn’t feel like dealing with the subway, so I arrived early.”
She told her how she’d seen Dash hand over several large manila envelopes to another man, who in turn, gave Dash a briefcase full of cash.
“How did you know it was cash?” asked Aine.
“Because he opened it and looked inside.”
“What were you doing?”
“Hiding and trying not to make a sound. Believe me, if I thought I could leave without either of them knowing I was there, I would’ve.”
“Then what happened?”
“When the other man left, Dash saw me. He grabbed me and started yelling at me, threatening to kill me if I told anyone about what I saw.”
“How did you get away from him?”
Ava closed her eyes, remembering the events of that night. What had seemed like circumstance at the time, no longer did.
“Dad. We were walking—actually, Dash was pulling me toward the elevator—when Dad walked up. I was so afraid of what Dash would do, and so relieved to see Dad, that I didn’t think about anything other than getting away from him. Dash, that is.
“Dad walked me out and called me a cab. He asked me again and again if I was okay, and I told him I was. I made up this story about Dash asking me to get back together with him, and I was so emotional because I turned him down.”
She explained that a few days later, she’d been contacted by a federal prosecutor and was brought in for questioning.
“I was scared shitless, as you can imagine, thinking I was in some kind of trouble. Instead, they told me Dash had been arrested, and asked me what I knew about the events that took place the night I saw him with the other guy.”
“What did you tell them?”
“I didn’t think it was much, honestly. But now that I think back about it, they were particularly interested in what Dad was doing there. I told them it must’ve been a coincidence and a lucky one for me.”
Ava groaned.
“God, what if that was the start of all of this?”
“What do you mean?”
“Tabon told me that Dash worked for someone who was close to our family. I pretty much disregarded what he said because Dad never had any friends I knew of. Mom either.”
“Did Tabon know Dad was involved?’
Ava shrugged. “He must have.”
She remembered Tabon, Gunner, and Doc talking about their father at the wedding, and how she’d gotten a bad feeling watching them.
“When he met me at the airport that morning and talked me into staying, he said something about the case against Dash being a lot more complex than I thought, and that the CIA wanted the man he worked for more than Dash. He also told me that he’d been hired to protect me.”
“Who hired him?”
“I think the CIA did.”
“Oh my God,” Aine moaned. “Do you think Dad had us kidnapped?”
“I have no idea.”
“Where is he now?”
“Dad or Dash?”
“I meant Dad, but where is Dash too?”
“I don’t know the answer to that either.”
The door opened and Monk came in. Before she could ask, he said, “Razor is in surgery.”
“How bad is it, Monk? Just tell me.”
“He’s critical.”
An hour after she and Aine were moved to a room on the fourth floor, Kade and his wife walked in.
“Hello, love. How are you feeling?” Merrigan asked quietly, noticing Aine was asleep.
Ava’s eyes filled with tears. “I’m so scared,” she whispered.
Merrigan pulled a chair close to the bed, put the guardrail down, and took Ava’s hand in hers. “You’ve been through quite an ordeal,” she said.
Ava shook her head. “It’s Tabon.”
Merrigan nodded.
“Have you heard anything?” Ava asked Kade.
“He’s still in surgery.�
��
“Try to get some rest,” Merrigan told her. “We’ll be here, and I’ll let you know as soon as we hear anything.”
“They drugged me with something.”
Merrigan ran her fingers through Ava’s hair. “Let yourself sleep.”
When she woke again, the sun was shining brightly through the window. How long had she slept? She raised her head and saw Aine was still asleep and so was Merrigan, who looked very uncomfortable, sitting in the room’s recliner.
“How are you doing?” Kade, who she hadn’t seen sitting on the other side of her, asked.
She put her hand on her heart.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“I’m feeling okay.”
Kade nodded; his eyes were hooded.
“What? Has something happened to Tabon?”
“He’s in intensive care, sweetheart.”
“Is he going to be okay?”
“He’s on life support.”
She lowered the guardrail on her bed and sat up. “I have to see him.”
“Ava, that isn’t a good—”
“What’s happening?” asked Merrigan.
“I told Ava that Razor is on life support,” Kade explained to his wife.
Ava turned to her. “I need to see him.”
“Of course you do,” she said, walking over and pressing the nurses’ call button.
“Can I help you?” said a voice through the speaker.
“We need a wheelchair as soon as possible.”
“Give me a minute,” said the voice.
“I can walk,” Ava told her.
“Who said it’s for you?” Merrigan said. She smiled, but Ava knew she was equally worried about Tabon.
She avoided eye contact with Kade, knowing he might try to talk her out of going to see him—not that there was any chance in the world he’d be successful in doing so.
When Merrigan explained why Ava wanted to be taken to the intensive care unit, the nurse asked them to wait another few minutes.
When she came back, she wheeled Ava to the elevator and took her up one floor.
“I brought your chart,” she said. “Otherwise, they probably wouldn’t let you in to see him.”
Razor Page 17