by Rachel Caine
Chapter Nine
In the end, they agreed that Jazz and Borden would take his car and head to the location; there were still two hours until the time listed on the Cross Society note, and that was plenty for Lucia to get Susannah Davis settled someplace safe. Someplace not on Manny's property; he again made that clear, in case Lucia had missed any of the first volley of refusals.
The simplest way to hide Susannah was to do so in plain sight. Lucia made use of Omar's credit cards to book a two-room suite at the Raphael Hotel for a week, with the private, if misleading, understanding that the booking was for a movie star recovering from plastic surgery. The star's personal assistant, Mr. Smith, would handle all room service and cleaning requests. No one would be allowed to enter the suite.
The concierge took on a hushed, serious air when he was given the news, and opened a secured entrance on the side of the hotel. Susannah - swathed in a silk scarf and huge sunglasses from a minimart, and one of Omar's jackets - was escorted inside quickly and silently.
Lucia waited in the SUV. Her cell phone, which doubled as a walkie-talkie, finally bleeped, and Omar's voice said, "We're in. Nice room, by the way. And complimentary champagne. I presume I'm being reimbursed for this. "
She hoped that Susannah was good on her promise to pay. "Yes, of course. Keep her away from the windows. "
"You want me to call a doctor friend to come take a look at her?"
"Be careful about it if you do. You good to go?"
"Let's see - guns, bullets, Kevlar, fruit basket. We're all set. "
"Watch your back. I don't like her husband, and I barely met the guy. I'll set up an interview with the FBI for tomorrow. Maybe we can get this over with quickly and make it their problem instead of ours. "
One challenge down. She swallowed a sip of water, felt it burn at the back of her throat, and remembered what Manny had said about her fever. She checked her watch. Still about an hour and a half to go. Might as well get checked out while she could, before. . . before whatever might happen.
She pulled the SUV into traffic and headed for the hospital. She asked for Dr. Kirkland, and was immediately bumped to the top of the waiting list, which told her something about how worried they were. She ended up exactly where she'd been a few hours before, in a stark E. R. examining room, wearing a flimsy cotton gown, getting stuck with needles. The fever, Kirkland said, was a worry, but they were still waiting for the cultures to be completed, and she was already on doxycycline to combat any infection.
"Rest," he told her. "You understand that's what will kill this thing, if it is a thing, right?"
"Yes. " She did understand. And just as soon as she took care of whatever waited at the corner of Parallel and Tenth Street, she'd comply.
Lucia pulled into the parking lot at the corner of Parallel and Tenth with fifteen minutes to spare, and saw Jazz and Borden parked in the shadow of a big industrial building. Backed into a space. Watching as much of the street as possible.
Lucia paid the parking attendant, walked over and slid into the back seat of Borden's rental car. It was clean, except for his briefcase and a well-thumbed Grisham novel. "So," she said, and slid on her sunglasses to cut the afternoon glare. "You kids been behaving yourselves?"
"Not especially," Borden said. "This is what you guys do all day? It's boring. "
"I'm sure it lacks the pulse-pounding excitement of legal briefs," Lucia said solemnly. "This is what we do all day. Sit in parking lots and wait for a crime to happen, so that we can investigate it. Oddly, our business model doesn't seem to be working out so well. "
The clock on his dashboard said 5:08 p. m. Jazz handed her a sealed bottle of water, ice-cold; Lucia uncapped it and took a deep drink. She was terribly thirsty today. Fever, she supposed. The naproxen had taken care of the muscle aches, but the fever seemed persistent. She checked the time and downed another horse pill.
"Did you get her settled in?" Jazz asked.
"Yes, she's at the Raphael. Omar's on watch. I'll contact Rawlins later and set up a meeting for tomorrow. With any luck, we can get paid and get some gratitude from the local field office. "
"Nice. " Jazz stretched.
"Don't we look suspicious, the three of us just sitting here in the car?" Borden asked.
"We'd look a lot more suspicious if we were all three making out in the car," Jazz said. "What?" she added, when Borden turned and gave her a wide-eyed look.
"You have no idea what kind of happy place you just took me to. "
"Shut up. "
It was 5:11 p. m.
"Actually," Lucia said absently, "you'd be amazed at what you can get away with doing in a car in the middle of the day. People just don't look. Even when they're parking next to you. 1
Borden turned to stare at her. Jazz was too much of a professional to do so, but Lucia could feel her grin.
"I'd tell you all about it," she said, "but then I'd have to kill you. National security. "
"God, I love my job," he said, and turned back to face the street.
Lucia, at the moment, didn't. She didn't like the fact that there were so many low rooftops offering firing positions. She didn't like the constant flow of traffic on the street in front of them. Work had just let out, and the lot was full of people on their way home.
Not an optimal situation. She could feel Jazz's tension, and knew she felt the same.
Five fifteen.
"Heads up," Jazz muttered.
Five sixteen.
Nothing.
"Come on, come on. . . " Jazz was chanting it under her breath, probably subconsciously. Lucia kept silent, but she was aware of her increased heart rate, of the sweat trickling down her neck and between her shoulder blades. For all of their banter, this was serious business, and they both knew it. "What the hell are we looking for? Come on, give us something. . . "
And then, Borden spotted it. "Um, maybe I'm wrong, but isn't that guy getting a shotgun out of his trunk?"
The one in question was a small, thin man dressed in a white short-sleeved shirt, khaki pants, loafers. Business casual. Cell phone clipped to his belt. Thinning brown hair. Gold-rimmed glasses.
A Winchester Model 1300 Black Shadow: Lucia's mind automatically cataloged it. Five shells, if he had one in the chamber, and she had to assume he did. He was getting it out of the trunk casually, as if he were taking out his lunch bag.
"Go," she said, and tapped Jazz on the shoulder. 'Take the back. "
"Front. "
"Back, Jazz. "
Before she could argue about it, Lucia slipped out and walked briskly forward in long strides, and made a sharp turn to bring her parallel with Mr. Shotgun.
He reached into the trunk and took out what looked like a heavy gym bag, black. From the rattle, she guessed it was filled with ammunition.
She swallowed hard and turned toward him. Her gun was out and held unobtrusively next to her side, in line with the seam of her pants. Safety off.
He looked up as he slammed the trunk lid. For a split second she saw his eyes, and they didn't match anything else about his perfectly ordinary exterior. Those eyes were full of nothing. Dark holes, gravity wells that consumed everything around him. The darkness inside this man wanted to kill.
Jazz was behind him.
"Hi," Lucia said. "Going somewhere?"
He started to bring up the shotgun, and for a split second she thought, God, no, he's really going to make it. But then Jazz kicked the bend of his legs from behind, he pitched forward on the asphalt, his mouth opening in shock, and dropped the weapon. It skidded to a stop at Lucia's feet. She put a foot on top of it as Jazz jumped on the man's back, pressed a knee into his spine and twisted his arms behind his back to snap handcuffs on.
It took five seconds. Five seconds of precise, well-coordinated action. Jazz looked up, and her blue eyes were blazing, her face glowing with excitement.
All that changed in one split
second.
Lucia didn't hear the shot, only felt the hot burn along her arm, the kinetic force rocking her to the side. She saw the spark of a bullet hitting the metal grille of a car fifteen feet beyond.
And then Jazz was moving, moving fast, and Lucia's body was following suit while her mind was still processing data. She hit the pavement and rolled into the thin cover of another car. Angles. . . the bullet had come right past her, hit the grille of the car at a flat angle. Someone on the ground.
A second shooter.
All that information passed through her mind in a little under a second as she slid beneath the car and twisted to get her gun out in front. With both hands around the grip, she scanned the street. A few people were starting to react to the single shot, but most had probably assumed it was a backfire, somebody dropping something. . .
A pair of feet started walking toward the man lying handcuffed on the asphalt. There was something about the body language, which was way too deliberate. . . predatory. He didn't seem to be in any hurry.
Lucia smelled blood. It hit her in a strange wave, that slightly acrid smell. Had somebody been hit? Jazz? No, Jazz had been well wide of the path of the bullet. . .
Damn. There was blood dripping steadily from Lucia's right arm, and a hot sensation starting to tingle along her biceps. It wasn't that bad, certainly not an arterial hit. The fact that she could feel it so soon after the strike meant it probably wasn't anything more than a graze, and the associated shock was minor.
She had no doubt that the man prowling between the cars, moving so purposefully, was the second shooter. What the hell was he doing? She didn't dare move to try to get a better look. Either he knew where she was, in which case she'd see him bend down to take the shot, or he didn't, and she'd rather keep it that way. He stopped circling and advanced to the handcuffed man, who turned over on his side, panting, staring up. . .
And his head jerked as the bullet smashed through his forehead and exited behind, into the asphalt, with a good portion of his brain, and most certainly his life.
And then the shooter's knees bent smoothly, she saw his body tilt sideways, and he was looking right at her, his finger tightening on the trigger. . .
She fired, but she knew even as she did so, even as her weakened right arm trembled and threw the shot wide, that she'd missed, and she was a dead woman.
Someone hit his blind side, coming over the hood of a car, and she could have been forgiven for naturally assuming that it was Jazz. Because it would be Jazz, wouldn't it?
Only the legs were too long, the body too angular, and in the second heartbeat she realized it was Borden, unarmed, who'd jumped the shooter.
Borden wasn't a fighter. Oh, Christ, no. . .
She could almost sense Jazz moving. Lucia shoved with her toes and slid out from under cover, rolled on her side, and saw the shooter throwing Borden to the ground, turning to aim his gun at him at point-blank range -
And Jazz fired. Two fast shots to the chest, dead center. Blood misted the air for a second longer than it took him to collapse to his knees, and Lucia squirmed out the rest of the way and kicked his handgun aside as he fell.
Borden was silent, panting. He was lying on the ground on his back, looking stunned and pale, and there was blood spattered in small dots on his skin and shirt. She silently offered him a hand - her left - and pulled him up to his feet.
This time, nobody had mistaken the gunfire for backfires; people were running, screaming and dialing 911. But where Lucia and Jazz and Borden were standing, staring down at the bodies of two completely nondescript gunmen, without a clue in the world as to what they'd been doing here, now, it seemed eerily silent.
Jazz moved to Borden's side and embraced him, hard and fast, her face pale and her breath racing. He couldn't seem to take his eyes from the dead man at his feet. Eventually, she let go, stepped back and tried for a bitter smile. "This," she said, "is a cluster f - "
"Don't say it," Lucia interrupted wearily.
"Well, it is. "
Lucia sighed and holstered her gun, or tried to; her right arm didn't seem willing to cooperate at the moment. Jazz looked up and spotted the blood, and her face blanched. "Oh Christ, L. , you're hit. "
"Grazed," she said. "Not even bleeding much. Don't worry about it. " Sirens in the distance. They were going to have considerable explaining to do. "Maybe we should work on a system by which the Cross Society tells us a few more details," she said. She felt unnaturally calm right now, but knew it would pass. "What do you think?"
Borden looked sick. Sick and scared and anxious, and he gazed from one of them to the other with so much emotion that it seemed to make up for the lack of it in the two of them.
"I didn't know," he said. "I didn't know. They didn't. . . "
"Tell you?" Jazz finished dryly. "No, really? Wake up, James, they don't tell anybody anything. Not even you. "
Lucia took the gun from her right hand and awkwardly holstered it. "Let's get our stories straight. "
"You think anyone's going to believe us?"
"Well, at least we have a lawyer present. "
Somewhat surprisingly, nobody in the police department seemed inclined to blame them for the shootout. Then again, Lucia noted, Detective Ken Stewart was nowhere to be seen, either. She nursed her soft drink carefully, after downing another aspirin to bring down her again-spiking fever, and wondered what Dr. Kirkland would think of her rest schedule. He wouldn't approve, she imagined.
She, Jazz and Borden were alone in a more upscale interrogation room. . . one not designed to resemble those on television. This room came equipped with a relatively comfortable sofa in dull green, a television set silently playing CNN, a water cooler, and reinforced safety glass windows and doors. There'd be surveillance, but it would be subtle.
Paramedics had touched up her arm; the passing bullet had ripped a furrow through about a quarter inch of flesh and a bit of muscle. Now that the adrenaline had left, taking its soothing blanket away, Lucia felt cold and exhausted, and she wanted, badly, to sleep.
Jazz poked Borden in the ribs. They were sitting on the couch, but she got his attention and they both moved. Borden wandered over to get a cup of water. Jazz gazed down at Lucia. "Come here and lie down," she said. Lucia was sitting upright in one of the wooden chairs. "On the couch, L. Now. "
"I'm - "
"Swear to God, if you say you're fine one more time, I'm going to beat you with a copy of Martyrdom for Dummies. "
Lucia mutely went over and sat on the couch, glared at Jazz for a second and then let herself go horizontal with a shameful rush of relief. Borden pulled up another chair, and he and Jazz sat; Borden worked on a palmtop computer and Jazz steadfastly stared at the television screen, watching the news scroll.
Lucia was almost asleep when Jazz announced, "Potential mass murder in Kansas City foiled by private citizens, police say. "
"What?"
"It's on CNN. " Jazz looked around for a remote control, didn't see one, and got up to change the channel. It didn't change. Only one station. "Great. Sons of bitches have it locked down. "
"That's so we don't have people surfing the porn channels," said a new voice. "The cops, I mean. We did that after you left the department, Jazz. Hey, I brought in a friend-that all right?"
Lucia opened her eyes and saw that a big, gray-haired plainclothes detective had entered the room. Ben McCarthy was right behind him. McCarthy crossed the room, trailed his fingers over Jazz's shoulder and exchanged a quick look with her, and then crouched down next to the couch as Lucia struggled to sit up. "No," he murmured, and those fingers moved lightly over the thick bandages wrapping her arm, then up to skim over her hair. "Stay down, okay? Nothing to get up for right now. "
"Lew," Jazz said, and stood to shake his hand. "Good to see you, sir. "
"How you been, Jazz?"
"Good, sir. Real good. " Jazz looked like a bashful schoolgirl meeting the p
rincipal. "Lieutenant Prince, this is Lucia Garza, my partner. We own - "
"I know all about your new business," he said. "Ben's been keeping me up to date. You saw the bit on CNN - it's playing on the local channels, too. Those men you took down, they left notes. They were on their way to the building across the street to take out their coworkers when you stopped them. Apparently, they figured it would be easier around quitting time - lots of confusion with people coming and going. Their firm works until six. " He gave Lucia a long look, then Jazz. "We're saying you two were there investigating a separate matter. Now, understand, with you mixed up in a couple of other events the last few months, some people have got their noses in the air. So you need to go low-profile awhile, got it?"
"Yes, sir. "
"Detectives took your statements?"
"Yes, sir. "
"Confiscated your weapons?"
"Just the one used in the shooting," Jazz said. "I've got another one. Registered. "
He nodded. "Good girl. You're free to go. I'd avoid the media if I were you. They're chumming the waters. It's bound to get worse. Your offices are shut down?"
"Yes. "
"Hope you've both got unlisted numbers. You're free to leave, all of you. Take the back way out of here, and if you want my advice, consider a few days off. We have any questions, we know where to find you. "
McCarthy hadn't moved. He was still crouched next to Lucia, one hand resting lightly on the arm of the sofa. He wasn't watching her, but she could somehow feel his attention focused her way. "Thanks, Lieutenant," he said.
The older man nodded briskly. "It's Captain now, actually. Keep your ass out of the wringer, Ben. Plenty of people gunning for you out there. Ken Stewart's one of them. "
"I know, Captain. "
"Then all of you, get the hell out of my house. I have to go give a statement on the front steps, that should give you time to go out the back. "
He turned and walked away, a big man, physically imposing, with a heavily jowled face and lugubrious eyes. The kind of old-school cop who showed up all too rarely these days.
Lucia let Ben help steady her. The world dipped and swirled a little.
"Let me take you home," he said.
She smiled faintly. "I was hoping you'd ask, actually. "
No media waited at McCarthy's ear, or lurked under the bumpers of Borden's rental vehicle. Apparently, they were all out front, listening to Captain Prince give his statement. Ben guided Lucia to the passenger side of his car before she had time to contemplate what she was getting into.
Either the car or the situation.
When he entered the driver's side and slammed the door, she turned her head toward him and said, "You drive a Thunderbird?"
"Yeah, why?" He started it up, and the engine sounded remarkably smooth for something that had been sitting in storage for a couple of years.
"It's just. . . such a cop car. "
"And I'm such a cop. "
There was something to be said for that, she supposed, but she'd have guessed that he'd drive something more upscale. Imported. A BMW, a Lexus, even a Volvo. A boxy Thunderbird well past its prime style era wasn't quite what she'd expected.
It was, however, a smooth ride, and she found herself leaning against the window, eyes shut. Fading. McCarthy's warm hand touched her cheek, and she roused enough to say, "I'm okay. "
"Yeah, sure you are. Did you hear from Manny yet?"
"No. "
He flipped open his cell phone - how had he gotten one so quickly? Or was it one of those disposable kinds? - and dialed. "Manny," he said, as he took the turn onto her street. She blinked and looked up at the streetlights. Everything seemed surreal in the harsh light. "Pick up, man, it's Ben. "
After a few seconds, he glanced at her, shook his head and hung up. "He's there, he's just focused on something else. With you and Jazz gone, hey, maybe he and Pansy - "
"Let's leave that thought right there, shall we?" She closed her eyes again, then opened them as he approached the parking garage. "You need a key card. " She dug in her purse and found it. Ben fed it into the slot and the metal gate rolled up to allow the big T-bird entry.
The parking elevators delivered them to the lobby. The lobby procedures seemed endless, from the checking of Ben's ID to the walk back to the upstairs banks of doors. Lucia's knees were ready to fold. She refused to let him see it.
They rode the elevator in silence, watching numbers light up, and as the fourth one took on a frosted white glow, McCarthy turned toward her, backed her up against the wall of the elevator and kissed her.
She was so surprised that for a second she didn't react, too overwhelmed by the sudden heat against her skin. Stunned by the damp, urgent pressure of his soft lips sliding on hers.
And then there was a red-hot flash of lightning through her body, a surge of something so primal that she couldn't name it, didn't think it had a name, and she made a sound that wasn't a protest and wasn't agreement and wasn't in the least part of the controlled, cultured exterior she'd created for herself. . .
. . . and before she could reach up and grab him, McCarthy was gone. He'd backed off, all the way across the elevator, hands behind him like a guilty schoolboy. Looking shocked.
She didn't say anything. Her lips parted, damp and tingling; her heart pounded deep and fast, like a Taiko drum. He hadn't disarranged her clothes, but they felt undone - odd, too tight and too warm.
McCarthy didn't say anything either. He looked like a man on the thin edge of control.
The elevator announced arrival, and she felt the upward movement glide to a graceful halt. The doors rumbled open.
Neither of them moved.
Are you coming? seemed like a double-edged entendre, at best. She took in a deep breath, saw him look at the swell of her breasts as she did, and said, "You should probably go. "
He swallowed. She found herself wondering what the skin of his throat tasted like, what sound he would make if she scraped her teeth and tongue lightly over that bobbing Adam's apple. "You're sure?" he asked. His voice was rough-edged and deep, like uncut velvet.
"Yes. "
She didn't dare invite him to the apartment. God only knew what would happen if he walked in the door just now. It's the fever. I'm ill. I'm injured. This wouldn't happen if I weren't already impaired.
Maybe that was what he'd come for. Wild, unrestrained sex, and she'd been half a second from doing it in the elevator, and God, it was insane how much she would have liked for it to have happened.
McCarthy smiled slightly, as if he knew what she was thinking - and maybe he did, maybe she was really that transparent - and slid his hand inside his jacket. It reappeared holding a red envelope.
"You have to be kidding me," she said. "Two in one day? Are they insane?"
"It could be argued. " He held it out to her. When she didn't take it, he gave it an impatient little shake, then sighed. "Look, take the damn thing, shred it, use it for a coaster. . . I don't want it anywhere near me, believe me. "
She stepped forward, took it and stayed where she was. Close. Close enough to see the hunger in his eyes when they met hers. He was crazy with it; she could feel it coming off of him in waves, and she'd be insane to -
"Come with me," she said, aware that it was most likely that mistake Eidolon had been jeering about in the first place, the one she couldn't help but make because she simply needed it as much as Ben did.
She stepped off the elevator and walked a few steps away before she heard his footfalls behind her. "I'm just making sure you get in bed," he said, and then, a beat later, "To rest. I meant, to rest. "
"Of course," she murmured. Her whole body was on fire, jittering with tension, pulling itself apart with need and denial and caution and wild, ungovernable desire. She couldn't keep a grip on her keys. They fell to the floor, and McCarthy was there ahead of her, reaching down to scoop them up, one hand on her arm to steady her
. Even through her clothes, she could feel the slightest nuances of his touch, the firm way his fingertips pressed, the heat of his palm.
She looked at him. He stared straight ahead, his face gone blank again. She couldn't see what he was feeling or thinking, but he didn't let go of her arm. It wasn't a possessive grip, just a light touch. Caring. Distant, almost.
"Ben?" she asked in a low voice. They were at her door. He slid the keys into the first lock and turned it, then the second. He pulled them out and handed them back to her, and looked straight into her eyes.
"You can get the alarm?" he asked.
"Of course. But - "
"Promise me you're going to bed. Promise me. "
She reached out, grabbed him by the lapel of his jacket and dragged him one step forward, and then he was kissing her. It was a long, feverish dream of a kiss, and she was against the hallway wall, his body pressed tight against her, his hands doing things inappropriate in a public space, and she didn't care, didn't care. . .
He pulled back from her with a gasp, and those blue eyes were wild and even more alarmed than they'd been in the elevator.
"Come inside," she said, and opened the door.
He didn't follow her. She could see how much he wanted to, needed to, but he put one hand on the wood of the doorway and braced himself, as if there was some invisible force pulling him toward her. He shook his head. "Get the alarm," he told her in a hoarse, low voice. "Go to bed, Lucia. Please. "
He reached in, grasped the doorknob and pulled the door shut with a quiet snick.
She felt it like a physical shock, and a healthy component of disbelief came with it. He turned me down? Twice? Lucia Garza had never in her life been turned down by a man she really wanted, not once. Not even the one who'd later turned out to be latently gay.
That bothered her a great deal.
She muttered imprecations in Spanish under her breath, and heard the accelerated beeping of the alarm. In thirty seconds it would sound, and for all she knew, the National Guard would be mobilized. She punched in the code with vicious precision, went to the door and stepped out into the hall.
The elevator doors were closing, and he was gone.
Slamming the door helped. So did violently kicking off her shoes. She felt hot and giddy, and terribly sore, and anger only intensified the feeling of disconnection. She tossed the red envelope - yes, it was neatly lettered with her name - onto the kitchen counter and went around to pour herself a drink.
She paused with the bottle of wine over the fine belled glass, and remembered McCarthy's hand on hers, holding her back from the beer. Antibiotics.
Jazz would have cursed and thrown a glass across the room and probably gotten drunk out of spite.
Lucia put the cork back in the bottle, replaced it in its holder, and was extraordinarily careful with the glass, just to be sure she didn't give in to her temper. Then she poured herself a large sparkling water, and took a long, hot bath. Careful not to get the bandage wet.
When she came out, dressed in a thick, white, fluffy robe with her small. 38 in the pocket, she settled on the couch, sipping water, stealing glances at the red envelope.
Some days she believed. Some she didn't. Today, having been at the right place at the right time to save uncounted numbers of lives, she was just angry at the entire world for having the gall to do this to her. Haven't I been through enough? She had. Beyond any question.
She put the water aside, walked to the counter and dug the UV light that Borden had given her out of her purse. There, on the face of the envelope, was Milo Laskins's bold, flowing signature.
She tore open the envelope to slide the thin sheet of paper out. No powder in it, but that didn't mean it wasn't deadly in its own way.
It read, THANK YOU.
That was all.
She ran the UV flashlight over the note.
The signature wasn't Laskins's. It was a different name, spiky and difficult to read, driven in straight-up-and-down strokes of the pen.
When she finally made it out, she felt a chill bolt down her spine.
Max Simms, psychic and serial killer, had sent her a personal thank-you note.