by Jette Harris
“You’re insane.” Monica shook her head.
“What?” That was the last thing Heather had expected to hear.
“The month is almost over!” Monica said. “He could let us go! And you—you’re just going to get us killed!”
Heather’s chest tightened. She wasn’t prepared for this. “Monica—”
“I’m not going to risk a small chance at freedom for something that is guaranteed to get us killed!”
“Shh!” Heather covered her mouth again, shoving her against the wall. “We only have two days.” Her voice cracked. “Avery was never planning on letting us go. He is going to kill us, and burn this house to ashes, and go back to his life as if nothing ever happened. That was his plan the entire time. He has done this before.”
Monica shoved her away. “I don’t believe you.” She folded her hands over her abdomen. “I can’t afford to.”
Desperate, tears began to rise in Heather’s throat. She didn’t understand. Before she could argue her case further, a gunshot made them both jump.
Monica stared at the door, hand over her mouth. Heather fell to her knees with a hand over her mouth. “Jamal…” she sobbed. Tears began to stream down her face.
They expected shouting, for the door to burst open, but it didn’t. Instead, they heard the thud of bare feet running throughout the house. When the footsteps came upstairs, Heather closed her eyes. But the door didn’t open. They could hear the splashing of liquid spilling onto the floor. A thin rivulet ran under the door. They stared at it as it spread toward them.
“Is that—is—” Monica was too terrified to speculate. “What is that?”
Now she wants help. Heather rose to her feet with a sigh. Going to the door, she touched the liquid, then sniffed it. She shook her head, turning back to her friend.
“It’s kerosene.”
“Oh, God.”
“He’s about to burn the house down.” Heather smirked, voice pinched with hysteria. She didn’t think Monica could get any paler, but she was wrong. Her skin was a ghastly grey color.
The door flew open, knocking Heather into the wall. Rhodes stumbled in. He spared a glance at her as she hit the floor, but headed straight toward Monica. His robe was soaked in liquid. His chest was splattered with blood.
“No!” Monica began to cry as he grabbed her shoulder. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”
“Face the wall.” He shoved her to her knees in front of the wall. She began to sob harder.
“This won’t hurt,” he promised. He pointed the gun at the back of her head.
“I’m sorry, Heather,” Monica sobbed. Squeezing her eyes shut, she lowered her head.
Rhodes hesitated. Never in his life had he hesitated when he needed to act. He turned to find Heather standing at his elbow. She was wide-eyed and resolute, looking alarmingly like she had when she demanded he move Z.
“I’ll go with you,” she said. “I’ll go, just don’t do this.” She inched between the gun and her friend. He could point the gun at her, or lower it.
“Lies.” He shook his head.
“You know me better than that.” She took a step toward him. Placing a gentle hand on his wrist, she persuaded him to point the gun at the floor.
“I can’t.” He took a step back. “I wasn’t careful enough. She’s seen things.”
“You can… Avery.”
Before Rhodes could collect his thoughts enough to reply, she folded herself into him, pulled his head down, and kissed him. It was everything he had been wanting: gentle, reassuring, giving. He allowed her to push him back, expecting to collide with the door. He hit the banister instead. He raised a hand to touch her face. She lowered hers to his chest.
And pushed.
Instinctively, Rhodes grabbed at the nearest thing to steady himself as he toppled over the banister. Heather was jerked off of her feet, and they both fell to the floor below.
75
Heather was floating in water under the flawless blue sky. Her eyes were closed. The sun was shining down, warming her chilled skin. Monica’s laughter floated over her, and she was rocked in the wake created by the girl swimming over.
“Heather!” Monica called in a hushed voice. “Heather!”
Heather began to paddle, sinking into the water. She turned to find Monica doing a breast-stoke in her direction, pulling up within a few inches. The inertia threw them together. Without a word, Monica took Heather’s face in her hands and kissed her.
****
“Heather!” There was panic in her voice now. “Heather?”
Heather gasped for air. Footsteps pounded toward her, and Monica dove toward her side. Heather’s back burned where she had hit the hardwood. Pain radiated from her bones. She knew she wasn’t supposed to move, but she also knew she didn’t have a choice.
“I thought you were dead!” Monica sobbed. She helped Heather to her feet.
Rhodes lay face-down on the other side of the chaise lounge. His foot was at an odd angle. A small pool of blood was forming where his forehead met the floor. His eyelids fluttered, but he was not moving.
“Not so lucky.” Heather turned away from him. Pain shot through her back as she straightened, but she forced herself to limp toward the open French doors. They had to be wary of slipping in the kerosene covering the floor. Like upstairs, there were piles of tires spread throughout the ground floor.
“What’s—” Monica began when she saw them, but was interrupted by a deep groan behind them.
“Run!” Heather shoved Monica forward.
The police officer lay in the middle of the great room. A puddle of blood spread from his head, and his brown uniform was soaked in kerosene. Heather spared enough time to confirm it was not Byron, but couldn’t hesitate for any details beyond his name plate saying DULEY. Monica, however, knelt by his side. She began to rummage in his pockets.
“Where’re his keys?”
Heather ran back. She grabbed the collar of Monica’s robe and dragged her to her feet. “The car’s still running!”
76
Rhodes pulled himself up using the chaise lounge. Pain shot up his leg. He clenched his teeth and forced himself to move. Monica’s curly hair was disappearing out the front door.
Groaning, he lumbered after them. At the threshold, he was just in time to watch them slam the doors of the patrol car. Left with no other choice, he stepped back inside the foyer. Opening the coat closet by the door, he grabbed a rifle. He stepped back onto the front porch and cradled it in his shoulder.
(Breath even. Wind estimated. Speed calculated.) He pulled the trigger.
The passenger-side window shattered. The car swerved, then stopped. Rhodes huffed, raising the scope again. (I didn’t miss. I couldn’t have missed.) He took a few painful steps forward. The car lurched, then took off again.
He didn’t have time to think about it. Reaching into the pocket of his robe, he pulled out a box of matches.
77
Every officer in Cheatham Hill and the surrounding municipalities listened in silence as dispatch called for Sgt. Duley. Ten minutes had passed with no check-in. They all experienced the same rising sense of dread and anger. When the order came in after another five minutes for officers to respond, Kondorf and Byron were already en route. They were joined by at least five others, making them third in a convoy of flashing lights and blaring sirens.
Kondorf’s heart pounded. He prayed so fervently the words ran together in his mind: Saint Michael, be our protection… we humbly pray… cast—cast… Byron was much worse off: He was pale, clutching his seat belt in a way that Kondorf had not seen him do since he was a rookie.
The Hospitality House sat on the city limits. The road leading to it was not widely used. The police cruisers paid little attention to the few cars driving in the opposite direction, unless they refused to slow down or pull off. In that case, the officers cursed the drivers in their mind as they flew past.
A car that looked like a police cruiser appeared on the hori
zon, barreling in their direction. The lead car slowed, forcing the others to slow as well. It was a good thing, too: the car—indeed a police cruiser—pulled wide to the right, then swung into their lane. Kondorf feared for a moment that it might run off the road and hit a large oak tree. It stopped before running off the shoulder.
The convoy was forced to stop. They managed to do so with about thirty feet between the lead car and the obstructing cruiser. A few vehicles pulled out of the line to zip ahead, continuing to the house. Loud whaps and thunks revealed that some of the guys in the back had been following too close or not paying attention. Normally, this would have amused Kondorf, but not today.
Unable to see anything from his seat, Kondorf stepped out of his car. He kept his hand on his gun. The cruiser’s passenger-side window was missing, only a little range of tempered glass remained. The cruiser’s driver-side door flew open and the driver fell out. Kondorf approached, seeing some movement through the windshield. A spider-web crack obscured the view.
The officers from the two front cars stood behind their doors, guns at the ready. They yelled orders for the driver to put up his hands and come out from behind the car. They fell silent as soon as they caught sight of the driver: It was a woman, with dark, messy hair. Her face was pale. She appeared to be wearing a robe that had at one point been white. She emerged from behind the car hunkered down, looking around her like a nervous cat. The robe was far too short for public use. Her right side, from her face down, was covered in brown stains.
No, not brown. Red. They saw it clearly as she emerged from the shade of the tree, into the sunlight. Kondorf took a few steps forward.
“Holy fuck,” Byron muttered. “It’s—”
“Heather?” Kondorf called.
She froze at the sound of the name. Her eyes met his.
“K—Kondorf?”
She raised her hands to her mouth. Ducking as if she expected something to jump at her, she jerked her head around. There were bandages around her wrists. She began to move, starting with one step, then another, then broke into a sprint. Kondorf ran to meet her.
“Oh, God,” she sobbed, throwing her arms around his neck. Kondorf expected to feel weighed-down or thrown-back, but there was little impact; She was alarmingly lightweight.
“I tried!” she cried into his shirt. “I tried—I…”
It took him a moment to realize that it wasn’t just her tears that were wet. The blood on her face rubbed off on his cheek and streaked his shirt. He barely had time to register this before her knees buckled. He lifted her into his arms. She clung tighter to his neck.
Three other officers had approached the car. They were touching their faces and running their hands through their hair. Kondorf stared for a moment before he realized what he was looking at: someone with curly brown hair was slumped against the dashboard, not moving.
Tightening his arms around her frail body, Kondorf carried Heather Stokes back to his police cruiser.
Discover the beginnings of Avery Rhodes in Phoenix Rising:
Flint Ranch
Salvage
Two Guns
Run Rabbit Run
book 2
Jette Harris
Copyright © 2017 Bridgette Harris
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
1
April, 2006
Atlanta (“Avery Rhodes”)
The back of the house still smelled like death, but that was because there was a corpse in the sunroom. The rest of the house smelled like Lysol and paint. When Avery Rhodes wasn’t renovating or running, he liked to keep to the kitchen; It smelled like coffee.
Rhodes paused before his first sip to scratch at a streak of white paint on his torso. Much like glitter, every time he thought he had gotten it all off, more would appear in the most awkward places. He leaned against the counter in the corner and raised his mug again when he heard a door knob rattle. Rhodes froze, his eyes fixed on the door leading from the kitchen to the side yard.
After a few scrapes and more rattling, the door drifted open a few inches. A young black man stepped inside, swinging a draw-string bag over his shoulders. Rhodes blinked rapidly at this unexpected guest. The young man did not notice him.
Less than three weeks ago, the house had been a shithole: peeling, mold-speckled wallpaper, cabinet doors hanging off one hinge, chipped tile counters, cracked linoleum on the floor. Now all the cabinets had doors and were freshly-stained. Polished copper pots and pans gleamed from hooks over the island. The house no longer smelled like shit.
The expression of wonder on the intruder’s face would have given Rhodes a twinge of pride, were he not wondering what the fuck this kid thought he was doing in his kitchen.
The young man wrinkled his nose, sniffing the rich aroma of Rhodes’s dark roast. He finally caught sight of the shirtless, shoeless man in the corner and his eyes shot wide. Rhodes glowered. He lowered the mug from his lips and turned to the knife block by his elbow to slide out a long, thin filet knife. Flipping it, he caught it by the blade.
Emerging from his shock with a gasp, the stranger turned to run. Rhodes flicked the knife. It struck the door with a hollow thud! just as the young man disappeared. The knife hung from the door for a few seconds before clattering to the floor.
Rhodes groaned. He was losing his edge. He sipped his coffee—finally—and crossed to the gaping doorway. A small sliver of blood ran down the blade and two fat drops on the stoop pointed toward the woods. Rhodes picked up the knife, but the young man was much too far for another hit.
The blade had left a deep notch in the door. Rhodes ran his thumb over it with a frown.
No matter. He had been planning on installing a sturdier door anyway.
2
Washington, D. C.
FBI Special Agent Remington didn’t know how to feel as he watched the stack of manila folders on his partner’s desk dwindle: some set in another stack, some passed off to a different division, many shredded, all no longer Senior Agent Richard Steyer’s responsibility. Steyer never said a word indicating what he was doing or why, but Remington had his suspicions. As the stack of folders diminished, a vague sense of dread grew.
Steyer stood in front of his desk one morning, hands folded in his pockets. There were two stacks of folders now: A tall stack of about twenty, and a short stack of three. He placed a hand on the small stack. The top one was fat with papers and photos. The bottom looked empty. His hand rested a moment before Steyer drew it away. Instead of tackling those three remnants of the original pile, he hoisted the large stack and carried it to the desk of Samantha Wickes, administrative assistant for the Violent Crimes division. After a brief exchange, Wickes pulled out her keys, unlocked the door to the file room, and led him in.
When Steyer returned a good half-hour later, Remington pretended to be busy reading an email. Steyer did not hesitate this time, but scooped the three files up and dropped them with a smack! on Remington’s desk. Remington avoided them and looked up at his partner instead.
“I’m retiring,” Steyer announced.
Remington couldn’t speak at first. He nodded slowly until he could make his throat cooperate. “Congratulations. I’m happy for you.” Although this was true, he couldn’t help but wonder why he was having trouble breathing.
Steyer heaved a sigh. “I didn’t want to leave any loose ends, but…” He tapped the top of the three folders.
Remington’s eyes flickered down to the tabs on the folders: PHOENIX, SFO—2002, PHOENIX, DTW—1997, and PHOENIX, PHX—1994. His forced pleasant expression slipped when he looked back up.
“Some legacy, I know.”
“I’ll take care of it.” Remington slid the folders to the edge of his desk. He opened a drawer and tucked them in tightly, as if their c
ontents might escape.
“I know you will. One way or another.”
****
One way or another…
Remington imagined a variety of ways he would like to close those cases as he lay in bed that night. None of them were practical, legal, or even remotely possible based on the information they had. His thoughts were interrupted by the apartment door opening and closing. He lifted his head and listened. There were two taps on his bedroom door before Samantha Wickes stepped inside.
Looking weary, she shed her blazer and kicked off her shoes.
“You coulda warned me.” Remington tilted his head to get a better view as Wickes unzipped her skirt and shucked it off, along with her stockings.
“Ritchie said he wanted to tell you himself.” She crossed the room in only her silk shirt and panties. “You taking it hard?”
Remington smirked and shook his head to show her how not-hard he was taking it. “Nah.”
“Liar.” She sat on the edge of the bed and kissed him. He slid his hand up the back of her shirt and unhooked her bra with a snap of his fingers. She chuckled and re-clasped it. “We need to talk.”
“Talk now or talk after?” He pressed his face into the silk and kissed his way up her ribcage as he tugged her buttons loose.
“Consider it a toll.”
Sighing, Remington laid back down with an arm behind his head. Wickes looked away and pursed her lips. His smile disappeared. “You look like you’re about to tell me I’m getting fired.”
“How bad would that be?” Her voice was distant.
Remington shrugged. “Cars are almost paid off. I’ve got savings. It won’t be too bad.”
“Good.”