Witness Protection: Moving Target

by Jet MacLeod

  “You killed her,” she stated as she watched him walking towards Del’s lifeless body. “You actually killed her. I can’t believe it. You killed her.”

  “Yes, I did,” Rudakov replied like he was going to start a victory dance.

  Chapter 32

  Angie stared at the heap on the floor. Her mind was reeling. She couldn’t believe that Del had actually been shot. She was staring at Rudakov standing over Del’s body. She tore her eyes from the sight. She didn’t want to remember this, but she knew that she would never forget it, either. The sight of Del’s lifeless body was burned into her brain. Angie couldn’t do anything but blame herself. It was her fault that Del had been called in to guard her to begin with.

  She looked down at the floor. She wanted to fall forward and cry, but she couldn’t. She knew that she was still in danger. She didn’t have a cell phone and she didn’t know who to call. She needed to get to Del. She knew that Del had some sort of communication device on her. She had to. She would find it and use it. She just hoped that she got a hold of Cole or Gregor. They were the only ones that could help her now.

  That is when she saw it. The cold blue-black steel of the pistol resting by the chair. She saw the silencer on the end of it. It was surreal. It was like she was watching herself outside her body as she ghosted a hand down to the floor and picked up the bloody pistol. It felt weird in her hand. She looked at it. It was heavy, but at the same time it felt good. She was angry and she knew that she would have to calm down before she did anything rash, and by rash she meant killing Rudakov. Then, again, she didn’t care at that point if he died. And, she definitely didn’t care if she was the one to do it.

  She read the nomenclature on the side of it. She stared at the manufacture’s name and the caliber. It was a modified Glock 40. She held it for what seemed like minutes, but was merely seconds. She knew that Rudakov didn’t see her. He didn’t know that she had picked up Del’s pistol. He was too busy gloating over his kill to pay her any attention. She leveled the pistol at his chest just like Del had shown her while they had been at Cole’s.

  She thought back to their time at Cole’s. She hadn’t really been paying attention. She was too busy trying to find out more about Del and why she was so reclusive. Now, she wished that she had paid more attention. She remembered the basic mechanics, point and shoot, but there was more to it than that. She knew that there was a certain finesse and skill that a shooter had to have. She wasn’t sure that she did. In fact, she was certain that she didn’t, but didn’t matter.

  “Rudakov!” she yelled at him.

  He turned to face her, pistol hanging down by his side in his right hand. The look of shock was evident. He never thought to pay her any mind. She had been tied to the chair, but now, Angie stood in front of that chair, free, and pointing Delia’s pistol at him. He gave her a smirk as he turned more fully towards her. He was just giving her a bigger target to shoot.

  “Angela, my dear, what do you think you are doing?” he asked as if he was coddling her.

  “I am finishing what she started.”

  “You...you are going to shoot me?”

  “Yes, I am,” she told him with as much conviction as her body could produce.

  She was trying not to shake in shock and fear of the situation. Her adrenaline was pumping and she could feel it coursing through her body, holding her rigid, and giving her the confidence to destroy him. She raised her chin at him defiantly. She stared down the barrel of the gun, lining up the sights, and preparing for the shot. It was just then that she remembered to pull the trigger as she let out her breath.

  “I don’t think you will shoot me. You’re a lawyer, Angela, not a fighter. I know that you are upset that I shot her, but let’s be smart about this,” he told her.

  “Be smart about this? You want me to be smart about this? You just shot her!!!”

  “That doesn’t mean that we can’t keep a level head about this, Angela. Give me the gun and I’ll take you to Salt Lake to the FBI offices there. I’ll drop you off and we can forget that this ever happened.”

  “Are you fucking serious?”

  “Now, Angela, that is no way for a lady to speak.”

  “I am sorry you must have me confused with someone that cares what you think right now. I don’t give a rat’s ass what you think. I could care less about what you think about anything, especially right now. You are a traitor. You aren’t worthy to breathe the same air as...well...anyone.”

  “Angela, I am giving you an out here,” he stated.

  “No, you are trying to give yourself an out. You never thought about what would happen if I got free. You’ve never put much stock into what I could do. I know that and I understand that, but you’ve miscalculated the outcome of this situation. I am not going to just let you walk out of here, and neither was Delia,” she told him.

  “She’s dead. What can she do now? Nothing! She can’t help you, Angela. No one is coming to help you. It is just me and you in here. Do you really think that you are going to win this little standoff that you are making?” he asked her in most condescending way he could.

  “It doesn’t matter what I think. It is what I know. I know that Delia Montgomery taught me how to fire a firearm to protect myself. I also know a little bit about how she operates. I know that she wouldn’t leave anything to chance. She has back up. I am sure that they are covering the building. You won’t make it out alive. And, if it is the two people that I know that she would have called for help in this little situation, as you call it, they actually have already told Gregor about your betrayal. So, I would have to say that I believe what Delia told you about SWAT being outside waiting on you.”

  “Then you are the fool,” he spat back.

  “No, I am not the fool. You are. Do you honestly think that she would have assaulted the building and made it this far without some sort of help? You are dense and egocentric if you do. I am sure that Gregor has even told them to shoot you on sight. So, Mikhail, it doesn’t matter if I shoot you or not. You will not be leaving this building alive. It’s over. You’re over. Delia has still won.”

  “She is dead.”

  “She is dead, but she still won the battle. You’ve failed. You’ve been uncovered and found out. There is no one or nothing that will help you, now. You have become personae non grata. You’re finished. And, if by some miracle, you do get out of this warehouse, you’ll be hunted for the rest of your life. If not by the government, then by Delia’s old friends in a non-sanctioned mission. You’re already dead, you just don’t know it yet,” she explained to him. “So, it doesn’t really matter if I am the one to shoot you. You’re already dead.”

  “There is no way that she had that kind of man power. She was one woman. She couldn’t have pulled off what you are telling me. She couldn’t. No one has that much power in her position. They can’t.”

  She took two steps tentatively towards Delia. She still needed to find some sort of communication device. As she stepped, she never took her eyes off of him. She wasn’t going to make the same mistake that he made with her. She didn’t trust him. She laughed inwardly as they were both watching each other. It wasn’t quite a Mexican standoff yet, but it was closer than she wanted it to be.

  She saw him tracking her movements. He was looking for a hole and that is what she couldn’t give him. She couldn’t give him an advantage. She had to stay in charge of the situation. She couldn’t falter now. She owed Del that much. She owed Del a lot more, but she was willing to lose a bit of her innocence killing him. She had to remain strong. She had to remain steadfast. She had to stay focused. She couldn’t lose it now.

  He spun around quickly as she moved closer to Del’s body. She still wasn’t close enough, but she was getting there. She never let her eyes leave his. He finally was tired of waiting for her to give up and let him go or shoot him. He was tired of the games.

  “Angela, are you really going to shoot me?”

  “I am.”

  “I th
ink that if you were, you would have done it by now,” he told her.

  She regarded what he was saying. There was a ring of truth to it. If she was as cold blooded as he was, she would have already pulled the trigger. He would already be dead. She knew that he was right, but she couldn’t let him know that. She couldn’t let him know what she was thinking. There was too much at stake, not including her life.

  “Angela?” he questioned when she didn’t respond to him.

  She met his eyes with fire in hers. He gave her another smirk. She had wasted too much time and she knew it. Her finger curled around the trigger. She didn’t know why she didn’t just have a sudden jerk and pull it, but it was like her body wouldn’t let her. She just stared at him.

  He was still examining her and her movements. She was slowly still edging towards Delia, but she hadn’t stopped watching him down the barrel of the gun. His smirk was growing with every passing second and she wished that she had the ability to just pull the trigger and end that incessant smile. She couldn’t do that and with every passing moment, he realized it, too.

  He finally had enough of her posturing and her bravado. He raised his own pistol at her. Now, they really were at a Mexican standoff. The only problem was that Del was already down. She was staring down the barrel of Del’s pistol at him, now pointing his at her. It was another surreal moment.

  “Now, Angela, are you going to make me shoot you? Or, will you be at good girl and put that pistol down? We both know that you don’t have it in you to shoot me.”

  “Are you willing to risk it?”

  “I am,” he stated, gripping his pistol tighter.

  “Are you sure about that?”

  “Angela, you aren’t going to shoot me. You are going to let me go. You can wait here for the supposed cavalry that is coming for you. I am going to leave and you are going to let me. You aren’t going to shoot me. You aren’t a cold blooded killer. You, however, are a cold blooded lawyer, but this isn’t a court room and there is no jury to convince of my guilt. So, I am just going to leave through that door back there,” he told her as he moved towards the door.

  “No, you aren’t,” she told him as she moved a little closer to Delia.

  “You aren’t going to stop me, Angela. We both know that. You don’t have it in you.”

  She fired a shot. She was tired of seeming weak. She may not actually kill him, but she sure could scare the ever-loving piss out of him. She watched his eyes grow large as the bullet passed just by his head and struck the wall behind him.

  “I told you that you weren’t going anywhere,” she stated, hiding the fear in her voice.

  “So, you did,” he replied. “You fired the gun at me, but can you really kill me, Angela? Can you?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Now, you don’t know if I will or not. All you know is that I will pull the trigger. Will I kill you? I guess that all depends on where I aim at, doesn’t it?” she asked him, lowering the sights to between his legs. “I don’t actually have to kill you, Mikhail. I can wound you and that would be enough for me now. I know that no matter what you aren’t going to survive. Either I’ll kill you, or the government will do it for it me. You are a traitor and treason is a capital offense that I agree with.”

  He lost his smirk. He obviously hadn’t thought about that. He was too worried about getting out of that room, away from her and away from the building. He hadn’t thought passed that.

  “You aren’t leaving.”

  “I am dead man either way, right?”

  “You know that you are,” she stated.

  “Then, I should just kill you anyway.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because it is what I was paid to do.”

  “You defected to Russia and are being paid by the South America drug cartels. Oh, how the mighty have fallen? You truly are a class ‘A’ idiot. You never thought of a contingency plan, did you?”

  “There was never the need to plan one,” he replied.

  “You were dealing with Delia Montgomery and you didn’t have a contingency plan for if something happened and she actually showed up to save me?”

  “She wasn’t supposed to make it this far. She was supposed to die, but she was never supposed to make it to me. I had enough men. I had everything planned out for her,” he stated angrily.

  “Obviously that wasn’t enough, now was it?” she asked him sarcastically.

  “I should just kill you.”

  “Go ahead and try it.”

  He looked at her. The fire in her eyes was still burning. There was something else there. It wasn’t resignation, but something else. He couldn’t name it, but it scared him. She might actually shoot him.

  “Angela?”

  “What Mikhail Alexei Rudakov? What do you offer me? What do you think that you have in your power to give me that I want?” she asked him.

  “Your life,” he stated through clenched teeth.

  “That was never yours to begin with. No, tell me. What would you give me to spare you?”

  “Money, power, anything you want,” he told her.

  “Anything?”

  “Anything,” he replied with a finality.

  “I want Del back. I want to be able to see her eyes and to know that she didn’t die in vain for me. You give me Delia back and I’ll let you go, you sick sonuvabitch, you fucking bastard.”

  “I can’t do that,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “Ask me for anything else and I’ll give it to you,” he demanded.

  “There is nothing else I want, nor do I need.”

  “You need her?”

  “More than you will ever know,” Angie told him truthfully, realizing how much she actually cared for Delia.

  Her loss was starting to get to Angie and she could feel it. Soon she wasn’t going to be able to hide the tremor in her hands and voice. Soon all her bravado would fail her and he would regain the upper hand. She knew that she needed to act quickly before all of her adrenaline wore off.

  He was tired of waiting. He was preparing to charge her. She wouldn’t drop the weapon. She wouldn’t let him leave. She was going to have to be injured just enough so he could leave. He really didn’t want to kill her, but he would if it meant that he would live to see another day. He didn’t care about anything else but his life in that moment.

  They were too busy staring each other down and locked on to each other to see anything else in that office. If they had, they would have seen Del’s body starting to breathe. They would have noticed the gentle rise and fall of her back with each breath.

  Angie didn’t want her to be dead. She wanted to see the life in her beautiful brown eyes. She was wishing for it so hard, that she didn’t believe her own eyes when she saw the movement. Rudakov must have seen it as well, because he decided in that moment to rush Angie. It was his last mistake.

  When Angie turned around to face Del, kneeling on the ground, she caught his movements in the corner of her eye. She turned back around in time to see a black handled Special Forces hatchet bury itself in Rudakov’s chest. She looked back at Del and fell to her knees. Del crawled over to her.

  “I’ve got you, Angie. I’ve got you, now. I told you that I wasn’t going to let anyone hurt you,” Del told her gathering Angie into her arms and holding her close.

  She ran her hands through Angie’s auburn hair. She held her tight, afraid that if she let go Angie would disappear. She could feel Angie’s tears on her cheek.

  “Shh, Angie, I got you.”

  “You’re alive…”

  Chapter 33

  I’ve forgotten how much that hurts, Del thought to herself as she realized that she wasn’t dead. But, damn it, her body hurt. She could smell the concrete floor beneath her. She knew that Angie was still in that damn chair and Rudakov was still alive. She needed to shake off the shock of being shot and get up. She knew that Angie needed her. She could die later, but Angie needed her to get up and stop Rudakov.

  She willed
air into her lungs and fought the urge to cough. It was slow and shallow at first and then she could finally take a deep enough breath. She felt the feeling return to the rest of her body. She took a deep breath and held it, willing the oxygen into her cells.

  Then she heard it. She heard Angie yelling at Rudakov. She yelled at herself for passing out from the pain or whatever. She could tell that there was something off in their voices, but she didn’t have the energy to get up. She couldn’t really move.

  She had to get up. She needed to see what was going on in front of her. She heard the movement. She listened closely. She felt the movements of Angie getting closer to her. She could feel the fear coming off of her as she retreated to Del’s side. Rudakov was somewhere across the room, but he was still close enough to do some damage to either of them if he so chose. Del couldn’t quite make out how far away he was from her.

  The pain in her chest was raw and overwhelming. She hadn’t felt a burning like that since Yulia shot her and she was sure that she was going to die that day. Today, however, she had no intention of dying. She didn’t care how much blood she lost, she was going to live long enough to help Angie out of that godforsaken building, even if it killed her.

  Her fingers itched as the blood and feeling returned to them. Her ears burned as Rudakov and Angie verbally sparred over her. Her lungs filled with life giving air and her brain took stock of injuries and the situation. She was bruised and battered, but she was alive.

  She felt her breath move throughout her body. She could feel her body start to move. Soon she wouldn’t be able to lay still. The shock of still being alive was going to overwhelm her sensibilities and her body would jerk. If Rudakov wasn’t dealt with by then, he might shoot her again, and this time with a life ending shot to the head. She sighed and no sound came out.