Private S.W.A.T. Takeover

by Julie Miller

  “Are you sure?” She came over to pat him on the stomach, then stretched up on tiptoe to kiss his jaw. “My intention was to fatten you up a bit on my pot roast and spend some quality time with you, not work you like a slave-driver.”

  “I don’t mind, Mom.” Holden grinned and dipped his head to kiss his mother’s cheek. “I’m more than happy to work for your pot roast.”

  He heard the crunch of tires on the driveway and spotted a familiar, if rarely seen, beat-up green Jeep Cherokee pull in, even before Bill Caldwell announced its arrival. “I’ll be damned.” He closed the back of his truck and went to greet Holden’s oldest brother, Edward. “Look what the cat dragged in. How’re you doin’, son?”

  Edward climbed out of the Jeep, his worn jeans and black sweater a familiar uniform of late. Edward considered questions like “How are you?” or “How do you feel?” to be rhetorical, and never answered them. But he did shake Bill’s hand. “It’s been a long time, Bill.”

  “Edward.” Susan hurried ahead of Holden, her arms outstretched as she pushed past Bill and wrapped Edward up in a tight maternal hug. “Oh, sweetie, it’s so good to see you.”

  He bent his head and hugged her back, hanging on just long enough for Holden to join the group. He extended a hand behind her back and straightened. “Little brother. Mooching a free meal?”

  Holden grasped his hand, relieved to feel the strength in his brother’s grip. “I’m earning my keep.”

  Susan pulled away, studying her reclusive son from head to toe. “Let me look at you.”

  Holden took the same opportunity to assess Edward’s ongoing recovery from the tragedy that had not only wrecked his body, but had destroyed his soul. Edward hadn’t shaved for a day or so, and the dark stubble made a smattering of scars along his jawline stick out like brands. Though a smile would be hard to come by, there were no circles beneath his eyes and his color was a healthy tan, indicating he was continuing to stay sober. He didn’t reach inside the Jeep for his thick, walnut cane until he was ready to close the door. Was it Holden’s imagination, or was Edward’s limp even less pronounced than when he’d last seen him three weeks ago?

  Outwardly, at least, John Kincaid’s firstborn was on the mend.

  “You look good, son.” Susan’s gentle smile had healing powers that even Edward wasn’t immune to. “I wasn’t sure you’d come, but I’m so glad you’re here.”

  Edward leaned in to accept her kiss. “I smelled your pot roast a mile away, Mom.”

  Susan reached for Holden’s hand and pulled him forward. “Holden, will you help your brother unload his truck? He’s got some things he wants to move out of his house. I said I’d put them in with my church donations.”

  “Sure.” He gestured to the back of the Jeep. “Lead on, Macduff.”

  While her oldest and youngest sons moved to the rear of Edward’s vehicle, Susan linked her arm through Bill Caldwell’s and led him back inside the garage. “You come with me to the kitchen and toss together a salad while I get the roast and veggies out of the slow cooker. I have to set another place for dinner.”

  After Edward opened the back hatch, Holden reached inside for a pile of clothes, still on their hangers in plastic bags from the dry cleaners. Holden hesitated for a second before scooping up the first armful. These were Cara’s things. Edward’s late wife had been petite and curvy, a dynamo of a woman who’d left a successful career in business to become a full-time mother. Her colorful, classy tastes were reflected in the stylish suits and dresses.

  It must have been hell for Edward to finally empty his wife’s closet. Holden picked up the entire stack and carried them for his brother. No need to ask why Edward wanted to get rid of them.

  He carried in a box of jeans and casual clothes, and a little girl’s bike that had never been ridden.

  Holden tried to distract his brother from the painful parade of memories. He talked about Chiefs football, and Atticus’s trip to Sarajevo with Brooke. He mentioned how it felt to be working under Mitch Taylor, the new precinct commander who now oversaw the Fourth, and how he often asked about Edward and when he planned to return to his work as an investigator. He even asked a curious question of his own. “So, what do you think about Mom and Bill getting to be such good friends?”

  “We’ll see.”

  Conversation with Edward was a minimalist thing, so Holden didn’t push for answers.

  Until he saw in the backseat the open box he was supposed to carry in next. A shaggy blond head with sweet blue eyes blipped into Holden’s memory and twisted his heart. He’d often volunteered to assist Edward in coaching his niece’s track and kickball teams.

  He stopped Edward on his way to the garage. “These are Melinda’s things. Her Special Olympics participation medals, some artwork from school. Christmas decorations. You’re not getting rid of these, are you?”

  “I don’t need you to be my conscience, little brother.”

  “I’m talking common sense. Even Mom isn’t getting rid of all of Dad’s things.” Holden knew he was treading on mighty thin ice here. But somebody needed to say this. “You can’t just erase your wife and child from your life, Ed. What if you get to the time when you’ve moved on, and you could treasure some of these sentimental items but you’ve given them away to strangers? Wouldn’t you feel the loss all over again?”

  “Move on?” Edward turned away from the box and leaned on his cane with both hands, seeming to need its support now more than he had a minute ago. “Every damn day it’s a chore to get up in the morning. And when I do I figure that means I’m moving on the way that grief counselor told me to. I try to stay busy. I’ve fixed up the house. I fixed the damn Jeep. And I think I’m doing okay, that I’m gonna make it.” Edward turned, and Holden saw a look of such bleak pain in his brother’s eyes, that he backed up half a step. Edward limped forward. “But then I go up into the attic to get a storm window, or I open a storage closet in the basement and I run across something of Cara’s or Melinda’s, and I’m back on that Christmas Eve morning. It’s a matter of survival, Holden.” His cane punctuated his sentence on the concrete beside Holden’s foot. “They have to go.”

  Well, hell. Holden could get all tough and in-your-face, too. But it was harder just to listen, and to love. He reached into the box and pulled out a hand-sewn rag doll ornament with plastic eyes glued crookedly on its face. An odd present to give a man like Edward Kincaid, but because his daughter had made it herself, Edward had loved it. “You’re not giving this to some stranger.”

  Edward swiped his hand across his jaw, taking all trace of emotion with it. He tapped his cane against the box. “It all goes.”

  Because he wasn’t about to lie to his brother, Holden simply nodded. He set the doll ornament back into the box, then carried it into the garage—setting it well away from the boxes that were going to the church. He’d tell his mom later. She’d want to keep the sentimental things. If Edward did want them one day, she’d be more than happy to give them back.

  After a few minutes of silence Edward’s mood seemed to come back into the tolerable range, and Holden offered a suggestion. “You know, if you’re looking for something to do to stay busy, come work out with me at the gym. I’ve found that physical exertion has been a pretty fair antidote to deal with losing Dad. And staying healthy’s always a good thing.”

  With his Jeep now empty, Edward locked it up. “I’ll think about it.”

  Holden slowed his pace to walk side by side into the garage. “You could always go back to work. Maybe get your private investigator’s license if the badge doesn’t suit you anymore. You could help Sawyer and Atticus and me find the man who killed Dad and broke Mom’s heart. If the four of us worked together as a team, we could get that bastard.”

  “I thought that investigation was off-limits to Kincaids. I know Sawyer uncovered some circumstantial evidence that the lab has, and Atticus has been nosing around in Dad’s journals, looking at his work with Z Group before Dad became a cop. But they�
�ve turned all that over to the police.” Those piercing gray eyes could still do a knowing big-brother look. “You’re a sharpshooter, not an investigator. So what are you up to?”

  Holden shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans before he answered. “I, uh, went and had a chat with a witness who was there that night.”

  Edward’s hand on his arm stopped him. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “I just wanted to know why she won’t open up about what she saw, and give us some kind of break on the case.”

  “She?”

  “Liza Parrish.” He skipped the description of freckles and curves and keeping him up at night. “She’s scared of something. Or someone. I saw a car nearly run her down last night. I don’t know if it’s connected. I ran the plates and it came up a rental car. Maybe if we could assign a bodyguard to make her feel safe, then she’d feel it was okay to open up and talk.”

  “You think she’s in danger?” Despite the fact his gun and badge were packed up in a drawer somewhere, Edward still thought like a cop. “Did you notify the OIC of your suspicions?”

  The OIC—Officer in Charge of the investigation—Kevin Grove, would have his hide if he knew Holden had already made personal contact—lots of contact—with the witness. “You think I should?”

  “Hell, yes. If she can break open Dad’s case, we want her in one piece.” Edward frowned at Holden’s uncharacteristic silence. “Is there something more going on here? Did something else happen between you and that woman?”

  The phone on Holden’s belt vibrated, saving him from having to answer.

  He flipped open his phone, recognized Lieutenant Cutler’s number. “Lieutenant? What’s up?”

  Mike Cutler’s clipped tone confirmed that this was no social call. “We’ve got a situation in the 1100 block of South Broadway. Someone called in a bomb threat to the Friedman Animal Clinic.”

  When he’d done his research on Liza Parrish, he’d found out that she was working an internship at that same clinic. Cars gunning for her in the middle of the street? Bomb threats? He wouldn’t buy any coincidence theory.

  The instinct to get to Liza jolted through his limbs. But he wasn’t supposed to know about her. He wasn’t supposed to care whether or not she was safe. He grit his teeth and ignored the distracting impulses. “That’s bomb squad’s department.”

  “Not when we’ve got a perp in the building across the street firing shots into the crowd of evacuees, onlookers and official vehicles.”

  Holden swore. “Any casualties?”

  “Not yet. But we’re up, big guy. Is your head back in the game yet? We need to do a sweep of the building across the street.”

  Holden put his hand over the phone and looked at Edward. “Will you stay with Mom? Tell her I’m gone?”

  He nodded. “Go save the day, little brother.”

  Pulling his keys from his pocket and dashing toward his Mustang, Holden put the phone back to his ear. “I’m on my way.”

  Chapter Five

  “Clear!”

  After Dominic Molloy gave him the signal, Holden turned the corner around the last of the air-conditioning units. Leading with his Glock, he checked between the exhaust vents and outer wall. With no shooter in sight, he announced it was safe for Dom to proceed. “Clear!”

  Holden watched his partner’s back while Dom peered over the edge of the building. “Clear! The next building’s roof is eight stories below us. If the shooter had jumped, I’d see a body.”

  It was probably safe to breathe easier now, but both men had been trained not to drop their guard until they were back at the van stowing their gear. Holden had one last wall to check. With the sunset at his back, he followed his own shadow to the front side of the building and looked over the edge to the street below. South Broadway was a four-lane street with bus lanes, parking and sidewalks on either side. No way would the shooter have risked a jump like that unless he thought he could fly. “Clear!”

  He nodded to Dominic.

  With an answering nod, Dom lowered his weapon and tapped the microphone inside his helmet to broadcast to their entire unit. “Roof’s clear, lieutenant. The perp must have gotten out with the last of the tenants when we evacuated.”

  “Understood. I’m waiting to hear from Trip and Delgado in the basement.”

  Holden lowered his Glock, noting how easy it would be to shatter the animal clinic’s front window from this position. The shooter had, too. Hitting a target inside the ground-level clinic would be impossible from this height, but anything on the street would be fair game.

  A man with a high-powered rifle would be untouchable this high up unless they had a chopper. Holden touched his black-gloved fingers to the ledge near a trio of powder burns where the shooter had rested his rifle. But he’d policed his brass like a pro. There were no casings on the roof, not so much as a gum wrapper to give any indication of the terror that had rained down just a half hour earlier.

  “This guy’s good,” Holden reported.

  Dominic walked up beside him. “Yeah, well, if he’s so damn good, why didn’t he hit anybody? Not that I’m askin’ for trouble, but there were civilians, cops, EMTs, reporters all on the street before we got the area completely closed off. How come all he hit was a window, a bus and a couple of traffic lights?”

  Holden crouched down and put himself in the shooter’s position. Even now, as uniformed officers kept bystanders and reporters more than a block away, he could adjust the angle of the weapon and make a difficult but doable shot and take out the driver of the television news van and two traffic cops.

  “What are you thinkin’, big guy?”

  “That our shooter hit exactly what he aimed at.”

  Dominic chomped his gum and frowned. “So what’s the point of calling in a fake bomb to get all these targets on the street, and then miss them on purpose?”

  “That’s what I’d like to know.” Had he been gunning for someone in particular? Like a mouthy redhead with fear in her eyes? “Maybe he didn’t spot his intended target so he fired wildly to throw us off track.”

  “Or maybe he just wanted to throw a scare into somebody.”

  Holden glanced down at his buddy. Dom’s off-the-cuff intuition was usually amazingly accurate. And bad guys did like to scare witnesses who might testify against them. Holden was already backing toward the roof entrance. “Did we clear the clinic across the street?”

  “Bomb squad did.” Dom followed behind him. “Our shooter’s long gone.”

  “Basement’s clear.” Lieutenant Cutler’s voice sounded inside their helmets, ending Holden’s intent to run across the street and find Liza. He still had work to do. “Report back to 517. I want to take this room apart before we turn it over to the lab guys.”

  “On our way.”

  The secondary location where the bomb threat call had been made from wasn’t an apartment so much as a bunch of empty rooms—rented for the week and paid for in cash. There was a card table, a folding chair and a telephone, and not a damn clue as to the perp’s identity.

  Dominic snickered at the name scrawled inside the building manager’s registry. “You honestly think our perp’s name was Johann Hart?”

  Holden was leaning against the window frame, watching as a team of crime scene investigators ducked beneath the yellow tape marking off the animal clinic. Uniformed officers were also beginning to let some of the clinic workers back in, assuming that was who the four men and women in the white lab coats were.

  Like the others on his S.W.A.T. team, he’d removed his helmet and holstered his gun, standing down from full alert. They now wore their ball caps and some pretty conflicted expressions over a dangerous suspect who’d escaped them.

  Razzing from the others drew Holden’s focus back into the room as Dominic waved a copy of the registration page in the air. “Hello? Johann, John. A hart’s a deer, a doe’s a deer. John Doe?”

  Trip shook his head. “How long did it take you to think that one up?”

 
; “This guy’s a ghost,” Delgado griped. “We’ll never find him.”

  “Focus, people,” Cutler ordered. “Our shooter’s in the wind. Unless we dig up a gun in this apartment, I’m going to assume he smuggled the weapon out somehow, and that he’s armed and dangerous.”

  A shock of copper-red caught Holden’s attention as Liza ducked beneath the tape to hurry after the other clinic workers. Ah, hell. Not only was that hair as good as a neon sign to aim at, even through the lengthening twilight shadows, but he’d spotted a television reporter and her cameraman pleading with one of the officers to let her in to the crime scene.

  Holden was going to jump out of his skin if he couldn’t do something about the train wreck he saw coming. “May I be excused from the search, sir?”

  Cutler’s blue eyes narrowed, no doubt assessing the unusual request. “Is there a problem?”

  “I need to take care of something.”

  The lieutenant deliberated for a few seconds, then dismissed him. “Go. If you see something, you get on the horn and call it in.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  HOLDEN SKIPPED THE ELEVATOR and took the stairs two at a time down to the street. He pushed open the front doors in time to see TV reporter Hayley Resnick and her cameraman being pushed back out of the clinic by a testy female CSI. When the reporter stuck her microphone in the CSI’s face and asked her to comment on the situation, the tall brunette turned and followed Holden into the building.

  “Just stay clear of the bullet holes in the front desk and counter,” she warned, hurrying past him. “The back of the building is clear, but I’ve got my people pulling a couple of slugs here.”

  Deciding that a response was neither wanted nor necessary, Holden headed toward the back where he could hear several voices—including Liza’s. His boots crunched over the glass on the floor, but as the CSI had indicated, it appeared that all the damage was relegated to the very front of the clinic.