by James Hunt
“Goddammit!” Grant punched the dash, and the radio’s receiver was knocked from its perch.
One of his knuckles cracked and bits of blood dotted the leather of the wheel and the dash. His hand ached, and he cursed under his breath. He veered left and maneuvered around a slow-moving van in the middle lane and took his aggression out on the accelerator.
“We have to stop them, Mocks,” Grant said, all of his concentration focused on the road, changing lanes, picking up speed, getting to the headquarters as fast as they could. “We can’t let them get away with this.”
“I know,” Mocks said. “And we will.” She placed a hand on his wrist. It was her turn to bring him back from the edge. “But it won’t do us any good if we wreck before we get there.”
The lump in Grant’s throat slid back down to his stomach, and his heart rate slowed. He took three deep breaths, exhaling slowly. By the time they returned to the house in the south side, the anger had dulled but hadn’t disappeared.
Grant parked the car in the corner, and they walked the two houses to the gang’s headquarters. Blood and bullet holes marked the carnage from earlier. On autopilot, Grant unholstered his pistol and took the first steps up to the porch, his eyes darting between the broken windows.
There were no cars out front, no signs that anyone had returned. Maybe Hickem was wrong. With the breach, the gang could have written the house off as a lost cause. But if that was the case, then there most likely wasn’t anything of value left behind.
The conditions inside the house weren’t better than the exterior. While the outside was riddled with bullet holes, the inside was littered with trash and ratty furniture. But it was the smell that made it unbearable. No central heat flowed, so a musty chill lingered in the air. Every breath Grant drew muddled his lungs with crap.
“I’ll start looking in the back, and you check the front,” Grant said. “If you hear anything, come and get me, and I’ll do the same.”
“Fine by me,” Mocks said, stifling a cough. “Sooner we can get out of here, the less time I’ll have to spend in the shower scrubbing myself clean.”
Grant stepped around empty beer bottles and was mindful of the used needles that littered the ground. He thought about asking Mocks if she was okay being around that stuff, but he decided against it. Of course it bothered her. She was an addict in the middle of a drug den.
The rooms in the back were small. Bare mattresses were shoved in corners, and more food wrappers and bottles littered the floor. What carpet wasn’t covered in trash was stained in what Grant figured was a mixture of booze, blood, and semen. The walls were decorated with pictures of naked women. A dartboard hung at the end of the hallway, and the misses were marked with tiny holes on either side.
But each room Grant checked had nothing more than the one before it. He wasn’t sure what he would find, and he wasn’t sure what he hoped to find. Maybe a manifesto, some type of communication, anything. If this gang was involved in the mass abductions, or even orchestrated them, then there had to be a paper trail somewhere. The Web wasn’t just flying by the seat of their pants.
“Grant!” Mocks said, her voice excited. “I’ve got something.”
Grant sprinted from the last bedroom and up the hall. He found Mocks in the living room, hunched over a laptop with her gloves on. He walked over, his heart racing at a breakneck pace. “Where’d you find it?”
“It was stashed under a floor board underneath the couch with a brick of coke,” Mocks answered, her keys gliding over the keyboard with one gloved hand. “Along with this.” She held up a small notepad with a bunch of symbols etched over it.
“What is it?” Grant asked.
“Don’t know.”
Car doors slammed outside. Grant and Mocks turned to the broken windows. Three sedans were parked in the street, and three men in suits and sunglasses stepped out. The wind gusted one of their jackets open and exposed the dual shoulder holster underneath, and they openly carried AK-47s strapped to their shoulders.
“We’ve got to go,” Grant said, closing the lid of the laptop and backtracking down the hallway.
Mocks followed on light feet and before they reached the first bedroom down the hall, the front door groaned as the men entered, and a flood of unintelligible voices followed. If they came for the laptop, then it wouldn’t be long before they realized it was gone.
Grant pulled Mocks toward the end of the hall and the dartboard, and they escaped out of sight just as the first gangbanger entered the hallway. The voices grew louder, and the crash of furniture thundered their haste.
Grant fumbled with the doorknob to the back door. It was locked. Footsteps in the hall grew closer. Mocks removed her pistol. Grant shook the door lightly. It was flimsy material. He shouldered it, and the wooden frame splintered as he stumbled into the backyard.
The noise gave them away, and heavy footsteps chased them down the hall as Grant and Mocks sprinted into the backyard, heading for the gap in the wooden fence. Grant stopped to let Mocks pass through first, and during his pause, three armed men funneled out the back door. They screamed, raised their rifles, and fired as he ducked behind the fence.
“Don’t stop, Mocks!” Grant pulled out his pistol on the run, the laptop still clutched under his arm. Mocks’s legs blurred together in her quick, short strides, and Grant’s own legs burned as they pounded against the pavement.
The small grid of houses where the gang lived had narrow alleys, forcing the pair to run single file. More gunshots fired, and Grant felt a wave of heat and air brush his left ear. He waited for the pain of a bullet, but none came as he followed Mocks around the next corner that spit them out onto the sidewalk of a four-lane road.
Heavy traffic sped back and forth, and Grant spun around to get a pulse on their pursuers. He watched two of them spill out onto the sidewalk a few houses down, their rifles raised.
With pedestrians and civilians outside in broad daylight, they opened fire. Grant and Mocks sprinted into traffic, Grant tweaking his ankle from the sudden burst of speed.
“Jesus Christ!” Mocks said, barely able to keep her feet as Grant pulled her across the road.
Cars laid on their horns and brakes screeched, but it all ended once the gunfire reached the road. Bullets tore apart trucks, sedans, vans, any vehicle that was in the gang’s path. Grant didn’t look back until they reached the other side.
His lungs burned, and the muscles in his legs turned to jelly. Mocks gave him a shove and pointed back to the thugs still trying to cross the now standstill, traffic-jammed street.
The pair sprinted between two houses in an old development and entered another grid-like maze of tight alleys and sharp corners. Clothes hung on lines to dry, most of them still wet from the constant drizzle.
Gunfire echoed behind them, but it sounded farther away now. Grant reached for his phone and dialed Dispatch, reporting their location. “Shots fired at 53rd South and Connolly Ave. Suspects are heavily armed. Medical units needed onsite.”
Grant skidded to a stop the moment the words left his mouth, and Mocks only made it a few more feet before she stopped to rest, too. The cold air was like breathing ice, and every breath was painful.
“There are still people trapped back there,” Mocks said.
Grant ripped off his jacket, wrapped the computer inside, and then stuffed it under the small space beneath the house to his left.
“Ready?” Mocks asked.
Grant removed his pistol and nodded. “Let’s go.”
The crash of metal and screams echoed louder on their return to the highway. In the last narrow alley before the road, Grant had a view of the street and its chaos: Screams. Gunfire. Smoke. Panic.
Grant and Mocks rushed into the violence, their pistols aimed at the gang that had unleashed so much hell.
Smoke drifted up from the hood of a wrecked truck, a young man unconscious behind the wheel. Grant veered to check on him and found the man’s forehead crusted with blood. He checked for a pu
lse and felt the faint beat of life. Grant started to move him but froze when he made eye contact with a gangbanger through the passenger windshield.
The shooter opened fire and Grant yanked the young man from the driver seat. Bullet holes redecorated the truck, and Grant dragged the unconscious man backward to the safety of the sidewalk.
The jammed cars provided plenty of cover, and Grant found most of them abandoned. He rounded the hood of a Ford Mustang, and another gangbanger appeared around the van’s rear.
Grant charged before the shooter fired and tackled him to the pavement. Both of their weapons fell to the asphalt and the thug rolled left, using the momentum to mount Grant and then wrapped his meaty fingers around Grant’s throat.
Grant’s airway closed. He punched the man’s sides as he choked for breath. The tattooed face above him blurred. His arms fell to his sides, and the mounting pressure in his head slowly faded. A numbness spread from his neck to his hands and feet. And that’s when he saw them.
His wife, Ellen, and his unborn child, Annie. The daughter he never had a chance to meet had red hair like her mother and blue eyes like him. She was smiling, reaching out to him. And just before they touched, she was gone. Vanished into nothing, just like in the car accident that had altered Grant’s life forever.
The thug’s limp body landed on top of Grant, the heavy man suffocating his lungs still gasping for air. He shoved the body off and rolled to his hands and knees. There was a muffled noise in his ears, like someone shouting underwater. His vision cleared, and when he craned his neck to the noise he saw Mocks huddled behind a car, evading gunfire.
“Grant!” she screamed between the gunshots, and he stumbled to his feet. He made it two steps before he stopped and reached for the AK-47 that belonged to the thug. He tucked the butt of the rifle under his arm and blinked away the last few black dots from his vision. He crept alongside the van and craned his neck around the front bumper for a better vantage point.
Two shooters. Automatic rifles. Grant motioned for Mocks to stay down. He retreated a step, his head still fuzzy from the fight, and then jumped straight up, slamming his elbows on the van’s hood to steady his aim before squeezing the trigger.
The recoil from the automatic rifle pounded against Grant’s shoulder in rapid succession. The power of the weapon caused his aim to drift, but the distraction alone was enough to give Mocks the needed time to escape the piece of Swiss cheese that used to be a Mazda.
Mocks leapt behind Grant and the van, and the trail of bullets followed her. The tires exploded, and the windows shattered as Grant and Mocks kept low on their retreat behind another cluster of cars.
The pair stopped at the driver side door of a BMW, the rear bumper smashed from a collision. Grant saw the man he’d dragged to safety still unconscious on the sidewalk. But aside from him, the street had turned into a ghost town.
“You all right?” Mocks asked.
Grant nodded. “Thanks for bailing me out back there.”
“I thought it was the chivalrous thing to do,” Mocks answered.
Grant peeked over the BMW, the pair of shooters closing in. There was nowhere left to run. “How much ammunition do you have left?”
Mocks removed her magazine. “Four rounds.”
Grant reached for his phone and texted Sam a message: yellow house off of 53rd, computer under the house wrapped in my jacket. Pivotal for case against the Web.
Grant clicked send in case they didn’t make it and then pocketed the phone. Vibrations rattled through the Beemer as gunfire grew louder. Glass shattered and rained on their shoulders. Mocks and Grant kept low, waiting for any lull in gunfire to make a move. The pair made eye contact and with hellfire raining down, Grant realized Mocks could be the last person he saw on this earth. Dying next to your partner didn’t sound so bad though.
“Ready?” Grant asked.
Mocks nodded. She inched toward the hood while Grant went to the trunk. He paused at the rear blown-out tire now sitting on its rim. Grant held up his hand, counting down from three, two, one.
Grant stood, lifting the rifle’s sight to the gangbangers to his left. Blood splattered over the man’s suit and he flew backward. He saw Mocks in his peripheral, the four quick strikes from her pistol, and she ejected her last magazine. She was empty. He pivoted his aim and knew that he wouldn’t make it in time before they gunned her down, but he had to try. Just as he squeezed the trigger on the thug who had Mocks in his sights, something stole his attention. A siren. Lots of them.
“Grant!” Mocks said, and pointed to the cluster of squad cars down the road.
The surviving gang members retreated into the crevices of their slums, firing randomly as the police formed a perimeter. Grant and Mocks quickly fished out their badges as officers converged on their location. Grant lowered the rifle then tossed it on the Beemer’s trunk, his hands raised as the officers circled him.
Chapter 9
The aftermath from the gunfight made the south side look more like a Middle Eastern warzone than a community in Seattle. People watched from the windows of their houses while pedestrians snapped pictures on their phones and streamed video to the web. The show of police force in the area was impressive, and officers scoured the area looking for the gang but found no one.
“Detective Grant.” An officer exited one of the alleys between the houses, the same one that had taken his statement on what happened. He was thorough, though his mechanical method of questioning was tedious. He held up the jacket and the laptop wrapped inside. “This what you were looking for?”
Grant sat in the back of a squad car, his legs hanging out the door and the sole of his boots grinding glass into the asphalt. He held a cup of coffee in his left hand that he hadn’t touched. He liked the warmth, but not the caffeine. Despite the fatigue, he was still wired from the gunfight. A light twitch in his right hand revealed his frazzled nerves.
“Yeah,” Grant said.
The officer unwrapped the jacket from the laptop and returned it to Grant. He held up the laptop. “What do you want me to do with this?”
“Get it to Sam Braddock over in Precinct Eighteen,” Grant answered, shaking the crud from his jacket. “Tell him it has to do with the website and that I need a summary of everything that’s on that computer.” He tapped the top of the screen. “There is also a note on there with some symbols. I don’t know what they represent, but they might be a password.”
Grant was thankful the young officer had a notepad out, jotting everything down. “Got it. Anything else?”
“Tell him to hurry,” Grant answered.
“Yes, sir.” The officer jogged off and disappeared into the clusters of policemen, paramedics, and from what it looked like, the FBI.
Mocks appeared with her own cup of coffee and leaned against the back of the van. “How you feeling?”
“I’ll be better once we find our kid,” Grant said, looking down at the coffee that had cooled significantly. He dumped the brown liquid onto the pavement just as Hickem and his agents arrived.
“What the hell was that, Grant?” Hickem asked but didn’t bother waiting for a response. “You realize that your little stunt will send these people underground? You may want to find these kids, but I want to bring down their organization, and God knows how much you fucked all of this up!” He pointed his large meaty finger right between Grant’s eyes.
“Did you get anything from the interrogations?” Grant asked.
Hickem’s stony expression reddened. “No.”
“And I don’t suspect that’ll change anytime soon,” Grant said, stepping out of the car and straightening his back, which gave a dull crack. “You’ve never gotten anything from interrogations of Web members, have you?”
“No,” Hickem answered.
“Then why the hell did you even agree to take us over there?” Mocks asked, her own face reddening now. “You almost got us killed, and you got one of your own guys shot!”
The left corner of Hickem’s mo
uth curved up his cheek. “Our protocols are clear about when I’m allowed to engage and utilize resources for a raid. It’s only by approval from my superior or special circumstances.” A more amiable expression appeared. “I was able to file this one as a special circumstance.”
“Unbelievable,” Mocks said.
“I’ll be able to use your names in the report, and when my boss asks why two Seattle detectives were part of a sting, I’ll get to tell them it was because the ambassador called me, and that’s my get out of jail free card.” Hickem crossed his arms, shifting his glance back and forth between the two. “Getting the jump on those guys allowed us to confiscate a lot of guns and a lot of drugs. And because we took a pivotal crew off the street, the whole organization will have to shift. And when people shift, they make mistakes.” Hickem straightened. “I intend to capitalize on those mistakes.”
“Well,” Grant said, sliding his jacket back on, parts of the inside wet from the ground. “I’m glad we could help you in that matter. C’mon, Mocks.” The pair walked through the crowded street and did one final check-in with the lieutenant on scene to make sure they didn’t need anything else.
“You’re all set, Detective Grant,” the lieutenant said. “And maybe next time when you’re going to be in my neighborhood, give me a heads up? I’ll schedule my guys for overtime in advance.” He cracked a playful smile, and Grant patted him on the shoulder.
“Will do,” Grant answered.
Once they were out of earshot and closer toward the car, Mocks spoke up. “I’m assuming you didn’t tell Hickem about the laptop on purpose.”
“I don’t need him confiscating evidence for his case when we can use it for ours,” Grant said. “He used us, and now we’ve used him. I’d say that makes us even.”
Mocks smiled. “That’s why you wanted that officer to go and get the laptop.” She shoved him in the side quite hard. “You needed to establish chain of evidence.”
