Zack (In the Company of Snipers Book 3)

by Irish Winters

  He pushed the warning out of his head.

  “Mei?” he croaked again.

  She whimpered. Finally.

  “Can you...hear me?” Nausea and vertigo buffeted his meager hold on gravity. His mangled gauze-covered fingers pressed into the mud behind him. They still hurt from when he’d pounded his car. A little more pain hardly mattered.

  Why was it so important to sit up in the first place?

  “Agent Lennox?” She sounded as bad as he did.

  “It’s...me,” he hissed. For awhile, neither said anything. It was all he could do to maintain the tripod thing he had going between his butt and his hands behind his back. He listened to mud squishing as Mei moved toward him.

  “I’m tied up.”

  “You...hurt?”

  “I feel funny, like I’ve been drugged.” Again more squishing, scraping noises until she bumped into his legs. “Are you hurt?”

  He laughed, a strangled coughing sound that didn’t sound like a laugh at all. “Hell...no. I’m...fine.”

  Her body pressed against his thigh. Another good thing. Now he knew her exact position. And she was warm. He had to make the best use of the time he had left. She had to live.

  “Lis...ten.” Breathing was harder now, his lungs thick and sluggish like they breathed soup instead of air. “Boot. Knife.”

  “Are you telling me you have a knife in your boot? Left or right?”

  “R-right.”

  She fumbled, but eventually pulled the knife from his inside boot sheath. He winced, gagging back bile at the nauseating sawing motion when she cut the tie at his ankles. Every little movement created swells he could not control. He willed himself not to throw up.

  She scooted along his thigh, grunting funny little sounds until they were sitting back to back. Her fingers searched his wrist for enough space to slide the knife. He gulped. Shaking more than helping, he stretched his arms as far apart as his strength would allow. Fire filled his lungs at the simple movement. Mei needed room to work, but the knife she was working with was razor sharp. Maybe those bandages would protect him if she slipped. Maybe not.

  “C-cold?” he asked between bone rattling shivers.

  “Same as you,” she muttered. “I need to get you out of here.”

  “’Kay,” he rasped. “That...be nice.”

  A flush of something warm trickled over his cold skin. Instantly, it chilled. Damn. She’d sliced him. It wouldn’t take long now. Maybe it was just as well. Now he’d die quickly. He sagged onto his side.

  “Hey,” she muttered. “Your turn. Cut me free.”

  Oh, yeah. That was the least he could do before he died.

  “Gimme...knife.” He reached for her in the dark, feeling down her arms until he came to where her hands were tied together. She held the blade down, a real good safety precaution considering how little control he had over his shaking fingers, and the fact he couldn’t see. Dark walls closed in. Lack of blood will do that.

  “Be careful. It’s sharp,” she cautioned, like he didn’t already know how much he honed his own knife.

  “Uh huh,” he grunted, taking the slippery tool carefully out of her grasp. And then he felt it on his wrist. It wasn’t him. It was her. “You’re...bleeding?”

  “No,” she lied. “I’m not.”

  “Are too,” he muttered. “You’re cut. So...sorry.”

  He fumbled the knife, nearly losing it. Multitasking was impossible with clumsy, fat fingers. Talking, cutting, breathing, and trying not to die all at the same time was hard. He focused. One thing at a time. His fingers searched between her slender wrists for the width of a razor sharp knife. She was a smart woman, stretching her arms apart to help the blade maneuver.

  After one sharp slice and one painful grunt, she was free. He leaned into her solid back, both hands to the ground for support.

  “Give me the knife. I can cut my feet apart now.”

  He complied, handing the knife in a wide arc around her, handle first so he didn’t hurt her by mistake. As soon as she was free, she turned and cradled him, tipping him backward onto the muddy ground, his head in the crook of her arm. At last. He could breathe again.

  “Lis...ten,” he rasped.

  “I’m listening, Agent Lennox. What do you want me to do?”

  “Get...help.”

  Mei looked at Agent Lennox’s battered face through the dim, dark light where they’d been dumped. It looked like some kind of a warehouse. The floor was definitely cold concrete with a layer of mud that had no doubt been frozen before their bodies thawed the upper crust. A square opening high overhead allowed the only light, a scant beam of the late afternoon sun. But it was enough to scare her. The big strapping agent who’d helped her so much now lay struggling to breathe, and there was nothing she could do to help. His jacket was gone. Hers too. The left side of his head was swollen and blackened with blood. Plus, he was going into shock. He wheezed, every word a struggle. She had no way to keep him warm.

  “Mei...” He choked and spit. “Must...go.”

  She hugged him one last time. “I don’t want to leave you.”

  “Got to.”

  With her forehead to his cheek, she felt him shiver. Agent Lennox was twice her size, maybe more. As usual, he was right. She had to go. Easing her body from beneath his, Mei lowered him onto the damp, dirty ground. “You have to hang on. I don’t have LiLi yet, and you promised you’d help me find her. You hear me?”

  One side of his mouth lifted in a sad attempt at a smile. “Yeah...promised.”

  “You don’t have your baby girl, either.” She smoothed both hands over his chest, scared this might be her last moment with him. “I’ll be right back.”

  “Hey,” he groaned, his hands searching in the dark for her. She clasped them both to her lips. “Should’ve told you...sooner. You’re...really...something.”

  She kissed his fingers. “Please, don’t die. I should have told you. I love you, Agent Lennox.”

  He groaned again.

  “I’m sorry I’ve been so rude to you.” All her sins spilled out of her mouth. “You’ve only tried to help. Don’t die, Agent Lennox. Please. I love you so much.”

  “Mei.” He gasped for air.

  “Yes?” She guided his hand to her mouth for one last kiss.

  “Zack. Call me...Zack.”

  Alone never felt so cold.

  Zack listened to Mei’s tentative footsteps squish through the mud as she walked into darkness, and then he was alone. It was okay. Time she left anyway. The cold was colder now, but he’d stopped shivering. It didn’t matter. Slumber beckoned, and he was tired. The pain in his chest commanded what little concentration he had left, and sent him writhing for any position that offered a chance to breathe easier. There was none.

  Can’t breathe. I’m drowning in my own blood.

  At last, it got the best of him. With gritted teeth, he let it have its way, and collapsed into the slimy mud. Darkness swarmed his thin hold on reality. The war came back to him. So much injustice in the world. Damned Taliban. Damned child murderers. Poor, poor children everywhere. He drifted. Poor Mei. He’d failed. Still didn’t find LiLi like he’d promised. Poor, poor Mei.

  Alex?

  Zack opened his one good eye. His damned boss was peering down at him through a long foggy tunnel. How’d he get into the war?

  The man had a blinding bright light that, well, blinded. Zack squinted, shifting his head to avoid the sharp poke in the eye the light offered. My hell. Can’t a man die in peace?

  “I’ve got you, son.”

  Two strong hands eased him out of the mud, cradled him, searched his neck and chest. Being handled hurt. He couldn’t breathe again. Neither could he talk.

  “I’ve got you, son.”

  Yeah, well, let me go. You’re killing me.

  Alex covered Zack with a blanket that felt like heaven it was so warm, but he still couldn’t breathe. Hands lifted him onto a board, but Jun was back. She stabbed him in the side this
time–with a knife. Damned, mean Jun. The knife felt long and sharp, but oddly, he could breathe better. Maybe she was good for something, after all. Or maybe she’d turned into a medic with a scalpel? He groaned the illusion away.

  Doom whirled on the cold November breeze. Fractured skull. Punctured lungs. Hypothermia. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’m dying here. Let me be.

  “You’ve got him now?”

  Alex just would not shut up.

  “Yes, sir. We’re taking him to Washington Central.”

  “Boss?” Zack gasped. If the nightmare really was real, if that one guy really was Alex, he needed to ask him something.

  “Yes?” Alex leaned over him.

  Zack blinked. Alex looked bad. Really bad. Kinda sad. Kinda mad. Awful dirty. He didn’t usually look so bad. Maybe it wasn’t him.

  “Umm.” Zack blinked. Thinking hurt. He’d wanted to ask something. Didn’t he?

  “You’re going to be okay.” Alex rested his hand on Zack’s forehead, like he was checking him for a fever or something.

  “Mei?”

  “She’s okay,” Alex said, but Alex was lying. Zack could tell.

  “My Mei?” he asked again. “She’s good? You sure?”

  “She’s fine, but you’re sick, son. Lie down and shut up.”

  Okay. Zack closed his eyes. That sounded more like Alex. He believed now.

  Mei was okay.

  TWENTY-ONE

  “How you doing?”

  Zack saw Alex’s face close above him. Too close. By then he’d been cleaned up, stitched up, and warmed up. The hands he’d abused his car with the day before were properly treated and encased in thicker bandages. They felt numb. And numb was a good feeling. He could breathe, something a man appreciated a lot more after he’d nearly suffocated on his own body fluids. The only problem was he’d woken up in a hospital, not his favorite place.

  “Better,” he wheezed. “So...I’m gonna live...to fight another day?”

  Alex patted the top of Zack’s head. Their manly relationship was always different than most. Alex was a hard man to get close to. Zack never knew how he’d done it. Just one of those things that happens when you fight side by side with a guy, save his ass once in awhile, and cover it the rest of the time. “No fighting for you for awhile. Looks like someone took a brick to that hard head of yours.”

  “Didn’t see the bastard who...threw the first punch.” It was still hard to breathe, much less talk.

  “What did you see?”

  Zack looked up into his boss’s blue eyes. Alex always looked so serious.

  “Stars, Boss. I saw...stars.” Sheeesh. What a stupid question.

  Those blue eyes smiled for a second, but his boss was going to ask him again. Alex did. “What was different at the foster home this time? Think.”

  Alex’s favorite word–think. It made Zack smile. The word had saved his life.

  “Yeah. Know what you meant. The blue van for one thing. Chinese driver...heavy set, five ten, dark clothes.” Zack stopped to catch his breath. “Same blue van...at the ATF stakeout.”

  “Same driver?”

  “No, those guys were black. This guy...definitely Chinese. Kinda chubby.”

  “Where was Mei while you were getting the crap beat out of you?” Alex wasted no time going straight for the jugular.

  “Inside, Boss. She...ah, went inside.”

  Blue eyes bored straight into Zack’s lying eyes. Man up, Lennox. He knows.

  “It’s my fault. We were going to...buy the little baby girl. Had all the money. Had to help her. Couldn’t leave her. Not again.”

  Whether he was too beat up to control himself or because his heart hurt thinking about the little girl he’d lost, but tears filled Zack’s eyes. He’d just confessed to stealing a million dollars to buy a child. Alex already knew he’d turned off his phone and earpiece. Lennox had screwed the mission. Again. He’d be fired for sure, but worst of all, he’d lost his one chance to save that baby. He’d failed the most important operation of his life.

  “Did you...did you see that place? And she’s so small.” Reconciliation morphed into anger. “I couldn’t leave her,” he declared.

  A glimmer of something drifted through those icy blues. Alex looked–pleased?

  “I’ve got news for you. You saved every single one of those little girls.”

  “What?”

  Alex nodded. “It was your call to Mother that brought the whole world of law enforcement down on those foster houses. And yes, I’ve seen the place. We even got the girls they’d tried to move before we got there. Caught the blue van and the men driving it, too.”

  Zack didn’t know what to say. He was delirious. That’s it. Alex was a by-product of the pain meds. He closed his eyes, hoping the next time he opened them his boss would be gone. He wasn’t.

  “Do you need a drink?” Alex held the glass while Zack sucked down a huge swallow through the straw.

  Okay. That did it. I’m hallucinating for sure. Alex is helping me get a drink? No way.

  “We got Richards and his secretary, Ms. Bradford, too. Remember her?” Alex kept talking. “She turned state’s evidence and gave the FBI all of her documentation. Mother and Ember are helping sort through it. Oh yeah, and speaking of the one million dollars? It was in the blue van. Still marked. Still in the same bag. You didn’t steal anything.”

  “And the babies? I mean, Boss, that little girl in the first foster home. I mean, where are all those little girls?”

  “Some are in the hospital. Some are going home to their real parents.” Alex paused.

  “Their real parents?”

  “They’re not all orphans. Some of those little girls were abducted from China. They need to go home. They have families who love them.”

  Okay. That was news. He hadn’t thought of that possibility. He’d been focused on saving one baby girl. That’s all. He’d developed a plan where she’d be part of his life, where he’d take care of her, feed her, keep her safe and clean, and make her smile every single day. A good nanny could take care of her while he worked, but he’d be home every night. The boutique where he and Mei had stopped had a cute pink bed, perfect for his little girl. He had a plan. It would work. It just didn’t include parents.

  Another little girl came to mind. “LiLi wasn’t there, was she?”

  “No, but I didn’t think we’d find her in this mess, did you?”

  “No, of course not.” Zack groaned. “How’s Mei? We need to find her daughter, Boss. You know that—”

  “You let me worry about that, okay?”

  “Yeah, but she’s been through so much, and—”

  “Knock it off. My job is to locate LiLi. Your job is to listen to your doctors and take care of yourself. Can you do that without screwing it up?”

  Zack shrugged. “Does she know yet?”

  “I told her. Mei’s a tough little gal, Zack. Don’t underestimate her. Do you feel like sitting up for awhile?” Alex raised the hospital bed without waiting for an answer.

  “Thanks, Boss.” Sitting up didn’t hurt this time, but it didn’t help either. The baby girl had slipped through his hands. LiLi was still missing. Mei would be crushed.

  “Don’t look so glum. You’re alive. Mei’s alive, and you’re a hero.”

  He didn’t feel like a hero.

  “You need anything before I leave? A drink? Pain meds? Anything at all?”

  “No thanks.” Zack fingered the call button with his clumsy, gauze-covered mitts. The joy of living through attempted murder faded with the knowledge of failing Mei. Maybe he’d ask for a pain med after all.

  “How about a little company?”

  “No.” Zack shook his head to protest when Alex opened the door.

  There stood Mei with her arms full of a pink-checkered baby blanket. She came to Zack’s bedside and set the bundle on his lap. “I have someone who wants to meet you,” she said.

  The sweetest little girl with dark almond-shaped eyes blinked up at him. She didn
’t smile. She didn’t coo. Her hair glistened clean and black around a pink baby face, and she smelled refreshingly of baby powder. All his pent-up worry turned to relief when he grabbed that little gal and pressed her to his face. She resisted for a moment, but let herself be hugged.

  “I’d like you to meet your little girl, Song Chang. Baby Song, this is the big strong man who rescued you and all your little friends. This is Agent...This is Zack.” Mei’s voice sounded soft and motherly, until she burst into tears. “I thought I’d lost you.”

  He gathered her into his bed alongside Baby Song, overcome and damned happy. Zack couldn’t speak, just held those special ladies while Mei tried to compose herself, and Baby Song watched with serious eyes.

  “You could have told me,” he muttered to Alex.

  “Nah. This is better.” Alex had taken up residence on the only available chair. “You deserved a little scare after scaring the hell out of me.”

  “Yeah, well.” Zack choked. They were here. His girls.

  “The Tigers dropped you through a hole in the floor of an abandoned warehouse over in Anacostia. They roughed you up pretty good first. Dropped Mei on top of you. Landing on you protected her fall, but it didn’t help you much.”

  “How’d you find us?”

  Mei raised her hand shyly. “You told me to get help, remember?”

  Zack shook his head. He couldn’t be certain of anything. “Hell of an op, Boss.”

  “You’re telling me? I was in a meeting with the FBI, Interpol and the State Department when you got through to Mother.”

  “I do remember that.” Zack rubbed the bruised side of his face with the back of one hand. “Someone clocked me. I think it was Jun.”

  “She won’t be running any more orphanages where she’s going.”

  “You got Richards, didn’t you?”

  Alex could not have looked more pleased. “The police caught up with him at his place in Georgetown. He thought he could work a deal. Even made a statement to the press about how it was all a big misunderstanding, how he was innocent.”

  “Innocent, my ass,” Zack growled, pulling Mei closer. She looked so pretty there in his arms. Who’d a thought?