Chase

by Sidney Bristol

  Nikki crept closer, using the trucks as shields, keeping her head down. Hillary waved at the man she’d almost kissed, then sauntered away, glancing once over her shoulder to ensure her male audience was watching the sway of her hips. Nikki itched to grab her pistol, but it was too soon. Hillary could lead her straight to a bomb. Or the bombs. Maybe even Wilson.

  Nikki fell in behind a trio of men striding with purpose. She had to almost jog to keep up, but not once did any of the men Hillary had entertained glance her way. It was difficult to keep Hillary in sight. Clearly Nikki had missed the memo about bleached hair and skin.

  There.

  Hillary bypassed the entrance to the infield and instead headed toward three lines of cars packed in nice and tight. They appeared to be in queue, waiting for their turn at the agility track. Which made sense. Gabriel had told her about Hillary’s drift racing.

  Nikki’s focus narrowed to keeping her gaze on Hillary. In this press of people, she couldn’t risk losing the other woman. Nikki’s shoulders burned from the intensity of the sun, and her heart pounded against her ribs. What if Hillary wasn’t involved in the bomb plot? Nikki could be chasing a dead end, but it was the only lead she had right now.

  She broke from the main crowd heading toward the infield, and the creeping sensation between her shoulder blades intensified. Luck had been on their side lately, but what if someone saw her and recognized her?

  Hillary meandered from one group to another, never pausing long. There were fewer people clustered around the cars, but enough Nikki hoped she could blend in. Hillary was her best lead to finding the militia.

  The cars here were in four lines. There was an occasional pop-up tent that seemed to be a staging ground for groups of drivers. Logos were plastered on some, others wore similar shirts. She was probably looking at teams, or people who competed for the same sponsor. For all she knew, Wilson had his own tent and the cars were the bombs. She eyed the closest car. The midnight blue paint gleamed. Why hadn’t she considered the cars might be the transportation? It wasn’t like there was a lot of security.

  Nikki needed to find Gabriel. They had to have more boots on the ground here, or they were going to end up casualties.

  She searched the milling crowd for Hillary, but she was gone.

  The hair on the back of Nikki’s neck rose.

  She casually turned her head, but there was no one behind her. Nothing to be alarmed about. Yet she couldn’t shake the sick sensation that something bad was going to happen before they could stop it.

  Hillary was still their best ticket. Arrest her, dangle a deal, and get answers. It wasn’t a great plan, but Nikki was desperate. She strolled toward a line of three red tents where she’d last seen the other woman. Clusters of men and a few women drank beer, poured cold water over their heads, and chatted, none of them paying her any mind. But still there was no sign of Hillary. How had she disappeared so fast?

  She walked the line of tents, eyeing the solid backing that provided more shade for the patrons.

  Nikki walked between the tent and the next car, peering around the plastic banner serving as the back wall to the tents advertising . . . something. The space was completely empty giving way to the infield and a short distance of nothing.

  A small, soft hand grabbed her left shoulder, and the hard barrel of a gun pressed against her ribs.

  “Fucking Fed.”

  The smell of Hillary’s breath was enough to make Nikki’s eyes water. Meth did foul things to the body, one of which was the worst breath imaginable. Nikki had smelled decaying corpses with a better aroma.

  She didn’t dare make a move against Hillary. Not with so many bystanders. If she shot the gun wildly, someone would die.

  “Hillary,” Nikki said, clinging to her inner calm.

  “I’m going to gut you, you piece of trash.” Hillary clawed at her back, grasping Nikki’s piece and pulling it out.

  She glanced around, hoping someone was watching, but they were conveniently covered by the banner and far enough away from the infield activity that no one would be able to see what was going on.

  Shit. This was really not good.

  “Would Wilson like that?” Nikki could still get some information out of her.

  “Shut up. Walk that way.” Hillary jerked Nikki around until they were side by side. Hillary had one hand up under Nikki’s shirt, holding on to the gun, and the other at her side, under the Kevlar vest. The six-shooter was out in the open. If only someone would just look their way.

  “Where are we going?” Talking, Nikki had to keep her talking, engaged. A meth head like Hillary was a paranoid, delusional individual.

  “Walk.”

  “Wilson know you’re here?”

  “Bradley can’t keep you alive.”

  “Does Wilson want me alive?”

  “You killed my baby brother,” Hillary snarled, leaning in close. “Get in the damn car.”

  Hillary shoved Nikki at the door of a silver Mustang. It sat perpendicular to the neat rows of cars on the very edge. Hillary pulled Nikki’s gun out from under her shirt. There was no other option for the moment. Nikki opened the door and sank onto the seat. The interior smelled of paint and rubber. Hillary slammed the door shut, glaring at Nikki.

  Did she make a run for it when Hillary stepped away? There wasn’t anywhere for Nikki to go, and she didn’t see security anywhere. If she ran and Hillary followed, she would have two guns to fire. Unless she used the car to run her down. Both ways, more people got hurt.

  She stayed right where she was, gaze locked with Hillary until she climbed into the driver’s seat.

  “Where is Gabriel? What do you have on him?” Hillary shoved her gun at Nikki, pressing the muzzle against her shoulder.

  “I don’t know where he is.” A truth.

  “You killed my brother.” Hillary pulled back the hammer, her face twisted into a mask of rage.

  This wasn’t how Nikki saw her life ending. Especially not now, not when she’d found Gabriel again. This couldn’t be her end.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  “Gabriel!”

  He turned, scanning the crowd for Nikki. Instead, Roni and Tori parted the flow of people, headed straight for him at a fast pace.

  “Where are the others?” Roni glanced around.

  “On their way,” Gabriel replied.

  All around them, people milled here and there, enjoying the day with no idea what was going to happen if his crew didn’t find Wilson’s people. The trouble was, they could be anyone. And Gabriel could barely focus on any of it.

  Nikki was still missing. It didn’t mean anything, but they’d had enough close calls that he was anxious with her out of his sight and incommunicado.

  Tori pulled her phone out of her back pocket. “Julian and John just got here. They’re coming through the tunnel.”

  “Have you seen them?” Roni pitched her voice low. There was no mistaking which them she wanted to know about.

  “Nothing. You?” He turned in a circle, scanning the crowds, letting his eyes follow whatever caught his attention.

  The infield was mostly retail and show space. On the grass, between the vendor areas and the track, people had coolers, chairs, and umbrellas set up to watch the drift cars go through their paces. Hillary’s pink and purple car was noticeably absent. An event like this was her bread and butter. She should be here, except she was in bed with Wilson and her brother was dead.

  “Where’s Nikki?” Roni asked.

  “She’s canvassing the area, but left her phone in the car. Keep an eye out for her?” Gabriel managed to keep his worry to himself. Nikki was a seasoned agent. This should be routine for her. Or as routine as tracking down rogue bombers could be.

  “Hey, John and Julian want to know where we are.” Tori wiggled her phone at him.

  What was it with everyone suddenly looking to him? Four years of being a yes-man, and now he was calling the shots. He kind of missed it.

  “Tell them to come st
raight through to the infield, take a left, and go to the end. My Skyline is down there. We can meet up, figure out how to divide the area, and search on foot.”

  “Okay.” Tori nodded.

  He turned, heading back the way he’d come. Roni fell in line beside him and Tori followed, no doubt relaying his message to the others.

  “What are you thinking?” Roni asked.

  That I want Nikki beside me.

  But she was working the case. Just like he should be doing, instead of obsessing about her safety. He pushed aside the urge to find her and focused on process. What the hell were they doing next?

  Gabriel glanced around. “Matt got through to security. I imagine we’ll see an increased uniform presence shortly. We need to try to find these guys before that. They feel the heat, they’re going to react. We want to be on them by then.”

  “Any word from that Nico guy?”

  “Nothing.” And that worried him, too. What if they’d gotten Nico caught? Or what if Nico pulled one over on them? There were too many uncertainties.

  Julian’s black Nissan 300ZX and John’s classic red Ford truck rumbled past, earning several admiring looks and a couple whistles. The classics were seriously underrepresented here. He could already hear Aiden’s voice in his head calling it a crime. Gabriel could hear the whole argument, that without the innovation of the American muscle car, none of the current models on the track would have been made.

  Streaming the tirade didn’t distract him for one second. Nikki was still absent and he had no way to get a hold of her.

  Julian and John met him and the girls in front of the Skyline where they circled up for a situation report.

  “What’s the plan?” Julian’s expression was grim. Usually Julian or Aiden took the lead in these circumstances, but that was because their crew specialized in covert, quiet actions. This was a whole other kind of operation, one Gabriel had been part of more than a few times during his FBI days.

  “We know Nico made a series of barrel bombs and pipe bombs. Nikki believes Wilson has had some sort of psychotic break that has triggered this. He’s got an endgame in mind, and we want to stop that.” Gabriel turned in a circle. “Let’s split up. Check the vendor areas, the trash cans, we’re looking for sealed barrels. The ones I saw were blue, but there’s no telling how they disguised them. Check in every five minutes via text, and if you see Nikki, keep her with you, okay?”

  “Why? Where’d Nikki go?” Julian frowned.

  “She doesn’t have her cell on her,” Roni said before Gabriel could.

  “And to think, when you started this kind of work, no one had cell phones.” Julian gave Gabriel’s shoulder a push.

  “Let’s go.” Gabriel turned and stalked away. Nothing would placate him until he got to put his hands back on Nikki.

  He approached his first garbage can near their cars. It was a big, plastic contraption with a lid. He pushed the swinging flap open and stuck his hand into the open space, but there was nothing there. Just emptiness. He kept his gaze roving over the displays and ducked in to stroll through a Nissan booth with their latest models. They needed to check inside trailers, the cabs of trucks, but that would take time, finesse, or maybe a warrant. What they needed was for Nico to make good on his end of the deal, but the man was gone.

  He glanced across the way at John, digging down into a barrel, his face screwed up. Yeah, this was not a glamorous job. If they were a fully run FBI operation they could have bomb sniffing dogs on site already, but they had to work with what was on hand. Themselves.

  John glanced up, catching his eye, and shook his head.

  “Shit,” Gabriel muttered. He lifted the lid off another garbage can and bits of paper and trash spilled out.

  Nikki would know a better way to do this.

  * * *

  Nikki tried to pull her wrists apart, but the bandanna Hillary had used to handcuff her was too old and worn. The fibers caught against each other, working better than a pair of handcuffs right now.

  “What do you think they’re doing?” Hillary laughed and sneered.

  Nikki tilted her head to the side, as if she too were curious why Gabriel was dumping out yet another garbage can. Smart. No one would suspect the trash bins to be dangerous.

  “They aren’t going to find anything there.” Hillary leaned in close and poked Nikki’s cheek, scraping her broken nail down the side of Nikki’s face.

  “Did you have a funeral yet?” Nikki stared straight ahead.

  Hillary sat up, but even without looking directly at her, Nikki could still see her face twist in rage. Hillary growled, sounding more animal than human, and swung her fist at Nikki. Hillary’s knuckles dug into the side of Nikki’s face with enough force to shove Nikki against the door.

  She grunted in pain, squeezing her eyes shut.

  God damn, that hurt.

  “Fuck.” Hillary cradled her hand. “You killed him!”

  “He shot at us first.” Nikki sat up, despite the pain radiating down her spine and bouncing around in her skull. Angering Hillary was her best bet at getting the woman to leak information.

  “Because you’re a Fed.”

  “I never said I was.” And how had they figured that out?

  “Bradley knows you. He knows all about you. You’re supposed to be someone important, right?” Hillary leaned back against the driver’s side door and extended her leg toward Nikki until she could jab her in the thigh with a toe.

  “Depends who you’re talking to.” Nikki shifted away, but not much. If she didn’t act like Hillary’s taunting bothered her, the other woman would grow more agitated, and maybe the meth head paranoia would kick in.

  “I don’t give a shit what Bradley says about you.” Hillary picked up the six-shooter from the driver’s side door and aimed it at her. “I’m going to kill you. He can have the pieces.”

  “Is that so? Why would he care about me?” Nikki stared at Hillary, not the gun. When had she become Wilson’s target? “Shouldn’t he care more about you? His girlfriend?”

  “Girlfriend?” Hillary laughed. “He wishes.”

  “Oh, I just assumed you were the woman he was talking about . . .”

  “What?” Hillary’s gaze narrowed.

  “Nothing.”

  “Tell me.” She leaned forward, the gun still a very real threat.

  “Why should I? You’re going to kill me.”

  Hillary seemed to reconsider for a moment.

  “I’ll let you say good-bye.” She nodded toward Gabriel, who was having a yelling match with one of the vendors. Probably about the trash he was spreading around.

  An opportunity to talk to Gabriel would be invaluable. There was a very real chance Nikki could escape this situation alive. If Hillary was really dead set on killing her, she’d have done it already. Dragging it out meant she had other things on her mind.

  “I am an FBI agent.” There was nothing wrong with admitting the truth now. One way or another, Hillary would be going away when this all went down.

  “See!”

  “There was an NSA report, and one of the things that tipped us off that Wilson was in Miami was that he was making arrangements for a lady friend here. I just assumed that was you.” The lie felt cold on Nikki’s tongue.

  “What kind of arrangements?” Hillary’s gaze narrowed.

  “A condo. A car. The necessities.” Nikki shrugged. If she supplied just enough details, Hillary could fill in the blanks.

  There was no such report, but Hillary wouldn’t know that. It wasn’t the most ethical thing Nikki had ever done to keep a suspect talking, but her life was on the line.

  “That bastard,” Hillary spat. She turned and chewed on a nail. “I knew he was seeing someone else, but putting her up somewhere? That’s rich. And here all I’ve been doing is helping him with this stupid plan. This stupid, stupid plan.” She slapped the steering wheel with the heel of her hand.

  Nikki eyed the six-shooter. How was the trigger weighted? What were th
e chances it would go off in the car?

  “What plan?” Nikki asked.

  “Like I’ll tell you.”

  “You’re going to kill me. Might as well tell me, right?”

  Hillary studied her for a moment. There was something not quite right about the way her eyes looked. As if they were slightly unfocused.

  “You could be wired,” she said.

  “Wired?” Nikki held out her hands and looked down at herself. “Where the hell would that go?”

  “It could be small. In your hair, in your clothes, something tiny. I’m not telling you shit.”

  “Fine. Fine. Okay.” The situation was far too calm. “I guess this other woman is the one with all the info. You were just a mistake, then. God, I can’t believe I didn’t see it.” Nikki sighed and rubbed her forehead.

  “Who is she?” Hillary demanded.

  “Beats me.”

  “You know where this condo is, right?” Hillary twisted the key in the ignition and the Mustang rumbled, chugging to life, spitting up smoke behind them.

  Shit.

  “I’ve never been there.” Nikki scrambled to remember the crew’s addresses.

  “But you know it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You won’t find the shit there,” Hillary screamed at Gabriel, leaning forward and gripping the wheel.

  Where should we look?

  Hillary flopped back, slashing her gaze toward Nikki.

  “They aren’t in the trash.” Hillary smirked. “You want to know where they are?”

  Yes. Yes, I do.

  “Not here.” She pressed the accelerator and the car lurched forward. A few pedestrians scattered. “I think I’ll kill you in this bitch’s bed and make Gabriel come to me. That should be fun.”

  Nikki closed her eyes.

  Please, let the crazy lady crash.

  Or security stop them. Or one of the crew find them. Nikki wasn’t all that picky right now, she just wanted out of Hillary’s death trap of a car.

  “Where are we going?” Hillary asked.

  There was only one condo she knew the address for.