The NightShade Forensic Files: Fracture Five (Book 2)

by A. J. Scudiere

Sometimes it was a video playing over top of the real world. Sometimes snippets sounded in his head, as though he was hearing them again. Alya yelling. His men screaming. The jungle of bullets, popping air as they screamed by him.

  But now, it entirely took him over as he sunk even deeper. Sight, taste, sound, hammering heart. He couldn’t see or react beyond it.

  He watched the shadows move and change beyond the sheets. The girls emerged, heads fully covered in the soft beige hijabs they wore around the house. As though they were hidden, or protected, but then it didn’t matter when he saw the rifles they held.

  Cooper stiffened, his own rifle lowering to take aim on the friends turned enemies. As he looked briefly down the line at the edge of the trees, he saw his fellow men’s rifles already aimed. In slow motion, as he lined up for the standoff, he realized he was the last one in place.

  Their father rounded the corner of the house, his movements precise and drawn out through the viscous scope of Cooper’s flashback. He, too, held a gun.

  The shape of it, the exact matte color, the weight of it he could see in the way the man held it—it was American. This man he thought was his friend was aiming a gun provided by Cooper’s own country on Cooper and his own men.

  He knew that bullets would start singing a split second from now.

  He already knew who would die—the father, Benj Freeman, . . . the list went on.

  But he didn’t know who’d drawn first.

  Eleri and Walter were left following the woman in the coupe. Surprisingly, Eleri was impressed by Walter’s skills at tracking the car without giving herself away.

  Eleri had classes in this. She’d passed with flying colors, both at the Academy and later by not having the people she was following turn on her. But Walter took it to a whole new level.

  Early on, she managed to suss out several cars heading long distance on the freeway, and tucked herself into the pack. The pack changed, but Walter didn’t make it obvious. If the woman in the coupe looked back, it wouldn’t look like Walter was behind her.

  Donovan had tapped out, having to work through an attack with Cooper. Eleri wondered what that looked like, but it was only about ten minutes later that he got on the phone and said they could get back in the game.

  Eleri laughed when she heard him ask Cooper Rollins if he was good to go. And then he blurted out, “Hell, no, you can’t drive.”

  Even Walter had giggled at that one, and Eleri was impressed once again, this time that Walter could giggle. When the call ended, she asked Walter, “Is Rollins really good to go? He can just have an attack and pop right back up?”

  Walter shrugged. “Only he can say if he is. A lot of guys get real depressed after an episode.” The other woman looked sideways at her, her one hand never coming off the steering wheel, her eyes somehow still on the road as she checked Eleri out. “You ever have a panic attack?”

  “Not really. I’ve panicked. But it was always at the appropriate time. If there is an appropriate time to panic.”

  “I’m sure it’s not the same for everyone. But it’s like that. Heart racing, adrenaline going. Sometimes the guys don’t know why they’re panicking, and that makes you look around for something wrong. You try to find something bad, so you can justify why you feel that way.” She slid casually over a lane, staying far enough behind the yellow coupe. “True PTSD is worse. They relive a traumatic event or events when they get triggered. Cooper’s got it bad. Not often, but when it happens, he isn’t even here anymore.”

  “You know some if this from experience?”

  “Panic attacks, yes. Not anymore though. I saw a shrink and it helped a lot.” She paused and then continued. “A lot of the guys went to Dr. Gardiner. He treated as many for free as he could. Held group classes on techniques to do when you feel it coming on. All on his own time because a lot of the guys downtown don’t have anything but the VA and the VA is booked.”

  “His death was felt by a lot of these guys then?”

  Walter nodded. “I’m in this as much to get his killer as anything else.”

  Eleri bit her tongue. Wanted to say it was Aziza. Wanted to tell Walter that the woman they were following killed Mrs. Loreen Sullivan.

  Eleri recognized her, but was unable to say so. Donovan understood, and thank God for that, but she couldn’t say anything else. She couldn’t say how she had the knowledge. Couldn’t say how she recognized her when Donovan didn’t. What a fucking mess. Instead Eleri sat in the passenger seat, trailing quietly behind a murderer, checking in with Donovan and Cooper.

  “We’re out near Westlake Village. How far away are you?”

  “Catching up. Weaving traffic like a mad dog. Maybe another seven minutes behind you.” He spoke through the phone and she heard some of the conversation and laughed again.

  “Yes, you are better at this than me. Except for the part where you suddenly abandoned your post in the middle of the fucking freeway at sixty miles per hour.”

  Then she sobered up. “Abandoned his post?”

  “Yeah, fucker vacated the driver’s seat in the middle of traffic. He starts some episode, then weaves, then he’s on the right side of me in the passenger seat, and no one is fucking driving the car.”

  “Holy shit.” She did have to admit that was some serious skill to get out of the driver’s seat while driving. At least Donovan and Cooper were okay.

  Walter tapped her on the shoulder, and she told Donovan what they were seeing. “She’s turning off.” Eleri relayed the exit number and said she’d text updates before hanging up and paying attention to their quarry.

  This woman stabbed Loreen Sullivan with a bomb. Eleri’s heart started pounding as the coupe made turn after turn. They were close enough to see the woman start checking the review mirror.

  Shit. She was suspecting them of doing exactly what they were doing.

  Her phone rang and she hit the button. “Where are you?”

  It wasn’t Donovan, but Cooper who spoke. He must have grabbed the phone while Donovan drove. “Right behind you. Peel off.”

  “Turn!” She said it firmly, but made a big deal of pointing to a house up ahead. If the woman was watching, she’d see the two women seeming to find their address.

  Walter pulled over, parking at the curb, taking a moment to do a three point turn and face the appropriate way on the street. As Eleri’s heart pounded at the thought of losing the woman, she saw the big SUV leisurely pace up the side street. Cooper and Donovan had arrived.

  “We have to get out.” Walter announced even as she pushed the door open and pulled a purse from the back seat. Eleri wondered what was in it. She didn’t think she’d ever seen Walter with a purse before. But the accessory and the softer gait made her new partner look more like any woman visiting a friend.

  Eleri got out, too, similar accessory purse in her hand. “Over there?”

  She pointed to the house tucked just beyond the cross street. It was close and would get them out of the way, since they couldn’t go knock on a door. They had just rounded the corner and Eleri peeked through some tall shrubs when she saw the yellow coupe come around again. “Walter.”

  She only said the other woman’s name, but together they ducked into the bushes as the coupe slowed down, checking on the now empty car.

  She had made them.

  Eleri was already hissing into her phone. “Hold back. She’s looping. Don’t let her see you.”

  But Donovan was on it. He’d gone straight through the intersection and Eleri left the phone line open so they could still track the yellow car.

  She and Walter watched the woman drive slowly past, look at the car, the house they’d stopped at, and more. Eleri breathed a sigh of relief that it appeared that several people were in the house.

  She and Donovan had already mistakenly alerted Ken Kellen and this cell that someone was onto them. The group already moved their base. They might have changed their plans. Her heart pounded as she hoped they hadn’t screwed this up. She hoped the fact
that the car was empty, that it looked like they’d gone inside, would help convince the woman in the coupe that it was just coincidence.

  The coupe drove past. Her heart started beating again, and Eleri hissed another message to Donovan as it headed another block down and took a turn.

  “On it.” He spoke back, sounding distant, as though the phone were on speaker. Then a full minute later, “She’s stopped at a house. She has a duffle bag in her hand.”

  “She didn’t carry it out to the car with her. It was already inside.” Eleri reminded them. That was bad.

  Cooper’s voice came over. “She’s greeted by the occupant. They’re talking at the door.”

  “Get me the address!” Eleri motioned frantically to Walter to use the tablet she’d pulled from her purse.

  They were standing on a small sidewalk in an unknown neighborhood, partially hidden by bushes and frantically working on two tablets simultaneously. If anyone was following the woman—a car had gone past—they were toast. Eleri wanted to pray, but she didn’t have the time. She had a military database up and waited for Walter to provide a name from her pull of the address.

  Eleri input the name and waited.

  Just then, Donovan’s voice came over the phone, a worried tone underneath the words. “The woman at the house doesn’t seem to want the other woman to come in. She’s being friendly, though. El, it looks like she’s sick. She’s coughing.”

  Eleri tucked the tablet under her arm and shoved Walter. “RUN!”

  36

  Donovan put the pieces together at the same time Eleri did.

  “Get out of the car.” He pushed on Rollins’ arm, a base reaction to the situation. Even as he crouched out the door and stayed low to the road, he pulled the gun from his holster and chambered a round.

  Gun or bomb? Too many questions.

  The pre-packed duffel bag. The woman at the house was sick. Coughing the same way Eleri said Loreen Sullivan was, right before this same woman stabbed her.

  As he watched, the blonde woman applied some sympathy and seemed to talk her way into the home of the now grateful older woman.

  Did she have a military connection?

  “Do you know her?” Donovan looked at Cooper Rollins.

  “No.” The other man was now in a stance similar to his own. Donovan had watched him practically roll around the back of the car to join up, his movements far too smooth to be anything other than innate by now. Rollins had also drawn a weapon Donovan wasn’t sure he should have possession of. Not after the breakdown he’d seen on the freeway.

  “You good with that?” he asked, as though the man would say ‘no’ and hand it over.

  “I’m fine.”

  Donovan wasn’t convinced, but he didn’t have other options.

  He signaled with his hand to Cooper, not sure if the other man was used to the same system, but it seemed to work and the two of them were partway up the walk when Eleri and Walter came running up the cross street and immediately dropped into position as they spotted the men.

  The four of them slowed their movements, all keeping low and approaching the house, weapons out. Donovan thought the women looked a little odd with purses tucked under their arms, and guns out, but it wasn’t the time to criticize.

  As he watched, Eleri frowned over his shoulder and he saw her pull her badge and hold it up to someone he couldn’t see, then put her finger to her lips. She must be signaling someone looking out a window or driving by.

  If the police showed up, what would happen?

  He only hoped whomever she was motioning to listened. And that they got somewhere safe. He had no solid idea what had been in that duffel bag. He’d put money on one of those knives that exploded, but he wouldn’t put a lot of money on it.

  Just when he and Rollins made it to the front bushes, Eleri and Walter hit the edge of the house. With a few signals, she opened their phone lines, quickly dialing in the four of them, and whispered, “Walter and I are headed around back. See what you can see.”

  “Time?”

  “I don’t know.” She answered back.

  She’d seen this woman kill Loreen Sullivan. She’d been Mrs. Sullivan for a few moments. When Eleri described the scene, it sounded like the woman had talked her way in, gotten close to her target, and stabbed her.

  If this story was the same, they didn’t have time to wait and case the joint.

  Any second they could hear the sound of a human being blowing up from the inside. The sound of failure.

  Donovan had seen the results and didn’t want any part of being here for that. So he crept closer to the door without waiting for a signal from his partner.

  A tap on his shoulder brought him around to see that Cooper was as close as his shadow and was moving around to the front of their little duo. Reaching for the old fashioned knob on the front door, the other man put a finger to his lips and turned it without making a sound, even to Donovan’s keen ears.

  Impressive.

  The finger-to-lips signal irritated Donovan, though he knew it was generic code for quiet entry.

  Rollins cracked the door and peeked through before sliding inside. Donovan followed, turning himself sideways to enter without disturbing anything more than they had to. A squeak, a footstep, even just a change in the lighting could alert the occupants they were there.

  He pushed the door closed behind him and slowly moved into the living area, stepping where Rollins stepped, as the other man led the way back toward the voices coming from the kitchen. The area had a small table and Donovan was motioning Rollins out of the way. The military man had gotten them in the door, but Donovan knew what was going down here. No one had told Cooper Rollins how this happened the last time.

  He heard the younger woman graciously accept an offer of tea, and when he heard the cabinets open, he slowly moved just one eye through the doorway. First he saw the occupant of the house—Mrs. Deen, the younger woman had called her—carefully plucking supplies from her cupboard. Then he saw the back of the head of the woman they’d followed here. Sarah. Mrs. Deen called her Sarah.

  Neither seemed to hear him.

  He saw Eleri in the back yard, also watching the scene.

  While Mrs. Deen puttered, Sarah leaned over, her long hair swishing to block his view. Unzipping the duffel, she pulled something out and moved it quietly into her lap.

  He looked to Eleri, outside the window. Though she’d seen the same motion from the other side, whatever the woman had pulled out wasn’t obvious.

  He held back. Don’t assume. Don’t assume.

  He could look like an idiot if he drew on her. He could kill someone without sufficient evidence. Worse, he could kill her and blow a hole in the entire Fracture Five plot. He couldn’t act unless he knew shit was going down.

  He held up his hand for Rollins to stay back, and he rolled slowly out of the line of sight. Eleri had eyes on the kitchen. Though it was silent, the phone line was open. She’d let them know if he needed anything.

  He waited.

  “You sound really sick.” Sarah started talking, and he prayed it was nothing; at the same time, he hoped it was gold.

  “I have been. I’m usually healthy, you know, but I just can’t shake this.”

  Donovan heard what he assumed was a kettle, heard the rattle and the water glug from the spring water bottle in the corner of the room. Then it went to hell.

  “Sounds like a bad infection. Or maybe ricin poisoning.”

  “Ricin?” The rattling stopped. Footsteps indicated that Mrs. Deen’s movements slowed.

  Donovan wouldn’t be able to look without being seen. And once she saw him, she’d give him away.

  “Yes. It’s ricin.” Sarah was smug. “I put it in your food the other day.”

  “What?” The breath behind the voice got heavy, and Donovan wanted to move so desperately, but they needed this intel.

  Clearly the older woman was a kind, gentle soul who took her tea in china cups, but she was no idiot. Her voic
e hardened to a brittle sheen. “Why would you do that? I’ve been nothing but good to you.”

  Another smug sigh. “But your son hasn’t. Did you know he’s dealing arms through your house? You had to know. You had to.”

  The movement at the counter stopped. Donovan didn’t know if that meant Mrs. Deen was shocked by the idea or by the fact that Sarah had found her out. He didn’t have time to sort the details, so he just kept listening.

  “You’ve been shorting us.” Sarah was on the move. She’d stood up, was moving closer to the older woman.

  “Sarah, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  His adrenaline kicked up another notch as he looked out through the window to see that Eleri couldn’t really hear what was being said in the kitchen, not through the phone line. But she made a small motion—palms up.

  She could not see a weapon. It wasn’t time to move yet.

  “Tell me where the money is and I’ll give you the antidote.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Something hit the counter with a thud, but though Donovan jerked at the noise, Eleri shook her head.

  They had to keep waiting, see how it was playing out. They had to walk in with everyone alive and with sufficient evidence for a takedown.

  Also, there were two consultants here—not agents, and not under the NightShade directive. The last thing the two of them needed was Rollins or Walter on their asses. So Donovan waited, tense as piano wire, ready to strike, yell, fire if necessary.

  “You know where he keeps the money.”

  “You’re going to kill me. There is no antidote to ricin.” The voice was steel now. “I’m not telling you shit.”

  “You will!”

  The sound of sudden movement accompanied the words and without conscious thought, Donovan sprang forward. Cooper Rollins was so close behind him, Donovan could not have stopped moving even if he’d tried.

  His gun was out, leading the way around the corner. Just as his foot planted on the kitchen tiles, the back door crashed open, Eleri and Walter busting through.

  Mrs. Deen and Sarah stood face to face, almost surrounded by the four operatives, each with a drawn gun. Mrs. Deen’s back was pressed to the counter and she looked shocked, though Donovan couldn’t discern why—there were far too many options. Was she surprised by the turn of events with Sarah? With people in street clothes busting through her doors, guns drawn?