Officer out of Uniform (Lock and Key Book 2)

by Ranae Rose

  He came out dripping on the other side and followed the trail of wet pine needles and broken brush. He was faster than Randy, and gaining on him. His palm ached against the Glock’s grip, and he longed to feel the recoil as he finally put down the psychopath who’d taken more lives than a small town usually lost to violence in a decade’s time.

  The air was humid and seemed to cling to him as he tore through the scrubby forest. Indiscernible from his sweat, it streaked down his face like a wet mask. Small branches snapped back and stung his cheeks and shoulders, and each little blow marked an uptick in his excitement, his bloodlust. He’d never really wanted to kill anyone before Randy Levinson, but that reserve was gone now.

  Randy had flaunted his inhuman bent for cruelty and violence like a flag, waving it over Riley County.

  Henry’s response was animal, primitive – he’d stop him. There was no place in the world for someone like Randy Levinson, especially not here, where the people he’d so maliciously targeted were the reason Henry’s heart beat, the reason he woke up in the morning.

  The overwhelming urge to put an end to the nightmare was highlighted by a sudden pain, a burning hurt that sliced through Henry’s hip, riding the burst of a single close-range shot.

  Randy had a hand gun and had fired a shot backward while running. Miracle of miracles, it had actually hit Henry.

  Sort of. He knew from experience that adrenaline had to be dulling the pain, but the fact that he was still running told him the damage couldn’t be that bad. So he kept going, and met Randy’s eyes when the other man turned to look over his shoulder at him, presumably to see whether he’d been hit.

  That eye contact cost Randy dearly. He tripped over something in the underbrush and went flying. When he hit the ground he rolled and came up firing again.

  The poorly-aimed shot missed Henry, who stopped in his tracks and fired back. There were years of practice and experience behind his shot, and the Glock was the very one he’d been trained to use for work, the one he took to the range weekly to make sure he was always ready to use it.

  So it was no surprise when Randy groaned, head tipped back and eyes rolling as he doubled over on himself.

  It was a gut shot. The bloom of blood on Randy’s shirt was clearly visible.

  Henry had been aiming higher, for the chest, but Randy had jerked at the last moment.

  That movement had earned him a painful wound. The hollow point bullet had mushroomed and fragmented inside his intestines, tearing up tissue and carving multiple wound channels that would result in extensive internal bleeding. The damage was done and most likely irreparable. For Randy Levinson, it would mean a slow and agonizing death.

  Henry could smell the blood already from where he stood a few yards away. It was pooling around Randy, surrounding him in red.

  Henry saw blood in his mind’s eye, too. Desert sand spattered with it, the stuff so dark against the pale grit it seemed like the stain would remain forever, marking where his life had changed. And the warden’s blood, thick burgundy syrup congealing in the sun. So much blood, he could feel the wetness on his hands. He was to blame for those things, wasn’t he?

  He’d turned away from his friends seconds before they’d walked over that IED without him. He’d also failed to stop Randy Levinson during the first search, after he’d escaped the prison bus. Blood had been on his hands all this time, and now, there was more. For the first time, he welcomed it.

  Randy Levinson’s blood wouldn’t wash away the rest, but it would make it a little easier to bear. By stopping him Henry had saved the lives of people like Sasha and the rest of the PERT officers, not to mention the other innocent people who doubtlessly would’ve gotten in Levinson’s way.

  There was a balance to this killing – atonement, or as close as he could get to it. He wished he’d managed this sooner, but it had finally happened, and he could already feel the weight of the world lifting off his shoulders.

  Randy laughed, and with it came a gurgling sound. His weapon lay in the dirt a couple feet from his limp right hand. The knife wound Sasha had inflicted on that arm was a red gash above it.

  “Shoulda killed you when I had the chance. Can’t believe I missed.” There was panting, more gurgling. “That fucking dog…”

  Henry said nothing. What was there to say to a person – a monster – like this? Nothing that could impress upon him the weight of his crimes, nothing that could make him sorry. If Henry’s work had taught him anything, it was that some people lacked a capacity for guilt, whether innately or because years of selfishness and cruelty had eroded it.

  “Guess it doesn’t fucking matter, does it?” Randy’s gaze seemed to focus on Henry and then drift astray as he spoke. “I still got your girlfriend.”

  Ice water trickled down Henry’s spine – or at least, that was how it felt. He was frozen with his Glock still in hand as Randy’s words swirled around him, their possible magnitude decimating his thoughts of the desert and the warden.

  Was it true – had he hurt Sasha? Or was he just bullshitting him?

  Hacking laughter mixed with gurgling noises bubbled up from Randy’s throat. “You’re hopin’ I’m lying – I can see it on your face, plain as day. And I would lie to you, just to see you look like you’d been kicked in the balls. But I’m not – I don’t have to. That bitch is a crispy pile of bones by now.”

  The world reeled around Henry, and his head pounded with sudden, unbearable pressure. He knew there was a chance Randy was just messing with him, but there was also a chance he wasn’t.

  Jesus, even the smallest chance that he’d done something to Sasha was enough to make Henry sick. If he knew for sure that he’d return to Wisteria to find that she’d died while he’d chased after Randy, he’d eat his Glock right there, go out with this worthless bastard.

  If Sasha was really dead, it wasn’t just what Henry wanted – it was what he deserved.

  Randy kept laughing. “How does it feel? To know the only person you gave a shit about is dead?” He grinned, and though it looked more like a grimace, there was obvious glee in the expression. “You can tell me… I know what you’re feelin’. Nothing matters anymore, does it? You realize that when it’s just you, you don’t really give enough of a shit to keep going. What’s the fuckin’ point?”

  Henry was cold – so cold – deep down in his bones, his gut. With each second that ticked by, he became more afraid that Levinson was telling the truth. And if he was – if Sasha was really gone – he’d fucking nailed it. Had fucking laid out exactly how Henry would feel.

  And then a breeze kicked up. Stirred the leaves around Henry’s head, and brought a scent with it: smoke. The scent was familiar, undeniable. It swirled around them, and Randy flashed that painful-looking grin again.

  There was a fire. Another fucking fire. The evidence fogged the air and Henry’s mind, threatening to bring him to his knees. He wasn’t sure why he held out, why he fought the urge to collapse.

  Training, maybe. It sure as hell wasn’t an impulse supported by his feelings. Half of him wanted to lie down and die. The other half wanted…

  He raised his gun, aimed it at Randy Levinson. He could finish him off now, could shut him the fuck up.

  Randy stretched out his messed-up arm, fumbled clumsily for his weapon.

  Henry was stricken with the sudden urge to let him pick it up. He could let it end like this, and no one would ever know. Then it would all be over, and he’d either slip into whatever life came next, or be buried under the sand and blood that haunted his dreams, crushed into nonexistence beneath the weight of nothingness.

  Hopefully that was how it was – hopefully there was nothing after this. He couldn’t bear the thought of rubbing shoulders or angel wings with the people he’d failed in this life, couldn’t stand the idea of a heaven haunted by the ones he’d loved and lost.

  Still, he had a finger on the trigger of his own weapon. His own weakness weighed on him like gravity, beckoning him to the ground. He was ca
ught between that and one small hope: the hope that Sasha was still alive, that this had all been Randy Levinson’s final lie.

  The idea tore through him like electricity, a current of possibility that was painful in its intensity. And he felt the beginnings of shame, of having almost thrown everything he ached for away. If Sasha was alive, and he did this – let this happen – he’d be wounding her deeply and irreparably.

  He couldn’t do that to her. He loved her. And so he pulled the trigger. Twice.

  The bullets burrowed into Levinson’s chest and blood welled up immediately, marking two side-by-side spots.

  It had been Henry’s experience that evil people usually lived the longest – defied odds that were stacked enormously out of their favor – and he witnessed that again as Randy continued to move. Somehow, he even mustered up enough breath to speak. “I hear those voices callin’ me. You hear them too, don’t you? You’re no better than me. No better.”

  Knuckles white against the grip, Randy lifted his gun, barking out one more choking gurgle.

  Maybe it was supposed to be laughter. Henry never found out, because Randy positioned the gun and pulled the trigger, blowing chunks of his own skull and brain into the air.

  A final act of defiance, a final grab for control. He’d killed himself like he’d killed so many others: without hesitation.

  Had that been his plan all along? The question had barely passed through Henry’s mind before he turned on his heel and ran in the direction he’d come. Toward the plantation house and the revelation that waited for him: a new lease on life, or the end of it all.

  CHAPTER 32

  6 Years Ago

  Helmand Province, Afghanistan: though Henry had been there for months, it was far from a temporary home. It was too hostile for that, merely the place where his boots touched the ground and he laid his head down – warily – at night. He was always grateful for that: the chance to lie down, mark off another day of his deployment. He tried not to think about it too much though, because that only made it seem longer.

  For now, the scorching heat and familiar stretches of boredom punctuated by bursts of adrenaline were his life. It was his second deployment, and he handled it all right, most days.

  Today was different. He had a bad feeling, an uneasiness churning in his gut, an itch between his shoulder blades. He felt like a target, out here sandwiched between dry earth and an endless, barely-blue sky. The muted shade was almost white, like the sun shone so hard here that it had bleached the color from everything, even the air.

  Maybe it was that they’d been here before and had exchanged fire just yards from where he stood now. Maybe it was the fact that the compound they were approaching could hold anything. That was what people feared the most, wasn’t it? The unknown. Things they couldn’t see, but felt in their bones.

  He was no different – he was only human. In this place, he’d learned to anticipate the possibilities, as awful and infinite as they sometimes seemed. The compound might be the mother of hidden surprises, deathtraps contained within walls that had hidden the truth from their view as they’d laid all their careful plans.

  He breathed in the dust stirred up by Addison and Rafferty’s boots. They were two members of the four-man fire team he led. Today they’d been grouped together with two other teams to form a squad, and someone else was in charge. Henry wasn’t calling the shots, and so he did his best to tune out the inexplicable uneasiness that had his skin crawling.

  Rafferty turned and shot Henry a brief look, half frown and half grin. Henry recognized the expression as an admission that the situation sucked, but forging on was inevitable.

  Did Rafferty have the same feeling Henry did? And what about Addison and Garrow, his rifleman?

  He was gripped by the urge to ask them, to know whether they felt it too. Because if they didn’t, and it was just him, it was probably nothing to worry about. But he knew these men better than he knew anyone else. They relied on each other in a way most people outside the Marine Corps had never experienced, would never experience. So if they felt it too…

  He opened his mouth to speak, but a sound in the distance distracted him. It had the ring of a powerful noise heard from far away, and he turned, took an instinctive step toward it as he squinted against the inescapable glare of the noon sun.

  The next sound came from behind him. Much louder, much closer. It was accompanied by an impact, one that slammed up against the back of him. There was no real pain, just force, and he got the feeling that the prickling between his shoulder blades was real now – something was sticking in him.

  He turned in time to see Addison on the ground, and Rafferty falling. The scene in front of him seemed scrambled, like he was trying to watch TV and the image was fucked-up, blurred lines that didn’t quite make a clear picture.

  And then he realized what he was looking at. Addison’s legs were gone below the knees, and though Rafferty looked whole, he was lying on the ground in a way that made it clear he was worse off than he looked. Another split second of staring revealed that he was bleeding from the neck.

  The smell of burning flesh filled the air, mixed with the scent of homemade explosives.

  Henry cradled his weapon as he got down on his knees, tried to see whether his friends were still alive.

  Other Marines gathered too, and the corpsman pushed through. Tried to stop the blood from flowing from what was left of Addison’s legs with tourniquets, shot him up with morphine and wrote a big letter M on his forehead in black marker.

  Rafferty never got the morphine; whatever had cut him had gone through the jugular. Most of his blood seemed to have gone into the ground already. The dry soil soaked it right up, drew it deep into the bloodthirsty earth.

  By the time the helicopter came, Henry could feel the blood running down the crack of his ass, down his legs. Redness blotted the desert camo pattern. Still, he wasn’t lying on the ground like Rafferty, or Addison, whose eyes looked glassy now.

  They still made him get in the helicopter. He got the feeling that he must look worse than he felt, though he couldn’t see his own back, just the stains spreading over the legs of his pants.

  The helicopter climbed higher and higher above the place where blood marked the ground like a sloppy X. He stared, then watched as everyone inside the helicopter gave up on Addison.

  Both of his dead friends were so close he could’ve reached out and touched them, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d left them both behind on the ground, back where they’d last stood together.

  * * * * *

  Henry crossed the creek and got back to the plantation house’s grounds in time to see smoke billowing from a window near the foundation. Two guys in work boots and grass-stained pants burst out of the open basement door. They were carrying someone between them – a woman. Her clothes were filthy, but her hair was blonde and her bright red shoes were unmistakable.

  They laid her on the grass, and a loud noise sounded from somewhere in the distance – a siren. Henry didn’t turn toward it, couldn’t look away. He was frozen on the near side of the creek, fifty yards from where Kerry and a woman with short silver hair were now kneeling beside Sasha.

  Henry heard Kerry’s sobbing from where he stood, loud and clear.

  Kerry and Sasha had been best friends for years. An intense tightness worked its way through Henry’s chest, and a wrenching feeling beneath his breastbone made him weak as he stared. The tiny brunette’s shoulders shook, and her dark hair hung in front of her face like a veil. Henry was momentarily mesmerized by her grief, by an empathy that ran deep, rooted in his past.

  And then any ability he had to empathize was swallowed up by a sense of déjà vu that crushed him. A part of him wanted to go to Sasha, no matter what, but his guilt was an unbearable burden, too heavy to allow him to walk. Her mother was approaching now, running out of the restaurant building and toward her daughter.

  That broke him, destroyed any thoughts he’d had of intruding on the scen
e. Instead, he forced himself to watch from a distance, where he belonged. He wished for Brutus to crawl out of the creek and swallow him whole, but it didn’t happen.

  This was his fault. He’d been so focused on redeeming himself that he’d turned his back on the woman he loved in her time of desperate need. He’d as good as killed her. He’d taken her mother’s only child, Kerry’s closest friend. He’d inflicted the pain he’d been carrying around all these years on other people, and he’d torn himself in half in the process.

  Flashbacks hit his consciousness in rapid fire fashion, disjointed and fleeting. He tried to hold onto them, tried to lose himself in the memories and be anywhere but here, anyone but the man who’d abandoned Sasha to die. It didn’t work, though: the memories flashed like flickering lights, then died, leaving him alone in the stark darkness of his current reality.

  Jesus, he’d fucked up. He’d put it all on the line, loving her. And it’d all blown up again. The agony of knowing what he’d done – of seeing her laid out in the grass like Rafferty or Addison in the sand – raged around him, an inferno of unbearable guilt that burnt away his naïve hopes that he could make up for his old failures, get past them. Every fiber of his being screamed for an escape, for anything to make it stop.

  Moments ago, he’d shoved his gun back into his duty belt holster as he’d sprinted toward the house. It seemed incredibly heavy on his hip, but when he drew it and lifted it to his head, it was the lightest thing in the world.

  * * * * *

  6 Years Ago

  Life was no longer simple. Before, each day of Henry’s deployment had been defined by the fact that he was still alive. Now, he was a little banged up and heavily bandaged, but still overwhelmingly fine. The gashes that’d been carved into the skin and muscle of his back by pieces of shrapnel the day before were deep, but they’d heal. He wasn’t missing any body parts – not so much as a pinky finger.