Packing Heat

by Penny McCall

  HARMONY WOKE UP THE NEXT MORNING AND DISENTANGLED herself from Cole, trying not to feel bereft as she did it, definitely not thinking about how it might be for the last time. Her feelings for him were the least of her worries.

  Her palms were sweaty and her stomach felt squishy, a combination of nerves and achiness and, yeah, fear. She wasn’t stupid; the kidnappers had no intention of releasing Richard. They’d do whatever it took to get the money, and they’d leave as few witnesses behind as possible. Cole was probably safe, since he’d be useful to them, but the odds of her and Richard coming out of this alive were pretty low. Single digits. Like zero. Which was a self-defeating thought, and she wasn’t giving up until five minutes after she was dead.

  Cole came into the bathroom while she was in the shower, and the need rose in her as it always did. But she couldn’t put herself back there again. She couldn’t afford the distraction.

  “Can you put the rest of the money into the account?” she asked him, already reaching for a towel when he pulled back the shower curtain.

  There was silence, and she knew she’d hurt his feelings. She stepped out of the shower, lifted onto her toes, and kissed him—more than a kiss, it was a plea for understanding. He didn’t disappoint her.

  “Okay if I take a shower first?” he said.

  “Sure, I even left you some hot water.” But she reached behind her and turned it off, laughing when he yelled because the water was ice-cold, and then shrieking herself when he splashed some on her.

  It was only a small bit of horseplay between the two of them, but it made her feel better, as if this day was like any other. Of course, normal for them meant everyone from Russian kidnappers to federal officers was trying to give them grief. Which would all be over in a few hours, she told herself, for better or worse. It was a little tarnished as silver linings went, but she couldn’t be too choosy.

  She didn’t waste a lot of time getting ready, just let her hair dry into her natural curls and swiped on some mascara. She put on a T-shirt and jeans, topping it off with the jacket that hid her shoulder holster. She was strapping on her ankle piece when Cole came out of the bathroom.

  He didn’t say anything as he pulled on his clothes, not until she picked up her phone.

  “Can we talk about how this is going down, first?” he asked her before she dialed.

  “I get the feeling you don’t want to talk so much as make a point, which is?”

  “Don’t go into this expecting you can somehow atone for the past, Harm. I know that’s why you’re here, but saving Richard now isn’t going to change what happened to your parents.”

  “I know that,” she said, although if she’d learned one thing over the last ten days, it was that she couldn’t keep her emotions completely in check. The trick was to accept what she was feeling instead of fighting it. Take last night, for instance, in the shower. Fighting her emotion had completely blocked her off, but when she’d let go . . . Well, the undertaking had turned out successfully, she thought with a small smile.

  Taking on the Russians was no different—scarier and a lot more dangerous than sex with Cole, but the principal was the same. There was no way to plan ahead, only outwit, outlast, and outplay. It was like Survivor, only the stakes were her life and Richard’s. And Cole’s possibly, which pained her the most. If she was going to keep them all in one piece she’d need her wits sharp and her mind clear. Fighting her emotions would only split her focus and hamper her ability to adjust to whatever situation presented itself. And Step One was to mitigate the risk.

  “Look,” she said to Cole, “I think you should stay here. Your part in this is done.”

  “Nope,” he replied with infuriating nonchalance.

  “I dragged you into this. You should take off, get lost, stay out of jail.” And stay alive. “You won’t be any good to me, anyway. Everyone will have guns except you.”

  “It’s not going to come to guns. They can’t kill us.”

  “Until they get the password and account number.”

  “By then we’ll be gone with Richard.” He looked up from the laptop, his gaze intent on her face, uncomfortably intent. She had to turn away. “It’s not like you to be so negative,” he said to her back. “Where’s the famous optimism?”

  “I’m just trying to be realistic. The chance of success is pretty low.”

  “You’ll think of something, Harm. You always do.”

  “Well, now we know where the optimism went.”

  “It’s not optimism; it’s faith in you. In us.”

  Harmony closed her eyes, unbelievably touched, another emotion she couldn’t afford at the moment. “I’ll try not to disappoint you,” she said, dialing her FBI cell with her back still to Cole. Her voice was even, but she knew her face would give her away.

  The head kidnapper picked up the phone on the first ring, and she shifted the heartache to one side and let necessity dictate her actions.

  “Is good to hear from you,” the now recognizable voice intoned with the now familiar Russian imperiousness, “as you are no longer at the Hotel Bel-Air.”

  “We’re just full of surprises,” Harmony said.

  “Leave the password and acc—”

  “It’ll be a trade. Face-to-face.”

  “Nyet.”

  “Then the deal is off.”

  “Very well.” And he hung up.

  She put the phone down on the table next to Cole. “Whatever happens, don’t let me touch that again for thirty minutes.” Then she handed him her guns, too.

  Cole set them by the phone, staring at them for a minute like they were alien artifacts. Then he looked at her the same way.

  “Just in case,” she said.

  Twenty-two minutes of sheer torture ticked by before Harmony shot to her feet, unable to take anymore. “It’s been long enough.”

  “You said thirty minutes.”

  “I’ve made my point,” she said. “Give me the phone.”

  Cole slid it away from her. She dove for it, coming up with her ankle gun instead, and pointing it at him.

  He rolled his eyes. “You won’t shoot me.”

  “That’s what you said last time,” she reminded him.

  “And I was right. You missed on purpose, remember? And you don’t know the account number,” he added, seeming a little concerned when the gun didn’t waver. “You can’t do this without the account number.”

  “Fine.” She put the gun down and went for the phone again.

  Cole lifted it out of her reach.

  “Really,” she insisted, “I’ve made my point.”

  She jumped in an attempt to reach the phone. He only lifted it higher, so she dropped her hand to his crotch, cupping her fingers around him, not with the intent to hurt, but he hunched instinctively anyway, so she grabbed the phone and slipped out of reach, putting a heavy armchair between them.

  “Dirty pool,” Cole said.

  “There are no rules in life-and-death situations. And thirty minutes was just a guideline.”

  Cole shrugged. “You’ve got the phone, make the call.”

  Harmony took a couple of deep breaths, trying to get a grip before she could call. She couldn’t have the kidnappers hearing her breath hitch and thinking they were getting to her.

  “Want me to call?” Cole asked, smirking, which immediately ticked her off.

  “I’ll do it,” she said, already dialing since irritation had steadied her nerves. Which was probably what Cole had intended. “I’ve got it under control, so you can stop with the reverse psychology,” she said to him, although she didn’t have time to give him even the abridged explanation because the kidnappers answered on the fourth ring. “Are you ready to come to an agreement?” she asked.

  “If your friend is dead, no agreement is necessary.”

  “Then I see no point to this conversation,” Harmony said. Her heart was pounding hard enough to bang against her ribs. She let it bang, regulating her breathing so it didn’t affect her outward
ly. “I guess that means you can kiss the . . .” She looked at Cole, he gave her the thumbs up. “. . . thirty million dollars good-bye.” And she hung up.

  This time she had no problem waiting. She didn’t have to. The phone rang, she gave it a beat, then answered. “I’m listening.”

  “You wish to meet in person.”

  “There’s no other way I’ll do this.”

  The kidnapper named an intersection in Los Angeles.

  “That’s South Central.”

  “Correct.”

  It had been renamed South Los Angeles, but it hadn’t altered reality. “Not a very safe area,” Harmony observed blandly.

  “The neighbors will not bother you if you do not bother them.”

  He had a point. Asking questions in a place where people would shoot you as soon as look at you was dangerous. So was taking a meet, but she’d pushed the Russians about as far as she could—with the exception of one last request, and they’d surely be expecting it. “I want to speak to Richard before I agree to anything.”

  “Nyet.”

  She huffed out a breath. “Are we going to have to play this game again?”

  “What game?”

  “The one where I hang up and call you back to prove I’m serious about walking away. Or maybe I won’t call back this time. What point would there be if I don’t have proof of life?”

  There was the customary three-second silence before Richard came on the line again. Russians didn’t waste time or words. “Harmony?” he said, sounding tired but pain-free.

  She had to swallow, so relieved to hear his voice tears came to her eyes. “How are you?” she managed to get out in a credibly even voice.

  “I’ve been better.” Richard paused, and there were only background noises, the kind of tinny voices, bonging, and scratchy music that probably came from a television playing some old movie in the background. Richard loved old movies, so it gave her hope they were treating him well.

  “It sounds like you’re strong at least.”

  “I am,” Richard said. “I don’t know what you said to them, but it’s been . . . tolerable.”

  “It’s almost over,” Harmony said. “Try to hold on.”

  “Listen, be careful, they’re planning some—” There was a yelp and he went silent.

  “Richard, are you all right?”

  “Yeah,” he said, breathing heavily, his voice strained. “I just have to watch—”

  “Agent Swift,” the kidnapper said, clearly having wrenched the phone away from Richard.

  “Yes.”

  “You come now.”

  Her phone beeped a low battery warning, but there was nothing she could do about it now. “I’ll be there, but you won’t get a dime unless Richard is well and able to walk out of there on his own steam. You don’t get the password until he’s free.”

  “This is not how exchange works.”

  “It’s how this exchange is going to work.”

  “How do we know to trust you?”

  Harmony snorted. “I’m not the criminal.”

  There was another moment of Russian silence, then he said, “I suggest you get moving, Agent Swift.”

  Harmony disconnected and picked up the room phone. “I requested you arrange for a rental car yesterday,” she said. “Can you have it out front in ten minutes? Thanks.”

  “Let’s go,” she said to Cole, hanging up the room phone and dropping her cell into the duffel. A minute ago she’d been shaky and nauseated. Suddenly she couldn’t wait to be in the same room with the bastards who’d kidnapped Richard. Finally being able to take action was a hell of a nerve steadier.

  She holstered her main gun and lifted her foot to a chair to seat her ankle piece.

  “If you do that in front of the kidnappers, it’ll be enough of a distraction,” Cole said.

  “I doubt Irina would be impressed.” Unless she got a look at Cole’s eyes. Cole’s eyes were intense, and hot enough that they should be outlawed in California wildfire territory. It wasn’t all about sex, either. He was a computer geek, but he’d spent eight years in jail, and this wasn’t just about freeing Richard, it was about freeing himself, too.

  chapter 27

  BY THE TIME THEY ARRIVED AT THE FRONT ENTRANCE of the hotel, a late-model Chrysler was waiting for them, a dull brown, four-door sedan with no rust and absolutely no curb appeal.

  “This is a step down,” Cole said.

  “Trust me, where we’re going, the GT would be a liability.”

  Cole got in the driver’s side. Harmony didn’t argue, climbing in and plugging her phone charger into the old cigarette lighter port. She directed him to the Rosa Parks Freeway, which took them east from Santa Monica to South Central, now known as South Los Angeles. She filled him in on her brief conversation along the way.

  “It’s a setup” was his immediate conclusion.

  “Of course, but what choice do we have?” But as she was replaying the conversation in her head, she remembered the sound she’d heard, the sound that had struck her as familiar before it had been drowned out by the phone’s warning beep.

  “What?” Cole asked her.

  “There was this sound in the background while Richard was speaking. A kind of bonging. I felt like I’d heard it somewhere before, but . . .” She frowned and shook her head. “I can’t place it.”

  “What did it sound like? A foghorn? A streetcar? No, that’s San Francisco. Church bells, maybe?”

  “I don’t know. It was deep, reverberating, like wind chimes only not so tinkly.” She blew out a breath, frustrated. “There’s no telling what it might be in LA. There’s a movie filming on every other street corner. The sound could be anything.”

  Like maybe a death knell. She shook off that depressing thought and put the sound out of her mind, watching the signs and directing Cole to the right exit.

  “Now I know why you wanted this car,” Cole said, steering the ten-year-old Chrysler off the highway into a neighborhood with gang graffiti on everything stationary, including a couple of street sleepers. “We’re not going to just walk into this meeting with absolutely no plan at all, are we?”

  “What do you propose we plan for? I know where we’re going, I know the general makeup of the neighborhood, but I can’t tell you any specifics.”

  “Irina and Leo are probably waiting to ambush us; we know that much.”

  “They won’t be waiting out in plain sight with their guns drawn, taking potshots at us. All we can do is take it slow and wait for them to make their move.”

  “No matter what we do we’re going to be surprised.”

  “That pretty much sums it up,” Harmony agreed. “The good news is they don’t want us dead, not until they get the new account number and password. And it should only be Irina and Leo. Based on history they think they can handle us.”

  “We handled them.”

  “You handled them, and they’ve adjusted for that, but so have we, and at least the numbers will be even. The really sketchy part will be getting to the meet. We’re going into gangland USA, the home turf of some of the nastiest, meanest criminals . . . Home turf. Home . . .”

  Cole glanced over at Harmony, just as she grabbed his arm, her frown turning slowly to a smile of dawning realization.

  “Turn the car around, Cole.”

  “What? Why?”

  “I know where Richard is, and it’s not South Central.”

  “LET ME GET THIS STRAIGHT,” COLE SAID, HIS EYES ON the road as they headed back to the freeway. “You have a house?”

  “In Hollywood, to be exact. Why are you surprised? You know I’m from California.”

  “But you live in Washington. Kind of extravagant to have a house you never use.”

  “It was my parents’.” Which said it all, judging by Cole’s expression, and made her add defensively, “I do use it. It’s a pretty good bribe. A bunch of stars live in the neighborhood, including this guy just down the hill from me who likes to meditate in his backyard. Na
ked. He’s been doing it for years, which should tell you how old he is and what a treat it would be to see him sitting cross-legged on a bamboo mat. Not that I ever saw him meditating, because my mother would never let me look out the west-facing windows from two to four in the afternoon, which is a shame because there are some really great views of the Pacific Ocean. And after the kidnapping I didn’t want the house sold. It was the last place I lived with my parents, you know, but I couldn’t live there again, so I only ever heard him meditating—”

  “Okay, I get it,” he said, looking bemused.

  “I’m sorry,” Harmony said, “too much information. I’m a little nervous.”

  He got that, too. “You think they’re holding Richard at your house?”

  “Yes.”

  “Because your neighbor is into meditation.”

  “And he rings a gong while he meditates.”

  “In his backyard. Naked.” Cole took a few seconds to get that mental picture out of his head. “Why would they use your house?”

  “It’s the last place I’d expect them to be.”

  Cole pulled the car over just before the entrance ramp to the freeway. “How sure are you?”

  “Nowhere near a hundred percent.”

  “If we don’t go to the meet and the kidnappers are there with Richard, they may kill him when we don’t show. If we go to your house and the kidnappers are there, they may kill him when we show up unexpectedly. There’s no way to be a hundred percent certain, but you need to think about this, make sure you’re going with your best bet.”

  Harmony exhaled carefully, running everything through her mind again, then running it by Cole. “I’m sure South Central is an ambush and Richard won’t be there.”

  “I’ll agree with that.”

  “And Richard uses my house whenever he’s out here and not on a case. They didn’t grab him there, but they would have been watching him, so they must have known about it.”