“I’d better do the wig and glasses thing,” Hayley said. “We don’t want one of the guys who were at the front desk leaving late and wondering why I’m hanging around with some strange man. There’s a bar across the street we can use.”
“That will work. We’ll use texting to communicate,” Zach said. “Gotta love everyday technology.”
“Before we go off halfcocked,” Ben said. “What kind of diversion can we come up with that won’t have him harming or even killing the kid because he’s afraid it’s the cops?”
“The most obvious is setting off the fire alarm,” Ez replied. “Even an idiot would want to get out of there.”
“A smoke grenade would add to his panic,” Hayley suggested.
“And you just happen to have some.” Ben wasn’t terribly surprised when Zach nodded, taking one from the second case to prove it. “Is there anything you don’t have in there?”
“When we’re traveling we try to pack for any contingency,” Zach replied. “We’ve got couple of flash bang grenades, tear gas, Tasers, pepper spray—”
“Okay, okay.” Ben held up a hand to stop him. “I get the picture.”
“Good. All right, boys and girl, let’s get dressed for our night out. Ben, I know you didn’t buy a black turtleneck so I’ll lend you one of mine. We’ll meet back here in ten, get something to eat, and then head to the storage facility.”
* * * *
“How are you doing?” Zach asked while he dug out the shirt for Ben.
“I’m fine, damn it. It’s not like I’ve done anything to stress my knee.”
“I didn’t mean that, although it’s part of it. We’re all new to you and it’s been quite a while since you’ve been in a situation even close to this.”
“Yeah,” Ben admitted reluctantly. “It’s taking a bit to get adjusted, but I am. Whatever you ask me to do, I will.”
“And let me know if you’re in pain?”
“You and Ez, I swear. Yes, Zach, I promise.”
Zach chuckled. “He’s been quizzing you, too?”
“Yep, and he, both of you, have every right to. I know I’m the weak link, physically. On the other hand, you know I can handle my weapons.”
“That I do. So, we’re good. Go change. I’ll see you in a couple. Oh, don’t forget your jacket.”
Ben knew why, said he wouldn’t, and then headed down to his room.
Chapter 4
It was almost nine when they left the SUV—on the lowest level of the parking garage this time, nose out for a fast exit—and collected their gear. Zach and Ben already had their pistols holstered at the back of their waists, hidden under their jackets. Ben had the case with the break-down sniper rifle hanging off one shoulder. He and Zach would carry the backpacks holding everything else the team needed, including Ez and Hayley’s guns. Keeping them, too, was necessary since the couple couldn’t take them to the bar and risk the doorman finding them if he did a pat-down—a possibility given the neighborhood.
At the moment, Hayley looked nothing like her true self. She was wearing a long, black, curly wig, glasses with rhinestones decorating the earpieces, enough make-up for two women, and a short skirt that barely cover her ‘assets,’ as Ez put it. The topper was the pair of four-inch heels, also trimmed with rhinestones.
“You look like a hooker,” Ben had said when he first saw her.
“That’s the idea,” she’d replied with a wink. “It’s what people will remember. Everything comes off, once we’re in the building, except the wig. I’ll lose it right before we leave with the kid.”
Ben hoped that’s what would happen. He knew there were no ironclad guarantees on a job like this; even with a team as good as he was certain theirs was.
Now, Hayley hefted her large, gaudy purse over one shoulder, linked her arm with Ez’s and they left the garage, crossing the street to the bar.
“Ready?” Zach asked Ben.
“Yep, let’s do it.”
They left the garage by the back exit, went down the street to the far end of the storage facility, and walked halfway down the narrow side street to the recessed rear doorway of the building across from the loading dock.
“Now, we wait,” Zach said quietly.
“I should have brought a book with me,” Ben quipped.
Zach chuckled. “Not sure there’s enough light to read.”
“Good point.”
They remained silent after that as they waited and watched. No one entered or left the building, or even drove down the street. Zach texted Ez a couple of times to find out if they’d seen anyone going into the storage facility through the front door, getting a ‘negative’ in reply.
By ten-thirty, Zach decided it was safe for them to enter the building. He texted Ez to let him know, telling him that he and Hayley should meet them by the side entrance. When they got there, Zach took the disposable particle respirator masks they needed from his backpack, handing them out, saying, “We’ll put these on. They have security cameras.”
“Gee, big surprise,” Ez replied dryly.
When Zach took four sets of thermal imaging goggles from his backpack, Ben shook his head. “What is that, Mary Poppins’ carpet bag?”
“Seems like it sometimes,” Hayley replied as she stuffed the rhinestone glasses she was wearing into her purse and put on the goggles, adjusted them to fit her face. The men did the same with both the goggles and the face masks.
Zach entered the code to unlock the side door then rearmed the box when they were inside. They were in a wide hallway with doors at both ends. They went down to the one to the front office. The only light in there came from outside and the ‘Exit’ signs over the doors. Since they were wearing the goggles that presented no problem. Zach punched in the code they needed to open the door to interior of the facility, they went through, and across to the elevator.
As soon as the team was on the fourth floor, they walked quietly down the dimly lit hallway to the unit Zach had rented. Hayley opened it, murmured, “I’ll be ready in a minute,” and went in, closing the door. When she opened it a few moments later, she was wearing jeans, a dark shirt, and tennis shoes. The men joined her, Zach and Ben setting their backpacks down beside her purse while Ez closed the door. Only then did they lower their goggles and turn on the overhead light.
Ben opened the rifle case, put the rifle together, and set it aside for the moment. While he was doing that, Zach gave Ez and Hayley their pistols plus extra ammunition. While they hoped they wouldn’t need it, it paid to be prepared for anything, including a gun battle.
“I’ll be back,” Zach said softly, holding up the listening sensor. He put on his goggles and mask, turned out the light, and left the unit, lowering the door behind him.
“It’s the expectation that’s a killer,” Ez said under his breath as he turned the light on again and began to pace.
Ben had to agree. He preferred action, no matter how minor, to standing around waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“Anyone up for a game of gin?” Hayley whispered, her eyes glittering with amusement.
“I wish,” Ez muttered. “In the first place I doubt you’ve got cards with you.”
Ben half expected she’d say she did, but she shrugged, replying, “There is that.”
After what seemed like an eternity, although when Ben checked his phone he saw it had only been ten minutes, there was a rap on the door. Ez flicked off the light, opened it, and Zach came in. As soon as the door closed, he turned the lights on.
“I found him,” he said. “We were right, he’s not alone.”
“So we go with plan B,” Ez replied.
“Yes.” Zach took the map he’d been given when he rented the unit, laying it on the floor, and said, “This is us. Here’s where the kid and his captor are.” He marked that unit, which was halfway down the hallway parallel to theirs. “There’s a fire alarm box to our right as we enter that hall.”
“Got it,” Hayley said, as she was the one designated to
set off the alarm to put their plan in motion.
“Ben, you take the other end of the hall. Ez and I will take our places on each side of the unit’s door. As soon as the alarm goes off, I’ll detonate the smoke grenade.”
With nods of agreement, they put on their goggles and masks and he turned the light off.
“All right, unless anyone has any questions, let’s go rescue a hostage,” Zach said.
No one did, so they left the unit and Zach put a block of wood under the door to keep it from fully closing. That way, if Ben or Ez were the first ones back they could get inside without any problem.
They walked silently down the hallway, turned the corner, went along the short hallway, and around the next corner. From there they dropped off one by one at their assigned positions. When Ben reached his, he turned, his rifle gripped firmly in one hand. He saw thermal images of Zach and Ez—Ez with his pistol at the ready, Zach holding the smoke grenade—on either side of the door to the unit where the kidnap victim was being held. Past them, Hayley stood next to the fire alarm. Zach turned to Hayley, slashing his hand down.
Seconds later the blare of the fire alarm echoed through the hallways. Zach activated the grenade, dropped it, and pulled his pistol from his IWB holster behind his back. Smoke filled the air.
For a moment, Ben was afraid their plan wasn’t going to work. He could see Hayley start down the hallway to join Zach and Ez, their bodies glowing through the smoke, but they were the only people there.
Then the door to the unit began to roll up. Ben saw the figure of a man ducking under it before it had reached the halfway point. He was holding something; Ben presumed it was a weapon. He must have spotted Ez in spite of the roiling smoke because he said, “What the fuck?” as he veered away and began racing down the hallway. Hayley was coming toward him, gun drawn, obviously planning to intercept. He managed to grab her wrist, pulling her against his chest with his gun pressed to her side. Before the others could react, Ben shouted, “Lean,” hoping Hayley understood what he meant as he raised the rifle. She did, falling to the side against the man’s gun arm and Ben fired. His shot hit the man’s shoulder. He let out a yell, releasing Hayley. Seconds later he was running again. Ben fired one more time, smiling when the bullet entered the man’s thigh and he fell to the floor, screaming in pain. Ez was next to him in seconds, pressing his pistol to the man’s head. “Move and you’re dead,” he spat out.
While that was happening, Zach and Hayley had entered the unit. It seemed to take forever before they came out again. Ben could see they had someone between them, another glowing figure in the slowly dissipating smoke.
“We’d better get our asses out of here,” Zach shouted. “The firemen will be here damned soon if they’re any good.”
“Fire stairs?” Ben asked as he hurried to help Ez get the wounded kidnapper to his feet, gritting his teeth against the pain in his knee.
“Elevator,” Zach replied. “Hayley, get the backpacks.”
She raced ahead, leaving Zach to take care of the young man. By the time they reached their storage unit she was coming out, one pack slung over her shoulder, carrying the other one and her purse. “He’s leaving a trial,” she said, pointing to the drops of blood coming from the kidnapper.
“Nothing we can do about it right now,” Zach replied as he took one of the backpacks from her.
They reached the elevator, Ben pushed the button and as soon as the doors opened, they were inside. When they got to the ground floor they could hear sirens. Zach pointed toward a door which, Ben hoped, opened onto the hallway and the side door of the building. “Out, and fast,” Zach ordered.
They did as he said, exiting onto the side street where they pulled off their masks and goggles, stuffing them in Hayley’s purse. They weren’t worried about the security alarm at that point. When it went off, it only added its noise to that of the fire alarm.
* * * *
Ez and Ben were carrying the now unconscious kidnapper. “Stay there with him,” Zach said to Ez, pointing to the recessed doorway across the narrow street that he and Ben had used for surveillance less than an hour previously. When Ez and Ben lugged the kidnapper into it, Zach saw that Ben’s lips were pressed tightly together and knew he was fighting pain from his knee. He also knew Ben would resent it if he said anything so he didn’t, merely leading the way back to the parking garage.
They reached it just as fire engines roared to a stop in front of the storage facility. When they got to where they’d left the SUV, Zach told the others to wait while he picked up Ez and Ben and their prisoner.
As soon as the SUV pulled up in front of them, Ben opened the hatch and Ez shoved the kidnapper face down into the back of the SUV, pulled his arms behind him, and cuffed him with heavy-duty zip-tie handcuffs.
“Where the hell…?” Ben asked as he and Ez climbed into the rear seat of the vehicle.
Ez grinned. “My pocket. I never go on a job without them.”
Zach backed out of the side street, since a fire truck blocked the front end, and returned to the garage. Hayley helped the young man they’d rescued into the front seat and then slid in beside Ben while Ez stashed the backpacks and her purse in back on top of the kidnapper, “To camouflage him,” he explained when Ben cocked his head in question, and they took off.
“Is he still alive?” Hayley asked in a tone of voice that said she didn’t really care one way or the other.
“Yep,” Ez replied succinctly.
“Where to, now?” Ben asked.
Zach looked at the young man. “I presume you want to go home.”
“Please,” he replied in a shaky voice. He took a deep breath. “Thank you. Thank you for finding me and for…for saving me.”
“Hey, not a problem,” Zach said. “It’s what we do.”
“What’s your name?” Haley asked him, and Ben realized Zach had never told them.
“Joe.”
“Nice to meet you.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” Joe said. “I mean it. It is. I wasn’t sure…” His voice petered out.
“I know.” She patted his shoulder.
“Is he…?” Joe took a quick look toward the back of the vehicle.
“He’ll make it, for what it’s worth,” Ez replied.
“What about the other guy who kidnapped me?”
Ez’s smile was evil as he said, “I’m sure our ‘friend’ will be glad to tell the cops where to find him, once we dump him off at the hospital and let them know what happened.”
They did what he’d said. After Zach pulled the SUV into the emergency bay, Ez hauled the man out, telling an EMT standing by an ambulance to help him take him inside as he’d been shot. He returned moments later, his phone pressed to his ear. “Yes, he was one of the men who kidnapped Joseph—” he glanced at Zach who said ‘Stevens.’ “Joseph Stevens. The kid’s safe and we’re taking him home.”
“Now all they need to do is figure out why Joe’s folks didn’t tell them he’d been kidnapped,” Hayley said.
“The cops aren’t stupid,” Ben replied. “They know that happens way too often. Parents believe the kidnappers when they say they’ll kill the victim if they go to the police.”
“Thank God they told you,” Joe whispered.
Zach chuckled as he drove away from the hospital. “I’m not sure God had anything to do with it, but who knows.”
Ten minutes later they pulled into the driveway of a large home in an upper-class area of the city. Joe was out of the car seconds later, running up the path to the front door. It opened before he got there, a man and woman stepping out to greet him, wrapping him in a tight embrace. Then the man came over to the SUV.
“There’s no way I can thank you enough for rescuing him,” he said.
“We were glad to help,” Zach replied. “We’ve let the police know he’s safe, but since they didn’t know he was missing you might want to call them. One of the kidnappers is in the hospital but he might not be willing to rat out his partner.”<
br />
Mr. Stevens nodded. “I will call, as soon as I get inside. The other bastard will contact me about where to deliver the ransom and the police and I can set up a trap.” He paused before saying, “Unless you want to.”
“No thanks. We’ve done what we’ve been paid for. It’s time for us to leave.”
Stevens smiled knowingly. “Before the police find out you were involved?”
With a shrug, avoiding the question, Zach replied, “Good luck. I hope they do catch him.”
“So do I. Thank you again for saving Joe.”
“Welcome,” Zach said before pulling out of the driveway to return to the hotel.
* * * *
“I have a question,” Ben said when he and the others had convened in Zach’s room.
Before that happened, they had changed their clothes, which smelled of smoke, and transferred everything from the backpacks into the weapons cases. Ben had taken the time to clean the rifle, first. As the others hadn’t fired their weapons, they didn’t have to.
“Ask away,” Zach replied.
“They have your fingerprints in the readers, yours and Hayley’s. If someone puts two and two together, the police will know the two of you were involved.”
“They can try to trace us through the prints, but it won’t do them any good. They’re not on file anywhere, any more than yours or Ez’s are.”
“Wait a minute. I was a cop. Mine definitely are,” Ben said.
“Nope. As soon as you joined the Vanguard team Durand’s computer experts made certain they vanished.”
Ben blew out a startled breath. “They can do that?”
“There’s nothing they can’t do when it comes to hacking into, well, anywhere they have to,” Ez told him.
Ben smiled slowly. “So if I wanted to turn to a life of crime, no one would know it was me.”
“Except us,” Zach pointed out. “Not that I’m worried you’ll become an arch villain. I don’t think you have it in you.”
“Not really,” Ben admitted. “You’re awfully quiet,” he said, turning to where Hayley had settled in one of the beds. “Okay, that explains why,” he added. She was curled up, her head on her arm, sound asleep.
A Second Chance Page 5
