I simply nod. All of a sudden, I can’t speak.
But that’s okay; my father speaks instead.
“Hello, son. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
twenty
The smoke was almost too thick to see through. Stepping over the dead body at the bottom of the steps, Zach slipped his suit jacket off his shoulders and held it to his nose and mouth. The heat wasn’t intense yet, but that was because the bulk of the fire was farther back in the bookstore-he could tell that even from here.
Pulling his Glock from its holster, he hesitated for a moment, cursed, then ducked inside.
He found the first body in the matter of only seconds; he almost tripped over it. As he had suspected, it was Jenkins. Fuck.
He continued farther into the smoke, the heat increasing, and found Winters only a few seconds later.
Motherfucker.
Two of his men, dead. It was unacceptable, but the blow would at least be somewhat softened if the target had been taken out, too.
He hurried over to the counter. Nothing behind it. He went down the side to the front of the store, then up the other side. Nothing there either.
Zach played it out in his head: the woman and man leave the store, meaning the place was empty except for John Smith. Winters goes in, does his thing, Zach in communication with him the entire time. Then, two blocks up, the woman and man turn back around and return to the store. Zach notifies Winters. Winters gets ready. Then the gunfire starts. Only, out of nowhere, another player enters the game. A big fucker carrying an MP5. Not your run of the mill book browser, that was for sure.
Whatever the fuck was happening, it wasn’t good, so Zach sent out Jenkins, who hurried across the street, down the steps, and all Zach could hear from his earpiece was screaming and shouting and shooting. A lot of shooting.
And now here he was, facing the flames, the smoke palpable, bracing himself as he advanced toward the back of the store.
Common sense told him to leave. The place was on fucking fire, and if the smoke didn’t kill the target and the girl and the big fucker, then the flames would. But years of experience told him otherwise.
He found the door. Despite the heavy smoke, his eyes burning, it looked like the door had been kicked open. He used his foot to push it forward, his gun at the ready, but it wouldn’t budge. He tried again, this time with more force. It gave only a little.
Zach squared his shoulders to the door, stood up straight, lifted his foot, and gave it a solid kick.
The door busted open, the shelf which had been keeping it in place tipping over onto the floor. Books fell everywhere. He hurried in, the Glock raised, but there was nobody in sight. Behind him, the smoke began pouring in, headed toward the back. That was where Zach smelled fresh air. He hurried that way and seconds later found steps leading up to the street. He climbed them and came to a door, which opened into an alleyway.
The alley was empty.
“Shit.”
He pulled his cell phone out and dialed Tyson.
Tyson said, “Yeah.”
“You have my location?”
“Of course.”
“It’s an alley behind the bookstore. I need to know who or what left it either east or west in the past two minutes. Whatever it is, track it.”
He was headed up the alley, having decided retracing his steps through the fiery inferno wasn’t the best idea.
“Checking traffic cameras now,” Tyson said.
“What about satellite?”
“It’s going to take a couple of minutes to override, and that’s only if it’s in the right position.”
“What about drones?”
“I’m looking into it.”
Zach had faith. Tyson was one of the best techs they had. If anyone was going to save today from being one gigantic clusterfuck, it would be him.
As Zach reached the mouth of the alley, Tyson spoke.
“Okay, I got it. Black Chevy Tahoe, entered the alleyway at four thirty-three. Exited on the other end at four thirty-four.”
Zach was already running. “License plate?”
“Not yet, but I’m working on it.”
Tearing down the block where he’d parked the sedan, Zach said, “Where are they now?”
“Give me a second.”
A car horn blared as Zach sprinted out into the street. It was a taxi, its driver slamming on the brakes. Zach smacked the hood and kept running toward the sedan. He jumped inside, fired up the engine.
“Come on, come on,” he said, both to Tyson and to himself, sitting behind the wheel, adrenaline ticking through his veins. The last thing he wanted to do was head in the wrong direction. That would cost seconds, potentially minutes, and right now he couldn’t waste a single one.
“Got them,” Tyson said. “They just turned onto Seventh Avenue, headed south.”
Zach spun the wheel, punched the gas, the sedan jerking forward into the street, nearly colliding with a Town Car coming head-on. Another chorus of horns blared, but Zach barely noticed. Keeping one hand on the wheel, one hand holding the phone to his ear, Zach asked, “Where do you think they’re headed?”
“My guess would be the Holland Tunnel.”
“What cops do we have in the area?”
“None.”
A car was double-parked and he swerved around it, nearly taking out the middle-aged woman running packages into her building.
“We need people at the bookstore ASAP. Two of ours are down, and so is one civilian. The thing’s going up in flames.”
“Any of our equipment inside?”
“Most likely. Winters had his case when he entered.”
“Shit. What happened?”
“I’m still not sure. Some guy came out of nowhere.”
“Who?”
“I have no fucking clue. But I know it wasn’t Eli.”
Tyson asked, “What do you think we should do about the rest of the block?”
The light at the next intersection was turning yellow. Zach punched the gas, swerved around a taxi, and cut the corner hard.
“Burn it to the ground.”
twenty-one
“What the fuck is going on?”
Nobody answers me.
“Where are we going?”
Still nothing. It’s like I don’t exist. Besides the brief exchange with my old man-seriously, my father, what the fuck? — nobody has said a word. But that doesn’t mean we’re not in a hurry. The two up front haven’t spoken, sure, but the driver is handling the SUV like a pro. Swerving here, accelerating there, we’re making good time in a city choked with traffic. But that still doesn’t answer the questions what the fuck is going on and where are we going.
I shift in my seat so my back is against the window. I realize that my hands are clenched, and I remember that I’m still holding the syringe. I still don’t quite know what I was thinking when I grabbed it-maybe there was some spiritual connection I felt with the thing that had, mere minutes before, threatened to end my life-and I still don’t quite know what to do with it now.
Beside me, Ashley isn’t freaking out as much as I figured she would. Granted, she looks scared, her entire body on edge, but she’s not screaming like she was earlier. If anything she’s catching her breath, trying to make sense of the situation. The only problem for her is that this whole thing is senselessly fucked.
“Dad.”
He’s leaning slightly forward, staring out the windshield, enjoying the high-speed show. He doesn’t acknowledge me.
“I thought you were supposed to be dead.”
He blinks. Turns his head in my direction. “Are you disappointed?”
“I haven’t decided yet. What’s going on here? Who are these guys? Who are the guys that just tried to kill us?”
“Those are good questions, John, but right now we don’t have time to go over each of them.”
“Fair enough. So let’s start with the first question. What the fuck is going on?”
My father gives a slight shake of the head, turns his attention back to the street. “Too complicated to explain at the moment. By the way, who’s your friend?”