Holding on tight to his anger, Jason rose and held out his wrists. “This hurts.”
“I know,” Amber said as she pulled out the cuffs. She put one on his right wrist, then guided his arm around his back before putting on the other one.
“No. You don’t.”
“Please don’t say that.” He heard her rustling something out of her jacket. “In fact, right now you might not want to say anything.” She paused. “It’s Amber. I have Jason cuffed. He’s coming peacefully.” Then, with the phone back in her pocket, she asked, “Where are your keys? Jacket pocket? We’ll lock up on our way out.”
“What, no search warrant? Or did you already do that while I was asleep?”
“We’ve got the warrant,” she answered with a mix of patience and guilt, “but the search comes later.”
“Great. Front left pants pocket.”
She patted him down, taking his phone, wallet and keys from his pockets. Then she gestured for him to walk toward the door. “Like I said,” Amber told him, “it’s better if you don’t say anything for now.”
Amber had the door only half-open before the hand clamped around her throat. Her eyes went wide as Lorelei stepped in through the doorway, her face set in a controlled rage, and pushed her back with an iron grip. The other woman’s glare was terrifying; her strength doubly so.
Lorelei snatched the gun from Amber’s shoulder holster with her free hand. She ejected the clip, pressed the safety and then dropped it to the floor in a few quick and practiced moves. “Jason, are you all right?”
“Lorelei, no! Don’t hurt her! She’s a-oh, holy shit!” Jason blinked further as he looked outside his door. Slumped to the floor in the hallway were two uniformed police officers, both with their eyes closed and smiles on their faces. “What did you do to the cops?”
“They’ll live,” Lorelei declared in a grim tone, “provided I am not given cause to end them. Are we alone here? I saw no other police present.”
Amber gasped for breath and swung forceful blows at Lorelei’s elbow and shoulder, hoping to break her grip. It worked, but Lorelei quickly reasserted control. She snatched up Amber’s wrist and bent it backward and around, swiftly bringing the younger woman into a hold that put her on her knees. Amber couldn’t believe Lorelei’s strength.
“Lorelei, it’s just us,” Jason answered quickly, “but you can’t hurt her! She’s not one of the bad guys!”
“That remains to be seen. We must bring the officers in here before someone sees them. Can you do this? No, you are restrained. Come here.” She maintained her hold on Amber with one hand, while fishing her key ring out of her jacket pocket with the other.
Despite the urgency of the moment, Jason spared a heartbeat to roll his eyes. Of course Lorelei carried around handcuff keys out of habit. He stood near her and turned around. The first of the cuffs came loose in just two seconds; she then gave him the keys to let him take care of the other himself. “Drag the policemen inside, please,” she instructed calmly after taking the cuffs from him.
“You’re making a huge mistake,” grunted Amber.
“That also remains to be seen. Whom do you serve, Amber? Or what else should we call you?” Lorelei immediately went to work putting Amber in her own handcuffs.
“Amber’s really my name,” she answered. She managed a look over her shoulder to see Jason drag the first of the cops into his apartment. “I’m an agent with the FBI. Jason’s under arrest.” She glared up at the other woman. “So are you.”
“Indeed. Will it shock you if I am not willing to take your legitimacy for granted? How am I to believe you are truly what you say rather than an errand girl for some animated corpse? Or worse?”
“They attacked me, too! I fought to get us all out. Jason saw, Alex saw!”
“It would not be the first time the corpses sacrificed some of their number to create a credible misperception,” Lorelei scowled. Though she had Amber cuffed, she maintained her hold on the other woman.
“Lorelei, she’s not going anywhere,” Jason said as he shut and locked the door. He stepped over the two unconscious cops. “You don’t have to hold her like that.”
“Did you resist arrest? No? And yet she put you in handcuffs. Were our positions reversed, Amber would not let me go unrestrained. Would you?”
“That’s not-that doesn’t fix anything,” Jason pressed. “Lorelei, I believe her.”
“They have arrested Alex,” Lorelei told him. “They took him from his classroom at school, in full view of the campus.”
“What?” Amber blinked.
“This surprises you?”
“That’s… doing it like that is crazy. You people are hunted. Why…?” She fell silent then, remembering not to think out loud in front of suspects.
“Yes. Why, unless someone is supposed to know that Alex was arrested?”
Amber swallowed hard. “It might’ve been done to get the vampires off his back. They’ll know they won’t find him at home or with his friends.”
“You sound unsure.”
“It’s because I am.”
“Are Drew and Wade also under investigation?” Lorelei asked.
“They’re-“ Amber hesitated. She wasn’t sure whether or not it mattered now. She couldn’t help but notice, though, that rather than reinforcing her grip to inflict pain, Lorelei merely held her in place and waited. “They’re in custody. My team arrested them on the night of the Halloween party.”
“What?” burst Jason. He wheeled around to look Amber in the eye. “But I’ve had text messages back and forth with…” a scowl fell across his face. “Oh, that’s just some dirty pool there.”
“It’s not strictly illegal,” Amber muttered, “depending on the circumstances.”
“Oh, what, circumstances like ours? Nice.”
“I hope for your sake they are unharmed,” Lorelei warned.
“They’re in Federal custody, not a dungeon,” retorted Amber. “We’re not your enemy here.”
“Yeah, you keep saying that,” Jason said. “What’d you arrest them for?”
“I wasn’t there,” she dodged. “But you’re charged with assault, arson and conspiracy,” Amber winced, and then glanced over to the two unconscious men on the floor. “And kidnapping police officers now, probably. Jason, this is only going to get worse.”
“What is your team’s agenda?” demanded Lorelei.
Amber bowed her head. “I can’t answer that.”
“Why,” said Jason, “because it’s all bullshit?”
“Jason, I know you’re one of the good guys!” Amber snapped. “But you’ve broken the law. A whole lot of laws. This mess doesn’t get cleaned up by you going around breaking even more laws. Either of you.”
His eyes came to Lorelei’s. She could read the conflict in his heart.
“Jason,” Lorelei said, “there is only one woman in this room who has never lied to you or used you as a tool against those you care about most.”
He took a deep breath and looked back to Amber. “She’s got a point.”
Chapter Thirteen: Extraordinary Measures
“I don’t blame you if you’re angry. You’re obviously in a bad spot. We haven’t explained much of anything. We’ve been a little rough. See, we’re dealing with some serious, ugly business, Alex-business you’re familiar with-and we don’t have the advantages you have. We don’t have the allies you’ve had. So we have to be extremely careful, and yes, a little rough.”
Alex sat opposite Hauser at the conference table. Handcuffs secured his wrists to the armrests of his chair. Two other agents, whose names he’d learned were Keeley and Nguyen, stood nearby with their eyes trained on him. Two armed guards lurked on the other side of the closed door, too. His back still hurt from the scuffle at the van. He said nothing.
The room felt old and long unused. It felt musty. Some of the paint sagged. The light fixtures worked, but Alex suspected this room hadn’t been used in at least a decade or more. He wondered where they’d taken him.