Radio, he mouthed, and motioned toward his car with his head. She nodded, and rose again to cover his movement.
Price rolled under the car, back towards the radio, while Alex continued to fire. She had to stop and reload her weapon, and that was when Brogan decided he’d have a better chance if he ran. Before she could stop him, he was on his feet, and heading down the short embankment that led to a tiny creek. Ken, seeing Brogan run, reached out to grab him. One bullet took Ken’s leg out from under him. Another one made half of Kyle Brogan’s head disappear in a red mist.
Alex looked up to see Ken roll under the car. She could see the blood trailing from his injured leg. She hoped Rick could bring in the backup cars soon, or they wouldn’t last. She continued returning fire, praying that she’d hear sirens in the distance.
Instead she heard the glass of windows breaking behind her.
Alex whirled, looking for Rick and David. Instead she saw a man standing at the hood of the car behind her. He had a gun in his hand and a smile on his face. In a split second, he turned and saw her. Both of them raised their guns and fired. Alex felt the bullet slide down her right arm, before thumping itself into the car beside her. At the same moment, the man’s right eye seemed to explode. Alex pulled her trigger once more, watching the man fall. Then she turned back to main group of attackers, returning fire as often as she dared.
Alex noticed that there was a deeper shot, like a larger caliber weapon, that began cracking across the parking lot. There were sudden shouts from their attackers, and it sounded like they were having trouble. Alex wondered if the agent from the blockade car had managed to flank them. She raised up to take a look, and saw him, half-in and half-out of his car. Whatever was happening to their opponents, he wasn’t the cause.
Ken took that opportunity to roll under the car, ending up next to Alex.
“Are you alright?”
“Yeah, other than being shot in the leg.”
Using Ken’s jacket, and a pocket knife, Alex rigged a quick bandage, wrapping it around the bleeding bullet hole in his thigh. In the middle of tying the strip, Ken placed a hand on her arm and told her to listen. She did, and heard silence, then footsteps.
Alex raised her head to look cautiously across at their adversaries. She saw two bodies sprawled on the hood of the car, and a tall figure in a black coat walking toward her.
Aiming carefully, Alex squeezed a round off, making sure it landed well in front of the approaching figure. The person stopped, and Alex stood, holding her gun on the roof of the car in front of her.
“Freeze! Federal Agent!”
The figure moved their hands far from their sides. The face was shadowed, but Alex could see the barrel of a gun in the figure’s hand.
“Drop your weapon!”
The gun didn’t fall, and Alex tightened her finger on the trigger.
“Alex, it’s Teren.”
For a second the name didn’t register, and then Alex’s eyes grew wide.
“Teren? What the fuck —”
“Later. Right now, I think you need an ambulance.”
Alex felt herself trembling, and realized the rush of adrenaline that had kept her in control through the attack, was about to run out. She was aware of pain, in her arm, and in her shoulder. Concentrating on that, she cleared her head, and nodded.
“You okay?” she called towards Teren.
“Yes. You’ve got one agent dead, and one injured over here. You want me to call for help?”
“Call 911. Tell them we need an ambulance and police backup. They should also contact FBI headquarters, let them know an agent is down.”
Teren pulled her cell phone out as she crossed the parking lot. “Got it. Everyone over here okay?”
“Ken’s hurt, I’m fine.” Alex looked around for her partner. “David?”
Not seeing him, she called for him again, and walked around the car towards the last spot she’d seen him in.
David was lying on his back, his hands out at his sides. One hand was still wrapped around his weapon, and there was a pool of blood forming under him. There was a bleeding hole in his chest, and he was very pale.
Alex dropped to her knees, and for a moment thought she might pass out. Then it passed, and she placed both her hands over the bullet hole and pressed down as hard as she could. “Ken! I need your help!”
Teren appeared, her armed wrapped around Ken’s waist. She eased the man off her shoulders, and turned away to dial. Ken pulled himself over.
“Where’s Rick?”
“I don’t know. The last I saw him, he was heading for the radio. By the lack of backup I’d say he didn’t reach it.”
Ken noticed that Alex’s voice had gone absolutely cold. There was no longer any emotion in the younger agent.
“What do you need?”
“Can you help me put pressure here? I can feel his pulse, and I know he’s breathing. I just need to get the bleeding under control.”
“Right. Here,” he ripped the buttons on his shirt front, and slipped the shirt off. “I’m gonna press this over your hands. Once I get it in place, you can slide your hands out, and help me press this down.”
They worked on getting the bleeding slowed, while Teren began to survey the scene. She saw Brogan’s body laying several feet away from the scene, and the body of another man by the front of the car. Alex had stepped over him to get to David.
“Is this an agent of yours, Alex?”
“No. I think he’s the one that shot David. I killed him.”
Teren, too, noticed there was no emotion in the woman’s voice.
She looked into the front seat of the car next to where Alex and Ken were working on their friend. She saw the body of a young man, with brown hair. His hand was wrapped around a two-way radio, and he’d obviously been holding it up when he was shot. There was a hole in the radio, as well as two in the man’s head.
“Teren, is there someone in the car?”
Teren hesitated for a second.“There’s a dead body in the car, Alex.”
Alex and Ken looked at each other, both knowing it had to be Rick Price. Ken felt the loss of the younger man keenly, and his eyes showed it. Alex’s eyes showed nothing. She didn’t think she’d ever feel anything again.
Chapter Twenty
In minutes, the scene was total chaos again. Two ambulances and a dozen cop cars pulled up in and around the small parking lot. It didn’t take long for them to get David onto a stretcher, and then Alex was closing the doors behind him as they rushed him to University Hospital.
One of the Philadelphia agents had been shot twice, once in the arm and once in the leg. He and Ken were taken in the second ambulance.
A third showed up to help collect bodies.
Alex was still watching the ambulance carrying her partner as it disappeared around a corner. She started when she felt a hand touch her shoulder. She turned her head to find Teren beside her.
“David’ll be okay, Alex.”
She wanted to believe that. But she’d seen the pallor of his face and knew it would take good luck for him to even survive the trip to the hospital.
After a moment longer, Alex turned to watch as a crew picked up Brogan’s body. Her brain kicked in, and she stopped them for a moment.
“I want his body searched, here and now. Everything is to be recorded and tagged as evidence. Do the same with the other unidentified bodies. I want the stuff bagged and ready to be taken to FBI headquarters.”
“FBI? This a PPD crime scene and —”
“Wrong, Sargeant. This is the scene of an ambush of six FBI agents, two of whom are now dead. That makes it a federal crime scene. You can either work with me, or you can get the fuck out of the way.” Alex’s coldness made Teren raise an eyebrow. It made the sargeant angry.
“Well, if you feds hadn’t —”
“That’s enough Sargeant.” Jeff Harnisch stepped up beside the glowering officer. “Agent Reis is correct. Your men are to secure the scene, but the FBI will take care of any further investigations here. Is that clear?”
The man nodded. He glared once more at Alex and turned away. Harnisch watched him leave, then he turned back to the blond agent.