8. Slider
8
SLIDER
I slammed the door and glanced around, not seeing a damn person waiting for us. The time on my watch read half past twelve. We were a half hour late.
“Dammit,” I swore under my breath.
“Do you think they headed back to their houses or the studio?” IRIS asked.
“Possibly.”
“I’ll get ahold of the director,” Thumper muttered, placing the call.
It was already hot as hell with the sun beating down on me. I strolled a few feet away, glancing around the small airport, just to be certain we were in the right location. In the distance, something reflected off the ground like little diamonds. Thumper called out to us, but I ignored him and jogged over there, my gut telling me this was not good.
I didn’t even get within twenty feet before I knew the situation was fucked.
“Yo!” I called out, jogging the rest of the way before kneeling on my haunches. I grabbed a cloth out of my pocket and picked up one of the spent casings, inspecting it before looking at the others. They were all over the fucking place. Whoever was here didn’t care about cleaning up after themselves.
“What the fuck happened?” Thumper asked.
“We need to find Audrey and Spencer on the double,” I said, shifting into work mode.
“IRIS, get on with Rae. See if she can pull up any camera footage from the area,” Thumper commanded. “Slider, call Lock and fill him in on what you’ve found.”
I nodded and pulled out my phone, dreading talking to the boss about this particular situation. I half-hoped he wouldn’t answer, but as usual, he picked up before the second ring.
“Slider, you’ve got the package?”
“Not exactly.”
“What does that mean?”
I glanced back at the casings on the ground and flinched. “We’re at the airport, but they’re not here.”
“Why aren’t they there?”
“Thumper’s trying to find out right now.”
I hoped he wouldn’t figure out that I was calling past the pick-up time.
“Why didn’t you call it in a half hour ago?”
Fuck, why couldn’t he miss that detail just one time? “We didn’t get here on time. We got stuck in traffic,” I lied. Well, technically, it was true. Yes, we were lost, but traffic was a bitch. There’s no way we would have made it no matter what.
“There are shell casings on the ground. A lot of them. Thumper’s trying to contact the director and find out where Audrey and Spencer are.”
“Good. Call me when you have an answer.”
He hung up—just like fucking Cash. I shook my head and jogged back to the truck.
“Let’s move!” IRIS shouted. “Rae’s got them headed east!”
“What about Spencer and Audrey?” I shouted.
“Never showed up at the studio,” Thumper retorted.
“What do we have?”
“Two tangos and a shitload of ammo. Looks like our baddies!” IRIS shouted.
“We’re a half hour behind,” I pointed out.
“Only fifteen minutes,” he corrected me. “Rae’s gonna give us a shortcut.”
I slammed the door as I got in back, giving IRIS the front so he could direct Thumper. I pulled my weapon and checked it, then grabbed the weapons bag and started going through it, preparing for whatever we came across.
I planted my boot against the seat, keeping myself in position so I didn’t slide around as I worked. Minutes flew by as we swerved in and out of traffic, bypassing as much of it as we could, taking the shortest routes possible.
“That’s them up on the right!” IRIS shouted. “Once we get to the other side of the bridge, it’s a fucking disaster of interchanges.”
“We have to take them out now,” Thumper snapped.
I took in the traffic and the length of the bridge. There was no good place to take out the vehicle. “Get me up alongside them.”
“I swear to God, if you go out there with a fucking umbrella, I’ll shoot your ass,” IRIS snapped.
I chuckled and rolled down the window as Thumper hit the gas, trying to get around the traffic. He jerked the wheel to move over, but the sound of a horn had him slamming on the brakes before we could get over.
“Son of a bitch,” he muttered.
I narrowed my eyes at the vehicle passing us, my eyes widening in surprise when I saw the face in the SUV beside us. “Was that…”
“Was that who?” IRIS asked.
“Wolf.”
“Who?”
“Wolf,” I said again. “From Reed Security.”
“Who the fuck is Wolf?” IRIS asked.
Dammit, I couldn’t remember his fucking name. “He’s the one on the team with that chick and her husband.”
Thumper snorted. “That’s clear as mud.”
He jerked the wheel as the vehicle passed, then hit the gas and rode their ass all the way. We were catching up, but not fast enough. They were still a good five cars ahead of us and the bridge wasn’t long enough to catch them before the interchange up ahead.
“We gotta get up there, Thumper!”
“I’m working on it!” He jerked the wheel again, taking us another lane over. We hit the curb, our wheels riding the edge as the whole right side of the vehicle scraped against the guardrail. Metal screeched in the most horrifying sound, but we passed the car, ignoring the way he waved his fist at us.
As soon as we were clear, Thumper hit the gas and all four wheels hit the road. We passed the Reed Security vehicle, waving with a grin as they watched us pass with confused expressions on their faces.
“Florrie. It’s Florrie, you dumbass,” Thumper snapped. “That was her husband, Alec.”
“Whatever. I knew she was a girl.”
“Congratulations for knowing your genders,” IRIS muttered.
“Get me up there, Thumper! I can get in there!” I shouted.
“There’s a goddamn truck in the way.”
“Hit him.”
Thumper swung his head back to glare at me. “You hit him. Some of us would like to not have a fucking airbag deploy in our faces.”
Right. I forgot how fucking sensitive they made them nowadays.
Thumper laid on the horn until the asshole finally moved. But just as he was stepping on the gas, Wolf came flying into the spot, swerving right the fuck in front of us.
“That son of a bitch cut me off,” Thumper snapped.
“We don’t have time for this,” I argued. “It’s now or never, Thumper. “Make the call.”
The interchange was a few hundred feet away. If we didn’t catch them now, we were fucking screwed. We needed to get there now and Reed Security was in our way.
“Fuck it.” He put his foot down and rammed the front of the truck into the back of the Reed Security vehicle. When they jolted forward and to the left, Thumper used the opportunity to squeeze between them and the vehicle to the right.
“TVI!” IRIS shouted, banging his fist on the dash, grinning with glee.
Thumper rammed the tail end of the side of the vehicle, sending Reed Security into a roll instead of a spin. The vehicle flipped over and over until finally coming to a stop in the middle of the fucking road.
I winced, knowing that was mostly my fault. “Oops.”
“Yeah, they were going a little too fast for that,” IRIS chuckled. “But hey, it was all in good fun.”
“Yeah, I’m sure they’ll see it that way when they get out of the hospital,” Thumper gritted out as he hit the gas and flew down the road. With the traffic thinning out, we would be able to catch up in no time.
“Just get me up alongside them.”
I started climbing out, gripping the doorframe as I prepared to jump across the expanse to the other vehicle. Other than the rails on the top, there wasn’t anything to prevent me from falling to the pavement and becoming roadkill.
“Closer!” I shouted.
As soon as Thumper got me close enough, I jumped, gripping the rails and holding on with everything in me. I could feel the plastic bending, unable to hold my weight for long.
My feet were slipping. I had to move now. Grabbing my gun, I slammed the butt of it into the window, smashing it in two hits. Glass shattered and the vehicle swerved, nearly sending me flying. I tucked my gun away just in time as the frame of the rail bent. I grasped the inside of the door just as the rail tore away from the roof and flew into traffic. Horns blared and cars swerved to avoid the flying object.
A man scrambled away from the door, staring at me with terrified eyes. He was lucky. At least he was on the inside.
“Get your ass in there!” IRIS shouted.
“I’m working on it!”
“Move faster! This isn’t a fucking picnic!”
I rolled my eyes and started hauling my ass up and over the frame, but just as I was about to crawl inside, a shot rang out, missing my ear by a fucking centimeter. I lost my grip, dropping back outside the vehicle. My wrist torqued as I held on with only one hand. My feet dragged along the road, burning as they skidded along the blacktop.
A tortured scream ripped from my throat as my wrist twisted. Fuck, I wouldn’t be able to hold on much longer. Shots fired and the SUV swerved, slowing enough for me to regain my grip. I glanced over my shoulder and saw IRIS firing at the driver. This was going to end badly if he took him out with me still hanging out the window and our clients in the back seat.
I used the distraction and quickly hauled myself up and into the backseat, pulling my knife from my boot as I landed. The passenger swung around, ready to fire at me, but I was ready for him. I thrust my hand up into his wrist, then slammed my knife into his throat.
The man behind me screamed, but the woman was cheering me on for some odd reason. With so much yelling, I couldn’t fucking concentrate. I turned on the man and slapped my hand over his mouth.
“I’m gonna need you to stop yelling for five fucking minutes, okay?”
He nodded with wide eyes. I wasn’t sure his chest was even moving at this point, but if he passed out, that meant he wasn’t yelling anymore, which was fine by me. Then I spied his tie and quickly undid it.
“Thanks. I’ll return it when I’m done with it.”
After removing it from the man’s neck, I spun around, throwing the tie over the driver’s head as I held it taut in both fists, then pulled back tightly, using all my weight to crush his larynx. His fingers clawed at the tie, fighting to free himself from the constraints as it cut off all the oxygen, depriving him of the last glimmer of hope that he would survive. After a few gurgles, his head flopped to the side and the SUV swerved out of control. We were on a collision course with a semi that was sure to kill us all. I lunged forward, grabbing the wheel to jerk the SUV to the right, narrowly avoiding killing us all. There was no way for me to stop us—not with the driver still in the seat.
Thumper pulled up beside me, slamming his fist on the horn. He was yelling, but I couldn’t hear a damn thing he was saying. IRIS pointed ahead, yelling out the window, but it was no use. With the wind, I couldn’t hear anything.
“The barriers!” the woman shouted, pointing ahead of us.
I spotted the orange barriers up ahead and steered right for it. “Hold on!” I shouted. This was gonna hurt like hell. I wrapped my arm around the driver’s seat and held on for dear life. When we were just seconds away, I released the wheel and ducked behind the driver’s seat to protect myself as best I could.
We slammed into the barriers with what felt like the force of being hit by a semi. The back end of the SUV lifted off the ground before slamming back down. Blood filled my mouth as my teeth sliced into my tongue, but as we settled, I realized the worst of it was over and I was still in one piece.
I looked up at the man and woman in the backseat, checking them over to make sure no one had any metal sticking out of any eyeballs or organs. Thankfully, that wasn’t the case.
The back door groaned open and IRIS stood there with a grin on his face. “Man, that was some fancy driving. I mean, if it was me, I would have gotten in the front seat, but hey, you do you. Did you know you have a splotch of blood right there?” he asked, touching his finger to his shoulder.
I glanced over, looking at the spot. “That’s not a splotch.”
“It’s not?”
“It’s a blotch.”
“What’s the difference?”
“A splotch is something produced by one’s own body.”
He frowned at that. “Are you sure? I think you have that the other way around. I would think it would be a blotch.”
I shook my head, pretty sure I had that right. “Nope.”
“A splotch is bigger than a blotch,” he continued. “That’s most definitely a splotch.”
I looked at it again. “How could it be a splotch when it’s small?”
“I wouldn’t call that small.”
I rolled my eyes at him. “Well, what would you call small?”
“I don’t know. A pinprick?”
“It’s not a fucking liter of blood, IRIS. It’s like…a pip.”
“A pip? No. If we’re gonna knock it down a peg, we’ll go with a mottle.”
“You’re only saying that because you like the word,” I said accusingly.
“No, I’m saying it because it looks more like a mottle!”
“Uh…sorry to interrupt,” the man in the seat said, “but who are you guys?”
IRIS glared at him. “Can you see that we’re trying to have a discussion?”
It was clear he wasn’t going to let this go. “Look, a mottle and a pip are basically the same fucking thing. If anything, I’d call it a speck.”
He threw up his hands, scoffing at me. “Are you fucking kidding me? Just how small do you think this thing is? Why don’t you just call it a fleck?”
“I would if I thought it was fucking snow!”
“I’d say it was more of a smudge,” the woman behind me interrupted.
I turned around and glared at her. “Who asked you?”
“Nobody, but I figured as long as you were having this ridiculous argument, I’d put in my two cents.”
“Well, you can keep your two cents because it most definitely is not a smudge.”
“Yeah,” IRIS agreed. “A smudge is the complete opposite of a blotch or a speck or a pip. Hell, a spatter would be a better word than a fucking smudge!”
I nodded at the man. “What do you think?”
He shook his head, his eyes still wide as he stared straight ahead. “I…I think?—”
Vomit spewed from his mouth, landing all over me before I had a chance to move. I gagged, barely holding it in as the smell overwhelmed me. I needed to get out of here, and fast.
I jumped out and shook off as much of it as I could. IRIS laughed at me, and then his eyes roamed over my shirt.
“Now, that’s what I’d call a splatter.”