Chapter 6
CHAPTER 6
AT TIMES, I was tempted to hop into the front of the ambulance and drive myself, it went so flipping slowly. At least when we drew up outside the hospital the doors opened instantly, and a trauma team descended on poor Seth and whisked him away. Another overzealous doctor tried to lead me into the emergency room.
“Hey, get off me!” I snapped, yanking my arm away from him.
“I need to check you out. You’re bleeding.”
“It’s not my blood.”
“Are you sure?”
“I think I’d know if I’d been injured.”
Or would I? Hmmm. A plan started to form in my mind. It seemed to be working at somewhere close to full capacity now, which meant I had all sorts of devious ideas popping up.
Making an effort to sound really blonde, I turned back to the doctor.
“On second thoughts, I feel a bit dizzy. A checkup mightn’t be a bad idea.”
I swayed for effect, and he helped me to an uncomfortable plastic seat.
“Sit there, ma’am. I’ll come right back with a wheelchair.”
As soon as he’d disappeared inside, Nick put his hands on his hips. “What the…? You’re not dizzy. You don’t even know what dizzy feels like.”
“Yes, I do. The first time Black took me up in a stunt plane, he did six barrel rolls followed by a loop-the-loop, and I got dizzy then. Just trust me. I know exactly what I’m doing.” At least, I hoped I did. “Can you get hold of Damon Belcourt at the DEA and ask him to meet me here?”
Nick rolled his eyes. “I’ll call him. Anything else?”
“Yeah. You can pick out a nice black outfit to wear to my funeral. And stop rolling your eyes.”
Before Nick could come up with a smart answer, the doctor reappeared and wheeled me into the hospital. He parked me in a cubicle, checked my vital signs, then peered down at me.
“How many fingers am I holding up?”
Three. “Er… Two?”
“What day is it?”
“April.”
“What state are you in?”
I looked at my blood-spattered clothes. “Not a very good one.”
“I meant which American state?”
“Oh. Kansas?”
He scribbled notes on my chart. “I’ll get the nurse to come in.”
Satan’s assistant duly arrived, poking and prodding hard enough to bruise. I may not have been in pain when I arrived, but she soon rectified that.By the time she’d finished, I had a new career as a human pincushion and Belcourt was hovering beyond the curtain in his cheap grey suit. Super.
“Stay in bed,” the nurse ordered. “I don’t want you fainting. I’ll be back once I’ve checked on another patient.”
Time for a little chat with my new favourite agent.
Over a cup of really bad coffee, I outlined the events of the night, leaving out some small parts, like the secrets hidden under my house, but laying out my theory about the attack being linked to the drugs case and possibly Black’s death.
Belcourt rolled his eyes. “You never do things by halves, do you? This is too big for me to deal with on my own. I need to call my boss.”
“Well, get on with it, then.”
I listened while he gave his superior an abbreviated version of what I’d just said. After a short pause, he hung up. “Crane’s on his way over.”
Great, we only needed a couple more people and then we could have a party.
Before Agent Crane arrived, Seth’s wife did. I needed to speak to her, and I couldn’t say it was something I looked forward to. Seth was a real family man, and he’d been married to Carla for just over four years. A shotgun wedding, he always joked, although he doted on his wife and son and never stopped talking about them. I’d met Carla a few times when she brought Justin over to swim at Riverley, and she’d been blessed with such a sunny disposition I hadn’t liked her at first. How could anyone be that nice? But I soon came to understand that was just the way she was.
Not today, though. Today was overcast with rain showers in Carla’s world. She clutched Justin’s hand as they sat side by side in the corridor, her face streaked with tears. Justin was dressed in a superhero outfit, complete with cape.
“Hi, Carla.”
Her lip quivered as she looked up at me. “Emmy, what happened?”
I glanced at Justin. How much should I say in front of him? “There was an accident at the guardhouse. An explosion.” I crouched down. “Hi, Justin.”
He stayed silent, glaring at me with a sulky expression.
“He only answers to ‘Batman’ at the moment. Or Bruce if he’s not wearing his cape,” Carla explained.
“Hi, Batman.”
“Hi. Where’s my dad?”
“Your dad’s with the doctors, and they’re helping him to get better.” I sincerely hoped that was true.
“Can I see him soon?”
“The doctors need a little bit more time. They have some special machines they need to use. So your job is to stay here and make sure no bad guys get past. Can you do that?”
He looked at me like I was stupid. “Of course I can. I’m Batman.”
I ruffled his hair before turning back to Carla.
“How bad is it?” she asked.
“It’s not good.” I couldn’t lie. “The top half of him was caught in the flames, and he’s got some nasty burns. He was unconscious when we found him, but he was breathing on his own.”
“That’s a good sign, isn’t it?”
“Yes. And he’s a fighter. If anyone can get through this, Seth can.”
“Do you know what caused the explosion?”
“Yes.” How much did I tell her? “It looks as if a missile was fired into the guardhouse.”
Carla clapped a hand over her mouth. “Who would want to hurt Seth like that?”
“It wasn’t about Seth. It was about me. They attacked the house too.”
“Did anyone else get hurt? Did the police catch them?”
“Mick didn’t make it. He was in the guardhouse with Seth. And yes, they’ve been caught.”
A tear ran down her cheek. “Poor Mick! He’s such a…” She caught herself and sniffled. “He was such a sweet man. Only last weekend, he came over to our house for a barbecue. I don’t think he has any family.”
“I don’t think so either, but we’ll check. If there are any relatives, we’ll find them.”
Mick was an army veteran, an only child, and an orphan. He’d grown up in care before he adopted Blackwood as his family. A bit like me, really. There were going to be a lot of upset people in the office tomorrow because he’d been popular with everyone.
In the background, Belcourt came into view with Crane, whose high forehead and chubby cheeks made him look far too young to hold the level of responsibility he did. When he caught sight of me, he raised an eyebrow.
I focused back on Carla. “I’ve got to go. The sharks are circling.” I nodded at the pair of DEA agents. “Make sure the hospital knows that Seth’s to have the best of everything. If the treatment’s not covered by his insurance, I’ll foot the bill. And if you need anything, just call one of us.”
She clutched at my hand. “What if he doesn’t make it?”
Her trembles transferred to me, and I tried to give her a reassuring smile. I’m not sure if I pulled it off, because I wasn’t convinced Seth would survive either.
“I’m scared too, but we have to stay positive.”
I was trying to make Carla feel better, but I’d lied. I wasn’t scared. A mixture of apprehension and anger simmered away inside me, not fear.
Anger because whoever Blanco was, he’d walked into my life and tried to destroy it piece by piece. First my husband, now my home and my friends.
Yes, I knew I’d stepped on his toes by inadvertently investigating his business, but I’d barely found anything, and his reaction was overkill. That was where the apprehension came in. If his response to me busting a few low-level drug dealers was to send a squad of mercenaries to make my birthday bash go with a bang, what would he do when I went after him personally?
I gently extricated myself from Carla’s grip and snuck back to my cubicle. Crane took the high-backed chair next to the bed while Belcourt hovered at the foot, waiting. I kicked back on the lumpy mattress and went through the story a second time for Crane’s benefit.
“Officially,” he told me when I finished, “I can’t be seen to condone any actions that might break the law.”
“But unofficially?”
“Unofficially, if Blackwood can take out the network supplying the bad coke, we’d owe you one. Senator Trent’s calling me ten times a day, wanting minute-by-minute progress reports. I can’t get on with anything else. It’s driving me crazy. Crazy!” He ran a hand through hair he didn’t have. “Last weekend, I had to miss my son’s sixth birthday party because of a drugs bust, and my wife’s not speaking to me because of it. Just tell Belcourt what you need, and we’ll do our best to assist.”
“Okay, so first favour. You can help me convince people I’m dead. It’ll be a whole lot easier for me to find this douche canoe if he doesn’t think I’m looking for him.”
Crane and Belcourt both rolled their eyes. What was it with that tonight? “Fine, but it’s going to take more than us to do that.”
“I know. Leave it to me.”
I called an acquaintance at the FBI. Mack had kept her word, and they already had agents on the scene.
“Agent Stone. Long time, no speak.”
He groaned, long and loud. “What do you want?”
“I love you too. I’m at the hospital. Do me a favour and get your sweet patootie over here.”
“Why do I get the feeling I’m not going to like this?”
“I have no idea. Don’t we always have fun together?”
“No.”
“I’m in the ER. Hurry up.”
He arrived twenty minutes later, looking like he’d rather be anywhere else. Well, that made two of us.
“So, tell me again,” he said. “Why should the FBI be taking over this case?”
I ran through possible options in my head. “Because if you identify the dead dudes in my house, I bet at least one of them had weapons he shouldn’t have been carrying. Oh, and maybe, just maybe, because they were trying to murder us all.”
Plus I’d rather have the FBI than the local cops, because the local cops didn’t like me very much since they thought I killed Black. That had the potential to make everything a little awkward.
“So you want me to wade in with my size twelves and fix up your mess?”
“Yeah, pretty much.” I gave him a snarky smile. “A bit like when you lost that informant last year and the whole paedophile case you and eight other agents had spent seven months working on was about to get flushed down the toilet, and I waded in with my dainty size fives and fixed up your mess.”
He rolled his eyes at me. Seriously, why all the eye rolling? But he owed me a favour, and he knew it. He looked at Belcourt and Crane, who both shrugged, then turned back to me.
“Okay, you need to lie down and put a sheet over your head. Which one of us gets to wheel the gurney?”
The final part of the jigsaw was Dr. Beech. Dr. Beech worked in the ER, but he also spent many hours tirelessly fundraising for the hospital. In the last decade, he’d organised fairs, hosted dinners, and wheedled cash out of everyone who crossed his path, culminating in the opening of a new paediatric wing. The Blackwood Children’s Centre. He was only too eager to go along with our little charade, and I think he was secretly thrilled to be assisting with a real, live FBI investigation, which was how Agent Stone sold it to him.
By the time his shift ended, Dr. Beech was the happy recipient of an IOU for a new incubator to go in the special care baby unit, and I was the proud owner of my very first death certificate. Dr. Beech was so chuffed with the night’s events he even offered to do a quick interview with the waiting press, and flanked by Agents Stone and Belcourt, announced my sad demise from unexpected internal bleeding to the reporters gathered outside the front door.
While my cohorts played the media, I snuck out to the car park. When I called Dan to pick Nick and me up, I’d assumed she’d bring one of the company’s Explorers, but she turned up in Nate’s Porsche 911. The three of us stood in front of it, staring down at the impossibly small trunk at the front of the car.
“How am I supposed to fit in there?” I asked. “What do you think I am? A freaking contortionist?”
Dan shrugged. “Everything else was blocked in. The cops turned up, then the fire brigade, the FBI, several ambulances, a carload of people from the DEA, some of Jed’s buddies from the CIA, and even a couple of guys from the NSA as well. I don’t think they wanted to be left out. It’s like a circus.”
“Well, make sure they don’t poke around in my house.”
“Don’t worry. Your legal team’s there too, snarling at anyone who comes close. Oliver’s been guarding the front door like Cerberus. The acronyms are hanging around outside, arguing over who’s got the biggest equipment.”
Good. As long as they were chasing their own tails, they wouldn’t be bothering us. Not that I was particularly worried. We’d defended ourselves against an armed gang who’d tried to kill us all, and that was clear-cut. But in the meantime, I didn’t want to get stuck in endless rounds of questioning over who shot at who first. I’d arranged to meet with Stone tomorrow—well, later today—to give a full statement, and he’d agreed to deal with the locals for me.
That gave me time to get Blackwood’s own investigation started. I hoped that having lost his entire team last night, Blanco needed some time to regroup, which would give us a clear run at him for the next week or so. I didn’t want to waste a second of it.
With that in mind, I made sure Nick took the driver’s seat then limbered up and squashed myself into the tiny space in the front of the Porsche.
Revenge, sweet revenge, here we come.