Chasing Frost by Isabel Jolie

Twenty-Six

Sydney

Phone lights shine in the darkness. People are videoing this massacre. Welcome to the social media age.

From the dance floor, I’m a sitting duck. I took out one shooter on the balcony. There could be more. I scan the area. It’s pitch black a few feet beyond the balcony rail. The disco lights continue to flash, as does the music.

I need the lights on. The music off. Most everyone has taken cover below tables or against walls. I rush to the bar, gun poised. Ready to take out any additional shooters.

One of the bartenders half rises. Bodies are packed behind the bar, huddled together.

“Can you turn on the lights? Turn off the music?” I shout.

He picks up his phone. Within seconds, overhead white lights flood the place, and the music stops. Muffled weeping fills the silence.

I can now see from the balcony to the back wall. There are two sets of closed double doors on the back wall.

“Police!” New York’s finest stream in, guns high. My gun is in the air, and the first one through the door heads straight to me, cautious and slow.

“FBI,” I shout. It echoes. I lower my voice. “Off duty. No ID. Shooter on balcony. I hit him. He had a long gun. Automatic.” I point my handgun in the direction of the assailant. “Area has not been cleared.”

He looks me up and down. I’m in stilettos and a little black dress. And I’m gripping a Glock 22.

“We need an ambulance. Three are down. Probably more.”

He lifts a handset to his mouth and radios back. “Assailant down. Shooters possibly still at large.”

Police officers in the back have already started the process of clearing out anyone near the exit door.

He backs up and talks to one of the other armed police officers. His partner approaches me.

“Come with me.”

“I can help sweep. I was Top Gun.” He might not know what that means, but in a nutshell, it means I have better aim than any of these guys. Not that these men would want to hear that.

“You’re off duty. SWAT arrived. They’ll take over. We need you outside.”

I hesitate. Shooters could still be at large, and I left Chase under a table inside. But I need to do my part so no one else gets hurt and we can get medical attention for Wes. He had a pulse, but it wasn’t strong.

As we exit the club, officers in bulletproof vests file in, on alert, guns raised. Ambulances line the street, as do cop cars. The whole street is blocked off. Maybe living in the age of social media isn’t so bad after all.

“She says she’s FBI. Off duty.”

The officer in charge steps right up to me.

“Agent Keating,” I tell him. “I need to call in.”

“FBI is on its way. What do you know?”

“Club scene. Fire from the top right balcony. Automatic assault weapon. Six-foot-plus white male. Private security for one of the customers saw the assailant before he started shooting. He shouted for everyone to take cover. Then the assailant shot into the crowd. Security returned fire.” I pause, as a vision of Wes on the floor, with two visible hits, comes to mind. “He needs a medic. I took his gun and shot back. Hit him between the eyes. The balcony has two exit points. I don’t know where they lead. If there are additional assailants, I’d expect that’s where they are.”

The officer in charge, a SWAT team member, and a few other agents who had crowded around, agree on strategy. Tactical SWAT is currently in the process of securing the location. Patrons are filing out, guided by SWAT. Farther down the street, on both sides of the barricade, both east and west, media vans can be seen.

The muscles in my palm and fingers cramp around the Glock.

“All clear. Location secure,” is announced nearby.

The medics pour into the building. First responders on a mission to save lives.

The officer in charge surveys, shouts commands, and listens, seemingly simultaneously. I return to his side and wait. After a moment, he peers down at me.

“This isn’t my weapon. It’s the one I used to shoot the assailant.”

He nods and directs me to a van. “Give it to Officer Carlton. Tell him it needs to be tagged.”

Sam, Olivia, and Chase exit the building, closely following a gurney. There are no signs of injury on the three of them as they exit. My chest muscles relax. They are safe. Chase is safe.

I float toward my friends. Warmth clasps around my elbow.

“Keating? You okay?” Agent Hopkins stands before me, his FBI badge prominently displayed on his jacket.

The lights, the noise, the crying, all the action slows. I recognize what’s going on. In training, I experienced a version of this. I’m coming off the adrenaline high. All my senses blend. I shot. I killed. A shot between the eyes. No one survives it. I aimed. I pulled. I took him out.

Agent Hopkins squeezes my arm. Hard. A slight pain. Not enough to bruise. Enough to bring me back.

“I’m fine.” I hold out the pistol. “I shot the assailant. Someone else’s gun. Need to deliver it to evidence.”

“What happened? Was the shooter there for Chase?” Hopkins asks me, but a NYPD officer pauses. I follow his gaze to my gun.

“Bag this as evidence.” The uniformed officer surveys me, and without saying a word, I can read him loud and clear. Who the fuck are you?

Agent Hopkins answers for me. “She’s FBI. Undercover. She shot the assailant. It’s not a government-issued gun.”

Officer Carlton slips on blue rubber gloves and lifts the gun with care. Swarms of officers and paramedics flood the street. An army of first responders swirl about. My breathing slows.

I flex my hand, stretching my fingers out, then tightening them into a fist, in and out. The whir of tonight. The spray of bullets.

“I’d like to talk to Wes. He’s private security. He alerted everyone before the shooting began. I want to know what he saw. I didn’t see the shooter. Not until after the shooting started. He used a military assault rifle. He came there planning to kill many.”

“Most recent count I heard is nine dead, eight in critical,” one officer states.

Officer Carlton speaks up. “I heard three shooters.”

I glance at him. He looks like he wants my confirmation. No one is a good source of information at this point.

“Can we go in? Check out the scene?”

Hopkins gives a brief nod, and I follow his lead, his badge. “You wore your wire. But you didn’t carry?”

“No. My gun’s in Sam’s trunk.”

As we approach the doors, two more agents I don’t recognize in blue jackets with giant yellow FBI letters emblazoned on the back greet us. Hopkins introduces them, says they’re working on Operation Quagmire.

When we step inside, it’s a completely different scene from this evening. Dead bodies remain where they fell. Investigators assail the place. A cluster of men stands up on the balcony. They’re checking out the dead assailant. Searching for clues. Unfortunately, the dead don’t always provide reliable answers.

Without the lights and music, the place has the aesthetic of an abandoned dive bar. The walls are painted flat black. Dark matter, blood, mars the floor. Footprints abound where people traipsed through it. Bloody streaks line the floor, as if the injured were dragged or crawled.

I center myself on the dance floor. Breathe in and out. Close my eyelids and replay the event. I raise them. I scan the bullet holes. Search for a pattern among the holes riddled along the floor and tables and the backs of booths.

I hurry up the metal stairs, to the balcony, sidestepping the throng of men, so I can double-check my theory. Hopkins follows me. I point.

“You can’t say he was aiming for us, specifically. But look. Every single bullet is on the left side, where we were. And we’d need to count, but does it not look like more bullets were sent to our table?”

Hopkins surveys the area then waves at our FBI counterparts to join us on the balcony. As we discuss the bullet hole patterns, one of the officers hovering over the assailant’s body interrupts us.

“His tats say he’s gang. We don’t know who all was here tonight. It’s possible this is gang-related.”

Great. Now Operation Quagmire encompasses gang-related crime.

Hopkins taps me. “What’re you thinking?”

“I’m thinking we’ve got a shitload of chefs in the kitchen. I don’t know what we’ll find about this guy, but my gut tells me those bullets were meant to take out Chase and me. Jackson, his lawyer, was supposed to be here tonight, too. The tickets Maitlin was magically gifted came from BB&E. If Sam hadn’t brought his security with him, inside, every single one of us sitting at that table would probably be dead.”

One of the other officers speaks up. “Twelve dead.”

“Do you believe in coincidences?” I ask Hopkins.

He shakes his head.

I don’t either. But I’m skeptical we’ll be able to connect this to BB&E. Especially if that officer is right and the assailant is gang.

I peer over a crouched officer. The assailant has a shaved head. He’s extremely muscular. A bodybuilder. Mid-fifties. Tats decorate most available skin. Hundreds of man-hours will be spent investigating him. Once we know who he is, we’ll check his bank accounts. His family’s bank accounts. We’ll look for any signs he was paid off. But there won’t be any.

These guys are too good. The media will play it out as yet another madman. In my gut, I know there’s a connection. Because I don’t believe in coincidences. Regardless of what I believe, a jury needs more than my gut and coincidences.

I killed someone tonight. I memorize his features. Then snap out of it and focus.

“Hopkins, if I’m right, how long before they realize they didn’t hit their targets?” My fingers visibly vibrate, and I ball them up. No one seems to notice.

“I sent a protective detail with Maitlin to the hospital.” Hopkins is thinking ahead of me. That’s why we’re a part of a team.

It’s three a.m. before Hopkins nudges me and tells me to go home. I’ve told my story to countless officers, both FBI and NYPD. I’ve filled out paperwork. I’ve gone play by play over every single detail I remember. I’ve drunk two bottles of room temperature water and gone to the bathroom in a bodega a few doors down that’s offered restroom access to officers. I have nothing more to add to this case.

A metallic taste fills my mouth, and mild nausea circulates. I’ve seen every single DOA body, including my first kill. Seventeen dead. More in critical condition. For the rest of my life, I will wonder if there is something I could have done to prevent this massacre.

I don’t go home. I head to the hospital. Wes is out of surgery. He’s in recovery. Sam and Olivia sit together in the waiting area. They tell me they sent Chase home a while ago. Neither of them questions me about my status as an FBI agent. They treat me like a friend.

“Sam, my briefcase is still in your car. I don’t need it now, but I will.”

“I’ll get it to you. Are you going back to your apartment, or to Chase’s?” He has his phone out, ready to send directions into the ether.

“You can send it to Chase’s.”

FBI headquarters as a delivery location might make more sense, but the last letters I want to utter to Sam and Olivia are F, B, and I. I want to be their friend. I don’t want to throw up my undercover role between us.

Two men with FBI badges stand at the far end of the waiting room. I approach them. “Detail accompanied Maitlin home, right?”

One of the men nods. I can tell he recognizes me. He’s not familiar to me, but I haven’t spent much time in our New York offices yet.

“Two men.”

I thank them and leave. My feet ache. Throb. I’m exhausted. I should go home so I can rest before returning to the office. I should, but I choose to shelve the “should.”