Hard Risk by Sidney Bristol
Chapter Twenty-One
York City, NY.
Robin and Jessica huddled behind one of the metal desks. They littered the room with no rhyme or reason.
The man who’d shoved Robin out of the van fell to the floor. She screamed and stared into his vacant eyes.
“Saaina!” Jessica shoved at Robin. “We need to move. Go.”
Robin tipped sideways then caught herself. Jessica pushed past her, crawling on knees and bound hands away from the men with guns.
What the hell?
Robin’s heart beat to the point that it sounded like a gun. The men had scattered, shouting at each other, some screaming. Bullets pinged off the desks and tore through the walls. It was chaos. But Jessica had a point. Saaina was there. She was also at risk, and Robin couldn’t leave her. Not after she’d learned the truth.
She got three desks away, then peered between the furniture to where she’d last seen the other woman. There was a huddled shadow behind one desk.
“Saaina!” Robin called out.
The form behind the desk across the room shifted and Saaina peered at them.
She was okay.
Relief rushed through Robin.
Jessica grabbed Robin’s arm. “He’s got the laptop.”
“What?” She jerked her head up in time to see the man Uncle Daar called Peter sprint out the back door.
“Oh, no you don’t!” Jessica bolted forward, keeping low and chasing after the man.
“Jess!”
Robin didn’t think. She reacted. It wasn’t until she was crossing the open space of the room that she realized how dangerous this was. One stray shot and she could die.
Fear gave her feet flight, and she raced after Jessica.
This was madness. All of it.
Friday. Office Building, New York City, NY.
Harper gripped the door. Tucker floored it. They’d left behind the FBI back-up along with support. In truth, Harper preferred it this way. The five of them worked best as a team without outside help or interference.
Robin was alive. He could believe nothing else. He shoved the little voices aside that cautioned him against the worst because he couldn’t live in a world where Robin didn’t exist.
Logan leaned forward between the seats and pointed. “I think that’s it. There.”
The building was an unremarkable, three-story beige building.
Harper’s body went cold as the sound of gunfire erupted.
“Shots fired. Shots fired,” Logan said.
Harper heard the words through his headset.
“Damn it, wait for back-up,” Baruti ordered in Harper’s ear.
Tucker slammed the SUV into park. Harper shoved his door open. The others piled out. They wouldn’t be holding back and waiting. Too many times they’d barely stopped disaster from happening and only because they didn’t wait.
“Roll out,” Logan barked.
“Logan!” Baruti’s other words were drowned out by automatic gunfire.
Robin was in there.
Harper’s strides carried him beyond Logan to the point of their advance. With the team at Harper’s back, there wasn’t anything they couldn’t do.
He pulled the glass door open and stepped inside. There was only one way to go, down a hallway and through a small space where an ancient copier sat next to a dried-up watercooler.
A man staggered backward then fell through the doorway ahead of Harper. The man wore tactical gear, but nothing could protect him from a bullet to the face. Determination and resolve chilled Harper’s insides as he focused beyond the dead man.
The plain clothes shooter stood beyond his target, staring at Harper. Probably because of the FBI vests Baruti had insisted they wear today.
Harper didn’t announce himself. He shot, but not to kill. Someone would have to provide answers. Someone would pay for terrorizing Robin like this.
He stepped over the dead man into the room beyond and chaos.
A small group of men in plain clothes had taken up position in a corner to Harper’s right. They were taking a great deal of fire from men in tactical gear.
“Fire in the hole,” Evan called out.
Harper ducked as two flash-bang grenades sailed over his head. He turned his face and counted.
One…
Two…
Three…
The room lit up in a brilliant flash of light followed by acrid smoke. Immediately the gunfire stalled as men cried out in alarm.
Across the room, a slight figure stood then darted around a desk and toward a hall leading to the back of the building.
Daar.
Harper couldn’t see him clearly, but he knew that profile. He’d stared at it enough.
“In pursuit,” Harper snarled and sprinted.
“Wright, wait,” Logan ordered.
But Harper wasn’t listening. He vaulted over a desk and hit the ground running.
A man a few yards from the hall lifted his gun. Harper launched himself, diving forward. The blast of gunfire was so close he could almost feel the heat from the barrel and the brush of the bullet as it passed him.
Harper hit the ground and rolled.
“Wright? Wright!” Jamie bellowed.
“I’m fine.” Harper shoved to his feet. “Anyone seen Robin? I’m pursuing Daar.”
“Nothing yet,” Logan said, but his words were drowned out with a familiar cry.
“Freeze, FBI!”
The cavalry had arrived, but they still might be too late.
Friday. Meeting Site, New York City, NY.
Shit.
This was vastly out of control.
Daar kept his head low as he raced after Peter and Robin.
At least she was clear of this madness.
How had the FBI caught up this fast? Was Peter just that sloppy? Or was it by design?
Daar should have paid more attention when Skilton was talking about the American investigation, damn it.
Ahead of Daar, the back door to the building swung on the breeze.
There was still a way out of this. If Daar could catch up with Peter and Robin, he could slip away while the FBI was busy with the grunts. It meant sacrificing Amaar, but that would be acceptable though regrettable.
Daar slowed to peer out into the alley behind the building.
He wanted nothing more than to put a bullet in Peter’s head. All this time he’d been passing on intel to the chancellor. So what had Peter said? How had he twisted things? At what point had Peter turned against him?
A scream rent the air.
Robin.
Friday. Office Building, New York City, NY.
Robin ran. All those times running after Button and Bow were paying off, at least she wanted to think so.
The man—Peter—was getting away. As fast as she was, he was faster. And he had the laptop. The one thing that might give her the answers she truly desired.
“Duck!” Jessica called out.
Robin swerved right, almost running face-first into the building. She saw an object hurtle through the air. Jessica had played softball for ages. Robin’s heart leaped into her throat right before the sick thud of whatever it was hitting flesh.
“Get him!” Jessica bellowed.
Robin shoved off the wall.
Peter staggered. He had his right hand with the gun pressed to his head.
She sprinted for him, running straight into him. They both staggered. The loose gravel underfoot slid and Robin crashed to the pavement, landing on her side.
Peter whirled, snarling curses, and aimed the gun at her.
Too late Robin realized she was in over her head.
“No!” Jessica screamed right before the gun went off.
Friday. Meeting Site, New York City, NY.
Daar dashed out into the alley following the sounds of a fight.
Yes, Robin had betrayed him but she was family. When it really mattered, they stuck together. He would make her see. Together they could build something great.
Movement to his right caught his attention, and he turned toward Peter as he fired at Robin and her friend. Peter bellowed something and fired again. Directly at Robin.
Everything Daar had built, his entire reason for going to such great lengths—gone.
She’d been his last hope, the person he could see carrying on the family legacy in some capacity. And now she was gone.
Rage boiled over in Daar. He lifted his gun and fired, screaming as he did so.
The first shot winged Peter, and he staggered to the side. He turned his head, staring at Daar with wide eyes.
The second shot hit Peter in the ribs. He lurched sideways and went to a knee.
Daar closed the distance and planted his foot against Peter’s face, kicking him.
“May God take your soul,” Daar snarled and emptied the rest of his bullets as he stared down at the man who’d been his right hand for fifteen years.
Friday. Office Building, New York City, NY.
A woman’s scream beckoned Harper forward. His feet skidded over gravel as he burst out of the office building into the alley behind.
Daar stood over two women and a man, his weapon clicking.
No more bullets.
Harper’s stomach clenched as he took in the blood and bodies.
Of course, that bastard had killed his family. Harper was too fucking late. This time the risk was too great.
He sprinted forward. “Daar, you monster!”
Daar whirled, tripping over the body of the other man, and went to his knees. Harper was almost on him when Daar jerked up a second weapon.
The dead man’s gun.
“Harper!” Robin cried out, her voice shrill and full of fear.
His heart beat against his ribs. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see what he couldn’t before. Robin sat with Jessica half on her lap. Robin’s hands were pressed to wounds. Blood stained their clothes and pooled on the ground.
“You’re a fucking fed?” Daar snarled. He spat curses in Arabic. “You son of a dog. You shoe licker. Eat shit.”
Jessica needed help. Now. Not in a few minutes. At least one of Jessica’s wounds was a central mass shot judging from where Robin’s hands were. A person could die in seconds if a bullet clipped an artery or the heart, not to mention the lungs and other vital organs.
Tucker’s voice echoed off the brick. “Wright? What the…”
Harper ignored Tucker and spoke to Daar, using his native language. “It’s over, Daar. Put the gun down. It’s time to stop.”
Daar’s face darkened. “You’ve been playing us the whole time?”
“What’s he saying?” Tucker asked in a low voice Harper mostly heard through the headset.
It was a monumental effort, but Harper spoke the words as calmly as if they were sitting down to dinner. “Put the gun down and we can talk.”
“You want me to just ignore how you’ve ruined our lives?” Daar continued. His gaze narrowed. “You’re one of them, aren’t you? The Americans nipping at our heels.”
The hair on the back of Harper’s arms and neck stood up. Even Skilton had refused to speak of this. “Not sure what you’re talking about. Why don’t we chat? Over some coffee? We can let the girls go and—”
Daar’s eyes went wide with rage. “I’ll never let you have her. Never.”
Fuck.
“Jess? Jess, it’s okay,” Robin chanted.
“This is all your fault,” Daar insisted.
“Is it? Am I the one who killed my sister-in-law? Did I kill my brother? Did I try to kill my niece?” Harper asked.
“You might as well have.”
“What the hell are they saying?” Tucker asked again.
Daar glanced around, seeming to notice that there were men at Harper’s back. Daar was outnumbered, and the longer this chat went on, the more likely it was that the FBI were circling in the other direction.
“You’re smart, Daar. If you put the gun down and promise to talk, we can cut a deal.” Harper had no idea if his words were true, but he’d say whatever necessary to get him to put the gun down. “Think about it. The FBI has you surrounded. You’re alone. Can you really get out of this on your own? We’ve eliminated your moles. You have no one left in our ranks to help you or end you. How do you want this to go down? You’re in control here.”
Daar licked his lips and glanced around, but his gun never wavered from Harper.
“Wright, talk to us,” Tucker said through the earpiece.
Daar took a step back toward the mouth of the alley at the same moment four men in tactical FBI gear stepped into view.
“What will it be, Daar?” Harper asked. “You want to be in control, or—”
Robin’s wail cut “Jess? Jess!”
Harper instinctively turned his head toward the girls and Robin’s frantic pleas.
Daar took a step back.
Harper jerked his attention back to Daar as the other man raised his acquired weapon, aiming it at his jaw.
“No!” Harper yelled.
He did the only thing he could think of.
Harper fired maybe a millisecond before Daar, but it wasn’t enough. Harper’s shot hit Daar in the shoulder. His body jerked one way then the other as his own shot blasted into his skull. Blood arced through the air and he fell back, landing a few feet from Robin.
“Medics! We need medics!” Harper yelled and dove for Daar, kicking the weapon away.
“Oh my God. Oh my God,” Robin wailed.
Harper didn’t know who to reach for. Jessica or Daar? Who could they save?
Friday. Office Building, New York City, NY.
Robin was frozen with terror. Jessica was literally dying in her arms and Uncle Daar’s body laid an arm’s reach away. What should she do? What could she do?
“Move your hands. Move,” a man barked at her.
Robin slowly turned her head to stare at a white man with the faint beginnings of a sandy brown beard on his chin. The ends of a red bandana stuck out from under his bulky, black helmet.
“We need two medical teams behind the building,” the man said with urgency. He glanced up, blue eyes locking with hers. “Robin? I need you to put your hands here and here.”
He guided her right hand then her left.
“Keep pressure there, as much as you can give me, okay?” His voice was firm and his orders simple enough she could follow.
Robin nodded. It was simple enough, though her head was tingling. She swallowed again.
“He’s still breathing. Damn it, I need some help over here!”
That was Harper.
Robin’s gaze slid back toward him.
He had FBI emblazoned on his chest in yellow. Why? What was going on?
“Coming through! Make way,” another voice called out.
“She’s priority,” the bandana-wearing FBI man shouted. “Get her first. White female, twenties, one chest wound, one to the stomach.”
Two?
Robin glanced down. It was hard to tell with the blood covering both of them.
“You’re doing great, Robin. Real great,” he said.
“H-how do you know my name?”
In the back of her head, she screamed at herself. Was that really important right now?
“Wright. He wouldn’t shut up about you.” He winced. “Harper. I mean, Harper.”
A new team of people dashed around the corner with a gurney rattling along with them. They descended like angels in Robin’s mind. In short order they put an oxygen mask over her face and lifted her from Robin’s lap onto the gurney, and then Jessica was gone.
Robin’s hands began to shake and her stomach clenched. With Jessica removed, the rest of what happened became more real now.
The bandana FBI agent crouched at her side. “Are you okay? I’m Tucker.”
She shook her head. How could she be okay in all of this?
Her gaze slid to where another team of paramedics were bent over Uncle Daar.
Half his face was gone. And he was still breathing? How?
What did they think they could do? Was he really still alive?
“Who is Wright?” she asked. Why? What did it matter?
Tucker winced then glanced away from her. “Harper. Harper is Wright. Harper Wright.”
“That’s… No…”
Robin frowned.
His name was Harper Gonzalez.
Except…
She’d understood very little of the exchange between Uncle Daar and Harper, but some of it hadn’t needed words.
“Robin?”
Harper’s voice brought her head up. She stared at him decked out in black with FBI across his chest and some things began to make sense.
The man at his apartment who’d also been in Miami, for example.
He reached for her. She scooted back. Sand and other debris stuck to her blood-covered skin.
Harper’s face creased. “Robin? It’s okay now.”
Except it wasn’t.
She planted her hands on the ground and pushed to her feet. Her knees weren’t quite ready, and she swayed.
“Are you a cop?” she demanded. “Is it true?”
“What?” His eyes went wide. He held out a hand to her. “No. No, I’m not a cop.”
Tucker rose to his feet, standing just behind Harper now.
She jabbed her finger at Harper’s chest. “Then why does that say FBI and why is he calling you Wright?”
“I can explain.”
Her anger rose. All this time and she hadn’t seen it. There’d been something off, but she’d thought it was her. Like an idiot. It had never once entered her head that the problem wasn’t her.
“Is your last name Gonzalez?” she asked.
Harper lowered his hands. “No.”
“Is it Wright?”
“Yes.”
“Robin?” Tucker shifted. “It’s not what you think.”
“Is it?” She laughed bitterly. “Because it looks like the FBI sent him to fuck me and screw me over. That’s what this looks like. I hope it was worth it.”
She was shouting at the end.
Was all of this worth it? Were Uncle Daar’s crimes so bad to set all of this in motion?
The airport had to be them, and so was the rest.
The paramedics lifted Uncle Daar’s gurney up off the ground.
“I’m going with him,” she said loudly.
“Robin, wait,” Harper said.
She whirled to face him. “Don’t you ever speak to me again. The next time I talk to any of you, I want a lawyer.”
Uncle Daar was not a good person. She knew that now better than ever before. But at least he’d never lied to her face or tried to make her think better of him. Unlike Harper. Because of him, she might lose everyone she’d ever loved.
Friday. New York City, NY.
Everything in Harper felt stretched too tight. From his skin where the blood had dried to his attention span and emotions. He was close to snapping. And there was nothing for him to do about it except try to talk to Robin.
Her grief-stricken face was etched into his mind. He’d known she would find out the truth, eventually. There was no barring that.
The steering wheel vibrated in his hands as he turned the wheel. Someone should get this vehicle checked out.
He’d thought there was time. Time to come up with a better way to tell Robin the truth. He’d put it off because they were still focused on Daar.
The only chance Harper had when he should have told her was when he’d taken her home with him. She’d come clean to him, so he should have done the same.
He’d thought he was protecting her by keeping her in the dark.
Harper scrubbed his hand over his face before recalling he hadn’t yet washed all the blood off. Grimacing, he shook his hand, as if that would make any difference.
The cell phone in the seat next to him rang. Again. But he ignored it. There was only one person he wanted to talk to.
He had to see Robin. He was the one who should be there with her, and they’d talk. Harper knew that if he could just get her to listen, to understand what they’d been doing, she would get it. She was the kind of person who wanted to do good in the world. They wanted the same thing.
The signs ahead pointed toward the hospital. He followed them and found a place to park for cops. The SUV had government plates, so it was good enough.
The ER waiting area was best described as barely controlled chaos. Several people wearing FBI across their chest were in the waiting room and more beyond.
A nurse locked eyes with him and she rushed toward him. “Where are you hurt?”
He shook his head. “It’s not my blood. The two gunshot victims, where are they? What’s their condition?”
The nurse glanced around then shook her head.
Of course, she couldn’t say anything to him. At least not in the waiting room.
Before she could say no, he changed course. “There was a woman who came in the second ambulance. Long, black hair, medium brown skin. Her name is Robin. Where is she?”
“I’m not sure,” the nurse said slowly.
One of the tactical FBI officers stepped forward. “I can take you to her.”
The nurse’s shoulders slumped, probably in relief.
“Please,” Harper said, the word forced.
“This way.” The man turned and beckoned Harper closer. He gave the nurse a last glance before leaning toward Harper. “The woman? She’s in that consultation room.”
“Thank you.”
Harper headed for the door. The man at the door eyed him but didn’t stop him from knocking.
“Come in,” a familiar, wavering voice called out.
His heart ached at the sound of pain in those two words.
Harper twisted the knob and stepped in quickly, closing out the rest of the world from this moment. He leaned against the door and met Robin’s wide-eyed gaze.
“Hey,” he said softly.
“Get out,” she snapped.
He held up his hands. “Robin, please? I can explain.”
She glared at him and pushed to her feet. Blood stained almost every inch of her clothes. “I don’t want to hear it! You used me. You lied to me. And I trusted you. I slept with you. I chose you over my family. And now they are dead.”
“I didn’t use you…”
“You didn’t? You seriously want to stand there and say, oh I didn’t use you?” Robin shook her head. “Get out, Harper, if that’s even your name.”
“I didn’t lie.”
“So your last name really is Gonzalez?”
Shit. “That’s it.”
“So you just lied about having lied, and you want me to trust you? No. No. Get the fuck out of my life,” Robin shouted.
He needed to make her understand. She’d get it.
The door was shoved open. Harper staggered forward and Robin scrambled across the room, behind the desk, and as far from him as she could get.
“Harper,” a familiar voice snarled.
He had a fraction of a second to glance over his shoulder before Logan grabbed him by his Kevlar vest and yanked backward.
“Ma’am, I’m very sorry about this,” Logan said in a much softer tone. “He won’t bother you again. You have my word.”
Robin stood there, hands balled into fists, and glared at them both. Only, Harper could see tears in her eyes.
Logan pulled Harper out of the room.
“What the hell?” He twisted out of Logan’s grip then shoved him farther away.
Logan pushed the consultation room door shut then met the eyes of the FBI officer standing there. “Don’t let this man in the same room with her, understand?”
Harper gaped at them. “You can’t do that. You can’t.”
He took a step toward the door, but Logan was there. He planted his hands against Harper’s chest and shoved him back against the opposite wall.
“You’ve done enough,” Logan said in a low voice.
“Harper?” another familiar voice said.
He turned as Kelsey and Saaina came around the corner, staring at them with wide eyes.
Great.
What was she doing here?
Saaina was the last person Robin would want to see right now.
Saaina’s gaze drifted down to Harper’s chest, and she nodded. “I wondered…”
He blinked at her. “You—what?”
She lifted her shoulders.
Kelsey put a hand on Saaina’s shoulder. “I think this conversation needs to happen not in the middle of the waiting room, guys?”
Saaina closed the distance and put her hand on Harper’s arm. “How is she?”
His heart felt like it was cracking in half. “She won’t speak to me.”
“Give her time,” Saaina said softly. “She lost her father and maybe her uncle. She might lose her best friend, too. It makes sense she would blame you given…”
“What do you care?” Harper snapped.
“What an asshole,” Kelsey muttered.
Saaina smiled a sad smile. “Pushing Robin away was the only way I could think of to save her.”
Harper opened his mouth then closed it.
She—what?
“Wright,” Logan snapped. “With me now.”
Harper glanced at Saaina, but Kelsey had already turned the woman toward the consultation door.
What was happening here?