Precipice (25 page)

She smiled as blood dripped from her lips, took a final, bubbly breath, and sank to the floor, her eyes lifelessly staring.

The ambulances would arrive shortly. Dax glanced around the scene, taking a quick assessment. Yemi remained locked in the vault, but there was only one exit from that room and he was standing in front of it.

Sloan, with a bloody ear and a gash on his shoulder, would require treatment, but he still managed to pull Nichols’ arms behind his back and secured them with handcuffs. Nichols had a graze on his forearm, a blackening eye, and was favoring his left leg.

The Scandinavian behemoth sprawled on the ground, a bullet hole ripped through his torso. It had probably pierced his heart.

A few steps away, Dominic lay on his side. His upper arm was bleeding profusely from a bullet wound, but Shannon had stepped in to wrap the injury after returning from tracking down Roth. Amadi was on his knees, leaning against the wall with his eyes closed, breathing hard. A darkening red patch soaked through his pants, just below the knee.

It wasn’t until Dax gazed further down the hallway that his stomach turned. A lone body lay prone in a small pool of blood.
Krieger!
He hurried down the corridor and slid to his knees, the red liquid immediately absorbing into his clothes.

“Hold in there, General.” He ripped off his shirt to try to wrap the wound.

He was too late. First aid wasn’t going to help. And no ambulance could get here fast enough. Dax listened to strained, rasping breaths as Krieger struggled to draw in enough oxygen to maintain consciousness. His lips moved, but no words escaped.

As Dax knelt there, Krieger struggled to lift his arm, revealing a trickle of blood running down his wrist, over the image of a cross. His hand came to a rest on Dax’s knee and he smiled.

A small, ruby bubble formed at Krieger’s lips between gasps. It grew slowly, steadily and finally popped. With its dissolution into thin air, his last, raspy breath evaporated in three tortuous words.

“Manny,” he choked. “I’m…forgiven…” And as the man’s last thoughts faded away, a smile appeared on his lips and a serene look fell over his face. General Michael Jeffrey Krieger was gone.

“And the last enemy to be destroyed is death…” Dax knelt at his side in prayer for a few seconds before whispering a goodbye. “I’ll see you in the next life, brother.”

Gradually he made his way to his feet and moved among the bodies, deep in thought. He had succeeded in pulling off one of the greatest coups in the long history of this town. A powerful, rising psychopath would soon be out of commission and, provided his men rounded up the culprits at the street below, it would be the largest mass arrest since the bust of the Gonzalez-Yang drug smuggling cartel in the 70s. He knew he should be proud of the magnitude of this accomplishment, but as he paced down the hallway, he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of sadness.

Too many lives were ended or shattered by this madman…innocent bystanders, unsuspecting witnesses, and anyone who got in the way. And then there was Krieger.

A good man, a military veteran, and a civilian who volunteered to join the fight…he died for the cause today. A good cause, to be sure, and his death assisted in bringing a mass murderer to justice, but his passing weighed heavily on Dax’s heart.

It would continue to do so for many years to come.

In the midst of the firefight and subsequent cleanup, Dominic remained preoccupied. His previous acting experience consisted of a couple elementary school plays, but his performance as a prisoner drained him. But that paled in comparison to losing his gun in the commotion and getting hit in the arm with a stray bullet.

He’d never been shot before, not even with a pellet or BB as a child. The closest he’d come was with a paintball gun in college. One of his roommates took him and a group of friends to a local facility one Saturday. One of those paint-filled pellets had struck him in the leg. The wound stung, left a small bruise, and remained sore into the next morning. He always imagined taking a real bullet would produce a similar, more intense feeling, though with greater tissue damage. But he was wrong.

The first thing he felt wasn’t the pain, but the impact. It was as though someone took a full swing with a sledgehammer to his unprotected arm, driving a shock through his entire body. Ten seconds of nothingness, or numbness, followed before a sudden and severe burning sensation traveled throughout the entire arm, like a red-hot poker jabbed under his skin. It only got worse with every passing second.

When Dominic let out a scream, Shannon had materialized in an instant. She dragged him to the wall and applied direct pressure to the entry wound. This initially increased the pain and he squirmed under her grip. But she held tight—wouldn’t let him escape—and her pressure eventually alleviated the burning sensation, albeit slightly.

Only after being bandaged and the clean-up effort began did he think to look around. His boss Sloan leaned against a wall—having already lit another cigar. Director Dax, a man he never saw outside of the office stood with him. They were talking together, discussing some call the director had received. He tried to listen in, straining to hear over the deafening throbbing in his arm.

The director spoke. “Hiroto Sasori has been notified. He says he’ll be on the next plane eastbound. He’s cooperating fully.” Sloan nodded. “Plus, Ford just radioed in. They were successful as well.”

“Any casualties?”

“Nothing serious. Agent Faye’s report was dead on.”

“How many in custody?”

“A little over a dozen, including Lynch.”

“Yemi’s right hand?” Sloan panted, the exertion of the previous moments still obvious.

“Exactly. And get this…they found evidence on him to suggest Sean Lynch may be an alias for Jesse Ziegler.”

“
THE
Jesse Ziegler, from the Helsinki Caper five years ago?”

“One and the same. If it’s true, we can tack on a few more domestic murders at trial…plus the Finns may want to ask him a few questions. But it gets weirder…he was already unconscious by the time we got to him.” Dax shrugged. “Looks like someone decided to do a good deed and felled him with a nearby two-by-four before we arrived.”

Dominic’s attention span waned as the conversation continued into topics he didn’t understand, so he let his gaze wander from person to person, unfocused, until his gaze fell upon a kneeling black man. The man faced away, head bowed, but there was no denying his identity. Dominic shook his head to jettison the hallucination, but the vision persisted.

He nudged Shannon to the side and struggled to his feet, using his good arm to brace himself as he rose. He stumbled across the hallway, his mind still having a hard time believing his eyes. “Amadi?” Anger and betrayal dissipated as the vision became clearer.

The man’s head snapped upward. He recognized that voice. “Hey Dominic.” He gave a weak smile and reached out to grasp the extended hand, so his old friend could pull him to his feet. He kept his grip until he could steady himself. It would take time to rebuild the weakened muscle mass, withered away during imprisonment.

“Didja miss me?” The familiar accent and sense of humor brought a wide smile to Dominic’s face.

“You were gone?” he kidded. “Where’d you go? Vacation?”

“Sumthin like that, man.”

“Someplace nice?” Their banter bandied back and forth, just like old times.

“Sure…If ya like dark an’ damp.”

As the mingled voices of medical personnel and government suits took over the scene, Shannon watched the interaction of the two men from afar. Both laughed out loud—their sincere happiness a welcome contrast to the grim scene around them—and embraced each other warmly, a slim glimmer of friendship and hope in a place rich with blood and death.

***

The vault door swinging open before him marked the greatest moment of Olayemi’s life. Wealth beyond his wildest dreams awaited him just inside. Fireworks exploded in his mind as he laid eyes on the stunning golden sparkle. It took a few seconds to realize the imaginary explosions inside his skull were mirrored by a series of very real explosions in the hallway behind him. Anders no longer stood behind him either, having rushed back into the hallway to join the fight.

His flight instinct directed him to flee from the gunfire. He pulled the door tight behind him, wedging it closed, and retreated further inside. It would be safer in here. According to his research, the metal was thick enough to withstand even the highest-caliber weaponry. Shutting himself in left him with no exit strategy, but few other options existed.

Besides, he trusted his team. Anders and Nichols were simple thugs, sure, but they were big, burly ones. Throw in an assassin and a government agent trained with weaponry, and he had a solid, talented team. If he waited out the storm, he could reemerge, gold bars in each hand, a championship prizefighter returning home victorious. And with any luck, he’d exit to find a smaller team waiting for him, fewer people he’d have to pay with a share of the loot. The thought made him smile.

While he waited for the melee outside to cease, he took a look around inside. Darkness enveloped him, so he clicked on a small flashlight. The yellow glow of the beam swung from corner to corner, illuminating it all. Solid gold bars piled floor to ceiling and stacks of hundred-dollar bills were easily as high. The vault was a lot smaller than anticipated, closer to a large safe than a true vault. But despite its size, there must have been hundreds of millions stashed away in here.

He reached out and caressed one bar gently with the tip of his finger before taking it into his hand. It weighed more than he expected, but that made it feel even more important. He relished the feel of that weight resting in his palm and a wide smile emerged. Never happier than at that precise moment, he was surrounded by all the wealth he was forever destined to possess. He deserved this. His fingertips tingled at the touch of the gold, a deep and desperate yearning at last satisfied.

The rush of being in the presence of obscene wealth flew to his head. His heart thundered with excitement and his mind struggled to keep up. A gold bar in one hand and a stack of Benjamin Franklins in the other, he leaned against the wall, then slid to the ground, enthralled by it all.

He rested there, a wide, toothy smile on his face, and waited for the initial rush to pass. And he waited. And waited. He began to lose track of how long he waited. But the haziness never dissipated. Instead something strange was happening. Rather than regaining his senses, his brain became foggier. And that tingling worsened. It spread from his fingers to his chest. Something was wrong.

Refusing to let go of his new wealth, Yemi attempted to struggle to his feet, but his limbs refused the brain’s commands to work. His eyes fought the ever-growing fog to search the walls and ceiling. Nothing. He shoved aside stacks of money and gold, searching behind every bar. No air vents, no openings, no circulation. The reality of the situation dawned on him. He’d trapped himself inside an airtight vault.

His scant oxygen supply was expiring. He was suffocating. His head swam.

A rabid panic took root in his oxygen-starved mind as white lights danced in front of him and he made a futile stab toward the door, his fingers brushing the handle. But instead of grabbing hold and opening the vault door, he fell flat on his face.

As he lay there, just as suddenly as it arrived, the feeling of horror and anxiety subsided and a weird, unwanted feeling of contentment took over. He lay on the floor and gazed at the door, vainly wishing it to open with what little brain power still functioned.

              The fog overcame all else and the comforting tingle grew stronger with each and every labored breath. Nothing around him felt real as his sense of perception skewed. Time folded in on itself. Seconds, minutes, hours…all became one. A blackness he’d never experienced seeped in around him until it asphyxiated his sight. Everything he believed in and strived for his entire life—wealth, fame, power—faded away into oblivion.

Everything went still. Then ablaze with a fiery wrath.

Howls of agony bellowed from all sides.

As Will’s limping gait took him past the capitol grounds, a series of vehicles blocked his path. A half-dozen black SUVs, four police cars, and three ambulances had parked outside the government building. Lights whirled, though all personnel, it seemed, had already headed inside.

But it was another car at the entrance that drew his attention.

The soft-top Sebring sat near the front gate, off to the side, parked haphazardly as if its driver had been in a hurry. He wouldn’t have paid it more than a passing glance, were it not for who stood next to the convertible. Leaning heavily on an open rear door of the vehicle was a girl. She propped herself at an angle, half bent over, as though about to topple from dizziness. He edged closer to check if she needed any assistance.

But as he approached, she turned toward him and he stopped dead.
It couldn’t be.
Will shook his head, positive a combination of stress and the variety of hospital-administered drugs still in his system was triggering hallucinations.

“Hello? Can you help me?” Her delicate voice wavered as she spoke.

He hurried to her side.
It was her. Alive!
She didn’t even appear to be hurt except for an unpleasant bruise near her temple.

“Hi…” he began.

The gorgeous strawberry hair matted against her temples and her freckles had vanished beneath a layer of dirt and grime, but she still looked as stunning as he remembered.

“Do I know you?” She peered into his face, confused. A nasty-looking welt on her head explained her amnesia, but he knew his black-and-blue face didn’t help.

“Kind of. We met at your father’s house yesterday. I’m Will Ricketts…” he offered, just as perplexed at her appearance and situation as she.

Her forehead scrunched as she tried introducing herself. “Emma Booth…I’m sorry…I don’t remember.”

“We were ambushed. They grabbed you when we tried to run.”
How did she escape? He heard the gunshot, watched them cart away her body…yet here she was…

A glimmer of remembrance took root behind those big, blue eyes and he reached out his hand. Taking his in a firm grip, she lifted her other hand from the metal frame of the door and steadied herself.

“Thanks.” She gave him another quizzical look before turning her attention to the surrounding area. “Where am I?” she asked.

“Outside the capitol building.”

“How did I get here?”

“You don’t know?” Will arched an eyebrow.

“I just woke up and found myself in the backseat…” she pointed an unsteady finger behind her at the car.

“I don’t know what to tell you. I was just passing by…I didn’t even realize you were still alive…I thought Lynch killed you.” He spoke in a soft voice.

“Lynch?”

“Sean Lynch. He’s –” Their conversation was cut off by a muddle of voices carrying from further up the path. A small band of people emerged from behind a cluster of trees along the driveway.

A beleaguered group of three individuals appeared first. A man with a heavily bandaged arm was flanked on one side by an attractive woman and on the other by a skinny, black man with a heavy limp. The three marched in step together. But the next duo created the biggest spark.

A heavyset, balding man with thick jowls dragged another man beside him, hands cuffed awkwardly behind his back. This captive was tall, broad-shouldered, but beefy, his face pock-marked and decorated with a thick handlebar moustache. At his appearance, the girl emitted a tiny gasp and stumbled as her knees gave way. Will tightened his grip to keep her from falling.

A rush of emotions overtook her and tears streamed down her cheeks. The memories were rushing back. “I remember…the gun…he hit me…” she whispered. And then, “Oh no…Daddy…”

Will used his cast to brace her and gently laid his other arm across her shoulders, pulling her in tight to him as her body heaved from the sobs. He tried to console her, knowing from personal experience that the death of a loved one’s not easy to deal with, especially under such unusual circumstances.

“And you…” She turned her head to gaze up at him and tears ran down her cheeks. “You…you were there. You tried to help me.”

“I tried,” he nodded. “I’m so sorry I was too late.” No apology would help at this point; no words of hope or consolation could ever restore her loss. All he could do was be present and let her cry her tears. A single tear rolled off her cheek, fell and left a dark stain as it traversed Artie’s small wooden cross. The sight stirred something in him and he offered a prayer of thanks, his only truly genuine prayer in years.

For the first time in his adult life, he felt a connection to something, or someone, greater than himself. Or maybe it was merely the first time his pride allowed such a connection to occur. But Artie’s faith and his sacrifice now made more sense. For the second time in 48 hours, he made a decision to surrender his life. This time, however, that decision was full of joy. The prayer he offered was plain and clumsy, but he silently promised to work on that.

Emma gave a thin, beautiful smile through the tears. “Thank you, Will.” Those three words, though simple, carried with them a sentiment that warmed Will’s heart and he wrapped his arm tighter around her. She stretched her arms around his body as well and as she did, he knew hers were not the only arms embracing him.

Something cracked deep inside his heart. The layers of pain and anger and guilt that drove him to the precipice and over had encircled his soul, growing in size and strength ever since Allie’s death. But in this embrace, they fractured, falling away in large chunks only to dissipate into oblivion.

Something warm and pleasant took its place in his heart and he smiled.