Chapter 13
Kat woke up with an odd foreboding whispering across her shoulders. She rolled over on her back to see Badger sitting with his knees up to his chest, his arms crossed over top, staring off into the distance. The stony look on his face, the locked jaw … Something was wrong. Slowly she sat up. He made no move to look in her direction. She got up, wandered into the bathroom, used the facilities and washed her hands.
As she walked back out, she realized he hadn’t moved. Knowing it wasn’t terribly wise, but not sure what else to do, she sat down beside him on his bed and hooked her arm through his. After a few moments she spoke in a low tone, her hand gently stroking up and down his arm. “What happened?”
He dropped his head back and released a heavy sigh from deep in his chest. “The audio recording I received …” He let his head roll toward her. “There’s a strong possibility it came from inside the vehicle my team and I were riding in.”
She stared at him, not comprehending for a long moment. “What?”
He repeated slowly, “The call was made from inside the vehicle I was riding in myself.”
She stared at him in horror, slowly sitting up, twisting to face him. She gripped his hands hard. “You’re saying one of the men you were with betrayed you all?” She searched his eyes, looking for any truth to this craziness. “How is that possible? He would have been blown up in the vehicle as well.”
“I know.” His words so simple, his tone so clear, left no doubt he couldn’t believe it himself.
She turned her gaze to stare out the window. “Any chance it was a miscommunication? Wasn’t intended to happen that way?” she asked, groping futilely for an answer. “Otherwise it suggests one of the men was looking to get killed.”
“Or thought he could get away. And is even now covering his tracks.”
She turned her gaze toward the door. “Surely you don’t suspect Erick, Cade or Talon?”
He shrugged.
She could feel the color drain away from her skin—a cold clamminess wrapping around her heart. She just couldn’t imagine how he felt. She pulled his arms apart and slid into them.
Instantly his arms relaxed, and she cuddled against his chest. So much pain resided in his gaze. She didn’t know how to help him. The only thing she could do was offer what little comfort she could give him. Or what little comfort he would accept. He closed his arms around her and just held her close.
She couldn’t fathom the sense of betrayal. “Is there any chance it’s a mistake?”
“I don’t know,” he said quietly. “I’ve been thinking about that nonstop since I listened to the recording. I called Mason, and Tesla had done some work to clean it up, and he sent it back to me. But not before Tesla and he had recognized my voice. And the engine of the truck driving in the background. Which means the caller wasn’t me.” He gave a half snort. “Obviously. But seven other men were in the truck. And you’ve met four of them.”
“I have. On my desk are more files,” she admitted. “One I’ve turned down.”
He twisted his head so he could look at her. But he didn’t question why she had turned whoever down.
Maybe that was a good thing. Since being at the vet’s office this morning, she’d wondered if some that she had turned down previously could have been helped in a different way. But it certainly wasn’t today’s issue.
“If it’s one of the six other men, then the outcome obviously wasn’t what he had expected. I don’t think anybody chooses to get blown up and spend weeks, months, if not years in pain overcoming the physical disabilities. So I have to assume somebody either wanted to die or expected it wouldn’t be as bad as it was.”
The grip around her chest eased slightly as she contemplated that.
“And I highly doubt it was done as some kind of prank.”
She shook her head. “No, of course not.” She winced but knew she had to go forward. “What’s the chance the man who died did it?”
His arms tightened around her again and then relaxed. “No. Mouse was the youngest of all of us. He was just a kid. Somebody we took under our wing and showed the ropes. He was fun-loving, bright, maybe too bright in a lot of ways. He was a good kid. He wasn’t suicidal.”
“Was he a joker? Was he somebody who would pull a prank like this?”
Badger shook his head. “Not like this. Definitely not like this.”
“Of course he paid the ultimate price,” she said for him.
He nodded. “That he did.”
They sat together like that for a long moment. “Will you tell the others?”
His breath caught in his throat, and then finally he exhaled with a heavy breath. “I don’t know what I’ll do. I’d have sworn I could trust them all with my life. And have done so many times over, but now … who do I tell?”
“Did you hear other voices? Did you recognize anyone’s voice? Did you recognize the speaker’s voice?”
“That’s the problem. Whoever sent the message disguised his voice. It’s computerized.”
“How does that work?”
“You can get scramblers for calls,” he said absentmindedly. “It comes out almost like a mechanical voice on the other end. This wasn’t quite so techno. But it definitely made his voice impossible to distinguish.”
“Meaning, he could have just had marbles in his mouth or something?”
That surprised a laugh out of him. “For the same effect, yes. It changed his voice, and I couldn’t recognize it.”
“Did you recognize anybody else’s?”
He didn’t say anything for a long moment, then nodded. “I think so. I think I’ve recognized three. The trouble is, seven of us are alive, and, out of all eight of us, seven of us have nothing to do with this. Seven of us are victims. There’s just one asshole who decided to throw our lives up in the air and see where they landed.”
“Surely you don’t think it’s one of your unit? You can’t jump to conclusions.”
“I know that. Before hearing that audio file, I would have said not one of them would have done anything like this. And that I trust them with my life. I have said so time and time again.”
“Then stop worrying about it,” she said gently. “You still have a lot of healing to do. If I had my way, I’d have you back in the hospital, having more surgery to fix that stump, so we can do better prosthetics. But you won’t take the downtime in order to make that happen.”
He sighed again, this time his hands gently stroking her back up and down. “You’ve got a good heart, Doc.”
She chuckled and laid her head against his heart, hearing the steady pounding under her ear. “So do you. But you’re bullheaded, stubborn and much too focused. And not on your own healing.”
“It is on my own healing. But it’s on a soul level. My spirit is damaged. My soul is hurting. And that audio file did not help.”
She lifted her head slightly to stare at him. “And when you open Pandora’s box, you have to expect what you’ll find is not what you want to find.”
He glared at her. “Mason said something similar.”
She nodded. “So listen to both of us. Drop it. If you find any other information, then you can follow it. But, in the meantime, let’s get you back to the hospital, get that leg fixed and get you moving on with your life.”
“And what about the other men?” he asked in a harsh tone. “They deserve justice as much as I do.”
She nodded. “They do. So pick the one you think you could trust the most and get him on board. And while you get your surgery, send him off and running to do what it is you need to have done. He can report back to you, and the two of you can figure this out.”
“And the others?”
She shrugged. “Bring them in as you need to. And slowly knock off the ones who had nothing to do with this and find out the one who did.”
He dropped his head back and stared up at the ceiling. “Easier said than done.”
“Nothing about this is easy. But either you get your leg fixed, or it’ll drop you.”
“You drive a hard bargain.”
She chuckled. “But you’re not giving an inch, are you?”
His lips twitched. “I’ll take it under consideration.”
She knew that was as good as it would get. She twisted so she could look at his watch and tapped its face. “Isn’t it lunchtime?” she complained. “I’m starving.”
Just on cue came a knock on the door. She laughed, hopped up and ran to it. Opening it, before Badger had a chance to stop her, she froze. It wasn’t Erick or Cade or Talon. But a tall lanky stranger, and the look in his eyes said he meant business. But the gun in his hand said so much more.
Badger bolted to his feet and slowly backed up, his gaze studying the man dressed in black. From the description he’d been given earlier, this man appeared to be the shooter who’d taken out his informant. Kat’s back was stiff, and every step she took was like she walked on stilts. But she was doing as instructed. When she got close enough to Badger, he gently squeezed her shoulders reassuringly.
The gunman motioned at the two of them to move toward the bed. “Sit down.”
Badger urged her backward with him. He had his phone in his back pocket. He entered the alarm code he and his unit had set up. It was a number only they knew. And it may help now. He managed to punch in the final digit, using Kat for cover. He wrapped her in his arms and gently tugged her to the bed, and the two of them sat down.
“Who are you, and what do you want?” Badger deliberately kept his voice low, calm.
The man gave a high-pitched laugh. “Well, I’ll take the USB key you were given. And the money you were supposed to pay him.”
“If you want either of those things, why did you shoot him?”
The man stiffened. “You don’t know nothing.”
“You killed the man and got nothing. How does that make any sense?” Kat snapped.
Badger admired her spirit, but he urged her to stay calm and to not set off the gunman’s temper. It was hard to see the man’s facial expression with the mask on, but the look in his eyes turned icy.
“You don’t know anything.” He waved the gun toward Badger. “Give me the money and the key, or I shoot her.”
With the quick squeeze of her shoulder he popped the USB key out of the laptop and threw it at the gunman.
He easily caught it midair. “And now I want the money.”
Badger got up, walked in front of Kat to his backpack, pulled it up from the floor onto the bed.
“Easy.”
Badger slowed his movements, but he had to open the backpack to pull out the money. He reached inside, his other hand up as the gunman held his gun pointed on Kat. Badger did have a gun in his backpack, but the chance of getting it out and getting the shot off and not getting Kat hurt was minimal. On the other hand …
Crack.
The gunman swore and fell against the door, his gun dangling harmlessly from his fingers. Badger pulled out the gun he’d used to shoot through the backpack and held it on the gunman. He walked over, kicked his gun away, plucked the key out of his hand and tossed it to Kat. Then he pulled out his phone. He could hear racing footsteps outside the door. He quickly called Talon and said, “Come in, but a man’s leaning against the door. I’ve shot him once. He won’t make it.”
His tone was dispassionate, cold. He quickly unlocked and opened the door enough that Talon could slide in. “We’ll have to call Jonas of MI6. He’s got a job we need him to do.”
“Holy shit. What the hell’s going on here?”
Kat came up behind Badger and crouched down beside the injured man. She placed fingers against his carotid artery and then shook her head. “You’re a little too accurate with that thing,” she said quietly. She stood and stepped back toward Badger. “How the hell did you get that here?”
“Talon brought it.” He looped an arm around her shoulder and tucked her closer to him. “The shooter wouldn’t have left us alive.”
He knew her head turned to look at him, but he didn’t want to take his eyes away from the man on the floor. The injured man made an ever-so-slight cough and collapsed the rest of the way to the ground. He gasped once or twice and stopped. That was called the death rattle.
Badger holstered his weapon, pulled out his phone, and, with the card Talon handed over, Badger quickly called Jonas. When the man answered, he brought him up to speed. “He’s bleeding all over the hotel floor right now. But he’s your shooter from last night.”
“I’m on my way.” Jonas hung up the phone.
Badger turned and led Kat back to the bed. “He’s coming. Just sit down here and relax.”
She shot him a look but behind it was temper. “I’m not being hysterical. I don’t need to relax. But I sure as hell wouldn’t mind going home.”
“I have to admit I’m with you there.” He turned toward the others and felt his leg give way as the metal pressed against the swollen part of his stump. He shuddered in place for a long moment, waiting for the waves of pain to ease back again.
Kat grabbed his fingers, just letting him know she understood. “You have to get that surgery.”
He dropped her hand and forced himself to walk forward to join the other men. He might have to get the surgery, but he still had to get stateside in order to do that. Things had to happen in a certain way, and right now they needed to get rid of a dead man.
Talon handed him the man’s wallet. Badger went through it, took a picture of the guy’s driver’s license and credit cards, checked to make sure nothing more was of interest and then handed it back.
Talon straightened. “Nothing else is on him.”
“Well, he was hired by someone,” Badger said in a harsh voice. “And he got one of his jobs done. Question is, was shooting us his second job or was he just cleaning up his first job? Or figured to collect a bonus for himself? But he knew about the money and the USB key.”
“That implies he knows for sure you were in that hotel room when he shot the informant. It also implies he knew a deal was going down and the details.”
“I already thought of that. Which just means my contact has either been hacked or our informant told someone.”
They pulled off the man’s hood and studied his face. They all took a picture of his face for ID. Badger quickly sent the shooter’s photo to Mason, then to Levi. “I’m hoping someone can do a full workup on this guy.”
As soon as word got out, all their phones started flashing. They looked at each other and grimaced. “Stone says he’ll work on it,” Talon said. He laughed. “Did all you guys contact him?”
“I contacted Levi. He’s the boss.”
Talon nodded. “Tesla’s on it as well.”
“Apparently nobody likes us getting shot at in England.”
“I don’t mind you getting shot at. It’s when you guys shoot back, that’s the problem.”
At the strange voice at the door, they all turned.
Jonas stepped into the room, stared down at the dead man and sighed. “We’ve got paramedics coming. They’ll take him away. But cancel the calls to the others. I think I know him. Low level hire. Been suspected of taking out a few high profile businessmen a couple of years back.” He turned to look at the others. “And what makes you think this is the guy who shot your informant last night?”
Badger filled him in on the little bit they knew.
Jonas nodded and said, “If his gun matches, then fine. It’s an open-and-shut case. I’ll presume he either saw you in the informant’s apartment building or saw you leaving.” He stared for another long moment into each of their faces, then added, “When are you leaving town?”
“Monday.”
He shook his head. “Your flights will be changed for free. But I’d like you out tomorrow.”
The men nodded. “We can do that.”
Jonas turned to look at Kat. “Sorry. Your visit is cut short. But your friends here bring trouble wherever they go.”
She winced. “That’s all right. I was just saying I wouldn’t mind going home myself.”
“Is it safe yet?”
Her face fell. Badger realized she hadn’t considered the problems she’d be going home to. “Probably not, but I can get a hotel while my house is fixed.” She raked her hands through her hair. “The sooner, the better. England’s not looking like such a nice place to visit anymore.”