Deadly Little Secrets (24 page)

Yountz took up the program. “And now, as my lovely co-host indicated, five of San Francisco's finest artists are here to perform a selection from the Opera's magnificent upcoming production of Wagner's Ring Cycle.”

He did the usual “please help me welcome” type of introductions, then handed over the microphone. Ana's aversion to the man grew with every sighting, and she made a mental note to do a run on him when she got back to the office.

They endured the four operatic selections, and then the announcement of the auction's highest bidders began. Gates slipped away to get something for them to eat, while she, Dav, and Sophia chatted. Since the earlier scare, Sophia was sticking close to her cousin. Her circle of admirers ebbed and flowed, but most stopped just long enough to say hello and comment on how much they admired her work.

Ana wondered how Dav was going to explain the young woman's presence to Carrie. Then she wondered why she was wondering.

Relationships aren't your thing, Burton,
Ana reminded herself.
Data is. Don't get involved. Don't begin to care.
The familiar litany she'd been reciting since Rome felt like dusty nonsense in her mind. Life was all about relationships.

“Here,” Gates said, offering her a loaded plate and another glass of wine. “There's more on the way.” As he spoke, several other team members stopped by, casually handing Dav and Sophia plates as well, before disappearing into the mob of patrons.

“Ah, Sophia, my dear, you've taken the field,” Dav said by way of congratulations. Ana couldn't see what it was, but Sophia's bidder number appeared on the tote board over the head of the lead auctioneer, along with an enormous photo of the frilly dressing table.

Gates looked at Ana, as if to say, “See, someone liked it.” It was all she could do not to burst out laughing.
Relationships add spice to life,
that other, traitorous part of her mind whispered.

It was well after two when they called for the limousines and migrated toward the doors. Each of her three companions had captured some prize or another in the auction, although Gates wouldn't tell her what his was.

“You'll just have to wait and see,” he said, giving her a mysterious look. “You'll like it, though.” His laughter was an intimate caress on her spirit, a buoying lift to remind her that maybe it was possible to open up again.

That warm sense faded as they waited in line for the limos in the cool dark of the early morning. Something about the scenario made Ana unaccountably nervous, and she began to scan the minimal crowd, note the security locations.

Ana and Gates were off to one side, with part of the security detail, but there was an awful lot of open space around them and overhead as well, despite the number of police and private security. Their number was called, and they and their security detail moved forward, the team waiting until Dav, Sophia, and Ana were in the limo before they took their final notes from Gates and dispersed to the cars in front and in back.

Ana was adjusting the folds of the dress on the seat, leaving room for Gates when she heard it.

The soft, wet twack might have gone unnoticed, but she recognized it. It was the sound of a bullet hitting flesh.

She looked at Gates, in time to see him gasping and gripping the glass of the window.

“GATES!” she screamed, leaping toward him from her sitting position. Just as it had in Rome, everything slowed to an infinitesimal crawl. He began to fall, his eyes showing white as he did so. The crackled, spiderwebbed glass was mute evidence of the bullet's passage through his body.

The team spun in place, drawing weapons, but no further shots were fired. The people nearest Gates saw the crackled glass, and the blood that now poured from Gates's wound.

Security surged forward, and the crowd pushed back toward the Opera House. Screams tore through the night, and people trampled one another in their haste to return to the relative safety of the building.

“Get him in the car,” Dav ordered, as Ana cradled him, half in, half out of the vehicle. “Quickly!”

Hands from outside lifted and pushed, and she and Dav pulled Gates into the vehicle.

“Now, drive, Declan,” Dav ordered. The limo peeled away from the curb heading for the nearest hospital. The glass whirred down, and the driver spoke. “I've got the hospital on the line. They'll be waiting for us. Police escort should be coming up now.” As he said the words, a squad car bullied its way in front of them, sirens blasting, its lights a blur of blue and red.

“Keep pressure on,” Sophia said, oddly businesslike and firm for someone in her profession. “Talk to him, keep him with us.”

Gates lay sprawled over Ana, both of them on the floor of the limo in the space between the plush seats. Sophia's hand was on Ana's shoulder, lending strength as Ana pressed a wadded up stack of monogrammed napkins onto the wound. The thick napkins absorbed the blood, but were sturdy enough to allow her to keep pressure on the wound.

“Gates,” Dav said, his voice firm, though his hand shook on top of hers as they both strove to staunch the bleeding in the front. With her other hand, she pressed more towels to the back. They had to keep the wound track sealed. At the very least, Ana knew his lung was punctured. At worst, he was bleeding internally and would die right before their eyes. “You need to stay with us. That's an order,” he said. “I know, I know, I don't give them often, but you're not to disobey me on this one, do you hear me?”

“Gates,” Ana said, and she thought his eyes changed, rose for just a moment to fix on her face. “I'm here too. We're getting you to the hospital, hold on. We've got you, okay? We're here, and we're not letting go.”

They kept it up for the four-minute ride to the closest hospital. They squealed into the emergency entrance, and the car was quickly mobbed by medical personnel. They whisked Gates away, into the bowels of the building where none of them could follow.

Still in their bloodied finery, they found seats in the waiting room outside the operating suites. The police came, took statements, left. They raised their eyebrows over her professional status, but didn't comment, taking her statement along with the rest. The team brought coffee, drank it or didn't, but they all stayed.

Detective Baxter arrived near dawn, bringing the news that there were additional casualties at the Opera House, thanks to the panic. With his news, Ana pulled out of her funk enough to remember to text Pretzky; her boss had known where Ana was going, what she was doing. If she saw the news before Ana contacted her, she'd fear the worst.

Pretzky arrived no more than forty-five minutes after Ana hit S
END
.

“Give me a sit-rep,” she snapped, ignoring the disreputable state of Ana's dress. One of Gates's team had given her his coat, and she gripped the sides of it, just to have something to hold on to. “Snap to, Agent.”

Heads turned at Pretzky's tone, and several of the team, Detective Baxter included, began to protest, but Pretzky was insistent.

“Burton. Report,” she said, shaking Ana's arm.

“We were waiting in line,” she rasped, and someone handed her water. She thanked whoever it was with absent courtesy and drank. “It wasn't a secure area, it made me uneasy.” She rolled her shoulders, remembering the feeling, wishing now that she'd said something, anything that might have prevented the night's tragedy. Things blurred before her eyes, and she thought she might pass out, but Pretzky shook her again.

“Burton, I said, report,” the woman insisted, with infuriating calm.

There was a mutter among the group, but Dav silenced them all with a look. Ana envied that kind of power, she decided in a hazy sort of side track.

“Burton?”

“Yes, Special Agent, I'm getting there,” she answered. Her voice sounded stronger, felt stronger, despite the bone-deep weariness in her soul. “The security detail was in lead, two up; Dav and Sophia, two middle; me and Gates, two behind.” The formation was good, they'd been watchful, everything was clockwork. She said that, too.

“Everyone was in the vehicle but G…” She couldn't say his name. Couldn't. “Bromley.” She used the impersonality of his last name to get her through. “He stopped, issued a last order, or made a comment to his team.” She looked around blindly, searching for the one he'd been talking to, the one who'd spoken, scanning for anyone who might fill in the blank of what Gates had said.

The redhead, Declan, rose, came over. “He rattled off who was in which car, told us that once we'd dropped Miss Sophia off at the hotel, the Sir Francis Drake, we'd regroup, get further direction.”

“We'd mentioned a late supper,” Dav added wearily, not rising from his chair. “Or an early breakfast, I guess you'd say.” Once he'd spoken, he let his head drop into his hands, scrubbing them over his face in a gesture of frustration and sorrow.

When no one else spoke, Pretzky turned back to Ana. “Everyone followed orders,” Ana said. “Gates had one foot in the car, ready to get in,” she said, staring blindly beyond Pretzky's shoulder, seeing it unfold again in her mind. “I heard that noise.” Ana met Pretzky's eyes. “You know the one, where the bullet impacts—” She couldn't continue. Pretzky put a firm hand on her shoulder, squeezed.

“I know. Go on.”

She finished it out. “He just dropped, half in, half out of the limo. We pulled him in,” she waved toward Dav, “and tore out for the hospital. They were waiting for us. We came here. That's it, I think.”

“Angle of the bullet?” Pretzky demanded, making her focus, making her think. Ana pictured the wound.

“Down, back to front.”

“Sharpshooter then, from a rooftop or maybe even the Opera House itself.”

“No, had to be a rooftop,” Ana corrected, seeing the angles in her mind's eye. “Gates was at a right angle to the building.” She demonstrated with her hands. “Couldn't have been the Opera House.”

Baxter was taking notes, but Ana paid him no heed. She continued, using her visual memory to key into the details her shock had masked. “This isn't about me,” she stated, knowing it flat and sure in her gut. She stared Pretzky down. “And it isn't about him.” She pointed to Dav. “Gates was the target. That shooter could have taken any of us out—Dav, Sophia or me—during the walk to the car. They didn't. They waited until everyone else was secure in the car before they took the shot. That shot was meant for Gates Bromley, and him alone—”

“Gates was the target,” she said as she scanned the room, locking eyes with Dav. “That was never a scenario any of us ran.”

Pretzky was about to say something when the squeak of rubber-soled shoes silenced everyone. A doctor, still wiping his hands dry, paced into the waiting area. He looked around the group, noting the blood on Dav and Ana. Responding, perhaps, to whatever pleading look must be haunting her face, the doctor honed in on her, spoke.

“He came through surgery. It isn't wonderful news. He's got damage to his lung, of course, but not as bad as we thought. Some bruising to the spleen. The bullet nicked his kidney, and we had to really work to stop that bleeding. There was some intestinal damage, but that was fairly simple.” It was a dry recitation of what must have been hideously difficult surgery. “He's lucky though. The bullet missed everything major. He's alive, and he's hanging in there. We'll know more in a few hours.”

“Can any of us see him?” Dav asked. He'd moved to her side without her being aware of it, she was so focused on the doctor.

To her distress, the doctor shook his head, a negative. “He's not stable enough yet. Give it a few hours, and we'll see.”

He strode off, and Pretzky took charge. “You,” she summoned one of Dav's men. “Can you get someone to bring them a change of clothes?” She indicated Dav and Sophia. “Unless they'd like to go home?”

Dav was a firm no, but he urged Sophia to go. “There's nothing you can do here, Sophia-aki. You have an early flight as well.” When she would have protested, he overrode her, speaking in a spate of soft, hurried Greek. Ana caught only a bit of it, but the gist was that she would be safer in Los Angeles, safer away from him.

When she finally agreed, he had Declan take her to the hotel. Someone else had already been dispatched to get Dav a change of clothes. “Give me your keys,” Pretzky said, holding out an imperious hand. “I know you won't leave, but you can't stay in that.” She waved at the dress.

“Oh, my God.” Ana looked down, clearly seeing the ruin of the elegant gown for the first time. “Misioia will be furious.”

At that, she burst into tears.

 

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Drake demanded, pacing the parking lot of the darkened Opera House. “What were you thinking, shooting Bromley? You may have ruined everything.”

“Neh.”
Jurgens denied everything with one cold word. “I am in Oakland, arranging the thing we discussed.” Drake could hear the icy fury in Jurgens's voice at the very idea Drake would blame him. “Careful what you say.”

Drake yanked his hair, the pain of it grounding him, helping him to focus. “Damn it. Sorry,” he said, knowing he'd better mend fences. “The shot was so damn good.” He stopped, scanned the lot, decided he'd better get into the closed confines of his BMW before he said anything else. “Hang on.”

He started the car before he continued. “Really, man. I apologize. Bromley's at the hospital, not sure if it was a kill shot or not, but it was a hell of a thing,” he explained. “No muzzle flash, just a snick and Bromley went down. You're so good.” He let admiration fill his voice, knowing he needed to make up for his earlier accusation. “I just, well, you know. I thought it was you.”

“You did not designate Bromley as a target.” Drake thought he heard a little lessening of the anger. “Therefore, no action on Bromley. This is the way it works. I do not do other jobs.”