When a Man Loves a Weapon (21 page)

“Well, now, me luv, what d’ya propose we do about this? I could shoot your fiancé there. Or the cop—better tell him to stop movin’, too,
álainn
, he’s wastin’ my time.”

She bit out an order to Cam, who’d also seen the laser dot and was crawling toward her, and he stopped and swore.

Red dots appeared on Trevor and when she glanced to her right, on Cam. Both men were in jeopardy.

“Or,” Sean continued, with no more rancor in his voice than if he were listing off potential grocery items, “I could cut yez in half wit’ bullets. Might be a bit messy, though. Oh, sure, and then there’s the bombs. You’ve got one minute. Choose.”

Fuck. She was going to die wearing a
BAMA
t-shirt.

“Sean, I can’t even pick out an ice cream flavor in one minute,” she said, extending an index finger so that Trevor would know the time limit. She wasn’t entirely sure he’d breathed at all since coming to a stop. “You gotta give me more time here.” Trevor tilted his head slightly, indicating the space behind the bar, but she wasn’t sure why.

The red dots did not even fucking quiver.

“And when you think about it, we just had a minor misunderstanding. Itty-bitty, hardly noticeable at all. Like, if you were one of my best girlfriends and I had your address—because seriously, some of them don’t give me their addresses, which used to kinda peeve me but considering I’m about to be shot, again, I’m beginning to understand—I’d totally send you flowers for an apology. They might have to be discount flowers, because I only have about a couple of bucks in my bank account, but they’d be pretty. And really, you’d be all ‘oh, you are so sweet, I don’t even know what we were arguing about.’ So, see? You
like
me. You don’t want to do this, I promise.”

How many years were in a minute? Two billion? Because it had been two billion years, staring into Trevor’s eyes, seeing the absolute fear and fury he had washing over him.

Sean chuckled. “
Àlainn
, I do, at that. An’ that’s why, me luv, I’m givin’ you the choice. So who’s it to be?”

Riles got the last of the gamblers out through the rear exit as she stared back at the wall of windows and out toward the nothingness of rainy night and klieg lights around the track. She hoped maybe she was gazing toward Sean. If he’d wanted to destroy her, he’d found the perfect way to do it.

“Jesus, Sean, I’m begging you. Please don’t.”

“Choose, luv. Last chance.”

“Then pick me.”

“No!” Trevor shouted, and her heart seized to a complete stop as both men moved toward her.

“That’s what I thought,” Sean said, and the entire world cracked wide open as a gunshot rang out, a bullet slamming at the very top of the plate-glass window facing her, embedding in the wall behind her, above her head, where twin crashes broke the night: the window and the bar mirror. Giant shards of glass, daggers, dropped straight down and shattered, bouncing outward, with her and Trevor and Cam sandwiched between a thousand razors. She flinched, screaming, curling away from the flying glass, rolling toward the back of the bar. Trevor was suddenly there, vaulting one-handed over the mahogany counter as she landed, blanketing her as the bottles behind the bar jolted, rocked, and then rained down on their heads. Cam swore, and she hadn’t even heard him move, hadn’t realized he’d gone over the bar as well, that he’d landed on her other side, and they all three looked up, straight above her head where the wall was now drilled with a bullet hole.

“He missed,” she whispered, shocked, as Trevor muttered extremely violent threats to every part of Sean’s body, though he still had the presence of mind to pocket his phone that she was still clutching like a lifeline.

“Not by accident,” Cam said. “I saw the laser track straight up.”

Another gunshot, and glass crashed as the enormous window on the farthest end of the room near the entrance smashed into a million pieces. There was a sudden quiet, complete stillness, the hush of foreboding. A high-pitched whoosh sang into the room and something thunked, bounced, and then thudded.

Trevor glanced past her, past Cam’s shoulder, and said, “Fuck.
Grenade
. Go!”

Gunshots fired and glass crashed in a near perfect synchronized ripple across the expanse of the room. Grenades slammed in each window in sequence, domino-style, chasing
them as they ran. Trevor led the way, Bobbie Faye and Cam following as fast as they could hurtle the debris left behind by the crowds. Trevor’s heart pounded out
sonofabitch sonofabitch sonofabitch
with each beat. He counted the seconds from the moment that first grenade had landed, one-thousand-one, one-thousand-two, expecting the explosions on one-thousand-three, and they were still two steps from the exit. One-thousand-four, one more step, one-thousand five, hit the door, slam it open, one-thousand-six, slide down the handrail, no time to explain, one-thousand
bam
, the first one exploded, and the building rocked, tossing them to the bottom of the stairwell.
Bam
, a six-second delay and the second one ignited as he rolled, pulling Bobbie Faye along, hearing Cam shouting something, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Cam was with them,
bam
the next one thundered, the concussion knocking them against the external wall. The world went white with dust as the next one
bam
blew plaster chunks down on their heads and he hit the outer exit door and
bam
the last one detonated, large pieces of wood and metal and ceiling tile showering the stairs behind them.

Open space outside the building,
keep moving
, and he scanned for cover as the crowds screamed away from the track, pandemonium every fucking direction. Lights, smell of rain and mud and horse manure assaulted his senses. Something in the building ignited and Trevor realized the alcohol stored on the premises was adding fuel to the fire, bottles
pop pop popping
like firecrackers. Trevor lifted Bobbie Faye and ran as a grenade landed in the grass where they’d just stood. Riles appeared and ran just ahead of them, his guns drawn, spinning and watching for anything that he could, but they were flat outnumbered, outgunned, outmaneuvered, and
fuck
they’d walked right into it.

The grenade behind them exploded, throwing up dirt and debris as they hit the ground.

Everywhere around them, people moved, frenetic, panicked.

The cops and agents on the ground shouted instructions
to one another to get the people away from the track altogether as they herded the screaming crowd out to an empty field beyond the parking lot, beyond the line of fire. An ambulance raced up, lights flashing but sirens off. Trevor gazed down at Bobbie Faye in his arms, her face drawn in pain, her left arm bleeding from a dozen little cuts and pieces of glass thanks to the fall over the bar. Blood soaked her shirt on her left side, her jeans were ripped, and he could see tiny slivers of glass embedded on the tops of her feet.

MacGreggor might as well have poured acid over him. He couldn’t have done a better job of hurting Trevor, than by hurting her. And that was the point, Trevor realized. There was no one else he cared about, not like this. Never like this.

He had to get her to that ambulance, check the cuts, clean the glass out, get her something for the pain—

He angled toward the horse barn as Cam motioned the ambulance driver to meet them behind the structure. No way were they stopping in the open, though MacGreggor’s snipers could have nailed them at any point since they’d left the building, given the right rifle.

Clearly MacGreggor had something else planned, or he never would have let them get out of that clubhouse, nor would he have used six-second delays on the grenades when three seconds were more typical. He sure as hell wouldn’t have given Bobbie Faye the extra couple of minutes that it took to save the gamblers’ lives.

Only when they made it around the corner of the barn did Trevor slow and set Bobbie Faye down. He crouched, removing the glass from Bobbie Faye’s feet and legs, barely aware she was doing the same for his arms and shoulders. What he
was
very much aware of as he brushed glass out of the calves of her jeans was that Cam stood inches away, checking her. Touching her. Running his hands through her hair. Murmuring “baby” over and over as she stood there, in shock, starting to shake.

The rational part of Trevor told him that Cam’s help was
a necessity, that they didn’t know what MacGreggor had planned for them next, and the best thing he could do was to let Cam help, to make sure she wasn’t hurt, and get moving out of there as quickly as possible.

The soldier part of him told him that he couldn’t take the time to kill or just put Cam on the ground, hard, because the bigger, physical enemy was still out there and obviously wasn’t finished.

The male part of him told the other two parts to go fuck themselves, and he looked up from his crouched position as Bobbie Faye wove her fingers through his short cropped hair and she read the fury on his face and said, “I’m okay.”

“I’m not,” he said. And he knew he wasn’t. He could still see the afterimage of the red laser dot on her chest. MacGreggor had outmaneuvered him. Trevor had failed Bobbie Faye—just by virtue of her being in that goddamned room, by earlier, being in that house, by being a pawn in MacGreggor’s game—he’d failed. Trevor would never burn away the image of the grenades landing in the room.

“Cam, stop, I’m fine,” she said, following his glare at Cam, who damned well knew what he was doing. “Trevor—it’s—”

He stood, a blur of motion, and kissed her before she could say “okay,” before she could explain how Moreau was just helping. She did not need the heartache of him being petty right now.

“LT,” Riles interrupted. “They were shooting from a water tower.” Trevor glanced over to the man, who was keeping an eye on their six. “I can see the tower lights beyond those klieg lights. Perfect angle down into the clubhouse. If we move fast, we could catch them.”

“Moreau,” he said, holding her to him, “you’re with me. You know this kind of terrain better than I do. Riles, you get her to the ambulance, and you stay there. And don’t you fucking leave her, or go anywhere, I don’t care if you have to take a piss, you use the tire. We’ll be right back.”

He knew Riles would follow his orders. Even though they
were no longer officially Spec Ops, even though he was an FBI agent and Riles freelanced, rank ruled.

He knew Bobbie Faye would argue. But she’d be arguing with air.

The only real surprise was when Cam nodded and set off with him at a dead run for that water tower.

Ce Ce had never been to Tiger Stadium at night, a Roman coliseum-type structure that was silhouetted against the bright lights of the field. The stadium was massive. That’s the word that kept playing over and over in her head: massive. The game was about twenty hours away and the pregame tailgating was in full, insane swing. RVs (which generally parked at the local Winn-Dixie up to a couple of days ahead of time, because the best non-subscription spots were first come, first served) were now parked in the RV section. Everywhere there were awnings and TVs and portable generators and cooking, the mouthwatering aroma of spices and rice and smoked sausages and steaks and everything grillable under the moon wafted toward them.

And beer. Everywhere. So much so that Ce Ce wondered if the beer companies’ stocks dropped on rain-out days.

Alabama fans had traveled three hundred and fifty miles and had set up in various spots in the middle of all that rambunctious chaos. Rowdy, barbed, good-natured ribbing (and a lot of betting) added to the hum.

The chicken foot—the one that was Bobbie Faye’s counterpart—hummed, but in the dark of the night under the yellow umbrella of parking lights, she couldn’t really tell if it was black or just dark brown, and she honestly couldn’t decide if it was vibrating because of the danger to Bobbie Faye or if it was simply the psychic vibes of the excitement over the game.

She hoped it was over the game.

Thousands of people milled around them. Monique had already mixed mimosas, extra-strength, and they’d started drinking the minute Ce Ce parked out on River Road. She’d
already finished her first by the time they got to the stadium and picked up their free tickets.

A few minutes later, she saw the group Monique was headed for: raucous, laughing, eating hot dogs while something—probably jambalaya—cooked in a big pot on a propane burner. But none of that mattered more than the big hunk of man standing next to the pot. At least six-foot-six and probably closing in on three hundred pounds, broad-shouldered, dark ebony skin darker than her own, and a warm, welcoming smile. She put him at maybe two or three years younger than she was, which was just absolutely okay with her.

She smiled at her friend, who was already grinning, and said, “Hon. You were right. I
love
football.”

Eight minutes.

Nina blew by two cops with lights and sirens and she knew if they weren’t already headed the same direction, she’d have had a chase on her hands.

Seven. She could make it in seven.

And then Gilda called her.

“Roadblock,” Gilda said by way of hello. “There were explosions. The chatter coming in over the scanner is garbled and insane.”

They didn’t usually listen to the police scanner, though Nina wasn’t entirely surprised Gilda knew to do it. This was, after all, Bobbie Faye.

“They’ve got a roadblock already set up on the entrance. I’m GPSing you. You’ll need to detour.”

Gilda detailed the directions and Nina thanked her and clicked off, focusing on handling the bike. It was lightweight, thank God, but she didn’t want to hit a patch of gravel and spin out.

The detour was going to add at least three minutes.

Explosions. There had already been explosions.

Resetting her internal clock, she glanced at her watch: ten minutes now. She could be there in ten.

*  *  *

Trevor and Cam ran across the muddy racetrack lane, through the grassy center, and on across the opposite curve without saying a word. Adrenaline and fear and anger pumped through Trevor; his whole world was burning down and he’d walked right into it. Just fucking slammed straight into it, and MacGreggor was making sure he knew it. Making sure Trevor knew that what was coming next was going to be torture on Bobbie Faye. MacGreggor’s game of forcing Bobbie Faye to make a choice between Trevor and Cam back there in that clubhouse was not coincidental, not some flip of the coin. MacGreggor didn’t
do
coincidental. A fire alarm creating a stampede at the casino and a second fire alarm which failed to create the needed exodus at the racetrack weren’t just ironic parallels to their last confrontation, when Bobbie Faye had used a fire alarm to her advantage. No, MacGreggor was toying with them. Taken together, the events today were probably a clue. A warning.
Fuck
, Trevor needed to think. To plan. He had to outmaneuver this bastard.