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‘I’m fine.’ Her tone was brusque and she turned away, her eyes sweeping the sidewalk for trouble, out of habit.
She was angry with herself. Why had she been thinking about that stuff? It was ancient history.
Right now, she had a job to do.
‘Have you seen any sign of them?’ she asked, peering into the shadows.
‘Nothing at all.’ He slowed the car to a crawl, squinting at the buildings around them. ‘Looks like we got here before backup did.’
This wasn’t normal. Harper frowned.
‘What’s taking so long?’
Miles shook his head. ‘No idea.’
Thirty-Ninth Street was narrower and much darker than Broad, lined on either side by some of the city’s most notorious public housing projects. Harper had been here many nights before, but she could never remember seeing it so empty. No one hung out on the steps, or gathered on the concrete drives. There were no pit-bull gangs comparing dogs, no crowds of young men jostling on the basketball court.
Miles gave a low whistle.
‘Well, this is unusual.’ He spoke softly, as if they might be heard through the windows.
Harper leaned forward in her seat to look up.
‘Someone shot out the streetlights.’
‘Five-six-eight, what is your situation?’ The dispatcher’s voice crackling out of the police scanner seemed too loud in the heavy silence.
A long moment passed. All the radio chatter had stopped now, as if every cop in the city was waiting for this one crime to play out.
‘This is five-six-eight.’ The officer’s voice was low now, barely above a whisper. ‘Suspects ran into the Anderson Houses. I’ve lost visual. I’m looking for them.’
‘Copy that, five-six-eight,’ the dispatcher said. ‘Be aware, backup is en route.’
Miles pointed to a decrepit cluster of boarded-up, graffiti-covered three-story buildings at the end of the road.
‘Anderson Houses,’ he said. ‘Been closed a few years now. Great place to hide.’
Pulling the car into an empty space at the side of the road, he cut the engine. The quiet that followed felt unnatural.
In sync, Harper and Miles unhooked the scanners from their belts and placed them on the floor of the car.
Miles looked at her, his eyes gleaming in the shadows. ‘This could get messy.’
Harper grinned at him. ‘What’s new?’
Tilting her head at the door, she reached for the handle.
There was no more discussion. They both knew how dangerous it was.
They jumped out of the car in the same moment, closed their doors carefully and edged down the road toward the boarded-up buildings.
Outside, the humidity hung thick in the hot air and the odd hush felt even heavier. Not one person walked down the normally crowded street. Their soft-soled shoes were silent on the pavement as they moved through the darkness. Still, Harper was conscious with every step of a sense of being watched.
The fine hairs on the back of her neck rose.
‘Where is everyone?’ she whispered.
Slowing, Miles scanned the ramshackle buildings around them. They appeared empty. But Harper suspected there were people there, behind every dark pane of glass.
‘Waiting,’ he said grimly.
Across the street, something moved in the shadows.
They both noticed it at the same time but Miles reacted first, grabbing Harper’s arm and pulling her behind a parked car.
They crouched low.
Peering into the darkness, Harper could make out three figures about twenty yards away. Two were tall and thin, one was short and stocky. Hidden behind a tall, abandoned tenement, the three didn’t seem aware they were being watched. They were staring intently in the opposite direction.
Following their line of vision, Harper at first saw nothing. Then she noticed the glow of a flashlight bobbing at the far end of the long, dusty courtyard.
Her heart sped up. It had to be the cop – Five-six-eight.
The killers were two buildings away from him and he was heading the wrong way. He had no idea where they were. But they knew right where he was.
Carefully, she raised herself up above the hood of the dusty parked Toyota, trying to get a better look at what the men were doing. The small one was fussing with something around his neck. It took her a second to realize it was a bandanna.
The three wanted men leaned towards each other, whispering. They seemed to be arguing.
The smallest one said something that silenced the others. Despite his size, it was immediately clear he was the leader of that group.
The other two dropped back as, with one hand, he tugged the bandanna up over his nose and mouth, like a bandit from a western movie.
Reaching behind his back, he pulled a gun from the waistband of his jeans.
Harper’s stomach dropped.
He was going to take the cop out.
In desperation, she looked over her shoulder to the empty street. Where the hell was backup? They should have been here long ago.
But behind them there was only darkness.
A few feet away, Miles had balanced his camera on the very edge of the trunk and was focusing it on the three men. His hands were absolutely steady.
Harper leaned towards him.
‘We have to warn that cop,’ she hissed.
Miles turned far enough to give her an incredulous look.
She couldn’t blame him. She knew as well as anyone reporters at crime scenes were supposed to be nothing but eyes and ears – always observing, never getting involved.
But surely this was different. Someone could die. And there was no one else here to save him.
Before she could make up her mind what to do, the three gunmen stepped out of the shadows.
Harper’s eyes had adjusted to the dark now and she could see them clearly as the one with the bandanna raised his gun, leveling it at the bobbing light in the distance.
The would-be shooter was small – no more than five foot four – and so young. He could easily be a teenager.
But his stance was confident. His hand was steady. There was a kind of eagerness to his posture – he leaned forward onto the balls of his feet, the gun thrust out. As if he couldn’t wait to kill.
The scene took on a haze of unreality. It was too late to call for help. They were too close, anyway.
Next to her, Miles took his first careful shots. There was no loud click – just a muffled shushing sound, instantly lost in the breeze.
He modified his cameras for silence.
Across the road, the gunman spread his legs, bracing himself to fire. The gun glittered silver in his hand.
Every muscle in Harper’s body tightened, preparing for the roar of gunfire. Her hands gripped the trunk of the Toyota in front of her, knuckles gleaming pale.
This couldn’t happen. She couldn’t sit there and watch a man die. She had to do something.
Closing her eyes she drew a sharp breath. Then, before she could talk herself out of it, she shouted into the quiet night.
‘Police. Drop your weapons.’ She paused, trying to think up something else intimidating to say. ‘You’re surrounded.’
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Miles glare at her.
Across the courtyard, the cop’s flashlight swung hurriedly in her direction. It blinked once, then disappeared.
The wanted trio whirled toward her voice. The taller two whipped handguns out of their waistbands and pointed them at the Toyota.
Harper and Miles ducked down below the windows.
Squeezing her eyes shut, Harper listened for any sound. Her heart slammed against her ribs. Her breath came in short, tight gasps. She had definitely not thought this through.
‘Great.’ Crouching next to her, every muscle tense, Miles hissed, ‘What’s next in your plan? Hit them with your pen?’
Harper didn’t have an answer. What was the step after yelling? Yell again?
Where were the real police, for God’s sake?
Cautiously, she raised her head to look at the men through the dirty car windows. All their guns were pointed directly at her.
With a gasp, she dropped back down. Her ribs felt too tight around her lungs – she couldn’t seem to breathe.
If the police didn’t get here soon, she and Miles were both going to die.
Swallowing hard, she tried shouting again.
‘I said drop your weapons, now.’
‘Fuck you, five-o,’ the tallest of the three shouted defiantly.
She heard a series of metallic clicks.
Her heart stopped.
She heard Miles whisper, ‘Oh, hell.’
They threw themselves down flat, hitting the rough concrete as the men fired.
The noise of three powerful guns letting loose was deafening – an almighty cannon roar.
Overhead, the windows of the car shattered.
Her hands covering her head, Harper squeezed her eyes shut as glass showered her.
They were trapped.
Chapter Four (#ulink_517dc7da-0a32-584e-b667-ae2f66305f85)
The shooting seemed to go on forever. When it finally stopped, the silence left a hollow feeling in Harper’s chest – a curious emptiness.
Her ears ringing, she reached out blindly for Miles.
He wasn’t there.
‘Miles,’ she whispered urgently, hands flailing in the air.
‘I’m alive,’ he hissed from a few feet away. ‘No thanks to you.’
Blinking dust and glass from her eyes, she saw him, crouched by the trunk of the car.
‘You dead, five-o?’ one of the shooters shouted mockingly.
Before Harper could think of an appropriate reply, a cool voice spoke from behind her right shoulder.
‘I am alive and very pissed off,’ it said. ‘Now drop your weapons or I will unload on you.’
Startled, Harper twisted around. A tall, broad-shouldered man stood directly behind her. He had a 9 mm semi-automatic pistol trained on the three suspects.
Luke Walker.
He wore a black T-shirt and jeans. The badge hooked to his belt gleamed. His gun hand was absolutely steady.
