Hotshot (7 page)

They’d made him come to this stupid “party” even though he might run into
her
.

He wanted to go home, but he couldn’t wimp out. Nobody was here for the forced fun. They came to scope out the other side. Get the lowdown in order to make the next hit for their own.

He bounced the ball three times fast before arcing it at the net for . . . a miss.

His fellow banger snagged the rebound and shot. “How lame is this?”

“Food’s good.” Better than anything at home. Except Shay Bassett had come to restock the tables, and he’d been forced out here in case she recognized his voice from that suicide hotline call. He’d disguised his voice, and it wasn’t like she knew him that well. Still, he wasn’t risking jack shit when it came to her.

So he continued to shoot hoops with the jag-off he called his brother. He shot again, ball rolling around the rim.

His brother shot. Nothing but net. The chains rattled and settled. “I get food at that corner market anytime I want.”

“Not me.” He wanted to hurl even thinking about standing beside that building in case someone realized he’d dis respected another gang’s tag.
Kevin
’s tag, and now Kevin was dead. “The old bitch that runs the place has it out for me.”

“Then pop her. Don’t let her get away with dissing you.”

He stayed quiet, swatting at a bee buzzing around his head. Memories of his blood-in to the gang made his hands shake and made him long for his inhaler even though he managed his allergies with meds these days.

“You weak with the women?”

He couldn’t stop himself from checking out the window where he could see Shay Bassett opening another box of pizza. He looked away fast to scoop up the rebound and make sure she didn’t feel him eyeballing her.

At least her big-ass bodyguard had left after his good citizen tour of the place. Was she screwing the guy? The big dude with his shaved head and no-fear eyes looked like a major player. Must be nice to twitch her tail and have all that protection. “Fuck no, I’m not a pussy.”

“Are you sure you’re not some kinda mama’s boy?”

The mention of his ma sent the pepperoni pizza tumbling around in his stomach faster than the annoying bee that kept flying by. “I said no.”

“You know what a real man has to do to keep his people safe.” He held out his fist.

He bumped fists with his brother, FEAR across their knuckles.

Marked for life. However long that would be.

Anger burned up his throat until he chucked the basketball at that fucking bee. No life. No choices left for him—or Shay Bassett.

Soon, really soon, she would pay the ultimate price for messing in a war where she didn’t belong.

Sitting at the flight controls, Vince flinched as the basketball soared near the camera image. Damn, that was a close call with the thug arcing the ball at their remote-controlled nanosensor “bumblebee.” He adjusted the altitude.

The small plane housing the mobile command center was parked at a small local airport, conveniently located near Shay’s gathering. Berg, Jimmy, and Smooth sat at screens, monitoring the different angles of video feed and sound. He could have the plane airborne in minutes for alternate sensoring, or he could zoom out on his motorcycle straight to her if things erupted.

Good thing Shay had been cool with him wandering around the center, making it all the easier to plant the nanosensor. Not a surprise, actually, that she’d cut him loose to roam, since the woman only put up with him as long as groceries needed unloading.

How much longer would the FBI agent insist on keeping Shay in the dark? Especially now that all signs indicated she was innocent.

Eventually, she would have to know. What would she think about hearing she’d been observed? Hopefully she would understand the need to keep her in the dark initially. But he suspected otherwise.

He’d heard the zeal in her voice when she’d spoken about the teens and the danger they faced daily.

Working the joystick, he scanned the outdoor basketball court, recognizing the activities director standing with a trio of teens he’d met earlier. So far, everything in the Eli dude’s background check appeared clean. Nothing they’d heard tonight indicated otherwise.

Actually, nothing they’d heard from anyone offered up clues. They would scrutinize the feed again after the event.

He tapped a series of buttons on the controller, easing the bee up a bit higher. Satisfied with the altitude, he programmed the sensor to fly a lazy circle over the court and an outdoor food stand. A few more taps, and he had the pin-size camera on the nano-bug centered up in the area he wanted to watch.
Sweet. Technology rules.

The suck-up who liked Shay’s “kicks” helped himself to three slices of pizza while his friend, the F-U kid, stuffed an abandoned cell phone into one pocket and a snack-size bag of chips in the other. The camera was so good Vince could make out the label. He remembered well never feeling full enough, too prideful to admit it, and gut determined to do anything to gain control of his life.

Vince adjusted the flight so it followed some of the kids in buttoned-up polo shirts and baggy jeans inside. A sweep of the room showed Shay restocking the drink table. He tweaked the focus until her face filled the screen.

Smooth tapped the buttons up and down the edges of the screen. “Your zoom looks a little close to me.”

Vince scrubbed his hand over his do-rag, civilian clothes and no shaving a definite perk to this low-profile assignment. “Just trying to hear what she’s saying.”

“Uh-huh. And you’re also swearing off doughnuts.” Smooth backed off the zoom with the tap of a button, switching his screen to another view of Shay.

“Easy there, dude,” Berg warned. “We don’t want to fire up the big guy.”

“Does he have a prior claim? I never would have guessed from all the time he’s spent watching her.”

“Hello, dirtbags.” Vince waved a hand. “I’m here.”

“Sorry about that,” Smooth said without a hint of contrition.

He needed to nip this in the bud. Rumors spread like crazy with his gossip hound pals. They had so much classified information to hold secret that they went to the opposite extreme in sharing every detail about each others’ social lives. “No claim, but I do know Shay Bassett. We were in high school together.” He couldn’t bring himself to call it a brother-sister connection. “I owe her father more than I can repay. He’s the reason I’m in the air force today.”

“Shit,” Jimmy snorted, workout clothes rustling as he twisted in his seat toward Vince. “Who started piping in the violins?”

“Screw off, my friend.” Damn, he even sounded like the thug tonight. “How about just take it down a notch.”

Jimmy grinned. “Like you did when I met Chloe?”

“I was just yanking your chain.” He’d gone easy on the guy, considering what a sap Jimmy was for his conductor girlfriend. “It was obvious you were gone on her from the second you met her a couple months ago. Things are different here.”

Smooth typed in commands to scroll through video feed. “Then you won’t mind if
I
make a move.”

“Of course not.” Shay was an adult. She could pick and choose her own dates. He was cool with that. Totally. “She’s older than you are.”

Smooth whistled while fine-tuning his camera view. “All the better.”

A growl started low in Vince’s throat before he even realized it.

Jimmy clapped him on the back, eyes still on the screen. “Dude, take it easy. You just got punked.”

A phone rang over their headsets, coming from the sensor feed. He followed the sound in flight until it got louder, louder still, bringing the nano-bee to the welcome table manned by the woman with a cane.

Vince pressed the seal of his headset firmer against his ear. “Hey, Berg, can you crank the volume? I’m going to fly closer in so we can figure out if that call’s anything of interest.”

“Wilco,” Berg answered, his fingers tapping in commands that increased the chatter over the headphones.

The microphones on the bee were good enough to pick up the conversation, easily hearing the person on the other line as well. Years spent flying aircraft gave Vince plenty of experience weeding out the chaff in order to listen to what he needed to hear.

The woman at the reception desk nudged aside her clipboard and picked up the receiver. “Cleveland Community, this is Angeline. How can I help you?”

“I want to speak with Shay,” a young male voice answered.

Vince straightened, making damn sure the record feature on their control center was working as advertised.

Angeline snagged a pencil, tucking the phone under her chin. “She’s busy right now. Could I take a message and have her call you back?”

“I have to talk to her,” the teenage voice snapped back, cracking in prepubescent urgency.

“If you will just give me your name and number, I assure you she will call back.”

“Maybe I just should have called the suicide hotline.”

All background noise faded in Vince’s mind as the woman’s face shifted, serious, professional.

“Don’t hang up, young man. I’m on a cordless phone so we can keep right on talking while I find her. Okay? Stay calm and I
will
find her.”

“You’d better, because I don’t have much time.”

Angeline nodded to an older guy beside her—her husband maybe?—and he helped her to her feet. She clutched a cane and moved with commendable speed for a woman with a bum leg. She shouldered aside teens, and apparently her presence commanded respect, because none of the scary-as-hell-looking kids said a word in complaint. “I can see her across the room. Only a few more seconds.”

“You’d better move faster, lady, or you’re gonna be sorry.”

“Hold on. I’m giving you to her now.” Angeline covered the mouthpiece. “Shay, there’s a young man on the phone, asking for you. I think he’s the one you’ve been worried about.”

Shay dropped the bag of pretzels, snatched the phone, and stepped back by a water fountain out of the fray. Even from two miles away, Vince could see the thoughts race across her expression. The worry. The fear.

“This is Shay.”

“Do you remember me?” the young male asked.

“Of course I do. We talked the other night, and I know you don’t want to die.”

“I’m not going to die today.”

“That’s good.” She sagged back against the silver fountain. “I’m glad to hear you say that.”

“If you’re not extra careful, Shay, this might be the day
you
die.”

Vince straightened in his seat, pressing a hand to his headset to seal in the sound.

“There’s a bomb in the building.”

SEVEN

The fire alarm shrieked in Shay’s ears, echoing through the cavernous gym.

“Everyone stay calm, exit carefully. Stay calm, exit carefully,” she repeated, urging teens toward the front entrance. She sure could have used some of Vince’s muscle right about now.

Her heart pounded as loudly as the feet drumming away in barely controlled chaos. She spun on her heels for a quick run back through the center. A sidestep kept her clear of Officer Jaworski’s line of sight just beyond the door. He would undoubtedly want her out.

Tough. She wasn’t leaving until she could be certain all of her charges were safe.

Jaworski’s voice blared over the bullhorn with tinny-sounding commands for order. While she wanted to avoid him for now, thank heaven he was on site to keep the peace outside.

“It’ll be okay; it’ll be okay,” she chanted on each gasping breath.

Clearing the center wasn’t going as quickly as she’d hoped. At least she could finally hear police sirens wailing at the full moon outside.

Shay sprinted through the entryway back down the empty hall, her gym shoes squeaking along tile. She opened one door after another, an exam room, another, her office.

All empty. And where the hell had she left her backpack? She couldn’t waste time searching.

Pressing a hand to the stitch in her side, she dashed into the girls’ bathroom, and damn it, third stall down, she found feet clad in a large pair of dusty kicks.

“Out, out, out! Bomb threat.”

A gasp sounded from inside the stall.

Two more feet slid to the ground, feminine ones in strappy sandals so small the other shoes took on an even larger—masculine—look.

“Out.” She pounded on the stall right by scratches in the paint.

Rickie’s a dickhead.

This place sux.

For a good time call . . .

“Open up right now, or I swear I’ll take it off the hinges.”

The door creaked wide to reveal a red-faced pair of Apocalypse teens.

Caden, wearing his too-cool shoes, buttoned his saggy jeans. “What’s the big deal? Somebody just tripped the fire alarm again.”

True enough, that happened often, but still. “Someone called in a bomb threat. We have to leave.”

“Shit,” he barked with a surprise that seemed real enough for her to cross him off her list of suspects.

The scrawny girl went paler than the porcelain john behind her. Another suspect down. If memory served, the girl was Toni, a teen she suspected suffered from either anorexia or drug abuse.

Toni tugged down her tiny spandex skirt. “Come on, Caden. I’ve got my mom’s car. I’ll finish you off there.”

How classy. Shay hated most of all that they reminded her too much of herself with Tommy. Losing your virginity in a smelly bathroom stall really didn’t make for much of a treasured memory.

Neither said another word as they brushed past, taking their sweet time. Hesitating in the door, Caden clicked his tongue ring against his teeth in a gross display.

Shay resisted the urge to shout out her frustration as she pointed down the hall toward the glowing Exit sign. “Use the back entrance. It’s closer.”

She would check the rest of the rooms while following them. Only a few more seconds, and she would be free. Not that she was worried. The place really wasn’t going to blow up. It couldn’t. She was just following routine.

And yeah, if she told herself that long enough, she just might stop worrying about what-ifs during this crazy week.

Finally she pushed through the back door and sucked in mind-clearing breaths that calmed her for a whole two seconds. She coughed on smoke wafting from behind the Dumpster.

Smoke with a distinctive scent rising above even the stench of rotting garbage.

Swatting at an irritating fly buzzing around her head, Shay followed the smell of weed right back to a quartet of Mercenaries toking up behind the Dumpster. She was too furious to be intimidated by the tattooed FEAR across their knuckles.

She kicked her way past a backpack. “That alarm means there’s a bomb threat, gentlemen. So move it, unless you want flames smoking out of your ass instead of your doo bie.”

Her order stunned them silent. Their slow-to-track red eyes didn’t comprehend the situation as a chorus of expletives went up from the unmoving crowd. Finally, a kid with swaths of acne got his butt in gear, trudging past her with leaden footsteps. “Whatcha gonna do? Send Jaworski back here? He’s probably too busy playing with his rod.”

The others laughed at the reference to the cop’s tendency to reach for his baton. She wasn’t amused.

As the fourth teen—one with a familiar snake tattoo peeking out of his shirt collar—passed, she snatched the hand-rolled from between his pinched fingers.

“Not a chance, Brody.” She stared down the seventeen-year-old with professor-type glasses and a scraggly attempt at a goatee. She ground his joint under her heel. “Now move it.”

She raced after them around to the front. Eli herded people from the parking area to a lot across the street, where Angeline kept watch over others under the umbrella of streetlights. A fire truck honked in the distance. Officer Jaworski lowered his megaphone as other police cars circled the building.

Shay jerked to halt beside him, panting. “Officer Jaworski? I think I found everyone.”

His face pinched with disapproval. “Miss Bassett, you shouldn’t have stayed inside.”

Okay, whatever. Why argue when she’d already gotten her way? “I grabbed a basic floor plan of the building.” She pulled out the flyer from a mini conference they’d held on parenting for teens, complete with a sketch of the building for attendees to use in finding different classrooms. “It’s not an exact blueprint, but it has the general layout.”

He took the flyer from her. “Good thinking. Thanks. Our bomb squad can use this until we can lay hands on something more official.”

She glanced at her pink and yellow striped watch and found that no more than ten minutes had passed since Angeline had made the announcement over the loudspeaker.

Jaworski dismissed her with a wave, crowding her farther away from the building, his hand reaching for his rod—uh, baton. She understood he had a job to do, but the way she saw it, the potential for an equally large explosion simmered around here with the two rival gang members all fired up and mingling. If Jaworski pushed too hard with his hammer approach, things could detonate.

She made a quick scan to count cop cars and found a half-dozen, decked to the nines with guns and more billy clubs. A dog barked from the back of one vehicle. For bomb sniffing or control through intimidation? Her stomach went tight.

Sounds assaulted her already saturated senses: the sirens, the voices, the bustling bodies. All of it swelled with restlessness. She forced even breaths in and out, wishing she could will peace through these kids and make them understand how lethal crowd control could turn. They needed to disband soon before—Damn it.

A fight broke out.

“Fuck you,” Rickie shouted, shoving another teen in the chest, scorpion tattoo on his hand flashing red. “Did you really think you could get away with dissing our tag?”

Amber stepped between them, her baby bulge all too vulnerable. “It wasn’t him. Webber wouldn’t do that.”

Caden stalked closer, crowding the pregnant girl. “Do you know something, bitch? Was it you?” The resident suck-up showed his true colors, ones that had nothing to do with gang colors.

Webber chest butted him, a sword tattoo flexing on his bicep. “You started the tag war. We retaliated. Now get the hell away from her.”

“Who do you think you are, telling me what to do?”

The exchange and shoves went so fast, in her growing panic Shay lost track of all the kids piling on.

Officer Jaworski barked through a megaphone. “Halt. Step back, or we will be forced to remove you.”

The cop’s orders all but bounced off the heads of the half-dozen or so teens pushing at each other while the rest of the crowd jeered. Shay could only think of pregnant Amber in the middle.

Elbows jabbed into her side as Shay pushed through, her gaze locked on the vulnerable girl. A heavy foot stomped hers. She bit back a curse.

Eli slid past. “Take it down a notch, Rickie.”

Rickie hauled back a fist and let it fly toward Brody. Eli ducked, barely dodging the punch and hooking the kid around the waist. His flailing foot grazed Shay’s stomach.

Ouch, shit, damn it.

She knew better than to get in the middle, but seeing Amber cradle her belly . . . Shay shouldered ahead to grasp the girl’s wrist and wrap her arms around Amber’s huddled body. Thank God no weapons had been drawn yet. This was seconds away from tear gas and drawn guns.

There had to be a better way.

She ducked clear of Rickie and Brody taking on anyone in their path. An elbow nailed her on the cheekbone. Sparks fired behind her eyes, wiping out her sight for a second before she blinked it clear again. She hauled the pregnant girl closer and backed away.

The smell of sweaty bodies and rancid hatred clung to the air. The lot filled with the shouts of their gang mates urging them on, the battle cry of street violence whooping it up until all she could hear were obscenities and shrieks.

Strong hands gripped her waist and ushered her out of the way with Amber. Shay started to scream, then swallowed back the sound in shock.

She sagged with relief. She didn’t even need to see his face to know. She recognized those intimidating shoulders in a biker rally T-shirt. The high-end motorcycle parked a few yards behind him only confirmed it.

Vince’s face came into sharp focus, a black do-rag over his scalp. “That way, Shay. Go. Now!”

Good God, was this man living in her pocket? How else could he always know when to show up?

He gave a careful but forceful nudge that sent her back and away, her fingers locked with Amber’s. Finally, Shay stumbled free of the smothering press.

She clasped the pregnant teen close to her side, surreptitiously checking the girl’s pulse at the wrist. A steady throb pushed through the cherry blossoms inked along Amber’s arm. “Are you all right?”

The teen swept the back of her hand across mascara-stained cheeks. “Fine, it’s no big thing.”

Shay wasn’t so sure the girl was as unaffected as she claimed, but her heart rate was only slightly elevated, not dangerously so. Shay gave Amber a gentle squeeze, her eyes zipping back to search the crowd to find Vince, her unlikely savior. He blocked a punch then secured his attacker in a headlock.

Now that she had a better vantage point, she could see the cops making headway. Vince’s presence helped even the odds, shoving apart the rival gang members. The street began to open up like the Red Sea to divide the warring parties of onlookers. Cops filled in blank spaces as they worked without weapons.

Amber twitched against Shay, the girl’s feet inching closer to the brawl. “He’s going to get hurt.”

Which “he” did Amber mean?

“You need to think about your baby. You’re having a little girl, right?”

Tears welled in her eyes. “Yeah, but what about him?”

Shay didn’t even know how to answer that other than to tuck the girl closer to her side.

A handful of cops stayed on the fringes, eyes darting, monitoring, hands on their holstered service revolvers. If anyone started pulling guns . . . Part of her longed for her own weapon, and another part of her was grateful the 9 mm was tucked away safely in her backpack somewhere in her office.

Slowly, the tide turned. Eli and Vince restrained Rickie and Caden, while Officer Jaworski and two other police officers snapped cuffs on the other offenders.

Caden gave a final token struggle against Vince’s hold, a bruise purpling his jaw, blood trickling from his eyebrow.

“Back down,” Vince barked, intimidating through his sheer size alone, “and listen to the cop, or you’re going to end up eating asphalt.”

“Fuck you, old man.”

“Stand in line, kid.”

Officer Jaworski took command from the middle, no longer using his megaphone or baton, just the power of a deep bass with authority that added years to his youth. “I want to make it crystal clear. If anything goes down tonight, I took note of who’s here, so I’ll know exactly who to haul in first for questioning. You’ll end up sharing a cell with your ‘friends.’ ”

An uneasy truce settled. Sure, there was mumbled BS and shuffling feet, but fists stayed down. Amber found her sister and gave Shay a wobbly smile. “Thanks, Miss Bassett.”

“Call me if anything feels the least bit out of the ordinary with the baby. You have my cell phone number.”

“Sure, whatever.” The girl bolted away and fell into her sister’s arms, sobbing.

A sigh shuddered through Shay as her official role started to ease enough for her mind to slow and question . . .

Vince had actually shown
again
.

And he could have been hurt in a riot gone wrong. Like before. She swayed for a dizzying second before she regained control. She would not, absolutely would
not
bend over and hold her knees.

After he passed Caden over to the cops, Vince powered toward Shay. “Are you okay?”

She rubbed the back of her neck to try to get some blood flowing to her brain again. God, she needed to replace the mental image of Vince injured because of her, of what could have happened, of what could happen still if that bomb threat wasn’t a hoax. “I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? You’re so pale, you look like you’re going to pass out.”

He thumbed the corner of her mouth, his hand coming back with a smear of blood. She pressed her fingers to her face, fast, suddenly aware of her body again now that the threat had passed. Her cheek throbbed from the elbow jab, but nothing felt broken.

Cool air brushed her stomach, and she glanced down. At some point, a big hole had ripped in the side of her T-shirt, a grubby shirt and jeans now after her trip around broken bathroom stalls, Dumpsters, and dirty cop cars. She smelled like weed, and her hair felt sticky with blood. How could a tiny split in her lip bleed so much?

She pressed the tip of her tongue against the cut.