The Law Of Three: A Rowan Gant Investigation (27 page)

“So you are going to go save her, then” came
her flat reply.

“I don’t think I could live with myself if I
didn’t try.”

“You could let the police handle it now.”
There was a narrow thread of hope woven through her voice.

“I will. If they can…” I let my words trail
off.

She turned slightly, twisting her body and
glancing over her shoulder. As she repositioned herself, she moved
partially into the light. My eyes were finally adjusting, and I
could see that her cheeks were flushed. Her smooth skin glistened
with the dampness of her tears, and she reached up to wipe her
eyes.

“Aye, you think they can’t?”

“It doesn’t feel very good,” I offered.

“Aye, so you will sacrifice yourself for her,
won’t you?”

“It’s not my intention.”

“But you will if you have to.” She offered
the comment as a statement of fact and then paused before finally
asking, “Won’t you?”

I didn’t answer her.

“Aye, what about me?”

“You’ll be safe,” I said softly. “Mandalay
will be here with you.”

“That’s not what I mean, then, Rowan!” She
turned farther into the light and glared at me sharply. “What of
me? Why are you so willing to leave me alone? Don’t you love me
anymore?”

“Felicity!” I was stunned. “How can you even
think that? Of course I love you. More than anything, you know
that.”

“Why do you want to leave me then?”

I moved forward and took a seat next to her
on the bed. She leaned into me as I slipped my arm around her and
pulled her close.

“Honey.” I tried to soothe her. “I don’t want
to leave you.”

“Aye, but you will,” she said. “If you
die…”

I didn’t want to lie to her, but I didn’t
want to acknowledge the possibility either. I had nowhere to
redirect the conversation, and I was beginning to share her
pain.

“I have to do whatever I can to keep you
safe,” I finally said. “That is what this is about. I love you. I
will always love you. No matter what.”

She moved her head against me as she slowly
shook it. “Aye, I am not ready to be without you.”

“I’m not ready to leave,” I told her.

“But you will…”

“If that is what it takes to keep you safe,”
I said. “Then, yes, I will.”

“Do you really think that he would try to
come here?”

“If he can’t get me out in the open, yes I
do. And I can’t allow that to happen.”

A siren sounded outside, muted by the walls,
but audible all the same. I gave her a reassuring squeeze before
standing up and moving to the window. I cautiously pulled back the
heavy drapes and peered out through the hole then down across the
parking lot. I watched the emergency lights of a squad car
flickering in chaotic strobes as the vehicle accelerated down the
street. The lights disappeared, and the wailing siren slowly faded
in the distance. I allowed the insulated fabric to fall shut, and I
turned back to face Felicity.

“You don’t have to do this, then,” she
insisted, her Irish brogue thick from her ongoing distress.

“Yes I do,” I answered, feeling a strange
calm at the decision.

Her nervous fidgeting had been completed, and
her spiraling curls now sat atop her head in a loose Gibson-girl.
Her green eyes flashed wetly in the dim light as concern deepened
the lines in her face. She’d run the gamut—anger, guilt, all of it.
The tone in her voice brought everything back around to demands
once again.

“What did Ben say,” she contended as if the
answer would somehow make a difference.

“The same thing you just said,” I
replied.

I took a deep breath as I ran my hand across
the lower half of my face, brushing my bearded chin. I winced as my
fingers grazed a still-healing wound on my upper lip—a leftover
from my stunt with Ben’s van.

Felicity took on a pleading tone as she gazed
at me, “Then why are you doing it?”

“Because we can’t keep living like this,” I
answered. “Because I want us to have our lives back.”

“How can we have our lives back if you get
yourself killed?”

I wasn’t sure if the next words out of my
mouth were the truth or a lie. I spoke them anyway. “I’m not going
to get myself killed.”

Tears were once again rolling across my
wife’s cheeks, and her voice cracked as she trembled. “Damn your
eyes, Rowan Linden Gant, you’d better not, then. Aye, you’d better
not.”

“Stay right there” were the first words to
issue from Ben’s mouth as I walked out of the bedroom.

Felicity was still in the process of making
herself presentable before coming out—her words, not mine—and I
swung the door shut to give her some privacy. I wasn’t paying all
that much attention to what was going on up the hallway as I
exited, but his voice was urgent and the instruction concise. The
energy forming the sentence told me that I needed to pay heed.

I looked up and saw immediately that he had
positioned himself at the opening of the short corridor. His back
was to me, and his left hand was extended behind, motioning me to
stop. I caught a quick glimpse of his right hand and saw that it
was filled with his sidearm.

My heart fluttered and hardness filled my
throat as my mouth went almost instantly dry. Unencumbered fear
raced from my brain to my stomach and brought more life to the
already churning bile. Each of my muscles tensed in unison as I
froze, making my knees suddenly feel weak as they locked.

An insistent series of thumps sounded from
the front door.

Beyond my friend, I could see Agent
Mandalay—her hand wrapped securely about her forty-caliber Sig
Sauer and her arm stiffly positioned to repel a close-quarter
hostile entry.

I caught my breath as I felt the tension
thicken. Ben raised his Beretta and assumed a solid firing posture
in a single fluid motion.

“Tell Felicity to stay in the bedroom,” my
friend called over his shoulder, keeping his voice low.

My voice was caught in my throat, and I found
myself unable to move. He glanced back at me quickly.

“Just stay behind me, Rowan.”

I watched on as Mandalay reached out with her
free hand, gripped the doorknob, and then brought her eye toward
the security peephole.

Sharp pain arced through my body as my
muscles executed the impossible task of tightening even more. I was
holding my breath, and my chest was beginning to burn. I heard the
latch disengage behind me as Felicity twisted the knob on the
bedroom door and began to swing it open.

My immediate thought was to turn and push her
back into the room, but I remained frozen. I heard the whoosh of
air as she pulled the barrier farther aside, and I shot the hot
breath from my lungs as I forced myself to act. I felt my arm
unlock—first at the elbow, then at the shoulder. My waist broke
free and started to twist as I began to move. Fortunately, I was
still looking forward when Mandalay’s shoulders fell to a relaxed
position. I stopped myself and jerked as my muscles tensed again.
Constance carefully holstered her weapon as she glanced away from
the peephole and back to Ben, just as another knock sounded.

“It’s your lieutenant,” she said with a note
of relief.

“Friggin’ wunnerful,” he muttered, but he
still relaxed noticeably.

“Row? What’s going on?” Felicity’s voice came
from behind me, couched with a slight hint of fear.

“Lieutenant Albright appears to be dropping
in on us,” I replied as my heart eased back to a normal rhythm.

Felicity screwed up her face in
disgust. “Aye, that
saigh
? Do
we have to let her in?”

“That what?” Ben asked.

“Saigh
,” she
replied as if the Gaelic word was common knowledge. “You know.
Bitch.”

“No kiddin’?”

“Aye.”

“Hmph, I gotta remember that one,” Ben
muttered then called back to her. “Well, trust me, Felicity, I’m
not real excited about her bein’ here myself.”

Mandalay twisted the knob on the deadbolt and
unlatched the swing bar security lock then swung the door open.
Lieutenant Albright stood on the opposite side, a scowl on her face
and her hand raised in preparation to knock once again.

“Just exactly what is going on in here?” she
demanded as she breezed in through the open door, instantly locking
her eyes on Ben. Her frown deepened measurably the moment she
noticed he was in the process of stowing his sidearm in his
shoulder rig. She didn’t even bother to acknowledge Mandalay.

“We were just being cautious,” the petite FBI
agent announced to the back of the lieutenant’s head.

Albright swung around to face her. Constance
shot her a forced smile as she arched her eyebrows.

“Do I know you?” Albright demanded. “Which
department are you with?”

Mandalay reached into her jacket and produced
a folding leather case which she deftly flipped open with one
finger. She thrust the badge and federal ID out at arm length and
then made a great show of introducing herself. “Special Agent
Constance Mandalay, Federal Bureau of Investigation.” She smiled
sweetly once again then as she snapped the badge case closed and
slipped it back into her pocket she adopted a mocking tone. “We met
this morning, by the way. I guess you were just too busy to
remember.”

I couldn’t see the look on the lieutenant’s
face, but I made a mental note to ask Constance about it when this
was all over because I am certain that it was priceless. I heard
Ben stifle a snort and couldn’t help but turn one corner of my
mouth up in a partial grin. Even with everything that was going on,
I still appreciated the underlying humor in the moment.

Albright snapped her head around at the noise
and landed her frosty stare on Ben then moved it to Felicity and
me.

“This is a secure building,” she finally
announced, moving farther into the room as she spoke. “Don’t you
think you were going a little overboard?”

“Not in my assessment, Lieutenant,” Ben
returned, his voice strained. “Porter got the phone number here
somehow, so I’m not puttin’ anything past ‘im.”

“I am well aware that he has the telephone
number,” she said. “However, that is a far cry from him actually
showing up here.”

Ben shrugged. “Judgment call.”

“Which is exactly why I removed you from this
case to begin with,” she snorted. “Your lack of judgment.”

She let out an angry breath and then looked
him up and down as if inspecting a soldier in formation.

“You shouldn’t even be here, Storm,” she
chided as she waved her hand at him in a dismissive gesture. “Look
at you.”

“I can still do my job, Lieutenant,” he
answered evenly.

“How long have you been on duty today,
Detective?” she pressed.

“That’s irrelevant.”

“I am not authorizing any overtime for this
you know.”

“I don’t remember askin’ for any.”

She wasn’t getting the reaction she obviously
wanted, so her anger grew with each sentence.

She glared at my friend and said, “I just
want to be absolutely certain that you understand that. Am I
clear?”

Ben spat his reply, “Crystal.”

“Feel the love,” Mandalay muttered just loud
enough for everyone to hear.

Albright ignored her, but Felicity snickered,
and my grin spread wide enough that I found it necessary to lower
my head and turn it to the side in order to hide from the
lieutenant’s scrutiny. At this point, the stress had been so
cloying, for so long, that the momentary release combined with our
exhaustion had made us somewhat giddy. There was still a nervous
overtone to the transpiring events, no doubt about that, but it was
impossible not to be amused by Mandalay’s sardonic observation. Of
course, the lieutenant immediately put an end to it.

“Mister Gant,” Albright snarled. “I do not
think you are in any position to find this amusing. Nor you Miz
O’Brien.”

“Don’t lecture me, Lieutenant,” I answered.
“I’ve had more than enough for one day, and I’m in no mood for it
right now.”

She unsheathed the sharp edge of her voice as
she glared at me. “Gant, if I were you I would take a different
tone. As it stands now, you will be very lucky if you are not
charged with accessory to murder.”

“Do what?” Ben barked.

I shook my head, and my eyes involuntarily
squinted as obfuscation took control of my face. “Excuse me?”

“Your telephone exchange with Porter was
utterly irresponsible,” she detailed, pointing at me with a stiff
index finger. “The comments you made regarding Miss Sullivan and
the lengths to which you endeavored to antagonize Porter may very
well cost that young woman her life.”

“Awww, Jeez…” Ben muttered.

“What the hell are you talking about?” I
demanded. “How do you even know what was said?”

Albright folded her arms across her chest and
continued glaring at me.

“The phone’s tapped, white man,” Ben said
aloud as he reached up to smooth back his hair. He caught himself
once again, but this time he lifted his other hand and began
tearing away the gauze wrappings just as I had earlier predicted. I
was mildly surprised that it had taken him this long.

“Sorry, Rowan,” Constance added. “We did it
after he called the Harper residence. SOP. We didn’t really expect
him to call here, but we couldn’t take the chance that he wouldn’t.
I was going to tell you, but we got sidetracked.”

“Okay,” I returned. “I guess I shouldn’t be
overly surprised by that. So exactly what is your problem,
Lieutenant?”

“And I quote,” she said. “‘Then what exactly
makes you think that I am going to give a damn about some
insignificant woman’s life,’ end quote.”

I stared back at her. “You’re just as bad as
Porter when it comes to taking things out of context, aren’t
you?”