Betrayed

Chapter 30

The vehicle skidded to a stop, its wheels inches from Alesandro’s head and shoulders.

Shane jumped out the driver’s door. Max flew from the passenger side.

Jack came from the back.

“They’re inside the building,” Elena shouted.

“Are you all right?” Shane called urgently.

“Yes.”

He turned toward the warehouse as the loading-dock door opened, followed by a blast of gunfire.

Elena screamed. She couldn’t see Shane, and she dashed around the borrowed car, using the SUV for cover.

As she peeked around the fender, she saw the Rockfort men crouching below the level of the loading dock, using the concrete barrier as a shield.

Shane had a backpack with him. He set it down and reached inside, pulling out something and tossing it through the open door into the warehouse interior.

It exploded inside with a terrible noise, a burst of smoke, and a concussion that shook the surrounding area.

He tossed in a second, then pulled a gas mask over his face. The other Rockfort men followed suit before dashing up the steps and pulling the door open.

Gunfire rattled through the smoke. The Rockfort men went in shooting, and Elena could see nothing. But she heard the sounds of battle.

Shane led the way up the stairs. Instead of pulling the pedestrian door open, he eased around to the garage opening. Beyond was a large room with cinder-block walls and industrial shelving clustered in several locations. At the back were spaces partitioned off into what might be offices. One of their opponents lay on the floor about halfway between the front and back of the open area. Jack moved toward him and rolled him over.

“Dead.”

As he spoke a burst of gunfire came from the back of the building.

While Jack retreated to the staging area, Shane and Max were already leaping toward the nearest shelves. They pulled them away from the wall and toppled them on their sides. Using the barrier as a shield, all three Rockfort men began to advance on the back of the building, pushing the shelves in front of them.

“It sounds like only one guy firing,” Shane said.

“Hopefully, the rest are dead,” Jack answered.

They kept moving toward the lone gunman, who must be holed up in one of the offices.

“Wait,” the gunman shouted.

“For what?”

“I’ll cut a deal with you.”

“Now? After you’ve spent so much time going after S&D?”

“Because Kinkead has something worth billions.”

“What?”

“A program that can predict which stocks are going to make fantastic short-term gains. Nothing like it exists. He’s going to market it to investors, and it will make them some money, but he’s keeping the best parts for himself.”

“Where did he get it?”

“From the father of a smart-as-shit kid.”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Your girlfriend’s got a copy of it. And we can share it.”

Elena knew she should stay where she was. She knew, but her brother was still lying in the middle of the road.

She ran to him, caught him under the shoulders, and dragged him back so that the bulk of the SUV was between him and the gunfight.

She’d gotten Alesandro to safety, but she gasped as she saw the smear she’d left on the wet pavement. He’d been lying in a pool of blood, and a red trail had followed him to the shelter of the SUV.

“Alesandro,” she gasped.

His eyes flickered open. “Elena…you came for me.”

She frantically pulled at his shirt. She had tended Shane’s wounds. She could do the same for Alesandro. “Where are you hit?”

He reached for her hand to stop her. “Don’t. It doesn’t matter.”

“But…”

“They beat me up pretty bad. Stuff inside me is broken. This is a mercy.”

“No!”

“Listen to me. I don’t have much time. I heard them talking…” He stopped and took a breath. “They called him Mr. Weller.”

“Just stay quiet,” she soothed as she leaned over her brother.

“Elena, you’re a good girl. I was always going to disappoint our parents.” He stopped and coughed, then started talking again. “Tell them I’ll wait for them in heaven.”

“Alesandro.”

He didn’t answer, and when she leaned over him and felt for a pulse in his neck, there was none.

Tears welled in her eyes as she reached to close his eyelids. She had thought she could rescue him, but she’d been wrong. He had suffered so much, and now he was dead.

“Nice of you to offer, but I don’t think so,” Shane growled.

“Wait. Why not?”

There were a lot of things Shane could have said, but he kept it simple. “Because you’re a motherfucking scumbag.”

He pushed the metal shelving forward, advancing on the man who began to shoot again, the sound of the automatic weapon echoing in the towering space.

Shane reached the wall of the first office, picked up the shelving, and smashed it through the window as an arc of gunfire followed the unexpected intrusion.

Taking advantage of the distraction, Shane darted around the corner and saw a tubby guy wielding an assault rifle. He shot the man in the chest. Cautiously he advanced on him, but the bastard wasn’t playing possum. He was dead, and as Shane stared down at him, irony washed over him. They’d called this guy Mr. Big. And he was bulky enough to live up to the name.

“Check the back of the building,” he called to his friends as he dashed back the way he’d come.

Elena looked up, seeing a figure running toward her. In the light spilling from the warehouse, she couldn’t see who it was, and she raised her gun.

“Elena, it’s me.”

“Shane!” She stood, dashing toward him. He leaped off the edge of the loading dock, landed on the pavement, and sprinted toward her.

They fell into each other’s arms, clinging and rocking.

“Mr. Big?” she gasped out.

“He’s not going to be after us any longer.”

“Gracias a Dios.” Then she raised her face. “He’s dead?”

“Yeah. He might be alive if he hadn’t tried to kill me.”

Shane looked past to see the crumpled figure lying nearby. “That’s your brother?”

“Sí.”

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“Thank you.”

He stroked his hands comfortingly over her back.

“He said they had hurt him badly when they tortured him. He said he wasn’t going to make it.” As she said the last part, she struggled to hold back a sob.

“I’m sorry,” Shane said again. “You came all this way to rescue him.”

“Nobody could rescue him,” she answered, finally understanding the truth. “He lost his sense of direction, and there was no way…” She let the sentence trail off.

“I know.” Shane continued to stroke her, holding her close, and she could have stayed there forever.

In the next moment, he broke the spell. “We can’t stay here,” he murmured.

“I know.”

As she acknowledged the urgency in his voice, he eased away.

She raised her head, taking in the scene of carnage.

“But the police…” she began.

“We’ve still got things to do, and we won’t get to do them if we’re all balled up with the cops.”

The two other Rockfort men had joined them outside the warehouse.

“Where’s your gun?” Shane asked.

She pulled the weapon out of the waistband of her slacks and held it downward, the way he’d taught her.

Shane took it, wiped it off, and knelt, pressing it into Alesandro’s hand, wrapping his fingers around the butt, and slipping his finger into the trigger guard.

“You’re making it look like he and Weller’s men had a gun battle?” she asked.

“Weller?”

“He said that’s the guy’s name.”

“Okay, that’s good. The cops will know other people were here. Only the bullet in the guy you shot will match this gun. But they won’t trace the rest of them to us.”

“How will they know who Alesandro is?”

“Maybe through his fingerprints. Or maybe they’ll need an anonymous call.”

Max was inside the borrowed car, wiping off the steering wheel and the other surfaces.

“He was directing you by phone?” Shane asked.

She nodded and pointed to the hood of the car where she’d left the phone.

Shane retrieved it, wiped it off again, and put it in Alesandro’s other hand.

“And the keys?”

She pointed to where they lay on the pavement.

Again, he wiped them off before putting them back into the ignition.

Then they all climbed into the SUV and drove away.

Shane and Elena sat in the backseat, his arm firmly around her.

“You did good,” he said.

“I couldn’t have held them off by myself.”

“You held them off long enough for us to get here.”

“I’ve got the tape from the camera,” Jack said from the front seat.

She winced. “With me naked.”

“Nobody’s going to look at it,” he answered.

She leaned into Shane and closed her eyes, but they snapped open moments later.

“Where are we going?”

“The Eastern Shore, to retrieve the SIM card.”

“And return it to Kinkead?”

“After we find out what’s on it.”

“Something important to S&D.”

“From what…Weller said, I think it’s more than that.”

“What?”

“We have to get the information off it.”

Emotional exhaustion finally overcame Elena. She knew that everything wasn’t settled, but she was too worn out to care. She drifted off to sleep. Her eyes didn’t open until she felt the car slow at the gate of the safe house.

She winced, remembering the last time they’d been there.

Shane stroked her shoulder. “Weller sent the men who came here before. He’s not giving any more orders.”

She answered with a tight nod.

“You stay here,” he said to the other two Rockfort men as they pulled up in front of the door. He slipped his arm away from Elena and climbed out of the car, heading for the front porch. The front door was unlocked, and as he pushed it open, he stopped short.

“What?” Max called.

“The place is a mess.”

“Mr. Big, I mean Weller, must have been looking for the S&D stuff.”

Shane’s jaw firmed. “If I had to guess, I’d say Kinkead was here, too.”

Jack and Max nodded.

“But we know Weller didn’t find it,” Shane said as he disappeared inside. “Otherwise there would have been no point in having you meet him. And I’ll know in a few minutes if Kinkead managed to get it.”

Elena waited with heart pounding. It felt as if Shane had been gone for years, but it was probably only a few minutes before he reappeared with the SIM card in his hand.

“Where was it?” Max asked.

“I slipped it into a crack between one of the legs and the top of the workbench.”

His partner grinned. “Clever.”

“Let’s find out what’s on it,” he said.

Jack looked toward the former safe house. “But not here. We don’t know who is going to show up next.”

“Right,” Shane agreed.

They all got back in the car. As they drove back toward D.C., Elena loaded the card into a slot in the computer that Jack had brought along. But when she directed the machine to the card, all they got was gibberish.