Otherwise Unharmed

  Gavino, Craig, Andrey, and a half-dozen others exited the vehicles and walked toward Jenna. The drivers stayed in the cars in case a quick getaway was needed. Words were exchanged, but I couldn’t hear any of it from where I was. I could see the demeanor of my faux coworkers though. Andrey danced back and forth between his feet, showing how nervous he was about this, even from my view. Jenna was incensed because she didn’t want them evaluating her work in the first place, and Gavino just looked as cocky as ever.

  I wasn’t going to miss him.

  With a rumble and screech of airbrakes, a semi with a long trailer pulled into the area. Jenna and her crew moved to the driver’s side door as a guy with a long ponytail exited the cab of the truck and handed Jenna a clipboard. Gavino and Andrey joined them, looked over the paperwork, and then Gavino motioned to the back of the truck.

  They all followed the driver as he opened up the back and grabbed a girl out of it. He shut the door again before yanking her over to Gavino and Andrey. She was quite obviously terrified as she was questioned by Gavino and fondled by Andrey.

  Jenna had her hands on her hips and was obviously not happy with whatever was being said. She tossed her hands up in the air as Andrey led the girl over to the SUV he arrived in and pulled her into the backseat. I moved the scope away from the scene when I realized what he was planning.

  I didn’t need to watch that shit.

  Jenna was pointing a finger and speaking quickly to Gavino, but it obviously didn’t matter what she said. He turned away from her and talked to the truck driver for a minute before motioning to Craig, who was still by the vehicles.

  As I moved my scope to Craig’s area, I saw the person I hadn’t gotten a good view of before as he moved a little closer to the building to get out of Craig’s line of sight. He was a big guy, dressed all in black and had a dark cap on his head. The clothing didn’t matter, though, because I got a clear view of his face.

  Mario Leone.

  Mario was Rinaldo’s bodyguard and was never far away from his boss without a damn good reason. There was absolutely no reason for him to be here at a cargo drop-off for Gavino’s organization—none whatsoever. He certainly wouldn’t be here without his boss knowing about it.

  As my muscles tightened, I checked out the whole area again. Back behind the main building was another smaller structure right next to the substation. There was a familiar car beside it—one that had not been there before.

  If I had been on top of the main building where I had told Trent I would be, I probably would have seen it pull up. From where I was, the scope’s vision was narrow enough that I missed it. Beside the car were three more people. Two I didn’t recognize, but one I knew very well.

  Rinaldo.

  “Oh fuck, no.”

  I immediately reached into my jeans and yanked out my phone. I hit his number and watched him through the scope as he glanced down, pulled his own phone out of his pocket, and glared down at the display. His eyes looked up to the closest building—right where the other sniper was located—and then started scanning the other tall buildings within view.

  Through the vision in the scope, it looked like his eyes found me, but I was too far away for him to see. I watched him turn away slightly and touch his hand to his ear. Then he pressed a button on the side of his phone and shoved it back into his pocket.

  “Answer the fucking phone,” I growled as I called again.

  He didn’t. Instead, he touched his hand to his ear again and looked up toward the other sniper.

  “Fuck.”

  I dropped down flat against the concrete roof as a bolt whizzed right past my ear. Who was paying the sniper was now completely clear, at least. I grabbed the Barrett and quickly focused on the sniper across the way as another shot rushed past me.

  He was reloading—not even looking down the scope as I pulled back on the trigger and watched his body slump. Grabbing my phone back off the ground, I typed out a quick text message, hoping Rinaldo would at least read the first bit before deciding to ignore me again.

  GET OUT NOW FEDS ON THE WAY

  He didn’t even glance at the phone.

  “Motherfucker!”

  Thinking about the consequences of what I was going to do didn’t even really enter my mind—I just knew I had to get to him and make him listen to me. If he wasn’t going to look at the phone, I had only one other choice.

  Though I couldn’t hear them, I could see the increase in activity across the river. The shots from the other sniper had been heard, and people were starting to duck into and behind their vehicles as they tried to determine who was the shooter and who was the target.

  I grabbed the Barrett by the carrying handle without even bothering to disassemble it first and tossed my duffel bag over my shoulder. I pulled the bipod assembly up against the bottom of the barrel and held the gun against my side as I raced to the stairwell. There were only twelve stories, so it didn’t take long for me to get down the stairs and out into the parking lot.

  Now I had a problem. I didn’t have a vehicle with me. The quickest way to get to Rinaldo was likely by boat—there were several right there at the dock next to the condos. However, it made me about as easy a target as I could be. There was no way I could wait for a bus at this point, so my options became limited.

  I looked around until I saw an older model pickup truck and ran over to it just as I heard another shot from across the river. Less than a moment later, I felt a hot, searing streak across the back of my shoulder.

  I dove down behind the truck on the side away from the river and tried to ignore the pain in my back. It hurt like a bitch, but I didn’t think it had done much more than graze my skin. Reaching up, I grasped the door handle, but the truck was locked.

  The butt end of the Barrett made quick work of the truck’s window, and I reached in to unlock it. Once inside, I huddled underneath the steering wheel and yanked open the panel. Three pairs of wires dangled below me, and I hoped the older truck had wires with conventional coloring. I started with a pair of brown wires, using my fingernails to strip the plastic off the ends and was rewarded with dash lights. The red pair of wires was next, and I knew I had the right ones when a little jolt of electricity ran up my arm as I tried to strip them manually.

  I slid the stripped wires against each other, and the truck’s engine roared loudly in the otherwise quiet night.

  I only had a couple of blocks to travel to get across the river and over to the rail yard, but it took me well out of the sniper’s view as I went around buildings and across the river. I ditched the truck on the street just above the tracks, taking a minute to remove the bipod and silencer from my Barrett to drop the weight a bit. It wasn’t really meant to be shot without the stabilization, but I had done it before. Carrying the heavy weapon in both hands, I made my way around the fence and through some trees. I was on the wrong side of the yard—I needed to get to the other side where Rinaldo was without Gavino seeing me.

  At least I wasn’t being shot at anymore.

  Racing over to the substation, I moved quickly and quietly down the length of it. Any sounds would be masked by the hum of the power grid, but I was still cautious. There had to be at least one other sniper in position, and I had no idea where he was.

  On the other side of the substation was the small building where Rinaldo had been. I came around the back of it slowly and saw his car on the other side. He was standing slightly behind it and talking in low tones to two men I didn’t recognize.

  Not knowing exactly how he was going to react, I kept a good grip on my rifle, but didn’t quite aim it at him.

  “Rinaldo!” I both yelled and whispered all at the same time, which had the desired effect, even if the action was an oxymoron.

  Rinaldo turned quickly, and the gun in his hand pointed in my direction.

  “Don’t shoot!” I called out in that same voice. “You gotta listen to me. You gotta get out of here.”

  “Arden, you son of a bitch,” Rinaldo growled.
“I’ll save a lot of money just killing you myself!”

  I raised the Barrett up to my shoulder.

  “You have to listen to me!”

  “You weren’t interested in talking, Arden,” Rinaldo said. “And I am now no longer interested in listening.”

  He leveled the gun at me, and I had no idea what I should do. I couldn’t shoot him with the Barrett from this distance without making a huge mess. If I had the Beretta instead, I might have at least tried to shoot his gun out of his hand.

  I was out of options.

  “The feds are on their way!” I finally said. “They wanted you, and I couldn’t let them do that, so I gave them Greco! They’ve got me for Ashton’s murder, and it was the only way to keep you out of it!”

  “You working with feds?” Rinaldo hissed. “You hate the fucking government.”

  “They have my DNA from Ashton’s body,” I told him. “There wasn’t any getting out of that one. They were going to use it against me and against Lia. He wanted me to turn over enough information to take you out, but I wouldn’t do that, sir. I couldn’t. We made a deal to bring Greco down, and that’s exactly what’s about to happen here.”

  Rinaldo’s eyes scanned my face for a moment, and he dropped his gun slightly.

  “They threatened your girl, this Lia Antonio, and you still wouldn’t turn me over?”

  “No, sir. I couldn’t do that.”

  Rinaldo’s hand went up to the top of his head and ran over the length of his receding hairline. He looked at me intently, lowered his gun completely, and let out a huge sigh.

  “Why didn’t you fucking tell me?”

  “I couldn’t,” I said as I lowered my weapon and walked to him cautiously. “If Greco had any suspicions about my loyalty, it wouldn’t have worked. It had to look like you were after me, too. It was the only way I could protect you.”

  “But now you tell me?”

  “That’s why I came over here,” I explained. “The feds are coming to pick him up right now. You have to get out of the area before they show up. You aren’t supposed to be here at all.”

  Rinaldo nodded.

  “They have my caviar in there,” Rinaldo said as he nodded toward the truck. “They are stealing from me again. I can’t let Greco continue to make me out as the fool. I could give up the shipment to see him picked up with it, though.”

  “Caviar?” I questioned. “There’s no caviar—just human cargo.”

  “I have it on good authority,” Rinaldo said. “My caviar is in the back of that truck.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “A man who has been working with us since I lost you,” Rinaldo said, and then his eyes widened. “Shit, Evan—he’s going after your woman right now.”

  He might as well have punched me in the gut.

  “What?” I asked, dumbfounded.

  “Double-crossing little shit!” Gavino Greco marched around the corner with Craig, Andrey, Jenna, and Jenna’s goons. “Rurik warned me not to trust you, and I should have listened!”

  I wasn’t sure who fired first, only that within seconds, the two men with Rinaldo were on the ground and there was a hailstorm of gunfire in the area. I took cover with Rinaldo behind his car as he began to fire toward Gavino, Andrey, and Craig.

  A van pulled up beside us, and several of Rinaldo’s men jumped out, weapons at the ready. A shot to Andrey’s shoulder sent him reeling backwards, and he began to crawl toward his SUV. The girl he had dragged back there was trying to get out as he reached the driver’s side door, and she was hit by a stray bullet.

  “The truck!” Rinaldo yelled as he pointed.

  The driver of the semi-truck was behind the wheel trying to pull out. I pulled up my Barrett, used the bumper of the car as a stabilizer, and took aim. My ears rang with the blast, and I watched the bolt go right through the truck’s engine with a massive explosion. The wheels screeched, the cab flew off to one side, but the trailer didn’t go with it. One more carefully aimed shot from my weapon and the cab, spinning in a giant ball of fire, was disconnected from the trailer.

  The trailer skidded to a stop, somehow managing to remain upright despite the gaping hole in the front of it. The screams coming from inside could be heard above the gunfire.

  “Evan—get a better vantage point!” Rinaldo yelled at me.

  I hated taking myself away from him in this situation, but he was right. I would be much more effective from up high. No longer caring who knew where I was, I grabbed the Barrett and ran the short distance to the main building, dodging bullets along the way. I scaled the ladder on the back side of the structure and perched near the corner.

  Without the bipod, and considering the weight of the Barrett, it was a little more difficult to aim, but I’d done this plenty of times before. Using the ledge around the roof, I balanced the weapon and began to take out Gavino’s men. Before I got another shot off, I felt and heard a bolt right near my shoulder.

  The second sniper.

  Grabbing the Barrett, I moved over to the air conditioning unit and placed myself behind it in relation to the other sniper’s shot. I had to shove the body of the first sniper out of my way to get where I wanted to be. There were a few bolt casings on the ground near the body, and I grabbed two of them to put in my ears to dampen the noise.

  My focus went back to the second gunner. Whoever he was, he wasn’t on this building, and he obviously hadn’t gotten the message that Rinaldo and I were now working together.

  Where were the fucking feds?

  I didn’t even want them showing up at this point—the Chicago police would be here soon enough, given the racket we were causing—but the feds should have been here long before now.

  There was only one other building in the area suitable for a sniper– the one near the street where I had ditched the hot-wired pickup. Once I aimed my scope up there, I spotted him quickly. He was scanning the area, trying to figure out where I had gone.

  “Sloppy work,” I mumbled as I carefully took aim. I drew in a deep breath, settled the crosshairs on the center of his forehead, breathed out, and pulled back on the trigger.

  The blast shook my body, but the guy on the rooftop dropped to the ground, unmoving. I closed my eyes for a moment, tried to force my heart to stop pounding, and focused again on the main area of the rail yard.

  Jenna was the first one I saw. She had a SIG in her hand and was aiming at the trailer of the truck. When I looked in that direction, I saw three of the girls who were part of the cargo trying to get out. The back door had broken open when the cab was hit, and they were trying to clamber out one by one.

  Three sharp pops from Jenna’s weapon, and the girls dropped to the ground, unmoving.

  “Bitch,” I growled as I took aim again. Another blast, and Jenna’s body dropped to the concrete. “You were a lousy fucking kisser anyway.”

  Moving the scope to the left, I saw a tussle going on between Mario and Craig. Mario was on top, and definitely had the advantage, but Craig’s hand came up and bashed his skull with the butt end of a gun. Mario was stunned, and the next shot went through his chest and out his back, leaving a gaping hole.

  Craig shoved Mario’s body off just in time to get a shot from my Barrett in the back of his head.

  Gavino was running to his SUV. I tried to aim at him as he got to the vehicle, yanked the driver out of it in his panic, and got behind the wheel. Rinaldo was running up, firing multiple shots at his adversary, but they were bouncing off the bulletproof glass.

  Not Barrett-proof, though.

  As he slammed his foot down, the SUV lurched toward Rinaldo, causing my shot to go wide. My second shot was quick—I didn’t have enough time to aim properly before Gavino ran down Rinaldo—and didn’t hit the cab as I had intended but the back half of the SUV instead. It swerved, tipped onto its side, and smashed into the back side of the building, out of my view.

  I grabbed the Barrett in one hand and the Russian rifle in the other. I ran for the edge of the buil
ding and the ladder, carefully balancing both weapons as I shimmied down. Moments later, I was on the ground again and running toward Rinaldo. Above the hum of the substation, I could hear sirens approaching.

  The gunfire had stopped, but bodies were everywhere. From the gaping hole in the side of the trailer, caviar was pouring out all over the ground. There were still girls peering out of the back door, but none of them were daring to try to escape now.

  Rinaldo was next to Gavino’s truck, but there was no Gavino in sight.

  “Where is he?” I asked.

  “Took off,” Rinaldo replied. “I didn’t even see him.”

  The sirens got louder.

  “Time to go,” I said.

  “My information was right,” Rinaldo said as he pointed to the front part of the trailer. “There’s my caviar.”

  “It wasn’t supposed to be here,” I said. “I was in all the discussions about tonight—there was never any mention of caviar. How did you know it would be here?”

  “My new man,” he said. “He had a contact in the Russian group—someone high up.”

  My mind went back to the argument between Andrey and Rurik, focusing on Rurik’s glee when he talked himself out of being here tonight. He had to be the informant. He wasn’t working for Rinaldo—I was sure of that—but using him to get back at Andrey and Gavino.

  “I might know what happened,” I said, “but we have to get out of here now.”

  “Agreed. And you need to hurry.”

  “He has Lia?”

  “I don’t know,” Rinaldo said. “He said he knew right where you were hiding, and that’s where he was headed when we came here. You better take my car—the keys are in the ignition.”

  I turned and started off, then looked back briefly.

  “Who is he?” I asked over my shoulder. “What’s the guy’s name?”

  “Kyle Davies.”

  The name gave me a bit of a start. It wasn’t someone I knew, but the name was so close to the private who bummed a cigarette off of me a few days before we were ambushed—Keith Davies. He was the third person in the video when the reporter was executed and the one whose information told the insurgents where to find us all. He nearly faced court-martial when we returned because they were convinced he had given the information willingly. It didn’t happen, but he was ultimately disgraced and ended up leaving the Marines as a result.