“When I saw the lack of information and was told to work with you, I have to admit the thought of two heads working on this was much better than me alone.” He grinned. “Can you use that dowsing business to find those Russians?”

  The sound of something hitting a window in the other room, and sudden movement, reached us.

  “What the hell?” I said, as Crockett opened the door a crack.

  “Gunshot,” he replied over his shoulder at me, then turned his attention to the room beyond. “Move. On me!”

  He stepped out of the way. Another bullet hit glass. Ben and Tania came through the door first. Enzo last. Crockett shut the door and locked it. Then opened the door into the hallway.

  “That glass didn’t break,” Ben said.

  “Bulletproof,” I replied, with my weapon in hand. “They must’ve used bulletproof glass down here.” I hoped that extended to the glass panels in the entrance way and the accessible doors upstairs.

  Crockett led the way to the stairwell. Glass blew across the floor from next to the huge front door. Bugger.

  “Moving,” Crockett said. “With me.”

  I locked the downstairs doors and followed them up. Glancing at the broken pane, I realised that even with that glass shot out they couldn’t reach the locks to open the door. Small mercy.

  A ruckus in the living room caught my attention. The upstairs was like a fishbowl, with concrete block interludes. So much glass and so many doors. Donald was in full freak out mode.

  Crockett gathered everyone into the middle of the lounge. “Hallway by the bedrooms, is the only place without windows,” he said.

  “Or.” I had another idea. “Back downstairs into the garage. Those steel doors won’t budge, and we can use part of the apartment, a full bathroom, and the small room out in the garage itself.”

  Crockett narrowed his eyes. I knew he was thinking. “Good idea, more comfortable than everyone crammed into one hallway.”

  “Downstairs then.” I looked for Ben and spotted him with Emily. “Ben, the black bag?”

  “I left it in the laundry,” he said. “Be right back.”

  Ben hurried through the lounge and dining room, keeping as far away from windows as he could. An almost impossible task.

  “Downstairs, let’s go,” I said, taking Nana by the arm. “Too many windows up here and too dangerous for all of us.”

  There were long narrow frosted windows from ceiling to floor in the front of the entrance way and either side of the huge front door. One pane was already strewn across the terracotta tiles.

  “Veronica, what is happening out there?” Nana said, with a hint of glee in her voice. Another round hit concrete. “Ester and Frankie would find this very exciting.”

  “A little too exciting, for my liking, Nana,” I said. “Stay behind me, put your hand on my shoulder, and keep close to the wall. Be careful, there’s no banister on the wall side.”

  “Yes, dear.”

  Nana’s boney hand rested on my shoulder.

  Chapter 28

  [Crockett: Russian’s and a siege.]

  The last thing I wanted to happen was a siege situation with an elderly woman in the midst of it, and here we were, exactly that. Fuck me.

  With everyone safely in the garage, we had some breathing space. Ronnie suggested that Nana and Emily stay in the apartment bedroom for now. The small window that faced into the garden looked like it was hidden from the outside by plants. She shut the small but heavy curtains across it anyway. Not that they’d protect anyone from bullets, but they would stop the glass exploding into the room if whoever was outside found the window. The door to the apartment living room was closed. Thankfully, it was a solid core door. I guess Art thought of a few things.

  “Hey,” Ben said from the hallway. “Ammo check.”

  “Seventeen and one in the pipe,” I replied. “Ronnie is the same. How about you, Enzo?”

  “Sixteen and one up,” he said. Glass crashed over the tiles in the entrance way. “Do you think that’s the Russian’s out there?”

  Ronnie joined me and replied, “No idea, Enzo, but even with silencers this mess is going to draw a police response. Early morning glass shattering is going to echo around the hills. No one wants AOS all over the house.”

  “True enough,” I said. That would cause deniability from the agency and we’d be flapping in the wind. “We need to get a vantage point, or to come up behind them.”

  “There’s no crawl space in the top storey ceiling, but I bet there’s a way we can get up on the roof.”

  “Ladder?” I asked.

  “Yeah, a ladder in the back yard,” Ronnie said, with a grin. “Ben has a rifle.”

  Ben called out from inside the garage, “Got something helpful.” We joined him. He’d found a long ladder. “Still have to get it up the stairs and out the back.”

  “Enzo and Ben, can you lay down some cover fire from the apartment?” I asked.

  “Yes,” they replied.

  Ronnie and Ben were deep in conversation, I couldn’t hear, and didn’t care. They were obviously dating.

  I looked at Tania cowering in the corner near the office with her hands over her ears. “Tania, go into the apartment,” I said.

  She didn’t look up or move.

  There was another crash, this time upstairs. Okay, so not all the upstairs glass is bulletproof.

  “Tania!” I reached her in four strides, grabbed her arm, and pulled her to her feet. “Move.” I gave her an encouraging push toward the hallway. “Go over there.”

  Donald lurked in the doorway of the garage room. “You all right?” I asked.

  “I believe so,” he said. He didn’t look it.

  “Go with Tania. Look after your Nana,” I said. When he passed me, I gave him a reassuring pat to his shoulder. “It’ll be all right.”

  “You don’t lie as well as Ronnie,” he replied. “That big, rugged biker exterior doesn’t fool me.”

  Enzo and Ben joined me near the door. They’d carried the ladder over and laid it on the ground. Maybe I should take one of them upstairs and leave Ronnie to provide cover fire. The glass downstairs is bulletproof.

  “You’re going to have to fire from the open door,” I said to Enzo and Ben.

  “Yes, we are. We’re also going to pray that glass can act as our cover, and we can rig some kind of extra cover from the furniture.”

  “Ronnie, you coming?” She was crouched down by the black duffel bag. On the floor next to her I saw two soft rifle cases and a box of ammunition. She straightened up with a pistol in her hand.

  “Give us two minutes,” I said to Ben and Enzo, before they went through the apartment.

  They opened the interior door to the living area and disappeared inside, closing the door. I heard the sound of furniture dragging across carpet.

  Ronnie walked into the apartment. “Emily!” She called, then threw her the handgun she held. I watched from the hallway.

  Emily snatched it from midair, dropped the magazine into her left hand, counted rounds, slid it back and performed a press check without missing a beat. Fuck me. That looked a lot like muscle memory. I filed all the questions that jumped around in my head, for later.

  Ronnie had the rifle bag slung over her shoulder. I took the other and did the same. Then I tapped Ronnie on the arm and indicated she should grab the end of the ladder.

  We moved into the entrance way sticking close to the side of the stairs and waited for the first rounds to fire from the apartment.

  I looked over my shoulder. Gunfire erupted. “Moving.”

  Ladder on the left, guns in right hands. I noted Ronnie carried her handgun in the high ready position. She switched hands, spun around, and walked backwards up the stairs. By the time we reached the top, she’d fired five rounds. We heard one yell of pain. There was more to Ronnie Tracey than I’d been told.

  Romeo trotted across the kitchen floor, as we entered through the hall door and manoeuvred the long ladder to the ranch slider. I pulled the door right back. The dog ducked out before I did. He ran across the concrete and onto the grass. I motioned to Ronnie. The best place for the ladder was right by the door, as no one could get around the back without scaling the high fences, and right by the door we couldn’t be seen from the other yards at all.

  I leaned the long ladder against the gutter and hoped it wouldn’t collapse.

  “Is the dog okay out here?” I whispered.

  “Yeah,” she replied, matching my hushed tone. “He’ll warn us well before anyone comes over that fence.”

  With the rifle case on my back and Ronnie right behind me, we scaled the ladder like a couple of monkeys.

  Crouched on the flat roof, I saw a high ridge, and figured it was the steeple looking part of the roof that had more windows in it and was visible from inside the lounge. A roof with cover. Helpful.

  The steel creaked as we hunched down and duck walked across the expanse to the ridge. We needed to keep our profile minimal. Below us, trading gunfire, were the attackers and our guys. I crept to the right side where the ridge ended. We were still too far back to get a look at the shooters’ positions. Abandoning the ridge, we moved closer to the edge. The roof was steel with an uncomfortable ridge every two hundred millimetres. Not ideal for belly crawling or lying on. No one said this job would be comfortable.

  Ronnie was nowhere near me. I spotted her moving on her stomach on the far left. We arrived at the edge, high above the driveway, at the same time. I shrugged the gun case from my shoulder and unzipped it to reveal a Mossberg Patriot, with a suppressor nestled next to it, and a small box of ammunition. I screwed the suppressor to the end of the twenty-inch barrel. The magazine held three rounds. I pulled the bolt back, a round filled the chamber, and now I had one up. I took the magazine out and added another round. Three and one up. I liked that better.

  I rang her phone. Didn’t even hear the buzz before her voice answered.

  “Two tangoes on my side. One behind the fence and one around the side of the house.”

  “I got one tango, behind the last car.”

  “Right, let’s do this,” she said.

  I lay the phone on the roof next to me, wriggled back a bit, and got as comfortable as possible with the rifle.

  “Contact.” Ronnie’s voice came from the phone a split second before a shot fired from her direction.

  I sighted my target. Cover fire from Ronnie pulled their attention. I put a round through his shoulder, and he staggered, then dropped. Re-aiming, I put a couple of rounds next to the car. Warning shots. I heard Ronnie fire a few more rounds. Someone yelped. All movement below us ceased. I spoke to Ronnie via my cell phone.

  “Think we’re good. Let’s go.” I hung up and called Enzo, while I unscrewed the suppressor using the bottom of my shirt, to avoid burning my fingers, and packed the rifle back into the carry case. “Take Ben, secure the area. Coming to you.”

  I slithered as best I could across the ridged steel until I was far enough back that it was safe to sit. I pushed myself into a seated position, then crouched. Ronnie did the same on the far side of the roof. Once past the steeple part we both stood and moved quickly to the ladder. From the roof top, I saw Romeo patrolling the edges of the back yard. I slid down the ladder and joined Ronnie at the bottom.

  Chapter 29

  [Ronnie: Too many secrets.]

  I left the men to deal with the injuries outside. There were calls made to MacKinnon and the ambulance. No one called police; that was part of MacKinnon’s job, keep the heat off us, while we finished what needed to be done. We might be deniable, but he didn’t want to risk losing control of Tania Bateman. He still hadn’t mentioned the drive. We all knew he knew about it, but he clearly didn’t want to talk about it. We had it as a bargaining chip for later if necessary. I hoped it wouldn’t come to that. I wanted the thing destroyed before it did any more damage.

  I looked out the main door of the downstairs apartment and watched Enzo and Crockett play rock, paper, scissors. Unbelievable. Enzo stayed with the wounded and cuffed Russian attackers, waiting for the ambulance. Ben excused himself and went to help once Crockett returned.

  “Donald,” I said, turning to face him. He stood in the doorway of the bedroom.

  “Is the madness over?” he asked with a slight smile, and a sigh. I joined him just inside the bedroom door.

  “Yes. Can you take Nana and Emily upstairs and make them a cuppa?”

  “Of course,” he said, with a smile. “Does Emily keep the gun?”

  I shook my head. “I’ll take it.”

  Emily smiled at me and handed me the Glock. “I know how to use that?”

  “Yes, Emily, you do,” I said, returning her smile. “I’m very glad your muscle memory kicked in. I thought it would.”

  “You did?”

  “I did. Sometimes I see you in there, unable to find your way out. And when you held the Glock, for a little while our Emily was back.” I touched her arm. “There’s hope.”

  Donald took Nana by the arm and escorted the women out of my view and into the glass covered entrance way.

  Just another day in sleepy Upper Hutt.

  Tania Bateman sat staring at the wall. I needed to know how much she knew, who she could implicate. I snapped my fingers in front of her. “Hey, get up and go into the other room.”

  We settled her and ourselves. Crockett and I wanted to talk to Bateman first.

  “It’s not just the drive they want, is it? It’s you,” I said.

  She attempted a shrug. Crockett picked up the mantle. “They want you, why?”

  Nothing.

  My turn again. “You’re one of them, and they’re taking you home, bringing you back in. Guess it doesn’t hurt that you’re a cryptographer. I have a feeling they’ll need someone to crack the encryption on the data.”

  Her eyes widened. “What data?”

  Tiresome.

  “The data you stole from TechSynth.”

  “Who do you work for, Lisette?” Crockett asked.

  “TechSynth,” she replied.

  “Not according to them. When they discovered you stole something from one of their clients, they trotted out a cover story to explain your absence. Pretty much says they don’t want you back alive.”

  She shrugged. “I can’t help you.”

  “You don’t get it. You are the one who needs help,” I said.

  “I was going home when that arse, Paul, grabbed me.”

  “Really? You’d been living under the bloody bridge for days, just a few streets from your house. Home? I don’t think so.”

  She said nothing.

  “No comment?” Crockett said.

  “You spend days hiding instead of going home, that’s not normal people behaviour,” I said.

  “You’re fishing,” Bateman said, making eye contact with me. “You don’t know me.”

  “We have your go-bag.”

  “You have nothing. Conjecture and wishful thinking, is what you have.”

  I smiled. “We know enough to place you in a garden where we discovered a matchbox that contained a very small USB drive.”

  “Anyone could’ve left that.”

  I shook my head. “You did.”

  “You can’t prove it.”

  “Yes, I can, but I don’t need to, not to anyone, ever.” I leaned over the back of the chair she sat in. “It’s time you told the truth.”

  “There is nothing to tell.”

  “You’re a spy. Who do you work for?”

  She smiled up at me. “My name is Tania Bateman, I work for TechSynth.”

  “Usually when a person buys a house, they live in it, and it’s sprinkled with signs of occupation. Usually, it doesn’t end up scattered across the neighbourhood in matchstick sized pieces.”

  “What?”

  She seemed genuinely surprised.

  “The house you bought and slept in, but didn’t live in. Because no one really lived there. It blew up. And I don’t think you did that, did you?”

  “I have no idea what you are talking about.”

  “Did you have internal surveillance cameras inside your house?”

  She frowned. “No.”

  Crockett bent down and growled into her face, “Are you sure?”

  “There were no cameras, there was nothing worth surveilling in the house.”

  Yeah, we knew that. It was a shell. A set. A faux house.

  “Who would install cameras in your home?”

  “I don’t know; the same people who were shooting at us?” she suggested.

  “The Russians who were bringing you back into the fold? Doesn’t seem likely,” I said.

  “Stand up!” Crockett said, hauling her to her feet. He patted her down and turned out her pockets. Then he carefully checked all the seams of her clothes. Eventually, he tugged at something and held up a tiny GPS tracker. “Could’ve been worse, could’ve been fed to her.”

  “Crush it,” I said. “Not that it probably matters. They already found us.”

  “We don’t know if there are others.”

  “What happened to your phone?” I asked Bateman.

  “Paul took it.”

  Enzo opened the door and came in. “Everything is okay out there. MacKinnon will meet the ambulance at Hutt Hospital and take charge of the Russians before there is a diplomatic incident and threats.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “Hey, Paul had a phone that belonged to Bateman. Do you know what happened to it?”

  “Didn’t know he had it.” He waggled his finger between me, Crockett, and himself. “We left Paul in Whitemans Valley. He’s probably not feeling too good and trying to find his way out.”

  “With the phone …” Crockett said.

  “Sucks to be him then,” Tania said, with a small smile. “They must be moving on what they think is my location by now.”

  “They found your location,” Enzo said. “Why would they trace the phone?”

  Crockett raised an eyebrow in his direction. “Two trackers, two teams, fuck me.”

  Enzo sighed. “Two different sets of players after the same thing.”

 

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