Chapter 14: Not Fooling Around

Richard pulled into Kori's garage in his Lancer, he wasn't planning on making this last too long. He entered through the front door and upon a quick scan of the room from the spot just inside the door it appeared that nobody was home. "Kori!?" He yelled. The only response he got was a clicking sound from his left and slightly behind. He quickly spun around to find Kori half hidden in the shadows, putting her berretta on a countertop.

"Can't be too safe these days" she commented.

"Especially considering what we do for a living" Richard said back.

"So you think Tara was the one who sent that driver after me?" Kori asked, walking towards Richard.

"It's my best guess, Slade wouldn't have taken that approach, he's more of an ambush person" Richard said.

Kori stopped right in front of Richard; barely a foot separated the two. "So what are we gonna do about it?" She queried, shifting her weight to one leg.

"Maybe it's time to start packing hotter pieces" Richard suggested, referring to their guns. "I know a guy who can get me anything I need, weapons, cars, license plates, ammo, you name it."

"Should come in handy" Kori said, obviously not paying too close attention.

"Kori?"

"Yes?"

"Stop adjusting my shirt."

Once Richard made the comment about his friend Kori had begun to lazily tug and pull at Richard's black shirt. "Oh… I'm sorry" She said with a sly smile.

"I didn't come here to flirt, I came to give some information and maybe get some in return" Richard said stone faced.

"Well that's all well and good Rich…" Kori began, unbuttoning the top two buttons of her shirt, "But whoever said you shouldn't mix business with pleasure never thought that people would make a living the way we do." As she finished her sentence she finished unbuttoning her shirt. She wrapped her arms around Richard's neck and went to kiss him but she felt a cold steel object press against her abdomen. She looked down to find Richard had his gun to her.

"I'm serious" Richard said in monotone.

Kori glared at him and pulled away, buttoning her shirt back up. "I first noticed the driver about five minutes after I left your airport…" She explained everything that happened the previous day, not leaving out any details.

"No plate number nor a description of the driver…" Richard said aloud to himself. "Well I can get both of those with a phone call. In the meantime lay low, I'll make some phone calls and get to the bottom of this little incident."

"Richard, I have a race in two days" Kori informed, irritated.

"Hey, I'm giving you advice it's up to you to listen to it or not" and with that Richard turned to leave.

Kori put her hand on his shoulder as he was about to open the door. "I gave you what you wanted…" Kori said in a seductive tone. She tugged on his shoulder and he turned to face her. "Now there's something I want…" She pressed her lips to his and it didn't take long before their tongues were locked. They kissed for barely less than a minute before Kori pulled back.

"So I have to pay my allies for information that's vital to both of our survivals and freedoms?" Richard asked.

"Yup" Kori said, embracing the man in another kiss.

Rachael was making lazy on one of the sofas in the hanger slash garage slash house. She heard a door open then close, figuring it was Richard she called out his name, and got no response.

Her instincts kicked in and she immediately knew something wasn't right. She got up from the sofa and knelt in front of it, looking over the top. She scanned the hanger but saw nobody. "Fuck" she quietly cursed, she was unarmed and her gun was in her bedroom. She walked to the wall and slowly made her way across to the other side, watching the entire hanger like a hawk. She eventually arrived at the separated rooms and retrieved her gun. She cautiously walked back into the open area and looked around again, still she saw nothing out of the ordinary, until she looked at her car, there was something, or somebody behind it. "HEY!" she yelled. An orange flash and a loud bang echoed through the hanger and a bullet narrowly missed Rachael's face and got implanted in the wall behind her. Instead of firing back she rolled to one side and behind a stack of pallets. She gathered herself together and took a deep breath, then peeked around the pallets, whoever was behind her car wasn't there anymore which means whoever it was either fled or relocated to a new hiding spot. Rachael was more inclined to believe the former, whoever it was didn't want to be seen and despite nearly giving her a bullet in the head she didn't believe they wanted to add murder to the trespassing charge, if they were looking to kill her they would've fired more than once.

Still, Rachael quickly but carefully made her way to the hanger light switches and turned all of them on, the entire building was now brightly lit, she looked around and didn't see anybody, she figured she had been standing still plenty long enough for whoever it was to take a kill shot. She was convinced she was once again alone and so returned to the sofa, this time leaving all the lights on and keeping her weapon close.

Garfield ran as fast as his legs would take him up the steep hill. He stopped for only a second to look back, Rachael hadn't followed him out of the hanger, meaning she hadn't seen him get away and also probably didn't know that it was him who had nearly shot her in the head. He took a deep breath and continued up the hill, his Barracuda was waiting on the other side.