Chapter XXI

Too Late?

The shack was just ahead, Warrick had to be inside, the evidence pointed in that direction. Each woman ran, each woman knew fear.


Sofia kicked the door in and shouldered it fully open. She'd barely gotten the word "Freeze!" out of her mouth when the perp escaped through a large window. She turned on her heel and darted around the shed, She ran after him, commanding him to stop. Her heels kicking up desert dust behind her. The last thing that caught her eye was Sara falling to her knees beside Warrick...her hands moving to perform basic CPR.
Sofia had always ran through her problems...it was her way of dealing. Now, she rarely chased perps down...but she did so now, however, with a vengeance that she'd never felt before pumping through her. Her frustrations, her anger, her fear, her adrenaline sang through her blood, pushing her faster...her legs pumped like pistons...propelling her closer to the bastard who'd taken Warrick.

She closed in on him, "STOP LVPD!" She was getting close, she could hear him wheezing. She didn't wait for him to stop. When she was in range, she lunged at him like an overzealous linebacker in the big game.

Sofia had never thought of herself as an aggressive person...but this man had killed people wantonly, just for...the sick sadistic pleasure of the act. He had taken Warrick...who, for all she knew, could be dead...And another, deeper knowledge chilled Sofia to the bone...it could have been Sara out here...by herself...in the clutches of a mad man...

They fell to the hard ground. His foot connected with her solar-plexus, knocking the wind out of her for a moment, but she recovered and hit him across the face...hard...with her gun. The satisfying crack of bones and cartilage breaking met her ears and she buried her knee in his crotch. Another hard hit on the face stopped his struggling and she turned him over onto his stomach, grinding the side of his face into the grit, grime and stone of the desert. In a practiced move she pulled her cuffs from the small of her back and slapped them on his wrists, ratcheting them them tight.

"Allan McQueen, you are under arrest for the murders of Melody Wendell, Gene Taylor, Horace Kent and Emma Monroe. For the kidnapping and attempted murder of Warrick Brown, for evading and resisting arrest, and assault on a police officer."

She stood and jerked him to his feet. Her gun was pointed at his head. "You have the right to remain silent..." She read him his Miranda rights as they marched back to the shack. She pushed her gun into his temple, "You better hope he survives, he's LVPD, you worthless sniveling piece of trash."

It was a little overboard, her higher brain was screaming at her to calm down...but by all rhyme and reason, she had the right to be a little bit pissed. First Jim, now Warrick. She hadn't been there for Jim Brass, but she had taken down Warrick's attacker...and he wasn't getting away. Anger burned through her as she marched him back towards the shack. She could see blue and red lights speeding towards them...back up had arrived...but was it too late?


Sofia held the gun steady, pointed at McQueen's head. Inside the shack she could hear Sara begging Warrick to breathe...and Catherine pleading for him to wake up. Sofia glared at the man who'd attakced Warrick Brown. He was unremarkable...His dirty blonde hair was receding, his thin frame sported an unsightly beer-gut...It was his eyes, though, that scared her... They were empty. "Do you believe in Angels, Detective?" She cocked her gun. "SHUT UP!"

The first uniforms came towards her, their guns drawn. She glared at them. "It's about time! This is our perp." The EMTs rushed by her, "They're inside." She pushed past the uniforms, intent on shoving McQueen into the squad car herself. She opened the door and gave one last glare at the man, she twisted his arms just a bit and all but threw him inside the back of the car. A smirk came across her face when his head smacked agaisnt the inside edge of the door. "Oh yes, watch your head." She slammed the door hard and turned her back on the car and McQueen. It was over for him. They'd stopped him...but that nagging, acid churning question came back... was it too late?

Author's Note: Why is it that on every other cop show the strong femaledetective gets a chase scene or shoot out every other episode (coughOliviaBensoncough) but Sofia has precious few of them? Well, I solved that problem...On that train of thought: My, my, isn't Sofia just deliciously angry in this scene? We'll see more of that later...

Evil cliff-hanger...I have to amuse myself somehow.