Part 12
Denver-Purgatorio Section
Vin parked his Jeep in front of the shabby brick building he called home. For a few minutes he just stared out the window, not seeing what was in front of him. His mind's eye kept replaying the picture of the young red haired kid, jerking as the bullet entered his body, then sliding lifelessly to the ground...then the flash as the grenade exploded...
He knew he had had no choice. He had to shoot the kid; had to try for a killing shot. That was his job, to protect his teammates, to protect the innocent who might be caught up in violence. No matter how many times he went over those few seconds in his mind, the conclusion was always the same. He had to shoot.
But that didn't stop him from seeing the look on the kid's face as he'd died.
Two preteen boys swaggered down the street toward him, moving with the slouchy strut of half-grown lions surveying the land they wanted to claim. They shared a cigarette. One caught sight of a pretty girl in an upstairs window and made a rude remark. They laughed, sniggering, elbowing each other in the ribs.
Then the second youth caught sight of Vin in his jeep. His eyes widened and he elbowed his friend again, harder this time, and nodded towards Vin. Insolence wiped clean of both faces; they straightened up, one pulling up his tattered jeans, the other quickly dropping the cigarette and stubbing it out with the toe of his boot. Vin knew both the kids, of course. They played on the neighborhood basketball team he coached. Both had older brothers in the local gangs. Vin, like the nuns at the nearby convent, knew that lecturing the kids not to take up with the gangs wouldn't work. Peer pressure was too strong a force, especially when backed up by guns, knives and chains. What Vin hoped to do was provide a positive alternative.
An alternative he himself hadn't had.
An alternative that Sammy Parker had never had.
Sighing, he got out of the jeep, reaching behind the seat for his duffel. "Pete," he greeted the taller boy. "Raoul. How you boys been? Ready for the game tomorrow?" He'd arranged a pick-up game with the Denver-Downtown YMCA.
Both boys nodded, flushed and embarrassed, looking like - well, like they'd been caught doing something they swore they never did. "You have a good trip, Vin?" Pete asked, his unctuous tone reminding Vin of Eddie Haskell in old Leave it to Beaver reruns.
Vin's grin vanished. "Work," he replied shortly, heading up the cracked cement steps to the front door.
"You shoot anyone?"
It was an innocent question. Coming from one of the older brothers it wouldn't have been, but Pete and Raoul were still young enough that the violence they saw on their TVs and even in front of their homes didn't seem to touch them.
Vin froze.
Sammy Parker's body jerking around, blood on his shirt. Crumpling into the hard packed Oklahoma mud...
Vin didn't say anything. He couldn't. There wasn't anything to say. Turning his back on the boys, he fumbled for his keys.
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The air in the apartment was stale and musty-smelling. Dropping his duffel in the entranceway, Vin made his way over to the windows that looked out over the street. He opened all three of them, letting the damp but fresh air rush into the apartment.
The phone rang. Vin froze, his back to it. He didn't want to talk to anyone right now. 'It might be about Buck.' Then he shook his head. Buck was well on the road to recovery. Vin would go see him later.
Right now he needed to be alone.
The phone rang three, four times, then the answering machine picked up. Whoever it was didn't leave a message, just the click of disconnection. Vin walked over to the phone and switched off the ringer.
It had probably been Chris. Vin knew his friend would have gone directly to the hospital to check on Buck and check in with Nathan. Once convinced the two of them had survived the absence of the others, the team leader would head to his small ranch outside of town.
Vin headed into the small, Spartan kitchenette. He opened the refrigerator, starting to reach for a can of beer. He hesitated, then let the door close. He opened the cabinet above the fridge. It contained a half-full bottle of Jim Beam and an almost-full bottle of vodka, both left over from the last time he'd had the guys over. He poured a healthy amount of the amber colored whiskey into a plastic tumbler and walked into the living room.
His cell phone shrilled. Swearing under his breath, Vin yanked it from his belt and clicked it off, tossing it on to the couch. 'Don't want to talk to anybody right now...' He gulped at the whiskey until he felt the sting. He knew he shouldn't ignore the cell. Chris would have his hide for that. But Vin just couldn't talk to anyone right now.
And just then someone knocked on the door. Vin shook his head and dropped into the battered armchair he'd found at a local flea market. "I'm not here," he muttered quietly.
Whoever it was, was persistent. They knocked three more times before ceasing. Vin nodded, satisfied. Then bolted upright as a woman's voice called through the door. "Agent Tanner? Vin?"
"What the hell-?" Vin recognized the voice. He stumbled to his feet and flung the door open.
Monica Hastings stood in front of him.
Denver
University Medical Center
Chris hovered at the door of the waiting room. He and Nathan had been unceremoniously ejected from Buck's room to make room for more and more medical personnel. Nathan sat on one of the shapeless couches, staring into a Styrofoam cup of coffee. There had been absolute silence between the two men since Nathan had finished filling Chris in on Buck's condition.
Chris stared down the hall, longing to be back in the room with Buck, to check on him with his own eyes. His mind rang with the words Nathan had just said.
Pneumonia.
It wasn't that he hadn't known that was a possibility. Dr. Culver had been frank about it all along - pneumonia was a likely complication of Buck's injuries. Although Chris intellectually knew it was a dangerous complication, he emotionally didn't accept the danger. Old people died of pneumonia. People with AIDS or cancer. Not a healthy, virile man still in his thirties.
Not Buck.
But then, Nathan had told him the rest of it.
Chris couldn't believe it. Didn't want to believe it. Someone had attacked Buck in the supposed safety of his hospital room? How the hell could that have happened? Again? With a police guard on the door and Nathan sitting right there next to the bed?
'Hell,' he thought guiltily. 'Yvette Morales got to him when he was in ICU with me sitting right there.'
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Nathan watched his friend warily. He very rarely fell victim to the infamous Larabee temper, but suspected he would today.
'Hell, I'll be lucky if he doesn't shoot me. Damn it! I let a killer attack Buck right in front of me and didn't do a damn thing to stop him!'
Chris rubbed his tired eyes, looking down the hallway. Something occurred to him and he turned to face Nathan.
"Where's the guard on Buck's door?" His voice was tight.
"The Denver Police pulled it off." Nathan went on hastily, "AD Travis said he'd arrange for some of the guys from Team Three and maybe Team Eight to cover."
Chris ignored the last remark. "They pulled the guard?" He repeated icily. "Why?"
Nathan shrugged, stepping past Chris to gaze down the hallway in turn. 'Sure is taking them a long time in there.' He turned, realizing Chris was waiting for an answer. "With Hoyt dead they don't think there's any more danger to Buck-"
"Someone tried to murder Buck — again! - right in his own hospital room and the Denver PD doesn't think he's in any danger?" Chris' voice was an icy hiss of suppressed rage. His eyes narrowed. "What do you mean, with Hoyt's death? Hoyt's dead?"
"You didn't hear?" Nathan questioned. Then he mentally kicked himself. 'Well, obviously.' He wondered if there was a limit to how many inane statements he could utter in one conversation. Aloud he hurried to say, "Someone stabbed Marcus Hoyt yesterday in the County Jail. He was DOA."
The line between Chris' eyes deepened. "Who killed him?"
"Some guy in for possession of cocaine." Nathan had to struggle to think of the name. "Justin… no, Dustin Renhold. Just a small-time dealer. He said Hoyt gave him attitude in the lunch line or something. Police think he's probably just trying to get himself a reputation on the street."
Chris' face darkened even further. "Damn it!" he exploded. "Hoyt was our link to Bolo Orlowski!"
"What?" Nathan really didn't have a clue as to what Chris was talking about. Bolo Orlowski - the name had come up as a suspect in the bombing of Buck's apartment but as far as Nathan knew Buck had vehemently denied any link. "Chris...I don't understand...if Hoyt's dead, the contract is off. Even if it was Bolo Orlowski, Buck should be safe now."
Chris whirled on him. "Bolo Orlowski killed my wife and son!"
"What?" Nathan was astonished. "How the-"
"Buck told me," Chris explained. "Just before we left for Oklahoma." He rubbed one hand across his face. "He's known - or suspected - all of these years and he never told me before - he was trying to protect me, damn him." The words were soft, half to himself.
Nathan thought about the thick folder Buck had entrusted to him. What had Buck said? Not to give it to Chris but to make sure it got to Vin, if Buck- 'Damn.' He was suddenly sure the folder had something to do with what Chris was saying. But what could be in it? Why would Bolo Orlowski have been involved in the deaths of Chris' wife and son? How would Buck even know if he was?
Nathan looked up and nudged Chris' shoulder as the door to Buck's room opened. Dr. Culver exited, followed by a couple of white-coated interns. Culver nodded at Chris and Nathan. "Agent Larabee. Agent Jackson."
"How's Buck?" Chris demanded.
Culver waved the interns away and gestured for the two ATF agents to follow him back into the waiting area. "Buck's condition is stabilized, for the moment."
"What does that mean?" Chris sat on the edge of one of the too-soft couches.
"It means - at the moment - Buck is breathing on his own." Culver sighed. He looked as tired as Nathan felt. "There is some edema - swelling - in the pleural lining that is not related to the pneumonia. We have to assume that it's being caused by whatever was in that breathing treatment. Until we can identify the compound, all we can do is treat the symptoms."
Nathan swallowed hard. Chris looked worried but a little confused. "So what is this 'edema' going to do?"
"Make it increasingly difficult for him to breathe." Culver was blunt. "I've ordered him back into ICU. I think both of you realize that the pneumonia by itself would have been difficult enough. Buck's still weak from the original trauma and surgery."
"So what are you saying?"
The doctor sighed again. "Buck has to be one of the most strong-willed people I've ever met. He's a fighter. But right now, I don't think he has the reserves to fight with. His temperature is going up, his blood pressure is dropping. His body is worn out. He doesn't have the strength to keep fighting. " He paused. I've advised him he needs to go back on the respirator.
Nathan frowned. "But if there's pulmonary edema-"
The doctor nodded. "That's the risk."
"Risk of what?" Chris demanded.
"If we put him back on the respirator, his lungs might become damaged enough that even if he lives, we could never wean him off of it." He looked up, met Chris' horrified gaze. "He'd be on life support indefinately."
~+~+~+~
There were two seats open on the flight to Denver. One was in First Class and JD let Bobby have it. Fewell was tall, long-legged like Buck and Josiah. JD remembered a couple months back when they'd had to fly to Seattle for a case and some new secretary had booked them on a cut-rate airline. The four six-plus-footers had griped all the way there and all the way back.
JD's smile vanished as reality hit him again. The warmth-the family he had felt he had then-was that all gone now? How could things change so fast?
He was just as glad to be away from Bobby for a while. He needed to think.
JD knew - he knew - that Ezra wasn't dirty. Ezra hadd been set up in Atlanta. Heck, JD had been listening through the earphones when the man who'd framed him had boasted about it!
'But what else happened?' He couldn't silence the niggling voice of doubt. Bobby was right, the entire FBI - and not just the Atlanta bureau -had turned against Ezra. Not one of his coworkers had ever harbored the slightest doubt of his guilt? Not one person had spoke up in his defense?
And what had happened to Bobby's cousin? Bobby blamed Ezra for whatever had happened to him, but what had happened to him? And how had Ezra been involved?
JD leaned his head back in the seat and closed his eyes. He was so tired suddenly, so confused. He hated these doubts about Ezra, but he kept coming back to the simple facts - Bobby was his friend. Why would Bobby lie? Or if not lie, why was he so convinced Ezra was dirty?
What had happened in that hotel in Shreveport? Who had Ezra been with? Could it have really been that kid from the bust? That didn't make sense. But who else could it be?
God, he missed Buck. He needed to talk to him. Buck could make everything all right again.
Just like a big brother.
'He's not your brother.' JD could hear Bobby's voice in his memory. 'Team Seven is not a family.'
"Yes, we are!" he whispered fiercely. The woman next to him looked over the top of her magazine.
Were they?
Unbidden the thought of that last night at the hospital came to him. Buck had lied to him. Buck still wasn't telling him the whole story. And Chris...Chris had yelled terrible things at Buck and then gone off to Oklahoma without even a worry. He hadn't even checked on him. Well, okay, JD didn't really know that for sure. But Chris had never mentioned anything about it and neither had Nathan or Buck when JD had called...
"We are on final approach to Denver International Airport. At this time we request that all carry on baggage be secured, seatbelts firmly fastened, seats returned to the upright position..."
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Bobby was waiting when JD got off the plane. "Hey," he said, falling in as they followed the herd of people to the baggage claim area. "You need a ride?"
JD shook his head. "I left Buck's pickup here," he replied.
"Cool." Bobby seemed in good spirits. He chattered on as they took the escalator down, about the woman who'd been seated next to him on the flight. JD really didn't listen. He didn't care. He just wanted to get his bag and go home.
He shivered as the thought burst over him again like a sickening storm. 'I don't have a home anymore.'
"Hey, JD." Bobby jostled his elbow as they waited for their bags to appear. "You think you'd be interested in that apartment at my place? 'Cause I know the rental agent-could maybe ask him to hold it for you."
JD shook his head automatically. "No. Thanks, Bobby, but I don't think so."
Bobby frowned, then shrugged, stepping away as he spotted his bag. "Well if you change your mind let me know. It's a great place, like I said, view of the pool." He turned, giving JD a casual salute as he headed toward the shuttle bus. "Think about it. You don't want to be someone's houseguest the rest of your life, do you?"
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JD had meant to drive straight to the hospital but he found himself taking a detour.
The converted warehouse that had been his home for the last three years stood, crippled and forlorn, abandoned on the corner. No cars in front of it or in the parking lot to the side. A large bold sign warned away the criminal and the curious.
JD parked in front of the building. Yellow crime scene tape and orange plastic netting surrounded the perimeter. Plywood barricaded most of the windows. JD's eyes went to one particular set of windows on the top floor.
The windows of what had once been his bedroom.
Slowly his eyes traveled over to the shattered brick wall. That had been Buck's loft bedroom. The whole wall blown out with the force of the explosion that had almost killed Buck.
Destroyed JD's home and security.
Robbed him of the family he thought he'd found.
Could it ever be repaired? There was damage to the support. Damage to the foundation.
The building was no longer sound.
JD's belief in his family, his brother, had received the same shattering blow as the foundations of the building.
Home.
Destroyed.
Family?
Maybe not anymore. Maybe they never had been.
After a long moment, JD reached for his cell phone. He punched in a number from memory. After three rings, voice mail picked up.
He could hang up.
He didn't.
"Bobby. It's JD. Hey...if you don't mind, talk to that rental agent. I think...I think I might be interested in the apartment after all."
tbc...