Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.
A doctor's office a bit outside of San Francisco.
Winston had stayed behind at Ames' house to discreetly move the masked man's body. Guerrero knew a pathologist who owed him a favor. He'd take a look and then dispose of it.
Thank God the house on the left was for sale and empty and the neighbors on the right were on holiday. Apparently nobody had heard the gunshots. Somewhere down the street someone might have noticed the ambulance, but the driver had turned off the siren a minute or two before arrival, so all in all they had drawn very little attention, hopefully.
Chance drove Ames to Dr. Grace's office, trailing the ambulance. "Long time no see", the slender woman greeted him curtly before disappearing into one of the treatment rooms with Alejandro.
"Don't worry, he's in good hands", he told Ames as they settled down in the waiting room.
She was still shivering all over. He removed her jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders.
"We should have brought him to a real hospital", she whispered. "I don't care what's gonna happen to me."
"Grace is not some back alley quack, she's really good at what she does", Chance tried to placate her.
"Then why have we never been here before with you, for example two months ago, when you had that gash along your thigh?"
"Our relationship is a bit strained… we ask her only when it's absolutely necessary…"
Ames didn't inquire further, she had her mind on Alejandro, but Chance's thoughts wandered back more than a decade ago nevertheless.
"You look like you know what you're doing", Junior mused, watching the young slender woman working feverishly on Baptiste's gaping chest wound.
"I'm an emergency surgeon. Call an ambulance and he'll make it." She had both her hands buried in Baptiste's chest.
"Ambulance is not an option", Guerrero said calmly. "We'll put him in our van and haul him off."
"Are you kidding me? Without continuous treatment he'll die!"
"He won't 'cause we'll take you with us. Place we go has all the equipment you need." Guerrero's tone of voice made it very clear that he wasn't joking, but she still dared to talk back.
Kind of matched. Everyone had run away from the shootout, she had dashed to Baptiste's side to apply first aid.
"I'm not going anywhere with you!"
In reply, Guerrero drew his gun, released the safety catch and pointed it at her head.
"Just play along and everything will be alright." Junior, careful not to get into Guerrero's line of fire, rested a reassuring hand on her back.
… … …
A couple of hours later she was sleeping on the leather couch in Joubert's office. Baptiste was sleeping, too, his breathing even, his pulse steady.
"She saved his life!", Junior protested.
"She knows where we reside and she's seen our faces", the Old Man insisted. "Look, I'll do it. I'll make it quick. She won't see it coming."
"There might be another solution", Guerrero chimed in.
… … …
"I've never seen anyone sleep so peacefully in the custody of kidnappers", Guerrero told the young woman whose name was, as he knew by now, Grace, while she slowly blinked awake. He was perched on the far end of the couch, watching her intently.
Grace didn't reply. She might have slept peacefully, but now that she was awake again, she was definitely scared. The large knife that was resting in Guerrero's lap didn't exactly help either.
Well, it wasn't intended to anyway.
"Can only mean you're more afraid of someone out there than of us."
Again she didn't reply, but he could read the answer in her face.
"I've dug around a little…" he produced a folder and started skipping through it. "Quite a few complaints to the police, nothing ever came out of it… you've also moved quite a lot, changed telephone numbers… there's even a fake name on your apartment door. Your ex-piano teacher, right? Stalking is a grave problem. I sincerely hope one day there'll be a law against it. In the meantime, do you want us to take care of that problem?"
Grace still remained silent. Guerrero gave her one of his semi-feral smiles. "You don't have to say anything. Just make sure you've got an alibi for tomorrow night."
… … …
She heeded Guerrero's advice. When the police came to her door the day after the next, telling her that the man who had made her life a living hell for five years had suffered an untimely and rather violent death, she did have an alibi. And yes, when she closed the door behind them, she felt elated. She had her life back!
But she also knew, should she ever lose a single word about the people she had met or the place she'd been to, she'd be framed for ordering a kill in no time.
The sound of his cell phone ringing snapped Chance out of his memories. Ilsa.
"Someone stole the plate from the museum shortly after you left", she informed him after inquiring about Ames. "Daisy is beside herself."
"There's something off with the plate, with the symbols on it. Tell her to take a look at the photos we made, maybe she'll figure it out and that'll lead us to whoever has it now."
Dr. Grace came in, told them Alejandro's state of health was currently stable and allowed Ames a couple of minutes with him, but under her watch.
"She won't kill him, doc", Chance protested.
"Yeah, that's what you always say and who will be left behind with the mess?" She was adamant.
A short time later Guerrero arrived. "Sergej is at the office with Ilsa and Daisy, making sure she doesn't break the computer table… What happened?"
"Looks like someone broke into the house, attacked Ames, they struggled. Alejandro came home early from a business trip, heard the noise, walked upstairs and into the bedroom, just as Ames fired at the intruder", Chance explained. "Seems she didn't really aim, just pulled the trigger… She accidentally hit Alejandro before killing the attacker."
Guerrero snorted angrily. "Stupid thing, firing off blindly like that. How often did we tell her…? Typical."
Ames, who was just coming out of the treatment room, stopped dead in her tracks. She felt like he had slapped her in the face.
And that she deserved it.