Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.
The Presidio. Meeting place.
They were all in position. Technically, nothing could go wrong. But they were all tense: Guerrero wasn't eating, Ames was relentlessly tapping her fingers against the steering wheel, Winston kept on checking the van's electronic. Emma hadn't snarled at Guerrero once.
The way the caller had dealt with them so far, framing some of them, blocking their telephone connections… in addition to the information that he had lost his lover at the hands of Emma and they had prevented her from having to pay for it….
Whoever "he" was – they had a name from the prison letters, but that had turned out to be a dead end – had had a lot of time on his hands.
Time that he had obviously used for lots of research and some very creative planning. It just didn't fit that he was after money…
Chance tried to imagine what he would do, should someone hurt… Ilsa…
He frowned, surprised that her name had jumped to his mind first. He'd go ballistic, should something happen to Guerrero or Winston, but in this context he had thought of Ilsa first, why?
There was an explanation that had to do with the nature of the relationship between the Blue Ridge Mountain Killer and his partner, but he didn't want to dwell on that right now. Another realization was much more urgent: Ilsa was still, Washington sewage rats adventure and South American jungle last minute rescue aside, the most vulnerable member of the team.
And someone who had done his homework thoroughly enough to frame three of them for murder surely knew that…
"I want to go and check on Ilsa", Chance told the others via earpiece. "You think you can get this done without me?"
Guerrero's reply summed up what they all thought. "Go ahead, bro."
… … …
Ilsa had been thinking about selling the apartment after the Hector Lopez incident. She had stepped around the spot where he had died for months, but in the end she had been too busy to set the necessary proceedings in motion. Running from exploding vehicles/armed thugs/various law enforcement people does consume time…
When she came out of the shower, walked down the stairs and noticed the glass of wine on the counter that she hadn't put there, however, she decided that the first thing she'd do tomorrow would definitely be calling some real estate people.
"Do you know what it's like to kill, Mrs. Pucci?", a heavily accented voice (Spanish? Good Lord, this was getting ridiculously repetitive) asked her before she had the chance to get really panicky.
She slowly backed away from him, towards her kitchen counter. Her knees were shaking and she bit her lip.
The intruder, a middle-aged man with military haircut and unsettlingly bulging eyes studied her thoughtfully. "Oh.. you do…" He smirked. "I bet that weighed heavily on your conscience. Well, that effect wears off after a while…" He drew his gun.
Ilsa's back bumped against the kitchen counter. Her knees were constantly threatening to give way. "Breathing is the key", Guerrero had told her. "Keep breathing evenly, it'll keep you from working yourself into a frenzy."
After the Lopez incident she had made certain …alterations… regarding her interior design. She knew from remodeling the office that Chance had stashed weapons everywhere in the building and she had figured what worked for him should work for her, too, shouldn't it? But hiding weapons was one thing, actually using them…
Military haircut man cocked his gun.
One day Ilsa had found a parcel on her desk. She had opened it and her first impulse had been to give it back to him. Should fit under your kitchen sink the attached note had said.
Military haircut man's finger twitched.
Out of nowhere, a shadow jumped at the intruder. Ilsa didn't need to see the second visitor properly. She just knew it was Chance.
Both men crashed to the floor, rolled over, several times, and hit the fridge hard. Several glasses on the other side of the kitchen shook and fell off their shelves, breaking into pieces. Chance landed a punch on the intruder's face and tried to wrest the gun from his hand, but the thug didn't let go. Chance grabbed his wrist with both hands, tried to bring his knee up…
The intruder pulled the trigger.
Ilsa screamed and the wooden door of a drawer cracked.
Stupid Ilsa, why did you scream?
The realization that a ricochet shot could coincidentally hit her…
Chance was distracted. Only for a split second, but he was distracted.
The thug's fist hit his temple hard as iron, Chance's head bounced backwards, bumped against the kitchen floor, he saw stars. And was that blood? His opponent jumped up, aimed straight at his chest, got ready to fire.
A shot rang through the apartment.
The thug froze, turned sideways and stared Ilsa.
The gun Guerrero had given her had fit perfectly under the kitchen sink.
She fired again, hitting the thug in the chest, just below the heart.
He dropped to the floor.
For a moment Chance could do nothing but look at her, completely shocked. Then he noticed how terribly she was trembling, how pale her face was. He shoved the dead man away, got up and caught Ilsa just in time to prevent her from falling to the floor.
Oh God, what had he done? She had had to shoot someone, to take another life, because of him.
Something broke inside of him.
At that very moment, his cell phone signaled. Guerrero.
"Chance? Bad news bro. He's got Emma. He abducted her."
A/N: This chapter was plotted by PocketSevens - I can't stress how helpful outside input is! THANK YOU!