Chapter 66:
"What happened in there?" she asked.
"We entered the place and it was barely lit. There were mattresses and drugged up women lying on them all over the room, so we walked in towards them and about six or seven people started shooting at us from dark corners. In short, we fired back and killed three of them. The rest got injured or surrendered. Garcia got a bullet to the shoulder but he'll survive, unfortunately."
"He risked his own life?" Sharon asked in surprise.
"I guess he was pretty desperate," he said and put his hand on Sharon's back again so she'd resume walking towards the ambulance. "But, anyway, one of my bullets killed one of his men. That's why I'll get suspended too."
"Who killed the other two?"
"The FBI."
"Good, so at least no one else from Major Crimes will get suspended. What about our men? Anyone injured?" she asked as he helped her sit on the edge of the ambulance.
"An FBI agent was killed. He was the first one to get shot," Flynn said gloomily.
"My god," Sharon said quietly and shook her head.
"A few more were injured, but nothing serious. Agent Howard got a bullet to the leg."
"What?!" she got up quickly but her head started spinning right away and she sat back down with his help.
"He'll be fine. He's already on the way to the hospital with Blackburn," his hand was on her shoulder but he lifted it quickly once the paramedic approached them. Flynn moved aside and watched him in silence as he examined Sharon for a few minutes.
"I believe you have nothing but a minor concussion. If you rest today you should be fine tomorrow. You might feel slight nauseas, dizziness and fatigue, but it's completely normal," the paramedic explained as he cleaned her wound and put a small bandage on it.
"Thank you," she gave him a little smile and got up slowly.
Flynn came to her side and supported her body again. "Come on, I'll take you home."
"No, we have to wait here for FID. And then I want to go to the hospital and see how the injured ones are doing, especially Agent Howard," she said and started walking towards some FBI agents in order to hear what happened from their point of view – an old habit from her days in FID.
"The paramedic just said you have to rest today," Flynn tried to convince her, but he knew it was in vain.
(***)
A while later, after the FID detectives finished interrogating them, Flynn drove with Sharon and Provenza to the hospital. They walked quickly along the corridors of the big building, until they saw from a distance several FBI agents standing together outside a room, and hurried towards them.
"Agent Blackburn," Sharon said and he turned around to see her. "How's Agent Howard?"
"He just got out of surgery. The bullet's out and he's going to be okay. I see you all are okay too," he said, his eyes moving from Sharon to Flynn and Provenza, and then back to her.
"We're fine," Provenza said grumpily. He never made an effort to hide his dislike towards Blackburn. "So Agent Howard is in recovery?"
"Yes, no one can see him yet."
"Thank you," Sharon said politely.
"I hope you were comfortable in the car while we were inside getting shot at," Blackburn said to her bitterly.
"Excuse me?" she felt the rage boiling inside of her. After what she went through with Suarez, she really didn't need to hear that.
"What the hell are you talking about?" Flynn took a step forward in anger but Sharon stopped him with her hand.
"Listen, Agent Blackbird," Provenza said slowly and emphasized the incorrect name to annoy him, "you left in the ambulance with Agent Howard before you had a chance to find out, but Captain Raydor took out Nicolas Suarez all by herself and revealed another warehouse, so do yourself a favor and crawl back to the hole where you came from."
Sharon realized she wasn't breathing while he spoke. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. Provenza defending her? She glanced at Flynn and saw his eyebrows were arched in surprise.
"Oh… really?" Blackburn said, embarrassed. "But, still –"
"We are here to check on Agent Howard, if you don't mind," Sharon cut him off rudely. It wasn't like her, but her near-death experience took all of the patience she usually had.
"Sharon, thank you for coming," a familiar woman's voice said to her right and Sharon looked quickly to see who it was.
"Chief Johnson," she half-whispered in awe at the sight of the thin, blonde woman, who was smiling at her bitterly with sadness in her eyes.