Love Is The Bond: A Rowan Gant Investigation (36 page)

“What’s happening?” I asked my friend as I
cocked the cell away from my mouth.

“Ackman just pulled into the parking lot, and
Osthoff’s on ‘is way,” he replied, naming off two members of the
MCS. “Ther’re also a coupl’a uniforms on scene already.”

“Don’t let them hurt her,” I appealed.

“Right now they’re waitin’ on us, Row,” he
replied. “I told ‘em not to go in until we got there.”

“You’re sure they won’t?”

“Right now they’re just watchin’ the door and
waitin’ for us,” he tried to reassure me. “Ackman’s gonna talk to
the clerk and watch for the ambulance.”

“Don’t let them hurt her, Ben,” I said
again.

“Row…” he started then paused.

My voice slipped into a frightened plea.
“Promise me.”

My friend sighed heavily then finally said,
“Yeah… I won’t let ‘em.”

A frigid chill ran the length of my spine. I
knew his clipped reply was meant only to placate me for the moment.
Logically, I realized that there were still far too many unknowns
at work for him to truly be able to make such a guarantee.

Emotionally, however, I just didn’t care. I
wanted her safe, no matter what the cost.

“She still on the line?” he asked after a
long moment of silence.

“Yeah,” I muttered.

“How is she?”

“Scared” was my initial reply. I followed it
a split second later with “And confused.”

“Yeah,” he replied.

“Not dangerous,” I stressed.

“Yeah, I know.”

I waited in silence for what was most likely
a full minute then asked, “What’s going to happen, Ben?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“You’ve got to know something.”

“This isn’t the time, Row.”

“Dammit, Ben,” I said, but the words came out
only as a fearful whisper. “You promised.”

I put my hand against the console and
stiffened my arm to brace myself as my friend whipped the van
through the cloverleaf and back onto Route 3 for the third time
tonight. Two impossibly drawn out minutes later, he turned into the
parking lot of the aptly named Route Three Motel.

“Honey, we just pulled in,” I said into my
phone.

“Help me, Rowan…” she cried.

“What the…” Ben yelped suddenly as we rounded
the end of the L-shaped building and came into view of the front of
the motel.

What had originally been described to us as
“a couple of uniforms” had drastically increased in that it now
took the form of four Illinois state police vehicles and a county
sheriff’s patrol car. Mixed in with the marked cruisers were
several plain sedans sporting emergency lights similar to Ben’s.
The face of the small building was lit up by an insane jumble of
headlamps and flickering light bars. The chaotic luminance was
enough to drive even a non-epileptic into a seizure.

The most frightening part of the tableau,
however, was the bustle of activity among the individuals
surrounding the wedge of vehicles. With a single glance I counted
at least three shotguns and what appeared to be a sniper rifle.

“Goddammit, Ben!” I half-screamed.

“Calm down!” he barked in return. “I’m gonna
handle it!”

“Felicity!” I said into my phone with a
panicked urgency. “Stay right where you are! Lay down on the floor
and don’t move. Do you hear me? Don’t move, just lay down and don’t
move!”

Ben pulled up to the scene and cranked the
gearshift up hard, slamming the van into park even as he was
applying the brakes. Before the vehicle had even stopped swaying,
he swung his door open and jumped out. I was no more than two
seconds behind him, but I could hear his voice already bellowing
before I even made it around the front corner of the Chevy.

“What the fuck is going on here?!” he
demanded.

“The locals,” a sandy-haired man I recognized
as Detective Ackman was replying as I came up next to my friend.
“They started pulling in as soon as I got off the phone with
you.”

“What the hell do they think they’re doin’?”
Ben asked with a hard shake of his head.

“It’s the Feeb’s gun,” Ackman replied.
“They’re treating this like a hostage situation.”

“Goddammit!” my friend spat as he finished
slipping his badge onto a heavy cord then hung it around his neck.
“Why didn’t you shut ‘em down?”

“I tried, but there’s a county sheriff on
scene taking over.”

“Jeezus…”

“Yeah, tell me about it.”

“Didn’t you tell ‘im this was under a Major
Case investigation?”

“Yeah, and he said he already knew that.”

“Already knew… Then what the… Screw it, where
the hell is he?”

Ackman pointed across the top of the squad
cars. “Over there. Grey hair, blue jacket.”

“Come on,” Ben barked, starting around the
van in the direction of the individual who had just been singled
out.

I followed at a near jog, still keeping the
cell phone pressed to my ear, although I couldn’t hear much of
anything over the noise of the bustling scene. Detective Ackman had
to quicken his pace as well, just to keep up with my friend’s
long-legged gait.

“I better warn you, Storm,” he said as he
strode along with us. “This guy dropped Albright’s name.”

“Dropped it how?”

“Like maybe he’s been in touch with her
recently.”

“You think she’s directin’ this?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Fuck me.”

As much as my brain was screaming for me to
plead with all of them to not hurt my wife, I managed to keep my
mouth shut. Right now, Ben was my only hope in this and I knew it.
I had to let him at least try to keep his promise, frail though it
was.

My eyes were darting about, taking stock of
the level of preparation. The comment I had earlier made to my
friend about cops with itchy trigger fingers leapt back to the
forefront of my thoughts, and it instantly made the hair on the
back of my neck pivot upward. Everywhere I looked there was someone
wrapped in a bulletproof vest and brandishing something lethal. In
fact, the least threatening firearm I saw was a teargas gun.

When we were only a few yards away from the
sheriff, Ben called out, “Hey, we need ta’ talk.”

The man turned toward us and immediately
showed more than a simple glimmer of recognition. In fact, it
appeared as though he was expecting us. Still, the look on his face
became even harder in that very instant when he saw me.

I’m sure my own expression had to be no
better because as it happened, I was just as familiar with him as
he obviously was with me. He was just the last person I had
expected to see, especially here. My heart fluttered in my throat
the moment my eyes met his then thudded back down into my chest and
began to pound viciously as the blood rushed in my ears.

The sheriff centered his gaze on my face as
we took the last few steps then came to a halt in front of him.

Until now, I never knew what had actually
happened to Detective Arthur McCann. All I could say was that my
last run-in with him had been at least five years ago. After that,
he had all but fallen off the face of the earth. I’d heard rumors
of him retiring, and even one that he had been fired. To be honest
I didn’t particularly care one way or the other. Either of those
options was fine by me as long as he was no longer packing a badge.
Unfortunately, he quite obviously still was.

My experiences with the man had been less
than pleasant but still not as bad as it had been for some other
Pagans I knew. In brief, McCann was a self-proclaimed expert on the
occult who had made it his mission in life to campaign against
anything non-Judeo-Christian. Those personal crusades had often
included the unwarranted hassling of Saint Louis area Pagans and
alternative religious organizations from behind the auspices of his
official shield.

While Barbara Albright had stepped in to fill
the void he left, I wasn’t actually sure just which one of them I
would consider more dangerous. Either way, it didn’t matter now
because they had apparently been in touch with one another, and
that was even worse. Of course, I suppose I really shouldn’t have
been surprised.

Planting his hands on his hips, McCann
glowered at me for a moment then looked over to Ben.

“Detective Storm,” he said. “I think you need
to get Mister Gant out of here now, or I will have him removed
myself.”

It was taking all I had to keep myself from
simply sprinting straight for the door of room number seven. Ever
since arriving on the scene, my gut kept telling me to do it, and
my head staunchly objected. Something was telling me that I was
going to end up in the back of a squad car before this was all
over; but, if that was the way it was going to be, I wanted to at
least be sure Felicity was safe first. Getting myself locked down
before she was ever out of the room wasn’t going to help me do
that. Even so, all the logic in the world didn’t keep the itch from
spreading.

Ben knew me well enough that he made it a
point to position himself between the motel and me. He had seen me
make a mad dash before, and it was obvious from the furtive glances
he kept throwing my direction that he was fully expecting me to do
so this time.

“Gimme a break, McCann,” my friend said to
the sheriff as he divided his attention between the two of us.

Ben was no stranger to this man’s exploits
either. In fact, he had even been front and center when McCann had
vociferously recused himself from working with the MCS simply
because of my involvement with a case.

“I am,” McCann returned. “I’m giving you a
chance to get him out of here before I arrest him for interfering
with an ongoing investigation.”

“Jeezus,” Ben spat. “You know that’s a load
of bullshit.”

“Not in my county it isn’t.”

“You’re a freakin’ cartoon, you know
that?”

“I can have you removed as well,
Detective.”

“Goddammit, Arthur, why didn’t you just
fuckin’ stay retired?”

“There’s no call for that sort of language,
Detective Storm,” he replied. “Now, you’ve got two minutes to get
Mister Gant out of here or I have him arrested.”

I instantly spoke up. “That’s my wife in
there!”

“Shut up, Rowan,” Ben ordered as he gave me a
sharp look then leveled his gaze back on McCann. “And, you, get off
your high horse. You ain’t arrestin’ anybody, and you sure’s hell
ain’t havin’ me removed. This is a Major Case investigation, and as
of now I’m taking over the scene.”

“No sir, you are not,” McCann replied.

“Yes sir, I am,” my friend returned.

“I am the ranking officer on the scene,
Detective Storm, and I will have you know that you are currently
standing in the middle of my jurisdiction.”

“Whupty-fuckin’-doo,” my friend huffed. “Your
county a participatin’ agency with the MCS?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact it is.”

“Good. Are you assigned ta’ this case?”

“No, but…”

“Ain’t no buts to it,” Ben snapped. “You’re
not assigned to the case, so back off and let me handle it.”

“I’m still the ranking officer on the scene,”
McCann objected.

“Maybe so, but I’m the ranking detective
assigned to Major Case that’s here now. So, like I said, this
investigation belongs to us, and so does this scene…”

“Like hell it does,” a fresh, but very
familiar voice came from behind us.

I turned to see Agent Drew standing only a
few paces away, and a wave of nausea swept over me. It seemed as
though the situation simply wasn’t finished with its downhill
slide. I had thought that when we arrived here things would start
to look up, but that belief had been dashed against the rocks as
soon as I saw McCann. Now, with the arrival of the cocky FBI agent,
I felt as though the current was pulling me under and holding me
there.

“And just who are you?” McCann snarled at
him.

The young man opened his ID with a practiced
flip and thrust it out as he stepped forward. “Agent Drew, Federal
Bureau of Investigation, and you are?”

“Arthur McCann. I’m the county sheriff.”

“Well, Sheriff, I’m afraid you are both
wrong. This is a federal investigation now and I am taking over the
scene.”

“Jeezus, Drew…” Ben started.

“Shut up, Storm,” he interrupted. “You know
I’m right. Federal law grants investigative jurisdiction to the FBI
in cases of assault on a federal officer. I won’t even go into
interstate flight to avoid apprehension.”

“That’s not why…” I started.

“Can it, Gant,” he snipped.

“Look, Agent Drew,” McCann began to object.
“I’ve already been in touch with Captain Albright, and…”

“So have we,” Drew interrupted him again.
“And she had little choice but to agree with us this time. Now,
like I said, the Bureau is running this scene, whether you like it
or not.”

“I don’t,” McCann spat.

“I’m afraid you’ll just have to get over it,”
Drew replied. “Now, the first thing I want you to do is have your
men stand down and back off.”

“But…”

“But nothing,” he snapped. “Tell them it’s
time to quit playing army, and put the guns away before someone
gets hurt. We’ll handle this.”

“Who is your superior?” McCann demanded with
a sudden rush of anger. “I don’t much care for your attitude, and
I’m not moving anyone until I know for sure what is going on
here.”

“Sheriff McCann, I don’t mind telling you
that I’m not overly impressed with your attitude either,” Drew
chided. “However, if it will hasten your cooperation and make you
dispense with the bullshit, my SAC’s name is Simpson. And, I
wouldn’t be a bit surprised if he is expecting your call.”

“You wait right here,” McCann replied,
repeatedly stabbing his finger at a point on the ground. “All of
you. I’ll be right back.”

“We’ll be here,” Drew said with a nod.